The Lithuanian Family in its European Context, 1800-1914: Marriage, Divorce and Flexible Communities

This book investigates marriage and divorce in the nineteenth-century European territories of the Russian Empire. It uncovers the way a peasant community employed unsanctioned marital behaviour, such as cohabitation and bigamy, among others, in order to respond to the external factors that had an impact on the family life, including transmission of inheritance and household structure. Lithuania was part of the Tsarist Empire until 1914. This case study reveals how under often restrictive laws and policies – serfdom up to 1861, and the pervasive role of the Church, in addition to deep-rooted customary practices – women and men manage to normalize their family life. The volume is based on a wide range of archival sources and uncovers familial behaviour both from an individual and community perspectives.

About the Author

Dalia Leinarte is Professor of History at Vytautas Magnus University, Lithuania, and a Fellow Commoner at Lucy Cavendish College, University of Cambridge, UK. She is a Chairperson of the UN CEDAW Committee. Leinarte is the author of Adopting and Remembering Soviet Reality: Life Stories of Lithuanian Women, 1945–1970 .