Journal Analele Banatului N.S. Archaeology-History

Ligia Boldea

Prezenţe feminine în sistemul domenial medieval bănăţean (1300 – 1450) / Female Presences in the Banat Medieval Domaine (1300 – 1450)

Jan. 1, 2015

Abstract

The present study intends to highlight the ways in which the noble females made their presence felt in the system of real estate ownership, impregnated by the masculine ascendant. The female presences in the Banat medieval domain system must be treated with care, given the multiple, different, highlighted situations, derived from the fact that the general rule of male ownership was not thorough and unilateral in those times, despite the obvious disadvantage female had since their birth. It is clear that the main ways by which the noble females came into possession of real estate were: the allotment of the female quarter (quarta puellaris) and of the dowry (dotalitium), converted in certain circumstances into real estate. They were joined by royal grants, fatherly wills, as well as the procedure of prefectio (the judicial transformation of daughters to suns). Also, we encounter noble females taking part in real estate transactions, inheriting lands, not just dowries and grants or going to court for their rights in front of the local and central competent bodies. The documentary information’s of the age show that the noble females owned in that time agricultural lands, gardens, pastures, houses, coins, serfs, animals, jewels, clothes, genuine treasures coming from the dowry of a noble parents, or from life savings, from marriages, from sales and purchases or from carried out bonds. Quite often we find stated in documents that certain goods were obtained by the noble ladies from their own purses, being mostly acquired during their time as widows.