Historical inheritance systems: Difference between revisions

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Both preferential primogeniture and preferential ultimogeniture were practiced in pre-revolutionary Russia, where the eldest son succeeded as family head and inherited more than the other sons.<ref>{{Cite journal|title=Peasant Inheritance Strategies in Russia |author= Bohac, Rodney D. |journal=The Journal of Interdisciplinary History |volume= 16|issue= 1|year = 1985|pages= 23–42| url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/204320}}</ref> The "the youngest son, if he remained with the father, inherited the house and also at times other property" (''minorat'').<ref>{{cite web|url=http://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/Minorat|title=Minorat|publisher=Great Soviet Encyclopedia}}</ref> However, the share of land and moveables of the other sons was only slightly smaller than that of the eldest and the youngest son. Only in the southern part of the country was the house inherited by the youngest son; in the north it was inherited by the eldest son.<ref name="efm.bris.ac.uk">[http://www.efm.bris.ac.uk/het/laveleye/prim02.htm Chapter 2 Village Communities in Russia], Emil de Lavelye</ref>

The Russian family of around 1900 considered property such as the house, agricultural implements , livestock and produce as belonging collectively to all family members. When the father died, his role as head of the family (known as Khozain, or Bolshak ) was passed to the oldest person in the house. In some areas this was the oldest son. In others it was the oldest brother of the deceased so long as he lived in the same house. There were some areas were a new head would be elected by the family members. If all surviving members of the family were under age, a relation would become a co-proprietor. If property was divided after a death, each adult male in the house got an equal share. Sons who had left home did not have a right of succession. Females remained within the family and received a share of the inheritance when they married. In the north of Russia, the oldest son inherited the house. In the south the eldest son would have set up a separate house while the father was still alive, therefore the youngest inherited the fathers house upon his death.<ref name="efm.bris.ac.uk"/>

== Systems of inheritance among various peoples ==

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=== Variations by class and context ===

An strong relationship between fertility and inheritance exists in "Malthusian" contexts of resource scarcity; in contexts where resources are plentiful, the relationship between inheritance and social outcomes can be different. In the northern United States ](more exactly the [[Midwest]] and the [[Northeast]]),<ref name="Farm family economy">The farm family economy in the American North, 1775–1875: an exploration of sibling differences John W. Adams and Alice Bee Kasakoff http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract;jsessionid=D7AA94010ED24A21FB1FC95B40568C52.journals?fromPage=online&aid=1829176</ref> an analysis of the outcomes of sons according to their fraternal birth order (the analysis didn't extend to daughters) revealed that being the first son had a positive correlation with wealth and fertility during 1775–1875, as in other Western cultures, but unlike in some European societies where resources were scarce, this had a complex relationship with migration, inheritance and other phenomena, since in the United States resources were plentiful. In the northern United States during 1775–1875, in large families, the first-born son travelled farthest, and he also had the most children. This is what one would expect from his early migration to a new area, and indeed, he married at a younger age; it was cheaper to set up a family in farming closer to the frontier. These differences by fraternal birth order for fertility and distances travelled also hold for wealth: the First, who went farthest during his lifetime, was wealthiest, Middle next, with Last the poorest. Instead of being able to benefit from staying behind and perhaps inheriting the family farm, the Last seems to have been disadvantaged by not being able to move to cheaper land as early in life as his brothers had done before him. In small families, on the other hand, the overall pattern is decidedly more 'Malthusian'. In these families the distribution of wealth was not related to migration. The First had a strong advantage over the other siblings. Although the Last was nearly as likely to have left his birthplace, he had two-thirds the wealth of the First. The Middles, who were most apt to have left their birthplaces, were as poor as the Onlies, who travelled least of all. So even though these families were smaller, there seems to have been less to go around. Scarce resources went to the Firsts, who became the wealthiest as a result. The much greater wealth of the Firsts in small families is consistent with the ideas of Sundstrom and David: Firsts stayed closer to home and became wealthier than the siblings who left. But parents in older areas were not abandoned even if their children did leave farming. Many stayed in the local area even though they worked as artisans or in commerce. These materials show that there was a disadvantage to staying home and caring for aged parents, but, contrary to their hypothesis, this happened in the large farm families close to the frontier, rather than in the older areas, where opportunities outside farming were located (and fertility of these families on those farms closer to the frontier was not reduced as Sundstrom and David predicted). Even so, the Last stayed near home despite the costs to him and without any 'bribe' to do so. The family migration pattern described in the large families seems to be designed to provide old age care since the family did not scatter until the father died. No bribe was required but the last-born truly suffered.<ref name="Farm family economy" />

Kathleen A. Gillogly discusses how inheritance practices and seniority of patriline, as well as the importance of inheritance itself, have varied over time among the [[Lisu people|Lisu]], mostly in response to changes in resource availability and poppy cultivation.<ref>Transformations of Lisu Social Structure Under Opium Control and Watershed Conservation in Northern Thailand by Kathleen A. Gillogly https://evols.library.manoa.hawaii.edu/bitstream/handle/10524/1545/gillogly_dissertation.pdf?sequence=1</ref>