Church Endowments and Family Inheritance in 18th-Century Moldavia
Church Endowments and Family Inheritance in 18th-Century Moldavia

Summary/Abstract: This study analyses the attitudes of and decisions made by those about to die on the basis of a series of published and unpublished sources such as testaments, probate inventories, trial outcomes, sale deeds, and dowries. The manner in which 18th-century individuals chose to manage and distribute their movable and immovable assets is an indication of the place they occupied in family networks and of the ways in which they interacted with their families and communities. The available documents reveal the types of testamentary discourses used and the legal prescriptions available in the period under consideration, but also showcase an intense religious culture and a constant concern for the salvation of one’s souls. Throughout this period, both the state and the church encouraged and endorsed this need for memorialisation through alms-giving and commemorative rites. The study is structured around a set of questions regarding the evolution of testamentary practices, notably that of who was entitled to inherit the so-called “part of the soul“ and of how grantees were to spend these donated resources.

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