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Were women the property of men, prior to 1919 in the UK
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It was suggested in a TV interview that I saw that prior to 1919 in the UK, women were owned by men. An example to solidify this, was women taking on their husbands last name.
My question is:
- Were women not been able to own property, mean that they were in
fact, property themselves? As in, they could not own land, but could
they just not leave their husband and go back to their families if
they wished? - Was it not the case that people who owned land in
general, were the aristocracy? Meaning that the vast majority of
both men and women in the UK did not have land to own? (Similar to
the TV show Poldark and Jane Austen novels)
The video in question is a thirteen minute excerpt from the interview of Jordan Peterson recently by Helen Lewis.
- 0:48: Lewis states:
You had a system where one set of people owned another set of people. Until women got full legal rights, [where] they could own property themselves, [and] they could work, essentially they were owned by their fathers and then by their husbands.
united-kingdom marriage civil-rights
edited 10 hours ago
Pieter Geerkens
36.1k5103174
asked 11 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
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Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
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up vote
1
down vote
favorite
It was suggested in a TV interview that I saw that prior to 1919 in the UK, women were owned by men. An example to solidify this, was women taking on their husbands last name.
My question is:
- Were women not been able to own property, mean that they were in
fact, property themselves? As in, they could not own land, but could
they just not leave their husband and go back to their families if
they wished? - Was it not the case that people who owned land in
general, were the aristocracy? Meaning that the vast majority of
both men and women in the UK did not have land to own? (Similar to
the TV show Poldark and Jane Austen novels)
The video in question is a thirteen minute excerpt from the interview of Jordan Peterson recently by Helen Lewis.
- 0:48: Lewis states:
You had a system where one set of people owned another set of people. Until women got full legal rights, [where] they could own property themselves, [and] they could work, essentially they were owned by their fathers and then by their husbands.
united-kingdom marriage civil-rights
edited 10 hours ago
Pieter Geerkens
36.1k5103174
asked 11 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
New contributor
Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
3
Hi Jonathan and welcome to History SE. Please cite the TV interview. What exactly was said? Women still commonly take on the husband's last name without being 'owned'.
– Lars Bosteen
11 hours ago
2
Well, can you call young children property of their parents these days?
– OON
10 hours ago
No, parents are responsible for their children. They do not own them. Example, children can be taken away from parents if they mistreat them and break the law.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
3
What has your own research shown you?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
Children take the name of their parents, even now. Are they property?
– Greg
3 hours ago
add a comment |Â
up vote
1
down vote
favorite
up vote
1
down vote
favorite
It was suggested in a TV interview that I saw that prior to 1919 in the UK, women were owned by men. An example to solidify this, was women taking on their husbands last name.
My question is:
- Were women not been able to own property, mean that they were in
fact, property themselves? As in, they could not own land, but could
they just not leave their husband and go back to their families if
they wished? - Was it not the case that people who owned land in
general, were the aristocracy? Meaning that the vast majority of
both men and women in the UK did not have land to own? (Similar to
the TV show Poldark and Jane Austen novels)
The video in question is a thirteen minute excerpt from the interview of Jordan Peterson recently by Helen Lewis.
- 0:48: Lewis states:
You had a system where one set of people owned another set of people. Until women got full legal rights, [where] they could own property themselves, [and] they could work, essentially they were owned by their fathers and then by their husbands.
united-kingdom marriage civil-rights
edited 10 hours ago
Pieter Geerkens
36.1k5103174
asked 11 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
New contributor
Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
It was suggested in a TV interview that I saw that prior to 1919 in the UK, women were owned by men. An example to solidify this, was women taking on their husbands last name.
My question is:
- Were women not been able to own property, mean that they were in
fact, property themselves? As in, they could not own land, but could
they just not leave their husband and go back to their families if
they wished? - Was it not the case that people who owned land in
general, were the aristocracy? Meaning that the vast majority of
both men and women in the UK did not have land to own? (Similar to
the TV show Poldark and Jane Austen novels)
The video in question is a thirteen minute excerpt from the interview of Jordan Peterson recently by Helen Lewis.
- 0:48: Lewis states:
You had a system where one set of people owned another set of people. Until women got full legal rights, [where] they could own property themselves, [and] they could work, essentially they were owned by their fathers and then by their husbands.
united-kingdom marriage civil-rights
united-kingdom marriage civil-rights
edited 10 hours ago
Pieter Geerkens
36.1k5103174
asked 11 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
New contributor
Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
edited 10 hours ago
Pieter Geerkens
36.1k5103174
asked 11 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
New contributor
Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
edited 10 hours ago
Pieter Geerkens
36.1k5103174
edited 10 hours ago
Pieter Geerkens
36.1k5103174
edited 10 hours ago
Pieter Geerkens
36.1k5103174
36.1k5103174
asked 11 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
New contributor
Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
asked 11 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
asked 11 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
1164
New contributor
Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
New contributor
Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
3
Hi Jonathan and welcome to History SE. Please cite the TV interview. What exactly was said? Women still commonly take on the husband's last name without being 'owned'.
– Lars Bosteen
11 hours ago
2
Well, can you call young children property of their parents these days?
– OON
10 hours ago
No, parents are responsible for their children. They do not own them. Example, children can be taken away from parents if they mistreat them and break the law.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
3
What has your own research shown you?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
Children take the name of their parents, even now. Are they property?
– Greg
3 hours ago
add a comment |Â
3
Hi Jonathan and welcome to History SE. Please cite the TV interview. What exactly was said? Women still commonly take on the husband's last name without being 'owned'.
– Lars Bosteen
11 hours ago
2
Well, can you call young children property of their parents these days?
– OON
10 hours ago
No, parents are responsible for their children. They do not own them. Example, children can be taken away from parents if they mistreat them and break the law.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
3
What has your own research shown you?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
Children take the name of their parents, even now. Are they property?
– Greg
3 hours ago
3
3
Hi Jonathan and welcome to History SE. Please cite the TV interview. What exactly was said? Women still commonly take on the husband's last name without being 'owned'.
– Lars Bosteen
11 hours ago
Hi Jonathan and welcome to History SE. Please cite the TV interview. What exactly was said? Women still commonly take on the husband's last name without being 'owned'.
– Lars Bosteen
11 hours ago
2
2
Well, can you call young children property of their parents these days?
– OON
10 hours ago
Well, can you call young children property of their parents these days?
– OON
10 hours ago
No, parents are responsible for their children. They do not own them. Example, children can be taken away from parents if they mistreat them and break the law.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
No, parents are responsible for their children. They do not own them. Example, children can be taken away from parents if they mistreat them and break the law.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
3
3
What has your own research shown you?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
What has your own research shown you?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
Children take the name of their parents, even now. Are they property?
– Greg
3 hours ago
Children take the name of their parents, even now. Are they property?
– Greg
3 hours ago
add a comment |Â
3 Answers
3
active
oldest
votes
up vote
10
down vote
accepted
Slavery was abolished in 1833 in England. Prior to 1919 women were not property. Not having equal rights doesn't automatically mean slavery.
A woman taking the family name of her husband is not a sign of slavery. It was a normal custom that only recently (about 40-30 years ago) changed.
You're looking at history from a very modern/progressive viewpoint. That rarely works.
answered 10 hours ago
Jos
6,18511337
3
Where it was custom to take the name, it usually still is. And still the default, custom wise. Only that a legal option was added to choose an alternative to this default?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
Slavery in this context was for people in the colonies, outside the UK. Inside the UK, were there slaves or indentured servants? Also, I feel that the marriage/property law was much more a rule for the aristocracy until the industrial revolution came where more people owned homes.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
add a comment |Â
up vote
3
down vote
If you consider the wording carefully:
Until women got full legal rights, [where] they could own property themselves, [and] they could work, essentially they were owned by their fathers and then by their husbands.
Then in becomes clear that the person making this statement spoke just figuratively. Which is not verboten and essentially a common way to criticise the patriarchy entrenched in many European systems of law for quite a time.
Only in this case the historicity is a bit off, focusing on just one aspect, and emphasising other important steps in the course of women regaining rights. For just one example:
Married Women's Property Act 1882
The Married Women's Property Act 1882 (45 & 46 Vict. c.75) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that significantly altered English law regarding the property rights of married women, which besides other matters allowed married women to own and control property in their own right.
A system that might be called patriarchy was the norm in European societies, at least up until the 20th century.
Patriarchy is a social system in which males hold primary power and predominate in roles of political leadership, moral authority, social privilege and control of property. Some patriarchal societies are also patrilineal, meaning that property and title are inherited by the male lineage.
As we have at least a language and philosophy disagreement apparent regarding that word and the question as posed and clarified in comments, the most mainstream definitions to look at for this kind of question, the desired timeframe of up to 1919 and centring around English law will be the concept of coverture:
Coverture (sometimes spelled couverture) was a legal doctrine whereby, upon marriage, a woman's legal rights and obligations were subsumed by those of her husband, in accordance with the wife's legal status of feme covert. An unmarried woman, a feme sole, had the right to own property and make contracts in her own name. Coverture arises from the legal fiction that a husband and wife are one person.
Coverture was enshrined in the common law of England for several centuries and throughout most of the 19th century, influencing some other common-law jurisdictions. According to Arianne Chernock, coverture did not apply in Scotland, but whether it applied in Wales is unclear.
After the rise of the women's rights movement in the mid-19th century, coverture came under increasing criticism as oppressive towards women, hindering them from exercising ordinary property rights and entering professions. Coverture was first substantially modified by late 19th century Married Women's Property Acts passed in various common-law legal jurisdictions, and was weakened and eventually eliminated by subsequent reforms. Certain aspects of coverture (mainly concerned with preventing a wife from unilaterally incurring major financial obligations for which her husband would be liable) survived as late as the 1960s in some states of the United States.
So whatever the reasons for these laws and customs to exist or to have existed, and whether or not there were explicit laws that stated something like "women are the property of men" it is essentially one possible way to put it: that women were in effect like property of a husband or father.
answered 10 hours ago
LangLangC
17.3k35595
1
I disagree that there is a patriarchy and I can assume other reasons for this marriage law to exist. Such as, men needed to own property to be able to marry into another family (as the parents wouldn't allow someone without property to marry their daughter). This would be in the context of a family that had sons and daughters.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
@Jonathan Do you disagree that there was a system that might be called descriptively "patriarchy" before 1919?
– LangLangC
9 hours ago
Yes and that would be using a modern lens to look at history.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
add a comment |Â
up vote
0
down vote
From another source: https://www.reddit.com/r/JordanPeterson/comments/9tsidj/gq_interview_were_women_mens_property_prior_to/e8ywxfl
Prior to the 1830s (it's been a while so I'm fuzzy) women could vote.
The stipulation was land ownership worth/generating £10 a year. Obviously far more men voted but there are plenty of British instances of women voting as of the establishment of parliament as we know it in the 1300s.
As the top comment states, the husband acquired the wife's property upon marriage, keeping the number of women enfranchised to a minimum.
As to the question: HA! No. Not as a collective.
Men could own slaves, but then so could women, so technically "men" could own "women" but definitely not in the sense the question is framed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reform_Act_1832
Statutes passed in 1430 and 1432, during the reign of Henry VI, standardised property qualifications for county voters. Under these Acts, all owners of freehold property or land worth at least forty shillings in a particular county were entitled to vote in that county. This requirement, known as the forty shilling freehold, was never adjusted for inflation; thus the amount of land one had to own in order to vote gradually diminished over time.[8] The franchise was restricted to males by custom rather than statute;[9] on rare occasions women had been able to vote in parliamentary elections as a result of property ownership.
answered 8 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
New contributor
Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
add a comment |Â
3 Answers
3
active
oldest
votes
3 Answers
3
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
up vote
10
down vote
accepted
Slavery was abolished in 1833 in England. Prior to 1919 women were not property. Not having equal rights doesn't automatically mean slavery.
A woman taking the family name of her husband is not a sign of slavery. It was a normal custom that only recently (about 40-30 years ago) changed.
You're looking at history from a very modern/progressive viewpoint. That rarely works.
answered 10 hours ago
Jos
6,18511337
3
Where it was custom to take the name, it usually still is. And still the default, custom wise. Only that a legal option was added to choose an alternative to this default?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
Slavery in this context was for people in the colonies, outside the UK. Inside the UK, were there slaves or indentured servants? Also, I feel that the marriage/property law was much more a rule for the aristocracy until the industrial revolution came where more people owned homes.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
add a comment |Â
up vote
10
down vote
accepted
Slavery was abolished in 1833 in England. Prior to 1919 women were not property. Not having equal rights doesn't automatically mean slavery.
A woman taking the family name of her husband is not a sign of slavery. It was a normal custom that only recently (about 40-30 years ago) changed.
You're looking at history from a very modern/progressive viewpoint. That rarely works.
answered 10 hours ago
Jos
6,18511337
3
Where it was custom to take the name, it usually still is. And still the default, custom wise. Only that a legal option was added to choose an alternative to this default?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
Slavery in this context was for people in the colonies, outside the UK. Inside the UK, were there slaves or indentured servants? Also, I feel that the marriage/property law was much more a rule for the aristocracy until the industrial revolution came where more people owned homes.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
add a comment |Â
up vote
10
down vote
accepted
up vote
10
down vote
accepted
Slavery was abolished in 1833 in England. Prior to 1919 women were not property. Not having equal rights doesn't automatically mean slavery.
A woman taking the family name of her husband is not a sign of slavery. It was a normal custom that only recently (about 40-30 years ago) changed.
You're looking at history from a very modern/progressive viewpoint. That rarely works.
answered 10 hours ago
Jos
6,18511337
Slavery was abolished in 1833 in England. Prior to 1919 women were not property. Not having equal rights doesn't automatically mean slavery.
A woman taking the family name of her husband is not a sign of slavery. It was a normal custom that only recently (about 40-30 years ago) changed.
You're looking at history from a very modern/progressive viewpoint. That rarely works.
answered 10 hours ago
Jos
6,18511337
answered 10 hours ago
Jos
6,18511337
answered 10 hours ago
Jos
6,18511337
answered 10 hours ago
Jos
6,18511337
6,18511337
3
Where it was custom to take the name, it usually still is. And still the default, custom wise. Only that a legal option was added to choose an alternative to this default?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
Slavery in this context was for people in the colonies, outside the UK. Inside the UK, were there slaves or indentured servants? Also, I feel that the marriage/property law was much more a rule for the aristocracy until the industrial revolution came where more people owned homes.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
add a comment |Â
3
Where it was custom to take the name, it usually still is. And still the default, custom wise. Only that a legal option was added to choose an alternative to this default?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
Slavery in this context was for people in the colonies, outside the UK. Inside the UK, were there slaves or indentured servants? Also, I feel that the marriage/property law was much more a rule for the aristocracy until the industrial revolution came where more people owned homes.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
3
3
Where it was custom to take the name, it usually still is. And still the default, custom wise. Only that a legal option was added to choose an alternative to this default?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
Where it was custom to take the name, it usually still is. And still the default, custom wise. Only that a legal option was added to choose an alternative to this default?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
Slavery in this context was for people in the colonies, outside the UK. Inside the UK, were there slaves or indentured servants? Also, I feel that the marriage/property law was much more a rule for the aristocracy until the industrial revolution came where more people owned homes.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
Slavery in this context was for people in the colonies, outside the UK. Inside the UK, were there slaves or indentured servants? Also, I feel that the marriage/property law was much more a rule for the aristocracy until the industrial revolution came where more people owned homes.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
add a comment |Â
up vote
3
down vote
If you consider the wording carefully:
Until women got full legal rights, [where] they could own property themselves, [and] they could work, essentially they were owned by their fathers and then by their husbands.
Then in becomes clear that the person making this statement spoke just figuratively. Which is not verboten and essentially a common way to criticise the patriarchy entrenched in many European systems of law for quite a time.
Only in this case the historicity is a bit off, focusing on just one aspect, and emphasising other important steps in the course of women regaining rights. For just one example:
Married Women's Property Act 1882
The Married Women's Property Act 1882 (45 & 46 Vict. c.75) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that significantly altered English law regarding the property rights of married women, which besides other matters allowed married women to own and control property in their own right.
A system that might be called patriarchy was the norm in European societies, at least up until the 20th century.
Patriarchy is a social system in which males hold primary power and predominate in roles of political leadership, moral authority, social privilege and control of property. Some patriarchal societies are also patrilineal, meaning that property and title are inherited by the male lineage.
As we have at least a language and philosophy disagreement apparent regarding that word and the question as posed and clarified in comments, the most mainstream definitions to look at for this kind of question, the desired timeframe of up to 1919 and centring around English law will be the concept of coverture:
Coverture (sometimes spelled couverture) was a legal doctrine whereby, upon marriage, a woman's legal rights and obligations were subsumed by those of her husband, in accordance with the wife's legal status of feme covert. An unmarried woman, a feme sole, had the right to own property and make contracts in her own name. Coverture arises from the legal fiction that a husband and wife are one person.
Coverture was enshrined in the common law of England for several centuries and throughout most of the 19th century, influencing some other common-law jurisdictions. According to Arianne Chernock, coverture did not apply in Scotland, but whether it applied in Wales is unclear.
After the rise of the women's rights movement in the mid-19th century, coverture came under increasing criticism as oppressive towards women, hindering them from exercising ordinary property rights and entering professions. Coverture was first substantially modified by late 19th century Married Women's Property Acts passed in various common-law legal jurisdictions, and was weakened and eventually eliminated by subsequent reforms. Certain aspects of coverture (mainly concerned with preventing a wife from unilaterally incurring major financial obligations for which her husband would be liable) survived as late as the 1960s in some states of the United States.
So whatever the reasons for these laws and customs to exist or to have existed, and whether or not there were explicit laws that stated something like "women are the property of men" it is essentially one possible way to put it: that women were in effect like property of a husband or father.
answered 10 hours ago
LangLangC
17.3k35595
1
I disagree that there is a patriarchy and I can assume other reasons for this marriage law to exist. Such as, men needed to own property to be able to marry into another family (as the parents wouldn't allow someone without property to marry their daughter). This would be in the context of a family that had sons and daughters.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
@Jonathan Do you disagree that there was a system that might be called descriptively "patriarchy" before 1919?
– LangLangC
9 hours ago
Yes and that would be using a modern lens to look at history.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
add a comment |Â
up vote
3
down vote
If you consider the wording carefully:
Until women got full legal rights, [where] they could own property themselves, [and] they could work, essentially they were owned by their fathers and then by their husbands.
Then in becomes clear that the person making this statement spoke just figuratively. Which is not verboten and essentially a common way to criticise the patriarchy entrenched in many European systems of law for quite a time.
Only in this case the historicity is a bit off, focusing on just one aspect, and emphasising other important steps in the course of women regaining rights. For just one example:
Married Women's Property Act 1882
The Married Women's Property Act 1882 (45 & 46 Vict. c.75) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that significantly altered English law regarding the property rights of married women, which besides other matters allowed married women to own and control property in their own right.
A system that might be called patriarchy was the norm in European societies, at least up until the 20th century.
Patriarchy is a social system in which males hold primary power and predominate in roles of political leadership, moral authority, social privilege and control of property. Some patriarchal societies are also patrilineal, meaning that property and title are inherited by the male lineage.
As we have at least a language and philosophy disagreement apparent regarding that word and the question as posed and clarified in comments, the most mainstream definitions to look at for this kind of question, the desired timeframe of up to 1919 and centring around English law will be the concept of coverture:
Coverture (sometimes spelled couverture) was a legal doctrine whereby, upon marriage, a woman's legal rights and obligations were subsumed by those of her husband, in accordance with the wife's legal status of feme covert. An unmarried woman, a feme sole, had the right to own property and make contracts in her own name. Coverture arises from the legal fiction that a husband and wife are one person.
Coverture was enshrined in the common law of England for several centuries and throughout most of the 19th century, influencing some other common-law jurisdictions. According to Arianne Chernock, coverture did not apply in Scotland, but whether it applied in Wales is unclear.
After the rise of the women's rights movement in the mid-19th century, coverture came under increasing criticism as oppressive towards women, hindering them from exercising ordinary property rights and entering professions. Coverture was first substantially modified by late 19th century Married Women's Property Acts passed in various common-law legal jurisdictions, and was weakened and eventually eliminated by subsequent reforms. Certain aspects of coverture (mainly concerned with preventing a wife from unilaterally incurring major financial obligations for which her husband would be liable) survived as late as the 1960s in some states of the United States.
So whatever the reasons for these laws and customs to exist or to have existed, and whether or not there were explicit laws that stated something like "women are the property of men" it is essentially one possible way to put it: that women were in effect like property of a husband or father.
answered 10 hours ago
LangLangC
17.3k35595
1
I disagree that there is a patriarchy and I can assume other reasons for this marriage law to exist. Such as, men needed to own property to be able to marry into another family (as the parents wouldn't allow someone without property to marry their daughter). This would be in the context of a family that had sons and daughters.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
@Jonathan Do you disagree that there was a system that might be called descriptively "patriarchy" before 1919?
– LangLangC
9 hours ago
Yes and that would be using a modern lens to look at history.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
add a comment |Â
up vote
3
down vote
up vote
3
down vote
If you consider the wording carefully:
Until women got full legal rights, [where] they could own property themselves, [and] they could work, essentially they were owned by their fathers and then by their husbands.
Then in becomes clear that the person making this statement spoke just figuratively. Which is not verboten and essentially a common way to criticise the patriarchy entrenched in many European systems of law for quite a time.
Only in this case the historicity is a bit off, focusing on just one aspect, and emphasising other important steps in the course of women regaining rights. For just one example:
Married Women's Property Act 1882
The Married Women's Property Act 1882 (45 & 46 Vict. c.75) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that significantly altered English law regarding the property rights of married women, which besides other matters allowed married women to own and control property in their own right.
A system that might be called patriarchy was the norm in European societies, at least up until the 20th century.
Patriarchy is a social system in which males hold primary power and predominate in roles of political leadership, moral authority, social privilege and control of property. Some patriarchal societies are also patrilineal, meaning that property and title are inherited by the male lineage.
As we have at least a language and philosophy disagreement apparent regarding that word and the question as posed and clarified in comments, the most mainstream definitions to look at for this kind of question, the desired timeframe of up to 1919 and centring around English law will be the concept of coverture:
Coverture (sometimes spelled couverture) was a legal doctrine whereby, upon marriage, a woman's legal rights and obligations were subsumed by those of her husband, in accordance with the wife's legal status of feme covert. An unmarried woman, a feme sole, had the right to own property and make contracts in her own name. Coverture arises from the legal fiction that a husband and wife are one person.
Coverture was enshrined in the common law of England for several centuries and throughout most of the 19th century, influencing some other common-law jurisdictions. According to Arianne Chernock, coverture did not apply in Scotland, but whether it applied in Wales is unclear.
After the rise of the women's rights movement in the mid-19th century, coverture came under increasing criticism as oppressive towards women, hindering them from exercising ordinary property rights and entering professions. Coverture was first substantially modified by late 19th century Married Women's Property Acts passed in various common-law legal jurisdictions, and was weakened and eventually eliminated by subsequent reforms. Certain aspects of coverture (mainly concerned with preventing a wife from unilaterally incurring major financial obligations for which her husband would be liable) survived as late as the 1960s in some states of the United States.
So whatever the reasons for these laws and customs to exist or to have existed, and whether or not there were explicit laws that stated something like "women are the property of men" it is essentially one possible way to put it: that women were in effect like property of a husband or father.
answered 10 hours ago
LangLangC
17.3k35595
If you consider the wording carefully:
Until women got full legal rights, [where] they could own property themselves, [and] they could work, essentially they were owned by their fathers and then by their husbands.
Then in becomes clear that the person making this statement spoke just figuratively. Which is not verboten and essentially a common way to criticise the patriarchy entrenched in many European systems of law for quite a time.
Only in this case the historicity is a bit off, focusing on just one aspect, and emphasising other important steps in the course of women regaining rights. For just one example:
Married Women's Property Act 1882
The Married Women's Property Act 1882 (45 & 46 Vict. c.75) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that significantly altered English law regarding the property rights of married women, which besides other matters allowed married women to own and control property in their own right.
A system that might be called patriarchy was the norm in European societies, at least up until the 20th century.
Patriarchy is a social system in which males hold primary power and predominate in roles of political leadership, moral authority, social privilege and control of property. Some patriarchal societies are also patrilineal, meaning that property and title are inherited by the male lineage.
As we have at least a language and philosophy disagreement apparent regarding that word and the question as posed and clarified in comments, the most mainstream definitions to look at for this kind of question, the desired timeframe of up to 1919 and centring around English law will be the concept of coverture:
Coverture (sometimes spelled couverture) was a legal doctrine whereby, upon marriage, a woman's legal rights and obligations were subsumed by those of her husband, in accordance with the wife's legal status of feme covert. An unmarried woman, a feme sole, had the right to own property and make contracts in her own name. Coverture arises from the legal fiction that a husband and wife are one person.
Coverture was enshrined in the common law of England for several centuries and throughout most of the 19th century, influencing some other common-law jurisdictions. According to Arianne Chernock, coverture did not apply in Scotland, but whether it applied in Wales is unclear.
After the rise of the women's rights movement in the mid-19th century, coverture came under increasing criticism as oppressive towards women, hindering them from exercising ordinary property rights and entering professions. Coverture was first substantially modified by late 19th century Married Women's Property Acts passed in various common-law legal jurisdictions, and was weakened and eventually eliminated by subsequent reforms. Certain aspects of coverture (mainly concerned with preventing a wife from unilaterally incurring major financial obligations for which her husband would be liable) survived as late as the 1960s in some states of the United States.
So whatever the reasons for these laws and customs to exist or to have existed, and whether or not there were explicit laws that stated something like "women are the property of men" it is essentially one possible way to put it: that women were in effect like property of a husband or father.
answered 10 hours ago
LangLangC
17.3k35595
edited 5 hours ago
answered 10 hours ago
LangLangC
17.3k35595
answered 10 hours ago
LangLangC
17.3k35595
answered 10 hours ago
LangLangC
17.3k35595
17.3k35595
1
I disagree that there is a patriarchy and I can assume other reasons for this marriage law to exist. Such as, men needed to own property to be able to marry into another family (as the parents wouldn't allow someone without property to marry their daughter). This would be in the context of a family that had sons and daughters.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
@Jonathan Do you disagree that there was a system that might be called descriptively "patriarchy" before 1919?
– LangLangC
9 hours ago
Yes and that would be using a modern lens to look at history.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
add a comment |Â
1
I disagree that there is a patriarchy and I can assume other reasons for this marriage law to exist. Such as, men needed to own property to be able to marry into another family (as the parents wouldn't allow someone without property to marry their daughter). This would be in the context of a family that had sons and daughters.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
@Jonathan Do you disagree that there was a system that might be called descriptively "patriarchy" before 1919?
– LangLangC
9 hours ago
Yes and that would be using a modern lens to look at history.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
1
1
I disagree that there is a patriarchy and I can assume other reasons for this marriage law to exist. Such as, men needed to own property to be able to marry into another family (as the parents wouldn't allow someone without property to marry their daughter). This would be in the context of a family that had sons and daughters.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
I disagree that there is a patriarchy and I can assume other reasons for this marriage law to exist. Such as, men needed to own property to be able to marry into another family (as the parents wouldn't allow someone without property to marry their daughter). This would be in the context of a family that had sons and daughters.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
@Jonathan Do you disagree that there was a system that might be called descriptively "patriarchy" before 1919?
– LangLangC
9 hours ago
@Jonathan Do you disagree that there was a system that might be called descriptively "patriarchy" before 1919?
– LangLangC
9 hours ago
Yes and that would be using a modern lens to look at history.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
Yes and that would be using a modern lens to look at history.
– Jonathan
9 hours ago
add a comment |Â
up vote
0
down vote
From another source: https://www.reddit.com/r/JordanPeterson/comments/9tsidj/gq_interview_were_women_mens_property_prior_to/e8ywxfl
Prior to the 1830s (it's been a while so I'm fuzzy) women could vote.
The stipulation was land ownership worth/generating £10 a year. Obviously far more men voted but there are plenty of British instances of women voting as of the establishment of parliament as we know it in the 1300s.
As the top comment states, the husband acquired the wife's property upon marriage, keeping the number of women enfranchised to a minimum.
As to the question: HA! No. Not as a collective.
Men could own slaves, but then so could women, so technically "men" could own "women" but definitely not in the sense the question is framed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reform_Act_1832
Statutes passed in 1430 and 1432, during the reign of Henry VI, standardised property qualifications for county voters. Under these Acts, all owners of freehold property or land worth at least forty shillings in a particular county were entitled to vote in that county. This requirement, known as the forty shilling freehold, was never adjusted for inflation; thus the amount of land one had to own in order to vote gradually diminished over time.[8] The franchise was restricted to males by custom rather than statute;[9] on rare occasions women had been able to vote in parliamentary elections as a result of property ownership.
answered 8 hours ago
Jonathan
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up vote
0
down vote
From another source: https://www.reddit.com/r/JordanPeterson/comments/9tsidj/gq_interview_were_women_mens_property_prior_to/e8ywxfl
Prior to the 1830s (it's been a while so I'm fuzzy) women could vote.
The stipulation was land ownership worth/generating £10 a year. Obviously far more men voted but there are plenty of British instances of women voting as of the establishment of parliament as we know it in the 1300s.
As the top comment states, the husband acquired the wife's property upon marriage, keeping the number of women enfranchised to a minimum.
As to the question: HA! No. Not as a collective.
Men could own slaves, but then so could women, so technically "men" could own "women" but definitely not in the sense the question is framed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reform_Act_1832
Statutes passed in 1430 and 1432, during the reign of Henry VI, standardised property qualifications for county voters. Under these Acts, all owners of freehold property or land worth at least forty shillings in a particular county were entitled to vote in that county. This requirement, known as the forty shilling freehold, was never adjusted for inflation; thus the amount of land one had to own in order to vote gradually diminished over time.[8] The franchise was restricted to males by custom rather than statute;[9] on rare occasions women had been able to vote in parliamentary elections as a result of property ownership.
answered 8 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
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up vote
0
down vote
up vote
0
down vote
From another source: https://www.reddit.com/r/JordanPeterson/comments/9tsidj/gq_interview_were_women_mens_property_prior_to/e8ywxfl
Prior to the 1830s (it's been a while so I'm fuzzy) women could vote.
The stipulation was land ownership worth/generating £10 a year. Obviously far more men voted but there are plenty of British instances of women voting as of the establishment of parliament as we know it in the 1300s.
As the top comment states, the husband acquired the wife's property upon marriage, keeping the number of women enfranchised to a minimum.
As to the question: HA! No. Not as a collective.
Men could own slaves, but then so could women, so technically "men" could own "women" but definitely not in the sense the question is framed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reform_Act_1832
Statutes passed in 1430 and 1432, during the reign of Henry VI, standardised property qualifications for county voters. Under these Acts, all owners of freehold property or land worth at least forty shillings in a particular county were entitled to vote in that county. This requirement, known as the forty shilling freehold, was never adjusted for inflation; thus the amount of land one had to own in order to vote gradually diminished over time.[8] The franchise was restricted to males by custom rather than statute;[9] on rare occasions women had been able to vote in parliamentary elections as a result of property ownership.
answered 8 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
New contributor
Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
From another source: https://www.reddit.com/r/JordanPeterson/comments/9tsidj/gq_interview_were_women_mens_property_prior_to/e8ywxfl
Prior to the 1830s (it's been a while so I'm fuzzy) women could vote.
The stipulation was land ownership worth/generating £10 a year. Obviously far more men voted but there are plenty of British instances of women voting as of the establishment of parliament as we know it in the 1300s.
As the top comment states, the husband acquired the wife's property upon marriage, keeping the number of women enfranchised to a minimum.
As to the question: HA! No. Not as a collective.
Men could own slaves, but then so could women, so technically "men" could own "women" but definitely not in the sense the question is framed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reform_Act_1832
Statutes passed in 1430 and 1432, during the reign of Henry VI, standardised property qualifications for county voters. Under these Acts, all owners of freehold property or land worth at least forty shillings in a particular county were entitled to vote in that county. This requirement, known as the forty shilling freehold, was never adjusted for inflation; thus the amount of land one had to own in order to vote gradually diminished over time.[8] The franchise was restricted to males by custom rather than statute;[9] on rare occasions women had been able to vote in parliamentary elections as a result of property ownership.
answered 8 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
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Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
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edited 2 hours ago
answered 8 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
New contributor
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answered 8 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
answered 8 hours ago
Jonathan
1164
1164
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Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
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New contributor
Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
Jonathan is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
add a comment |Â
add a comment |Â
Jonathan is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
Jonathan is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
Jonathan is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
Jonathan is a new contributor. Be nice, and check out our Code of Conduct.
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3
Hi Jonathan and welcome to History SE. Please cite the TV interview. What exactly was said? Women still commonly take on the husband's last name without being 'owned'.
– Lars Bosteen
11 hours ago
2
Well, can you call young children property of their parents these days?
– OON
10 hours ago
No, parents are responsible for their children. They do not own them. Example, children can be taken away from parents if they mistreat them and break the law.
– Jonathan
10 hours ago
3
What has your own research shown you?
– LangLangC
10 hours ago
Children take the name of their parents, even now. Are they property?
– Greg
3 hours ago