Taylor Speer-Sims
July 22, 2012
Primogeniture
Primogeniture had been a law that
originated with the rule of the eldest son. This rule then moved, through time,
into the English common law system. The ideal had been to keep land and
valuable titles in the family decadency. By entailing property, the hope was
that the family property would remain in an honorable person. The first son had
been favored for many reasons throughout centuries in different cultures. So,
it was easy to place the honor on his head. However, there had been situations
that the patriarch was unable to foresee. These encumbrances placed the
property into possession, and sometimes ownership, of persons that had no
initial relation to that of the man that had initiated the entail in the first
place.
Introduction
Primogeniture allowed for the eldest
son to inherit property and titles. This system ensured the continual, fluid
succession of ownership and guaranteed that properties and titles would stay
within the family. From its installation they naturally assumed that every
eldest male heir would procreate other male heirs throughout perpetuity. If for
some ungodly reason there had been no direct male to inherit, the next
surviving male that was directly in line would then take over responsibility
and receive all due rewards. This, however, proved easier said than done.
Keeping sound integrity of the
inherited rewards had been the reason that primogeniture had been established.
Taking many years to be instituted, it found its way from feudalist ideals
through to British common law where it had finally been written down as a true
law, the ideal of the eldest son inheriting into perpetuity found its
following. Acquiring land by both nefarious and legal means, men wanted to rise
to a socially higher position than where they had been born. Although great in
idea, entail had its problems in reality. There had been many difficulties that
the law of the eldest son created, and many of the grand estates that the laws
had been set up to protect, actually found themselves with residents that were
not related to the family that had originally owned them.
Background of the Rule of the Eldest Son
The eldest son had
always been a treasure to families, no matter the level of income. Having the
chance for the family line to continue throughout eternity meant more than just
bravado; it also meant a deep sense of love and joy for parents. More children
for families meant love too, along with making the chance of the family dynasty
to continue. In this system, however, the eldest son had meant more to families
then their other offspring. One reason for more love given to the first born,
was simply because they were the very first child born.[1]
The older child had more
notice from the parents, sometimes just because they had been born first. It
was simply easier to love a child when there had been no other children around.
Parents heaped all of their hopes and dreams upon their only child. After all,
the eldest had been the only child, and were treated as such, before any others
came along. [2] The eldest son was expected to take care of
the parents and other children at their maturity, and so was given higher
privileges than any of the other children. Many families were indeed afraid
that this could be the only child because women died in childbirth and low
fecundity.[3]
Fecundity rates, death
in childbirth of the mother and infant morbidity rates had been a large factor
in putting the eldest son on a pedestal. Each region of England, as well as the
rest of Europe, had its own life-support potential.[4]
Reasons for the above included diet, disease, living space, climate, and age
and workload of the mother.[5]
The higher the income of the family, the better care the mother and child had
which would have created a higher fecundity and maturation age of the child.
However, even this did not guarantee that every child would grow to adulthood
and procreate, thus creating more generations of fine elder sons to continue
the family line. Because of this, many were treated as special and were given
the best of everything to help assure their growth to manhood.
Giving the firstborn son
the best of everything was not a new concept to families of the 18th
and 19th centuries. The first cut of meat went to the firstborns of
Amerindians to show pride of family.[6] The Celts doted on the eldest son as
favorite and gave them the first chance to prove themselves worthy of holding
titles or becoming Ri (chief like title). The Roman Caesars made sure to have
their eldest son inherit their title, and if they did not have an heir, they
would adopt a male to become a blood son.[7]
Ancient Egyptians expected their eldest son to be better at everything. He
received more schooling and was to have the best manners.[8]
The firstborn sons of the Hebrews have been given more because of culture and
tradition.[9]
The ancient Hebrews and
Egyptians as well as the early Christians believed that the firstborn male was
a gift from God(s). The importance of these sons was shown in the way that God
delivered justice to Pharaoh in Exodus 11. There were a total of ten plagues that
were released upon Egypt by the Hebrew God. The first nine were absolutely
horrendous to the people of Egypt. None of those phased the heart of Pharaoh
until the tenth took place. The very last of these plagues completely crumpled
his tenacity and allowed the entire slave population to be released. [10]
What was this last
accursed affliction that debilitated the mighty realm of the Egyptians, and
their king along with them? The torment that broke the will of Pharaoh, was
obviously, the death of firstborns. God must have believed that the first born
was important to all people because at the beginning of Exodus, “And the Lord
said unto Moses, Yet will I bring one plague more upon Pharaoh, and upon Egypt;
afterwards he will let you go hence…”[11]
Then further, “And all the firstborn in
the land of Egypt shall die, from the firstborn of Pharaoh that sitteth upon
his throne, even unto the firstborn of the maidservant that is behind the mill’
and all the firstborn of beasts.”[12]
If the Jews did not place the God’s mark on their own door, their sons, too,
received the wrath of God. This clearly showed the preference for the firstborn
over any subsequent children.
Another indication of
preference for firstborn sons in religion was Christ himself. Christ had been
the only, but still firstborn, Son of the Hebrew God, especially in human form.
Jesus had also been the firstborn of Holy Mary, who would later become arguably
as important as her son.[13]
Christianity became popular in the west after Constantine. Constantine had been
the eldest son of Constantius Chlorus, the Caesar of the West.[14]
Constantine became a hero to later Christendom because he had changed the
mighty heretical Roman Empire into one that followed Jesus.[15]
As Christ had been firstborn, and his first state champion had also been
firstborn, it was easy to see the relationship of Christian followers with
their own eldest son.
The rights of the senior
male child increased as time went by. Rights began as duties but then blossomed
as religion and economics dictated. Some said that the rights of the eldest
went as far back as Adam. However, it was not until after the decline of Rome
that primogeniture became popular throughout Europe.[16]
Rome had been interested in other cultures beliefs and customs. And so, they
had started to bring forth the idea of having their eldest son inheriting and
accumulating more with each succeeding Caesar.[17]
As Rome split into different states, the idea of feudalism, with its succession
rights, began to flourish throughout Europe.
The feudalist system was
founded after the division of the great Roman Empire and resulted in smaller
ones that did not hold the authority that the original had. Because there was
not as much power of the state, the ruler also did not have as much power as
they would have wished. Making the subservient class pledge themselves to the
higher ones created a sense of superiority for the nobility. This was an
economic and state system that was centered upon the lordship of a certain
region. While there were debates as to its origins, the point remains that
feudalism was prevalent in Western Europe from the 10th century and
continued in some locations until the 15th century. Feudalism
created a need for keeping property in the family that was not necessarily
there beforehand.[18]
A hierarchy was created with a king at the top, his sons, and then with a line
of subsequent nobility. Each pledging fealty to a man directly above him in the
ladder of command, yet not all pledging to the king.
Kings wanted their might
to be felt by all. What better way than to have his representatives in other
areas of the realm as well? One way had been to send nobles, which had pledged
themselves to him, out into the world. Another had been to populate the realm
with men who would automatically (or so he thought) be true to his authority.
Many of these men had been from the king’s own bloodline. This had also been
true of the lesser nobles, such as dukes within his own dukedom, counts within
his own county, and so forth throughout the different size domains. “The
history of individual succession walked hand in hand with the history of landed
sovereignty.”[19] The eldest
son had the larger titles, and thus the larger tracts to manage for his father.[20]
Receiving the right to
rule and/or manage from their father, often sons pursued their own agenda.
Ironically, the idea had been to have their sons follow in their own footsteps.
This irony did not seem to matter to the man that did not want to follow in his
father’s steps because he had wanted to be the patriarch in his own right. It
was the point of being in charge of a dynasty, or house, mattered. This, too,
had been a part of Christianity’s foundations for God said to Moses “…These be
the heads of their father’s houses.” [21]
This indicated to all that they may have been a man, but it would have been
better for them to be the leader of their own house. Men felt the need to have
been the “father” in God’s statement, not to have the name of their forebear be
the one that God mentioned.
Men wanted to have their
own destinies and be the sire of great dynasties, even nations. This had been
important because it perpetuated the idea of primogeniture. The first son
wanted the rights of the properties of his parents in their entirety. Having
sons to carry out the father’s name had been instilled throughout Christendom.[22]
This idea continued throughout the feudalist period, through the Renaissance,
and also through the Georgian times into the Regency and beyond.
Originally written for class at American Military University.
[1] Andrea
Kleppe. Personal communication with author. July 1, 2012
[2] Ibid.
[3] Bonnie
Speer. Personal communication with author. June 28, 2012.
[4] Stephen Molnar and Iva M.
Molnar, Environmental Change and Human Survival: Some
Dimensions of Human Ecology. (Upper Saddle
River, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 2000.), 23.
[5] Ibid, 132.
[6] Ibid.
[7] Billy
Bowman. Personal communication with author. July 1, 2012.
[8] Sameh
Abadeer. Personal communication with author. June 27, 2012.
[9] Kleppe.
[10] Holy Bible, The.
Exodus; Exodus 11.
[11] Ibid.
[12] Ibid.
[13] Holy
Bible, The. St. Matthew 2.
[14] Marcel Le Glay et al. A History of
Rome, 4th Ed. (Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2009.),
526-527.
[15] Ibid, 608.
[16] Evelyn Cecil, Primogeniture.
(London: Spottiswoode and Co., 1895.), 3.
http://books.google.com/ebooks/reader?id=qXMuAAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader.
(accessed June 23, 2012).
[17] Bowman.
[18] Norman
Cantor, The Civilization of the Middle Ages (New York: Harper Perennial, 1993),
174-199.
[19] Cecil, 22.
[20] Ibid, 220.
[21] Holy
Bible, The. Exodus 6:14.
[22] Cecil, 20.
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