Abstract
We investigate the origins of agricultural inheritance traditions, equal partition and primogeniture. Our case study is the German state of Baden-Württemberg. Our empirical findings suggest that rural inheritance traditions were primarily determined by geography. First, fertile soils allowed splitting of the land among siblings for longer and with fewer conflicts, and hence we find more equal partition in areas with higher soil quality, especially at elevation levels conducive to intensive agriculture. Second, geography determined the settlement pattern. Areas that were settled before the Middle Ages, when land was abundant and free, are more likely to apply equal partition today. In areas that were largely uninhabited until the Middle Ages, primogeniture is the norm. We argue that these areas were deforested with the obligation of primogeniture, imposed by feudal lords.
| Originalsprache | Englisch |
|---|---|
| Seiten (von - bis) | 660-674 |
| Seitenumfang | 15 |
| Fachzeitschrift | Journal of Comparative Economics |
| Jahrgang | 49 |
| Ausgabenummer | 3 |
| DOIs | |
| Publikationsstatus | Veröffentlicht - Sept. 2021 |
| Extern publiziert | Ja |
Bibliographische Notiz
Funding Information:We would like to thank the editor, Timur Kuran, as well as two anonymous reviewers for their constructive and helpful comments. We also thank Sibylle Lehmann-Hasemeyer, Nikolaus Wolf, Eric Chaney, Giacomo De Luca, Alexander Donges, Matthias Morys, Nathan Nunn, Steven Pfaff, Ulrich Pfister, Andrew Pickering, Yannay Spitzer, Jochen Streb, and Max Winkler. We also thank seminar participants in York, Hohenheim, and Göttingen as well as the participants of the III. Congress on Economic and Social History 2019 in Regensburg and the 18th Annual ASREC Conference 2019 in Boston, especially Jared Rubin, Mark Koyama, and Sascha Becker, and the 2nd Workshop on Geodata in Economics 2019 in Hamburg especially Stefano Falcone, Maxim Pinkovskiy and David Weil.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Association for Comparative Economic Studies