Simple Malthusian models remain an important tool for understanding pre-modern demographic systems and their connection to the economy. But most recent literature has lost sight of the institutional context for demographic behavior that lay at the heart of Malthus's own analysis. This paper...

This article investigates women s position in early modern Bohemia by focusing on female household headship, which was very low by European standards. Empirical analysis suggests that the factors hypothesized in the literature as influencing female economic independence in preindustrial Europe...