Urodzenia pozamałżeńskie w parafii św. Mikołaja w Łące w latach 1664–1914

Abstract

The article presents extramarital births in the Roman-Catholic Parish in Łąka, in the Land of Pless, in Upper Silesia. The research has been based on the existing parish registers of baptism for the years 1664–1914. In that period 839 extramarital children were born in the parish, which is 7.6% of all the births. Of those 839 children 15 were stillborn babies, which means that there were 824 baptised extramarital children. The parish registers do not contain any information on the fathers and the data concerning the social, professional and territorial background of the mothers are rather poor. The most extramarital births used to occur in Autumn and Winter (54.5%), especially in January and February (conceived in April and May). The least extramarital births used to occur in June, August and November (conceived in Autumn and Winter). Most of the extramarital children were baptised on the first day after their birth (42%). On the very day of their birth 17.8% kids were baptised. 89.9% of the extramarital children – as in the case of the rest of the kids – were presented for baptism by a woman and a man. Only 10% infants were presented to baptism by one person, usually a woman. The above presented questions have been drawn up thanks to the aggregative method. The number of extramarital births in a rural parish is surprisingly high in comparison to others within the Regierungsbezirk Oppeln. The seasonal character of extramarital births did not differ from the seasonal character of the births of other children. And neither did the procedures of baptism in the two groups.

Keywords

• demography
• extramarital births
• Upper Silesia
• Łąka
• the 18th–19th centuries