Patterns of Mediterranean Patriarchy: Historical and Regional Variants from Tuscany to the Balkans and the Levant

Mikolaj Szoltysek, The Cardinal Wyszynski University of Warsaw
Mateusz Grzyb, Cardinal Wyszynski University in Warsaw
Bartosz Ogórek, Institute of History, Polish Academy of Sciences
Siegfried Gruber, Institute of History, University of Graz
Johann Büssow, Institut für Arabistik und Islamwissenschaft Fakultät für Philologie, RUHR-UNIVERSITÄT BOCHUM

This paper examines patriarchal authority across Tuscany, the Balkans (Albania, Montenegro, Serbia, Moldova), Anatolia (including Istanbul), the Levant (Palestine), and Egypt, following Germaine Tillion’s Republic of Cousins, which treats the Mediterranean not as a unified cultural bloc but as a comparative field shaped by recurring, though variably expressed, logics of patriarchy. The study uses a broad set of historical census-microdata to identify both shared patterns and regionally specific forms of family-based gender inequality. Our empirical base spans six centuries and multiple imperial, religious, and ecological contexts. For Palestine, we use thousands of household records reconstructed from late Ottoman Nüfus registers (late nineteenth–early twentieth century). For Egypt, we rely on mid-nineteenth-century census samples from IPUMS International. For Albania, Montenegro, Serbia, Moldova, Istanbul, and other Balkan and Anatolian regions, as well as for Tuscany (1427), we employ harmonized data from the Mosaic project. Combined, these sources offer a comparative perspective rarely achievable in Mediterranean family history. To compare the extent and internal structure of patriarchy, the study integrates: (1) visual tools and descriptive statistics; (2) exploratory spatial methods to detect regional clustering; and (3) inequality measures that quantify the intensity and dispersion of patriarchal practices. Given the temporal and spatial heterogeneity of our data, we also control for key demographic, socioeconomic, and geo-environmental factors shaping regional levels of patriarchy. The project addresses three questions: (1) What were the main Mediterranean variations in sex- and age-related inequalities in family systems, and how distinctive were they globally? (2) Do regional differences reflect a single “Mediterranean patriarchal system” or multiple divergent regimes? (3) Do these differences persist once contextual conditions are considered? By mapping these patterns across the studied regions, the paper reassesses both the diversity of Mediterranean patriarchies and the usefulness of the “Mediterranean model,” highlighting structural continuities as well as divergences.

No extended abstract or paper available

 Presented in Session 46. Patriarchal Regimes in Comparative Perspective: Variation, Measurement, and Historical Change