Work packages

WP 1

Family dynamics

(RO1)

WP1 studies wills and inheritance conflicts to examine gender inequality and generational/age-based differences in premodern families, and to develop a more nuanced conceptual vocabulary beyond simple dependent/independent binaries.

PhD 1

Generational dynamics and age inequality in late medieval Brabant (focus on parent–child relations; Antwerp, Leuven, Nivelles).

PhD 2

Testators and their families in early modern Warsaw (Old & New Warsaw, 1543–1604; including widows, spouses, and children; wills and related records).

WP 2

Policy dynamics

(RO2)

WP2 examines how ecclesiastical and secular institutions promoted or constrained testamentary practice, including cooperation and interference between authorities and legislative interventions.

PhD 3

Testamentary practice in the wake of the Hussite movement (documents from 1437 to 1526; online repertory and commentary).

PhD 4

Legislative process and interests behind the Kursächsische Konstitutionen (1572) and questions of ius commune vs ius proprium.

WP 3

Jurisprudential & jurisdictional dynamics

(RO3)

WP3 studies how learned law taught at universities related to legal practice in university towns, and how local regulations and jurisdictional complexity shaped testamentary freedom and disputes.

PhD 5

Joint last wills of spouses in Leuven (c. 1550–1580), including the role of learned law and legal practice.

PhD 6

Wills of law professors and related legal practice in early modern Krakow; strategies within jurisdictional complexity and normative hybridity; source editions and database work.