Land and Family in Pisticci

The study of family and inheritance systems is a traditionally anthropological one. Dr Davis has examined a South Italian town with records from 1814 and concludes that the present 'typical' European system is of recent adoption, a response to the gradual and peculiar integration of Pisticci into a nation-state and national economy. The account of landholding distinguishes carefully between legal rights and informal cessions of land, and agriculture is put into the context of other economic...