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gentry marriages "mr" and "mrs"

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  • gentry marriages "mr" and "mrs"

    i found a marriage in jun 1591 between "mr william cave and mrs elizabeth bundnell? (transcribed "brudnell")" in stonton wyville, leicestershire.

    why the use of "mr" and "mrs"? i heard once that for gentry the terms were used as a sign of respect, instead of indicating a widow? does anyone know?

  • #2
    Mrs is always a widow as far as I know. She would have been Miss if she were never married.

    The only time I have heard of Mrs being given as a courtesy title is for older female upper servants, such as a cook or a housekeeper.

    OC

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    • #3
      Originally posted by kylejustin View Post
      i found a marriage in jun 1591 between "mr william cave and mrs elizabeth bundnell? (transcribed "brudnell")" in stonton wyville, leicestershire.

      why the use of "mr" and "mrs"? i heard once that for gentry the terms were used as a sign of respect, instead of indicating a widow? does anyone know?
      Don't know if it's any help, but given your 1590s date, various characters - both married and unmarried - are referred to as Master and Mistress Ford, Page etc in Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor. Also for what it's worth, they are all what we would now call middle-class, not quite gentry.
      So could Mr and Mrs at that time just be abbreviations for Master and Mistress, with no indication as to whether single or unmarried at the time of marriage???

      Christine
      Last edited by Karamazov; 26-02-17, 11:13.
      Researching:
      HOEY (Fermanagh, other Ulster counties and Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada) BANNIGAN and FOX (Ballyshannon, Donegal, Ireland and Portland, Maine, USA) REYNOLDS, McSHEA, PATTERSON and GOAN (Corker and Creevy, Ballyshannon, Donegal, Ireland) DYER (Belfast and Ballymacarrett) SLEVIN and TIMONEY (Fermanagh) BARNETT (Ballagh, Tyrone and Strangford, Down)

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      • #4
        In SW Scotland during the 1960s - 1980s it was still common to hear a woman of any age who was either married or widowed being called Mistress. Unmarried women were Miss. This applied right across the social scale.
        Last edited by GallowayLass; 26-02-17, 13:45.

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        • #5
          Oh, I've just twigged it's a transcription you are looking at. I don't recall seeing the abbreviation "Mrs" in such early records, it would be mistress. I have quite a few 1500s marriages in the gentry and they usually say Mr Joe Blogs and Jane Doe, the daughter of Mr Fred Doe. Remember that in the 1500s, women belonged to their fathers before marriage and to their husband afterwards. Only as widows did they become a person in their own right.

          OC

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          • #6
            Leicestershire parish records are now online on FMP, so you can see the original register:

            Create an account for free with Findmypast to discover your family history and build a family tree. Search birth records, census data, death records and more.


            The writing's a bit hard to read, but it does look like Mr and Mrs. The other people on the page aren't given titles, so they were presumably gentry. It looks like Brudnell to me too.
            Last edited by Mary from Italy; 26-02-17, 17:08.

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            • #7
              never mind that:( I'm so jealous anyone has got that far back

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              • #8
                Val

                Lol!

                It can be surprisingly easy to get that far back and further, if your ancestors owned property! It's a different kind of research though, no bmds unless they are marriage agreements.

                OC

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                • #9
                  OC my lot are horrible to research, doesn't help one Great Grandfather was born in Germany and another in Poland, so hard to find anything.:( plus one lot had a habit of covering his tracks.

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                  • #10
                    I've been lucky enough to find a few people in in my tree in PRs dating back to the 1500s, but as OC says, to go back further it helps if they own property. Wills can be very useful, and I've made a lot of headway since the Leicestershire wills went online.
                    Last edited by Mary from Italy; 26-02-17, 19:56.

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                    • #11
                      The couple i am looking for are most certainly gentry. William cave of grantham, lincs was a son of margaret cecil, sister of elizabeth I's advisor lord burghley. He was knighted in 1603. The wife is elizabeth burnell of winkburn, notts. I was wondering if this was their marriage, but apparently they married in 1592 at southwell, notts according to freebmd. The transcript also states "mr william cave and mrs elizabeth burnell". From the tidbits i can find on the internet, elizabeth was only married once.

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                      • #12
                        Val

                        I have many lines which stop dead in 1800 because of illegitimacy so I reckon I deserve the two lines that gallop back to the 1200s! Both of those lines " follow the money" as they say, and while I am confident I have the right family, I'm not so confident I have the right individuals or even the right generations.

                        OC

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                        • #13
                          I suppose OC most of us will never be 100% sure all the time, you do get a sort of sense if its wrong dont you ? I have a few which I was positive about but then I started to wonder, and talked myself out of it.
                          Last edited by Guest; 26-02-17, 23:14.

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                          • #14
                            Hm Deene Park Northants has been the seat of the Brudenells since 1514! Not yet found acristocracy in my family but I have found some working for the Brudenells! Deene is not that far from Burleigh.

                            Janet
                            Last edited by Janet; 27-02-17, 16:57.

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