The random—and not so random—musings of a quirky Regency romance writer.
No one with that many people in her head can possibly be normal...

Sunday, March 29, 2009

Regency Law

Good grief! There is a reason I never considered becoming a lawyer. I hate law books. 

Legal age of adulthood in Regency England: I've heard 21 or 25, male or female; I've heard 21 for men; 25 for women. Everyone seems to have a different idea.
If I understand A Compendious and Comprehensive Law Dictionary By Thomas Walter Williams (1816) correctly, the legal age of adulthood was 21, male or female. At 21, a person was old enough, by law, to marry without parental consent. They were also allowed to do whatever they want with whatever unentailed properties they owned. This seems to be true of women, but somewhere I read that women never got the total freedom with their property that men did. I'll be looking into this some more...

If I got this wrong, feel free to correct me. 

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