Property transmission and household developmental cycle: continuity and change. The case of a Czech village in Bulgaria (1900-1950)
Abstract
The text analyzes property transmission, household developmental cycle and intra-familiar relationships in Voyvodovo, Czech village in Bulgaria, in period 1900-1950. Voyvodovo Czechs, Evangelics whose forefathers left Czech lands in 1820s to settle in Banat to move to Bulgaria in 1900, were attached to land and agriculture, but yet they had to deal with changing political, economical and cultural environments.
The text focuses on the relative impact of cultural continuity vs. adaptation in the area of inheritance and family relationships. It is argued that from the point of view of the developmental cycle it is difficult to place Voyvodovo ethnographic material unequivocally into the wider classifications of the European family.
The case of Voyvodovo also illuminates some methodological difficulties resulting from the differences in using historical and social anthropological methods.