Exogamy, endogamy and illegittimate children: family strategies of genoese traders at Granada during Modern Age (16th-18th centuries)

Abstract

Genoese merchants and other national groups, traders at major ports and cities of the Monarquía Hispánica (Flemish, French, English) formed small colonies or factions surrounded by locals during the Modern Age. In the case of the Genoese colony of the city of Granada, especially those that the settlement was preferable to return to Genoa, there was the difficult choice between integration, not always easy or advantageous, in the elite of Granada or endogamic marriages with the same national group. In this paper we analyze the two options and some behaviors or family strategies undertaken by the Genoese in particular as regards marriages and the surprising abundance of illegitimate children incurred in Castilian women who appear in this study, such once consequence of the above.