Marriages of the inhabitants of Mosty koło Jabłonkowa parish during “the long 19th century”

The article was written based on parish registers kept in Zemský archiv v Opavě and sources published in the 19th century. Issues regarding demographics in the territory of the Catholic parish of Mosty koło Jabłonkowa, such as: crude marriage rate, ratio of first, second and subsequent marriages, the age of newly‑weds at the moment of entering into marriage, seasonality of marriages, and the number of children born inside a single marriage.Overall coefficients related to entering into marriages in the Mosty parish were mostly higher than average values for Czech lands and Austrian Silesia lands. In Mosty the most numerous were first marriages whose number attained maximal value in the late 1860s and early 1870s and at the beginning of the 20th century. It reflects the general tendency of gradual decrease in percentage of remarrying observed across Czech lands in the second half of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. Data from Mosty on the age of newly‑weds at the moment of entering into marriage are analogous to the results regarding the entirety of Czech lands, yet the lowering of the age of entering into first marriage in the 1870s and at the beginning of the 20th century was characteristic of the parish in question. The findings of investigation into seasonality of marriages in Mosty in the years 1791-1910 are in line with the results obtained for Czech lands and Austrian Silesia - the marriages were concluded most frequently in February and January, often also in autumn (November). The lowest number of marriages was recorded in April, March, and December. Over the entire studied period (1791-1910) in the Catholic parish of Mosty on avarage 4.8 children were born per marriage, which was roughly the same as the results for Czech lands in general.Głównym celem artykułu jest przedstawienie kwestii związanych z zawieraniem małżeństw w katolickiej parafii w Mostach koło Jabłonkowa w XIX wieku. W tekście omówiono liczbę zawieranych małżeństw oraz ich okoliczności, wpływ sytuacji społecznej i gospodarczej na liczbę małżeństw w latach 1791-1910. Punkt wyjścia dla rozważań stanowią badania metryk ślubnych. Ważnym celem opracowania jest wykazanie przydatności analizy demograficznej dla wyjaśnienia przyczyn i konsekwencji przemian demograficznych w kontekście postępującego procesu industrializacji