The politics of fertility in seventeenth-century France -- Making pronatalist law -- Gendering reproduction -- Domesticating new France -- Implementing pronatalist policy -- Inside the famille nombreuse -- Depopulation and the revival of pronatalism in the eighteenth century -- Appendix. Provisions and implementation of the 1666 pronatalist edict
Summary
The French obsession with population has roots in the old regime, when the French state used its power to convince French men and women to marry and procreate large families. Drawing on archival research, Tuttle explores the interactions of men, women, and officials all vying for control of the reproductive process
