The Family,Love,and Suicide in Early Modern Geneva

Abstract

Analysis of criminal proceedings and death records for early modem Geneva reveals an explosion in suicides after 1750. New attitudes toward courtship, marriage, and the family contributed to this dramatic increase, as unprecedented numbers of people took their lives because of family concerns, such as marital breakdown, unhappy love stories, and deaths of family members, Greater interest in the companionate marriage was central to these changes. After 1750, marriage, even more than parenthood, offered immunity to suicide, as married people were underrepresented among those who took their lives. Although men constituted the large majority of suicides, women and men shared the growing emphasis on conjugal sentiment, which cut across class lines.