Titel: GID:191.36.95400
Skrivet av: Ingela Martenius skrivet 2011-02-13, 14:52
Expecting or bearing a child out of wedlock was indeed against the law until 1864, but there are plenty of examples of women who were never brought before a court. If Kjerstin did appear before a court, there will be a record of it - the judiciary district court (häradsrätt) records. The judiciary district (härad) for Östra Ämtervik was Fryksdal (nedre). So the records are filed under Fryksdals nedre tingslags häradsrätt and are available through AD Online. Few court records are indexed, you have to leaf through all records for a year or two.
About the name: 90 % of the population made do with patronymics until well after the 1850's. There were however a number of cases when it was deemed appropriate to assume a family name; one of them was if you became a craftsman of any kind and in particular a smith. However, it wasn't appropriate to start using a family name until you were at least a journeyman, preferably of some years standing. Jonas seems to have behaved just as he ought according to the customs of the time: he didn't marry until he he had been a journeyman smith for some years, and about the same time he would have assumed a family name. Ängberg (or Engberg, also in Sweden a common spelling variation today) is perhaps not the most typical of smiths' names, more like a burgher's name, but that became more and more common from the late 18th century. Where Jonas had the idea specifically of Ängberg is very difficult to say; perhaps he had an association with a farm called that, or he just simply liked the sound (very common reason). Swedes still change family names very frequently, it's a sort of national sport (2009 is supposed to be a top year but then statistics for 2010 aren't ready yet...) - and many select a name from a list of suggested names pre-approved by the authorities, not making up a name from fond associations. Swedes most often have no special feeling for the family name (since it very rarely is more than a generation or two old), and when picking it are more concerned about the sound of it and - for practical reasons - that it matches the old name's initial letter (Larsson e.g. becoming something like Lindqvist). Read more about Swedish naming customs here.
The morning gift was mandatory, by law, until 1921; the law even specified the minimum amount. Some clergymen just wrote morning gift according to law, some always specified, some specified only when it was more than the minimum amount and some never mentioned it (since it was mandatory). The woman never received the gift unless she became a childless widow; then it was used as a widow's pension.