ABSTRACT
In the course of time, prolongation of life changed the age pyramid, stabilized family life and reduced the frequency of remarriages and the proportion of orphans. Among the ruling families of Europe, the probability of first marriage has increased and so, too, has the age at first marriage. As compared with the first hundred years, during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the younger age groups showed declining percentages becoming married, while in the older age groups the percentages rose, implying a diminishing proportion of elderly bachelors and spinsters. For childless married men, the age-specific death rates per 1,000 person-years were higher than for bachelors and correspondingly higher than for fathers. The healthier bachelors married and became fathers if neither they nor their wives were sterile, or if they did not die prematurely as a result of war or pestilence.
