ABSTRACT

Given the centrality of a maintenance agreement to the future prosperity of a separated wife, it is striking that provisions for alimony are seldom mentioned in cases of judicial separation appearing before the archbishops' court for either York or Canterbury, even where rulings have survived. The existence of legislation demanding that adulteresses forfeit all rights to their dower raises the question of whether or not a wife's culpability entered into the court's decisions when determining a man's responsibility to provide alimony. Thus, Adam was cited to appear in the church of Farnham the following month, apparently to verify that he was indeed making payments to his wife. Records of the church have been joined with Chancery petitions, letters patent and close, and even borough records in order to examine the legal trail of marital separations across medieval England. Alimony agreements from late medieval England are best characterised by variety.