by LAURENCE STONE

This book charts and documents, analyses and explains some of the most massive shifts in world views and value systems ever to have taken place in England. These elusive cultural changes are illustrated by a study of the origins of the modern family - a family whose characteristics are that it is conjugal in domestic composition; liberal rather than patriarchal in the distribution of power; bonded by affection between spouses rather than economic interest; deeply concerned with and attached to children; and frank in its expression of sexuality. The complicated and erratic evolution of these attitudes is traced over three centuries, and a theoretical model is put forward to explain their irregular development, and the wide differences that existed from class to class.

Published in 1977 by Harper & Row