Differences Between The Chesapeake Culture

721 Words3 Pages

The Chesapeake’s culture and beliefs were different in many ways. The Chesapeake norms were different from English social norms, which resulted in an unstable region. With the difference between the two cultures, led to relatively ambiguous gender roles for women in the Chesapeake (Berkin, 6). In order to understand the relationship between the men and women in the Chesapeake, one would say it is common for men and women to both marry more than once throughout their lifetime (Berkin 5). Marrying more than one is showed throughout the culture due to the fact that many women marry at young ages, even as early as age 14. The ratio between the two sexes was about six to one and by 1680 a ratio of three to one (Berkin, 6). Men are fortunate to find a wife since there is a big difference in the amount of women to men. One of the reason men and women tend to marry more than once is due to the fact that Chesapeake often experience an early death. Early death was caused by bacterial diseases during pregnancy (Berkin, 7). Men often lived longer than women, but also experienced an early death due to bacterial infections …show more content…

It was common for young Puritan girls to marry at a young age. Many women married before the age of twenty-one and started to have kids right away. By 1650’s the age of women got married steadily to sixteen years old (Berkin 25). The ratio of men and women in the Chesapeake region was unbalanced (Berkin 25). Chesapeake’s often died at a young age, those who harvested tobacco died at an early age, however other Chesapeake who would live longer than those who harvested. Between 1630 and 1670, about three to ten percent of women who gave birth died following their child’s birth. Childbirth was one of the top reasons for women’s death. Although this was dangerous towards many women, many births still followed (Berkin