明清文书档案反映的农民家庭规模

Peasant Family Size in Ming and Qing Dynasties: Evidence from the Local Archives

文章以明清部分文书档案为中心,对明清农民家庭规模进行考察。研究发现,遗存的明代户帖、黄册文书等展现了当时一些农民家庭人口构成的具体情况,其规模较小,户平均为5口左右。清代保甲烟户册显示的家庭人口规模大致与此相同。黄册底籍所载表明,小家庭占当时农村居住人户的绝大多数。

Based on some local archives from Ming and Qing dynasties, this paper examines household size of peasants at that time. The remained records of household registration and local archives from Ming dynasty document the small size in some peasants’ families then, about five on average per household. The household registration of some villages in Qing dynasty show a similar average family size to that of Ming dynasty. These findings indicate that the majority of families in Ming and Qing dynasties were small-sized.