Jane Austen's Novels in the Context of Strict Settlement
Melanie Lim
Mentors: Gary Richardson & Wayne Sandholtz
Strict settlement was a legal system of inheritance that prevailed in England from the sixteenth to the
nineteenth centuries. In a settlement, a landowner specified the pattern of succession for his estate, usually
leaving his land to his eldest son and the son of his eldest son. Because strict settlement had such a
tremendous impact on Jane Austen’s life, she incorporated it into the plots of many of her novels. Austen,
however, does not elaborate on the effects of strict settlement on her characters since her contemporaries
were intimately familiar with this legal system. Unfortunately, modern readers who are unfamiliar with strict
settlement cannot fully grasp the major events in her books. This research project seeks to show how a
thorough understanding of the system of strict settlement can provide a deeper insight into the actions of
Austen’s characters and the tensions that occur in her novels.