I've so far only read the first chapter and Lucy Worsley is starting to annoy me a little. She remarks things in this book so weirdly worded without clarifying or elaborating, as if it was common knowledge. First she writes that it was common for brothers to marry a sister, without explaining what she means, because brothers were never allowed to marry their sisters in Regency England, it was brother-in-laws who were allowed to marry their sister-in-laws (which later was made illegal in the Victorian period). Then, only a few pages later, she writes this:

Mr Austen's 'factotum', John Bond...It was his job to manage Mr Austen's rented farm...Following country custom, he'd marry his wife Ann only after their first daughter was born.

Then nothing. No explanation, how this custom worked, what society in the country thought of that and what the ramifications were to have a child out of wedlock. Because from what I know of this era, children born before marriage were and would stay being illegitimate even after the parents marry, when they were born before that happened.

Immediately after I read this I went on a googling-spree trying to find out what she's referring to here. I didn't find anything on it being completely acceptable in the country to marry after the first child was born.

The only things that came up in my search was that in earlier centuries there were customs such as "handfasting" and "bundling", but they were sth different.

Handfasting was "a traditional marriage or betrothal practice in which a couple make a pledge by joining, clasping, or symbolically binding their hands." So still a legitimate marriage, just without someone of the clergy in attendance.

Bundling "emerged in rural, cold regions (such as colonial New England and parts of Europe) due to shortages of beds, harsh winters, and the high cost of firewood...It was an 18th and early 19th-century colonial courtship custom where engaged or courting couples were permitted to share a bed for the night, fully clothed, sometimes separated by a wooden board, or with the woman sewn into a "bundling sack" to ensure physical boundaries were maintained."

Only after a bit more research did I finally receive the term "bridal pregnancy". Apparently there was a time in the 19th century where

"prenuptial sex and cohabitation were a normalized part of the courting process. It served as a way to prove a woman’s "fecundity" (fertility), with the understanding that marriage would immediately follow if she became pregnant."

I don't know how much of this is actually true, it was the first thing google showed me when I searched for "bridal pregnancy". It was difficult to find a legitimate source for this.

"For the working class and rural communities, marriage was largely an economic necessity. Communities often accepted premarital intimacy, provided the couple followed through and married before the baby was born. In stricter religious and upper-class circles, these quickened marriages were often forced ("shotgun weddings") to salvage the family's reputation and ensure the child was born legitimate."

So, I'm still struggling to understand what Worsley means by saying it was so common for country people to wait til the child was born. Especially someone who works for a clergyman. The child would be illegitimate. And in that era that meant sth, even in the lower classes, I believe.

If you read this far and know more about this topic, please enlighten me!

...brothers sometimes married an older sister and then, if she died, the younger one.

Excuse me, what? What does she mean by that? The full quote is this:

In an age when parents often died before their children were grown, aunts and uncles and extended kin could be just as important. 'I like first Cousins to be first Cousins, & interested about each other', Jane would later write. Among the Austens, cousins frequently married, and brothers sometimes married an older sister and then, if she died, the younger one. The pool of eligible spouses at the 'right' level in society was not large, so this was a world that was almost incestuous.

I must've misunderstood this! Is she talking about brother-in-law marrying his sister-in-law? I could understand that. It can't be that she means biological siblings. I know that there was a time in that period, or at the very least in the middle of the 19th century, when marrying your brother-in-law or sister-in-law was considered incest by law. But Worsley wrote here that brothers married an older sister. But she couldn't have meant that, right? Because she wrote afterwards "almost incestuous", and the way she wrote it would mean full on incest. I'm confused!

it is more natural to have flowers grow out of the head than fruit.

I don't know why, but I thought the whole following section was pretty funny 😄 Jane is all over the place here with her thoughts, but I cannot help but find her personality quite witty and cheeky here:

So much for Mrs Piozzi. I had some thoughts of writing the whole of my letter in her stile,...but I beleive I shall not. - Though you have given me unlimited powers concerning Your Sprig, I cannot determine what to do about it, & shall therefore in this & in every future letter continue to ask you for farther directions...I cannot decide on the fruit till I hear from you again. Besides, I cannot help thinking that it is more natural to have flowers grow out of the head than fruit. - What do you think on that subject? - I would not let Martha read First Impressions again upon any account, & am very glad that I did not leave it in your power. She is very cunning, but I see through her design; she means to publish it from Memory, & one more perusal must enable her to do it. - As for Fitzalbini, when I get home she shall have it, as soon as ever she will own that Mr Elliott is handsomer than Mr Lance that fair Men are preferable to Black - for I mean to take every opportunity of rooting out her prejudices."

For those who don't know, First impressions was the original title of Pride and Prejudice.