Heirs, Kin, and Creditors in Renaissance Florence

This study, based on Florentine repudiations of inheritance, reveals that inheritance was not simply an automatic process where the recipients were passive, if grateful. In influential European societies of the past, it was in fact a process that continued long after the deceased''s death. Heirs also had options: at the least, to reject a burdensome patrimony, but also to manoeuvre property to oth...