Child in Krakow family in the 2nd half of the 19th century : demographical study

The article constitutes the foundation for further demographic research on the population of children who lived in Krakow in the second half of the 19th century. The community which was the object of the study comprised the inhabitants of Krakow aged 1 and 14. On the basis of the preserved population censuses, the author investigated the percentage of children in the entire population of the city; she tried to answer the question what the structure of the defined subpopulation was with regard to sex and religion and what the percentage of families with children in the total number of Krakow households and families was; she also tried to provide an answer the question how numerous these households were and what the position of children in them was. The author also tried - unsuccessfully - to define in approximation the children’s professional activity. The results of this study point out that the biggest percentage of children, with a small predominance of boys occurred in the population of Krakow around the year 1869; it also showed that the children from Roman-Catholic households had reached the highest percentage (cir. 60%) around the year 1890. The households in which there were children constituted between 56 and 60% and upwards, in the years 1857-1890, whereas as regards the number of family members in these households, there predominated 5-person families in all of the investigated time intervals. Whereas throughout the entire period subjected to analysis, the number of children living outside the families continually increased. The children were entrusted to the care of various institutions, were sent away to boarding schools or else went into service; very often, they were entrusted to the care of distant relations or acquaintances. The number of children who had no families was also on the increase.