Reproductive histories and survival in a pre-transitional islander population, Minorca 1600-1875

Marta Muñoz Tudurí, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
Mireia Esparza, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
Clara E. Garcia-Moro, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

The goal of this work was to analyze trade-offs between reproduction and women’s maintenance through a family reconstitution using data from an islander pre-transitional population, Es Mercadal (Minorca Island, Spain), from 1600 to 1875. The study of the costs of reproduction on post-reproductive survival in pre-transitional populations is commonly restricted to the healthiest women who achieve to reach those ages. In turn, our purpose was to analyze the relative effect of women’s reproductive histories on their own reproductive lifespan as well. We found that the probability of death within the childbearing period was related to birth spacing. However, we did not found an association between reproductive histories and post-reproductive survival. In that pre-transitional population characterized by low nutritional levels and a high infectious burden the trade-off between reproduction and maintenance was mainly manifested through the short-term effects of reproduction effort on women survival.