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Widow Conservation was a practice in Protestant Europe in the early modern age, when the widow of a parish vicar was remarried to her husband's successor to ensure her economic support. This practice was common in particularly Scandinavia (''Änkekonservering'') and the Protestant parts of Germany (''Konservierung von Pfarrwitwen''). At the introduction of the Protestant Reformation, the priests were allowed to marry. However, as the priests did not own the vicarage and property attached to his profession, his spouse and issue were left without means to support themselves after his death. The future support of the widows and children of vicars thereby became a concern for the various churches. The most common solution was that the successor of a vicar married the widow (or perhaps the daughter) of his predecessor, thereby "conserving" her. ==Denmark-Norway== In the united kingdoms of Denmark and Norway, the ''Kirkeordinansen'' or Church charter of 1537, issued by Christian III of Denmark after the Reformation in Denmark–Norway and Holstein, secured the widows of priests the right to a ''Naadensaar'' (Year of Grace), during which they were secured an income from the parish of their late spouses and residence at the vicarage.〔Præstegaardsliv i Danmark og Norge i Tidsrummet fra Reformationen til det syttende Aarhundredes Slutning Af Vilhelm Bang (1891)〕 Other than that, however, nothing was done to provide for priest widows, and when the year was over, they were left to support themselves as good as they could, often as midwives or by some small business enterprise in the closest town.〔Præstegaardsliv i Danmark og Norge i Tidsrummet fra Reformationen til det syttende Aarhundredes Slutning Af Vilhelm Bang (1891)〕 In 1566, a recommendation was issued in which priests were lectured to show mercy to the widows of their predecessors and let them stay in the vicarage, and some vicarages established an adjoining widows house in their vicarage.〔Præstegaardsliv i Danmark og Norge i Tidsrummet fra Reformationen til det syttende Aarhundredes Slutning Af Vilhelm Bang (1891)〕 This proved to be insufficient, and by the early 17th-century, it had became customary for a parish to elect a vicar on condition that he marry the widow of his predecessor.〔Præstegaardsliv i Danmark og Norge i Tidsrummet fra Reformationen til det syttende Aarhundredes Slutning Af Vilhelm Bang (1891)〕 There was never any formal law to require this, and if the parish protested to the authorities against a vicar who broke his promise after having ben elected, their complaints were given no support by the crown: however, in practice this was an accepted custom which vicars adjusted to, and during the 17th-century it was not uncommon with vicar's wives who had been married to four priests in succession.〔Præstegaardsliv i Danmark og Norge i Tidsrummet fra Reformationen til det syttende Aarhundredes Slutning Af Vilhelm Bang (1891)〕 In 1659, the first local pension fund for vicars widows were established, after which more and more parishes started to chose this solution, but the custom of Widow Conservation nonetheless continued until the late 18th-century.〔Præstegaardsliv i Danmark og Norge i Tidsrummet fra Reformationen til det syttende Aarhundredes Slutning Af Vilhelm Bang (1891)〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Widow conservation」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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