Aristocratic families and social stability in eleventh-century Provence

For many aristocratic families in southern France and Catalonia, the eleventh century was a period marked by a series of challenges to their estates, and therefore to their economic and social well-being. Studies on this subject have shown that these families responded by turning inward, relying upon the strengths and sacrifices of each of its members, and by adopting an aggressively defensive posture towards the rest of society. While this tightening of links among family members often resulted in conflicts with other groups and individuals in society, it had other less obvious results — it gave individual relatives the authority to speak for, and assume responsibility for, the actions of one another. If this new family unity was often disruptive to society, in other ways it had an important stabilizing influence in society.