Pride & Prejudice is a classic novel written by Jane Austen in 1813. During that time in history the practice of ladies having a dowery was still in use. The amount of a ladies dowery was also a status symbol and made the lady “more desirable” for a marriage. The graph above shows the dowery amounts for the female characters in Pride & Prejudice.
Each Bennet sister (Jane, Elizabeth, Mary, Kitty, and Lydia) only had a 1000 pound dowery. This amount was not that big for the time and made them in theory, “less desirable” for marriage. However three of the five sisters ended up finding husbands by the end of the book. So even in the 18th century, not everyone marries for money.
Carolina Bingley had a large dowery at 20,000 pounds. Although this amount should have made it easier for her to marry, she never found a husband in the book. Her personality was her biggest downfall.
Georgiana Darcey had the largest dowery in novel at 30,000 pounds. Unfortunately for her, this made her a target for men who only wanted to marry to increase their bank accounts. Luckily, the first and only attempt at this was stopped. Georgiana was still unmarried at the close of the novel. But this had to do with her age, because she was also one of the youngest characters at 16.
Pride & Prejudice Characters Dowery Amounts Graph Notes:
The x-axis (horizontal part of the graph) shows the name of the character. The y-axis (vertical part of the graph) shows the dowery amount. Each bar represents the Pride & Prejudice dowery amount that character has in British pounds. Jane Austen: She was an English novelist made famous from authoring six major novels, which interpret, critique and comment upon the British society at the end of the 18th century. Dowery: Money or property brought by a woman to her husband at marriage.
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