Page 141 - Upland Families, Elites and Communities

A Dynasty of Mayors and a Member of Parliament

age growth of the village population and households. In 1820, there were
as many as eight Černe holdings (some of which were indeed estates) in
Tomaj, which represented a larger share of the total holdings than in 1758.
In 1870, the number and the share of Černe households in the village was,
again, a little higher than half a century earlier (figure 4.3). A hypothetical
perfect reciprocity with the other families in the village at baptisms (at a
rate of 1:1) would mean that about six percent Černe godfatherhoods in
Tomaj would represent a normal yearly average in the mid-eighteenth cen-
tury, in the early nineteenth a normal share would be around eleven per-
cent, while in the second half of that century it would be close to twelve
percent (table 4.1). These shares of the Černe households in relation to all
the households in Tomaj, applied to godfatherhoods, represent a conve-
nient means of determining the excess proportion of godparents relative
to the demographic weight of the Černe family in the village community
and thus also a useful criterion to measure their popularity in the village
community. This way, it becomes apparent that as members of the village
elitetheywereindeed aboveaveragely attractive asgodfathers,especially
between the 1740s and 1820s, while later during the nineteenth century,
with rare exceptions, in their best years they barely reached a fair level of
reciprocity within the community.
In the last decade of the seventeenth century and the first of the eigh-
teenth, the fluctuation and the high percentages of Černe godfathers in
Tomaj (figure 4.3) seems to derive much more from the low number and
the fluctuation of births than from anything else. In all the years record-
ed, the Černes act as godfathers only once in a year, except for 1702, 1705
and 1709, when they appear twice. Being mayor between 1690 and 1710
does not make Marko the eldest attractive as a godfather. Namely, there is
no evidence of him acting as a godfather. It is his sons Štefan and Tomaž
who served frequently as godfathers, while Andrej is recorded only twice,
in 1705 and 1707. It seems indicative that in 1696–1697, when Andrej had

and (apparently) also with his married brother Jakob, his wife and children. The second
holding was then still in the name of Tomaž, Andrej’s brother, although he had died in 1752,
so theactualheadmust havebeen his son Jožef with hiswifeand children.In fact, theother
son Anton died a few days after his father in 1752; in 1758, Anton’s widow Marina Černe
(born Fabjan) was recorded as the head of a third holding, a half-farm that had belonged to
her deceased father Ivan Fabjan (ast, atta, 242.1, 3; šak, žat, mku 3). This Anton was
the founder of the Černe family branch called Fabjanijevi (due to his marriage and probably
later inheritance of the Fabian holding by his son), from which in the next century the
member of parliament Anton Černe stems.

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