448 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



In France and Italy also Jews frequently marry christians. This 

 is particularly the case with the French aristocracy, who often marry 

 Jewish heiresses. 2 In Italy the Jews to-day are thoroughly assimilated, 

 and many observers state that mixed marriages are almost as frequent 

 as pure marriages. 



In eastern Europe they are less frequent. In Austria, during 1901, 

 there were contracted 7,576 pure Jewish marriages and 147 mixed 

 marriages. But here we can see how far isolation acts as a preventive 

 of intermarriage. Of the 147 mixed marriages contracted during 

 1901, 98 were in the city of Vienna and 25 in Bohemia. Although 

 three quarters of all the Austrian Jews live in Galicia, still not a single 

 case of intermarriage was recorded there during that year. It must 

 also be mentioned that in Austria intermarriage between Jews and 

 christians is not permitted by the law, and in many cases of mixed 

 marriages, one of the parties adopts the religion of his or her partner, 

 and the marriage is thus recorded as pure christian or pure Jewish; 

 or one or both declare themselves as dissenters (Konfessionslos) and 

 appear on the registration lists as the marriage of a Jew with a dis- 

 senter, or of dissenters. As a result of this condition the available 

 figures do not by any means represent the true condition of affairs. 



Up to 1895 intermarriage was entirely prohibited by law in Hun- 

 gary, unless one of the parties was converted to the religion of his or 

 her partner. Since this law was abolished in 1895, mixed marriages 

 are taking place in large numbers. During the nine years, 1895 to 

 1903, 3,590 Jews married with christians, and 60,275 with Jews, i. e., 

 5.95 per cent, of all pure Jewish marriages were mixed. Most of these 

 marriages are contracted in the city of Budapest, where the proportion 

 reached 17.06 per cent, during 1903 and 1904. The steady increase 

 of mixed marriages in that city is well seen from the following figures : 



1896-1900 



Jews to christian women 6.71 



Christians to Jewesses 7.22 



It thus appears that every thirteenth Jew who married in Budapest, 

 during 1904, married a christian. 



For English-speaking countries there are no available statistics on 

 the subject of intermarriage, because no religious censuses are taken. 

 In England they occur often among the native Jews, and although 

 among the immigrant Jewish population in London they are less fre- 

 quent, still they are not as rare as is generally believed. In New South 



2 It has been alleged that most of the mixed marriages are contracted be- 

 tween christian noblemen and rich Jewish heiresses. This is disproved by the 

 figures in the table of mixed marriages. The proportion of Jews who marry 

 christian women is larger than that of christians who marry Jewesses. 



