ETIENNE COURIOLE University of Lyons3 (LAHRA) and University of Toulouse2 (FRAMESPA), Lyons and Toulouse, FranceTOM ERICSSON Umeå University, Umeå, SwedenANNICK FOUCRIER University of Paris-I, Paris, FranceSANDRO GUZZI University of Lausanne, Lausanne, SwitzerlandANTONIO IRIGOYEN University of Murcia, Murcia, SpainCRISTINA MUNNO Venice University, Venice, ItalyMARIANNA MURAVYEVA Herzen State Padagogical University, St Petersburg, RussiaKARI-MATTI PIILAHTI University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland

• List of Figures and Tables Contributors Spiritual Kinship and Godparenthood: an Introduction; G.Alfani  & V.Gourdon PART I: THE EARLY MODERN PERIOD Immigrants and Formalisation of Social Ties in Early Modern Italy; G.Alfani Ecclesiastical Godparenthood in Early Modern Murcia; A.Irigoyen Godparenthood and Social Networks in an Italian Rural Community: Nonantola, Sixteenth-Seventeenth Centuries; G.Alfani  & C.Munno Godparenthood and Social Relationships in France under the Old Regime: Lyons as a Case Study; E.Couriol PART II: GODPARENTHOOD FROM THE EARLY EIGHTEENTH CENTURY TO THE AGE OF INDUSTRIALIZATION What's in a Name? Choosing Kin Godparents in Nineteenth Century Paris; V.Gourdon Spiritual Kinship, Political Mobilization and Social Cooperation: a Swiss Alpine valley in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries; S.Guzzi PART III: REFORMED GODPARENTHOOD Kin, Neighbours or Prominent Persons? Godparenthood in a Finnish Rural Community in the First Half of the Eighteenth Century; K-M.Piilahti Who Wants to be a Godparent? Baptisms in a Lutheran Church in Paris, 1755-1804; T.Ericsson PART IV: EASTERN EUROPE AND EUROPEANS ABROAD Godparenthood in the Russian Orthodox Tradition: Custom against the Law; M.Muravyeva The French in Gold Rush San Francisco and Spiritual Kinship; A.Foucrier Notes Bibliography