Marriage

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"Married" redirects here. For the radio comedy programme, see Married (radio series).

Marriage is a social, religious, spiritual and/or legal union of individuals. This union may also be called matrimony, while the ceremony that marks its beginning is usually called a wedding and the married status created is sometimes called wedlock.

Marriage is an institution in which interpersonal relationships (usually intimate and sexual) are acknowledged by the state, by religious authority, or both. It is often viewed as a contract. Civil marriage is the legal concept of marriage as a governmental institution, in accordance with marriage laws of the jurisdiction. If recognized by the state, by the religion(s) to which the parties belong or by society in general, the act of marriage changes the personal and social status of the individuals who enter into it.

People marry for many reasons, but usually one or more of the following: legal, social, emotional, and economic stability; the formation of a family unit; procreation and the education and nurturing of children; legitimizing sexual relations; public declaration of love.

Marriage may take many forms: for example, a union between one man and one woman as husband and wife is a monogamous heterosexual marriage; polygamy– in which a person takes more than one spouse– is common in some societies. Some jurisdictions and religious denominations recognize same-sex marriage, uniting people of the same sex.

A marriage is often formalized by a ceremony called a wedding, which in modern times is usually performed by a religious minister or a civil officer. The act of marriage usually creates normative or legal obligations between the individuals involved and, in many societies, their extended families.

Definitions

Anthropologists have documented a diverse variety of marriage practices across different cultures. Many competing definitions of marriage have been proposed to capture its essential, cross-cultural characteristics.

In his three volume The History of Human Marriage (1921), Edward Westermarck defined marriage as "a more or less durable connection between male and female, lasting beyond the mere act of propagation till after the birth of the offspring."

The anthropological handbook Notes and Queries (1951) defined marriage as "a union of a man and a woman such that children of the woman are recognized as legitimate by both parents." Because the Nuer of Sudan allow for female-female marriage, Kathleen Gough suggested "a woman and one or more other persons." Nuer female-female marriage is done to keep property within a family that has no sons; It's not a form of lesbianism. A legitimacy-based definition has been criticized as not being universal and as being circular.

Edmund Leach argued that no one definition of marriage applied to all cultures. He offered a list of ten rights associated with marriage, including sexual monopoly and rights with respect to children, with specific rights differing across cultures.

Duran Bell proposed that marriage has traditionally been characterized by sexual access rights, suggesting that modern societies which do not provide for such rights have moved toward a distinct institution.

History

See also: History of civil marriage in the U.S. and Timeline of same-sex marriage

The way in which a marriage is conducted has changed over time, as has the institution itself. Although the institution of marriage pre-dates reliable recorded history, many cultures have legends or religious beliefs concerning the origins of marriage.

The origin of marriage may lie in a man's need for assurance as to paternity of his children. He might therefore be willing to pay a bride price or provide for a woman in exchange for exclusive sexual access. Legitimacy is the consequence of this transaction rather than its motivation. In Comanche society, married women work harder, lose sexual freedom, and do not seem to obtain any benefit from marriage. But nubile women are a source of jealousy and strife in the tribe, so they are given little choice other than to get married. "In almost all societies, access to women is institutionalized in some way so as to moderate the intensity of this competition."

European marriages

For most of European history, marriage was more or less a business agreement between two families who arranged the marriages of their children. Romantic love, and even simple affection, were not considered essential. Historically, the perceived necessity of marriage has been stressed.

In Ancient Greece, no specific civil ceremony was required for the creation of a marriage - only mutual agreement and the fact that the couple must regard each other as husband and wife accordingly. Men usually married when they were in their 20s or 30s and expected their wives to be in their early teens. It has been suggested that these ages made sense for the Greek because men were generally done with military service by age 30, and marrying a young girl ensured her virginity. Married Greek women had few rights in ancient Greek society and were expected to take care of the house and children. Time was an important factor in Greek marriage. For example there were superstitions that being married during a full moon was good luck and, according to Robert Flacelière, Greeks married in the winter.

Like with the Greeks, Roman marriage and divorce required no specific government or religious approval. Both marriage and divorce could happen by simple mutual agreement. There were several types of marriages in Roman society. The traditional ("conventional") form called conventio in manum required a ceremony with witnesses and was also dissolved with a ceremony. In this type of marriage, a woman lost her family rights of inheritance of her old family and gained them with her new one. She now was subject to the authority of her husband. There was the free marriage known as sine manu. In this arrangement, the wife remained a member of her original family; she stayed under the authority of her father, kept her family rights of inheritance with her old family and did not gain any with the new family. A law in the Theodosian Code (C. Th. 9.7.3) issued in 342 CE prohibited same-sex marriage, but the exact intent of the law and its relation to social practice is unclear, as only a few examples of same-sex marriage in ancient Rome exist.

A woodcut of a medieval wedlock ceremony from Germany.

From the early Christian era (30 to 325 CE), marriage was thought of as primarily a private matter, with no religious or other ceremony being required. Until 1545, Christian marriages in Europe were by mutual consent, declaration of intention to marry and upon the subsequent physical union of the parties. The couple would promise verbally to each other that they would be married to each other; the presence of a priest or witnesses was not required. This promise was known as the "verbum." If freely given and made in the present tense (e.g., "I marry you"), it was unquestionably binding; if made in the future tense ("I will marry you"), it would constitute a betrothal. One of the functions of churches from the Middle Ages was to register marriages, which was not obligatory. There was no state involvement in marriage and personal status, with these issues being adjudicated in ecclesiastical courts.

In the 12th century, aristocrats believed love was incompatible with marriage and sought romance in adultery. Troubadors invented courtly love which involved secret but chaste trysts between a lover and a beloved.

The average age of marriage in the late 1200s into the 1500s was around 25 years of age. Beginning in the 1500s it was unlawful for a woman younger than 20 years of age to marry.

As part of the Counter-Reformation, in 1545 the Council of Trent decreed that a Roman Catholic marriage would be recognized only if the marriage ceremony was officiated by a priest with two witnesses. The Council also authorized a Catechism, issued in 1566, which defined marriage as, "The conjugal union of man and woman, contracted between two qualified persons, which obliges them to live together throughout life." This change did not extend to the regions affected by the Protestant Reformation, where marriage by consent continued to be the norm. As part of the Reformation, the role of recording marriages and setting the rules for marriage passed to the state. By the 1600s many of the Protestant European countries had a state involvement in marriage.

State recognition

In the early modern period, John Calvin and his Protestant colleagues reformulated Christian marriage by enacting the Marriage Ordinance of Geneva, which imposed "The dual requirements of state registration and church consecration to constitute marriage" for recognition.

In England and Wales, Lord Hardwicke's Marriage Act 1753 required a formal ceremony of marriage, thereby curtailing the practice of Fleet Marriage. These were clandestine or irregular marriages performed at Fleet Prison, and at hundreds of other places. From the 1690s until the Marriage Act of 1753 as many as 300,000 clandestine marriages were performed at Fleet Prison alone. The Act required a marriage ceremony to be officiated by an Anglican priest in the Anglican Church with two witnesses and registration. The Act did not apply to Jewish marriages or those of Quakers, whose marriages continued to be governed by their own customs.

In England and Wales, since 1837, civil marriages have been recognised as a legal alternative to church marriages under the Marriage Act 1836. In Germany, civil marriages were recognised in 1875. This law permitted a declaration of the marriage before an official clerk of the civil administration, when both spouses affirm their will to marry, to constitute a legally recognised valid and effective marriage, and allowed an optional private clerical marriage ceremony.

Chinese marriage

Main article: Chinese marriage

The mythological origin of Chinese marriage is a story about Nüwa and Fu Xi who invented proper marriage procedures after becoming married.

In ancient Chinese society, people of the same surname were not supposed to marry and doing so was seen as incest. However, because marriage to one's maternal relatives was not thought of as incest, families sometimes intermarried from one generation to another. Over time, Chinese people became more geographically mobile. Couples were married in what is called an extra-clan marriage , better known as antithetic marriage. This occurred around 5000 BC. According to modern Chinese scholars of a Marxist persuasion, society supported a matrilineal family model, therefore husbands needed to move to, and live with, their wives’ families. Yet individuals remained members of their biological families. When a couple died, the husband and the wife were buried separately in the respective clans’ graveyard. In a maternal marriage, a male would become a son-in-law who lived in the wife’s home. This happened in the transformation of antithetic marriage into monogamy, which signifies the decline of matriarchy and the growing dominance of patriarchy in the ancient China.

Selection of a partner

Main articles: Arranged marriage and Forced marriage

An arranged marriage between Louis XIV of France and Maria Theresa of Spain

The selection of a marriage partner may involve either the couple going through a selection process of courtship or the marriage may be arranged by the couple's parents or an outside party, a matchmaker.

A pragmatic (or 'arranged') marriage is made easier by formal procedures of family or group politics. A responsible authority sets up or encourages the marriage; they may, indeed, engage a professional matchmaker to find a suitable spouse for an unmarried person. The authority figure could be parents, family, a religious official, or a group consensus.

In some cases, the authority figure may choose a match for purposes other than marital harmony. Some of the most popular uses of arranged marriage are for dowry or immigration.

In rural Indian villages, child marriage is also practiced, with parents at times arranging the wedding, sometimes even before the child is born. This practice is now illegal under the Child Marriage Restraint Act.

In some societies ranging from Central Asia to the Caucasus to Africa, the custom of bride kidnapping still exists, in which a woman is captured by a man and his friends. Sometimes this covers an elopement, but sometimes it depends on sexual violence. In previous times, raptio was a larger-scale version of this, with groups of women captured by groups of men, sometimes in war; the most famous example is The Rape of the Sabine Women, which provided the first citizens of Rome with their wives.

Other marriage partners are more or less imposed on an individual. For example, widow inheritance provides a widow with another man from her late husband's brothers.

Marriage ceremony

Main article: Wedding

Couple married in a Shinto ceremony in Takayama, Gifu prefecture.

A marriage is usually formalised at a wedding or marriage ceremony. The ceremony may be officiated either by a religious official, by a government official or by a state approved celebrant. In many European and some Latin American countries, any religious ceremony must be held separately from the required civil ceremony. Some countries– such as Belgium, Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Romania and Turkey– require that a civil ceremony take place before any religious one. In some countries– notably the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland, Norway and Spain– both ceremonies can be held together; the officiant at the religious and civil ceremony also serving as agent of the state to perform the civil ceremony. To avoid any implication that the state is "recognizing" a religious marriage (which is prohibited in some countries)– the "civil" ceremony is said to be taking place at the same time as the religious ceremony. Often this involves simply signing a register during the religious ceremony. If the civil element of the religious ceremony is omitted, the marriage is not recognised by government under the law.

While some countries, such as Australia, permit marriages to be held in private and at any location, others, including England and Wales, require that the civil ceremony be conducted in a place open to the public and specially sanctioned by law. In England, the place of marriage need no longer be a church or register office, but could also be a hotel, historic building or other venue that has obtained the necessary licence. An exception can be made in the case of marriage by special emergency license, which is normally granted only when one of the parties is terminally ill. Rules about where and when persons can marry vary from place to place. Some regulations require that one of the parties reside in the locality of the registry office.

Within the parameters set by the law of the jurisdiction in which a marriage or wedding takes place, each religious authority has rules for the manner in which weddings are to be conducted by their officials and members.

Cohabitation

See also: Cohabitation

Marriage is an institution which can join together people's lives in a variety of emotional and economic ways. In many Western cultures, marriage usually leads to the formation of a new household comprising the married couple, with the married couple living together in the same home, often sharing the same bed, but in some other cultures this is not the tradition. Among the Minangkabau of West Sumatra, residency after marriage is matrilocal, with the husband moving into the household of his wife's mother. Residency after marriage can also be patrilocal or avunculocal. Also, in southwestern China, walking marriages, in which the husband and wife do not live together, have been a traditional part of the Mosuo culture. Walking marriages have also been increasingly common in modern Beijing. Guo Jianmei, director of the center for women's studies at Beijing University, told a Newsday correspondent, "Walking marriages reflect sweeping changes in Chinese society." A similar arrangement in Saudi Arabia, called misyar marriage, also involves the husband and wife living separately but meeting regularly.

Conversely, marriage is not a prerequisite for cohabitation. In some cases couples living together do not wish to be recognised as married, such as when pension or alimony rights are adversely affected, or because of taxation consideration, or because of immigration issues, and for many other reasons. In modern western societies some couples cohabitate before marriage to test whether such an arrangement might work in the long term.

In some cases cohabitation may constitute a common-law marriage, and in some countries the laws recognise cohabitation in preference to the formality of marriage for taxation and social security benefits. This is the case, for example, in Australia.

Sex and procreation

Marriage typically requires consummation by sexual intercourse, and non-consummation (that is, failure or refusal to engage in sex) may be grounds for an annulment.

There are some married couples who remain childless either by choice or due to infertility or other factors preventing conception or bearing of children. In some cultures, marriage imposes an obligation on women to bear children. In northern Ghana, for example, payment of bridewealth signifies a woman's requirement to bear children, and women using birth control face substantial threats of physical abuse and reprisals.

On the other hand, marriage is not a prerequisite for having children, and having children outside of marriage is today not as uncommon as it used to be. In the United States, the National Center for Health Statistics reported that in 1992, 30.1 percent of births were to unmarried women. In 2006, that number had risen to 38.5 percent. Until recently, children born outside of marriage were termed illegitimate and suffered legal disadvantages and social stigma. In recent years the legal relevance of illegitimacy has declined and social acceptance increased, especially in western countries.

Many of the world's major religions look with disfavor on sexual relations outside of marriage. Sexual relations by a married person with someone other than his/her spouse is normally called adultery, and is also frequently disapproved by the major world religions (some calling it a sin), and has often been - in some jurisdictions continues to be - a crime and grounds for divorce. (See adultery.)

Marriage law

Main article: Marriage law

Rights and obligations

A Ketubah in Aramaic, a Jewish marriage-contract outlining the duties of each partner.

See also: Rights and responsibilities of marriages in the United States

A marriage, by definition, bestows rights and obligations on the married parties, and sometimes on relatives as well, being the sole mechanism for the creation of affinal ties (in-laws). These may include:

• giving a husband/wife or his/her family control over a spouse’s sexual services, labor, and property.
• giving a husband/wife responsibility for a spouse’s debts.
• giving a husband/wife visitation rights when his/her spouse is incarcerated or hospitalized.
• giving a husband/wife control over his/her spouse’s affairs when the spouse is incapacitated.
• establishing the second legal guardian of a parent’s child.
• establishing a joint fund of property for the benefit of children.
• establishing a relationship between the families of the spouses.

These rights and obligations vary considerably between societies, and between groups within society.

Right to marriage

Article 16 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights declares that "Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution. Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses." The Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam gives men and women the "right to marriage" regardless of their race, colour or nationality, but not religion.

Marriage restrictions

Main article: Marriage law § Marriage restrictions

Marriage is an institution that is historically filled with restrictions. From age, to gender, to social status, restrictions are placed on marriage by society for reasons of benefiting the children, passing on healthy genes, to keep property concentrated, or (in some cases) because of prejudice and fear.

Some legal, social, or religious restrictions apply in some countries on the genders of the couple. In response to changing social and political attitudes, some jurisdictions and religious denominations now recognize marriages between people of the same sex. In some jurisdictions these are sometimes called civil unions or domestic partnerships, while some others explicitly prohibit same-sex marriages.

Societies have often placed restrictions on marriage to relatives, though the degree of prohibited relationship varies widely. In most societies, marriage between brothers and sisters has been forbidden. All mainstream religions prohibit some marriages on the basis of the consanguinity (lineal descent) and affinity (kinship by marriage) of the prospective marriage partners, though the standards vary.

There have been countless restrictions placed on marriage by different societies throughout human history, including recently. Restrictions against polygamy and marrying within a particular group or race have been common. Many societies, even some with a cultural tradition of polygamy, recognize monogamy as the only valid form of marriage. Many societies have also adopted other restrictions on whom one can marry, such as prohibitions of marrying persons with the same surname, or persons with the same sacred animal. Societies have also at times required marriage from within a certain group. Anthropologists refer to these restrictions as endogamy. An example of such restrictions would be a requirement to marry someone from the same tribe.

State recognition

Main article: Marriage law § State recognition

In many jurisdictions, a civil marriage may take place as part of the religious marriage ceremony, although they are theoretically distinct. Some jurisdictions allow civil marriages in circumstances which are notably not allowed by particular religions, such as same-sex marriages or civil unions.

Marriage relationships may also be created by the operation of the law alone, as in common-law marriage, sometimes called "marriage by habit and repute."

The status in the eyes of one authority may not be the same as for another, e.g., a marriage may be recognised civilly, but not by a church, and vice versa.

Marriage and religion

All mainstream religions have strong views relating to marriage. Most religions perform a wedding ceremony to solemnize the beginning of a marriage. Some regard marriage as simply a contract, while others regard it as a sacred institution.

Buddhism

See also: Buddhist view of marriage

Christianity

Christian wedding in Kyoto, Japan.

Main article: Christian views of marriage

Liturgical Christian communions - notably Anglicanism, Catholicism, and Orthodoxy - consider marriage (sometimes termed holy matrimony) to be an expression of divine grace, termed a sacrament or mystery. In Western ritual, the ministers of the sacrament are the husband and wife themselves, with a bishop, priest, or deacon merely witnessing the union on behalf of the church, and adding a blessing. In Eastern ritual churches, the bishop or priest functions as the actual minister of the Sacred Mystery (Eastern Orthodox deacons may not perform marriages). Western Christians commonly refer to marriage a vocation, while Eastern Christians consider it an ordination and a martyrdom, though the theological emphases indicated by the various names are not excluded by the teachings of either tradition. Marriage is commonly celebrated in the context of a Eucharistic service (a nuptial Mass or Divine Liturgy). The sacrament of marriage is indicative of the relationship between Christ and the Church (Ephesians 5:29–32), yet most Reformed Christians would deny the elevation of marriage to the status of a sacrament, nevertheless it is considered a covenant between spouses before God. (cf. Ephesians 5:31-33)

In Catholicism, a principle objective of marriage is procreation: "[e]ntering marriage with the intention of never having children is a grave wrong and more than likely grounds for an annulment." Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints believe that "marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and that the family is central to the Creator's plan for the eternal destiny of His children." The LDS belief is that marriage between a man and a woman can last beyond death and into eternity.

Judaism

A Jewish wedding, painting by Jozef Israëls, 1903.

Main article: Jewish views of marriage

In Judaism, marriage is viewed as a contractual bond commanded by God in which a man and a woman come together to create a relationship in which God is directly involved. Though procreation is not the sole purpose, a Jewish marriage is also expected to fulfill the commandment to have children. The main focus centers around the relationship between the husband and wife. Kabbalistically, marriage is understood to mean that the husband and wife are merging together into a single soul. This is why a man is considered "incomplete" if he is not married, as his soul is only one part of a larger whole that remains to be unified.

Islam

Main article: Islamic marital jurisprudence

A Muslim bride of Pakistan origin signing the nikkah nama or marriage certificate.

A Muslim couple being wed alongside the Tungabhadra River at Hampi, India.

Islam also commends marriage, with the age of marriage being whenever the individuals feel ready, financially and emotionally.

In Islam, polygamy is allowed for men, with the specific limitation that they can only have up to four wives at any one time, given the religious requirement that they are able to and willing to partition their time and wealth equally among the respective wives.

For a Muslim wedding to take place, the bride and her guardian must both agree on the marriage. Should either the guardian or the girl disagree on the marriage, it may not legally take place. In essence, while the guardian/father of the girl has no right to force her to marry, he has the right to stop a marriage from taking place, given that his reasons are valid. The professed purpose of this practice is to ensure that a woman finds a suitable partner whom she has chosen not out of sheer emotion.

From an Islamic (Shari'Ah) law perspective, the minimum requirements and responsibilities in a Muslim marriage are that the groom provide living expenses (housing, clothing, food, maintenance) to the bride, and in return, the bride must be a partner (sexually) to the husband. All other rights and responsibilities are to be decided between the husband and wife, and may even be included as stipulations in the marriage contract before the marriage actually takes place, so long as they do not go against the minimum requirements of the marriage (for example: the woman marries the man with the condition that she will not sleep with him).

In Shia Islam marriage must take place in the presence of at least two reliable witnesses, with the consent of the guardian of the bride and the consent of both spouses (including the girl). Following the marriage, the couple is immediately allowed to consummate the marriage. does require witnesses or official statement or presence in a definite place. To create a religious contract between them, it is sufficient that a man and a woman indicate an intention to marry each other and recite the requisite words in front of a Muslim priest The wedding party can be held days, or months later, whenever the couple and their families want to announce the marriage in public..

In Sunni Islam, marriage must take place in the presence of witnesses, with consent bride and the consent of both spouses (including the girl). Following the marriage they may consummate their marriage.

Bahá'í

In the Bahá'í Faith marriage is encouraged and viewed as a mutually strengthening bond, but is not obligatory. A Bahá'í marriage requires the couple to choose each other, and then the consent of all living parents.

Hinduism

Hindu marriage ceremony from a Rajput wedding.

Main article: Marriage in Hinduism

Hinduism sees marriage as a sacred duty that entails both religious and social obligations. Old Hindu literature in Sanskrit gives many different types of marriages and their categorization ranging from "Gandharva Vivaha" (instant marriage by mutual consent of participants only, without any need for even a single third person as witness) to normal (present day) marriages, to "Rakshasa Vivaha" ("demoniac" marriage, performed by abduction of one participant by the other participant, usually, but not always, with the help of other persons).

Sikhism

In a Sikh marriage, the couple make rounds around the holy book called Guru Granth Sahib four times and the holy man speaks some words from the Guru Granth Sahib in the form of kirtan.

Same sex marriage

Main article: Religious arguments about same-sex marriage

For the most part, religious traditions in the world reserve marriage to heterosexual unions, but there are exceptions including Unitarian Universalist, Metropolitan Community Church, Quaker, United Church of Canada, United Church of Christ and Reform Jewish congregations.

Financial considerations

The financial aspects of marriage vary between cultures and have changed over time.

In some cultures, dowries and bride prices continue to be required today. In both cases, the financial arrangements are usually made between the groom (or his family) and the bride's family; with the bride in many cases not being involved in the arrangement, and often not having a choice in whether to participate in the marriage.

In Early Modern Britain, the social status of the couple was supposed to be equal. After the marriage, all the property (called "fortune") and expected inheritances of the wife belonged to the husband.

Dowry

Main article: Dowry

A dowry was not an unconditional gift, but was usually a part of a wider marriage settlement. For example, if the groom had other children, they could not inherit the dowry, which had to go to the bride's children. In the event of her childlessness, the dowry had to be returned to her family, but sometimes not until the groom's death or remarriage. Often the bride was entitled to inherit at least as much as her dowry from her husband's estate.

In some cultures, dowries continue to be required today, while some countries impose restrictions on the payment of dowry.

Bride price and dower

In other cultures, the groom or his family were expected to pay a bride price to the bride's family for the right to marry the daughter, or dower, which was payable to the bride. This required the groom to work for the bride's family for a set period of time.

In the Jewish tradition, the rabbis in ancient times insisted on the marriage couple entering into a marriage contact, called a ketubah. Besides other things, the ketubah provided for an amount to be paid by the husband in the event of a divorce or his estate in the event of his death. This amount was a replacement of the biblical dower or bride price, which was payable at the time of the marriage by the groom to the bride or her parents. This innovation was put in place because the biblical bride price created a major social problem: many young prospective husbands could not raise the bride price at the time when they would normally be expected to marry. So, to enable these young men to marry, the rabbis, in effect, delayed the time that the amount would be payable, when they would be more likely to have the sum. It may also be noted that both the dower and the ketubah amounts served the same purpose: the protection for the wife should her support cease, either by death or divorce. The only difference between the two systems was the timing of the payment. It is the predecessor to the wife's present-day entitlement to maintenance in the event of the breakup of marriage, and family maintenance in the event of the husband not providing adequately for the wife in his will. Another function performed by the ketubah amount was to provide a disincentive for the husband contemplating divorcing his wife: he would need to have the amount to be able to pay to the wife.

Morning gifts, which might also be arranged by the bride's father rather than the bride, are given to the bride herself; the name derives from the Germanic tribal custom of giving them the morning after the wedding night. She might have control of this morning gift during the lifetime of her husband, but is entitled to it when widowed. If the amount of her inheritance is settled by law rather than agreement, it may be called dower. Depending on legal systems and the exact arrangement, she may not be entitled to dispose of it after her death, and may lose the property if she remarries. Morning gifts were preserved for many centuries in morganatic marriage, a union where the wife's inferior social status was held to prohibit her children from inheriting a noble's titles or estates. In this case, the morning gift would support the wife and children. Another legal provision for widowhood was jointure, in which property, often land, would be held in joint tenancy, so that it would automatically go to the widow on her husband's death. Islamic tradition has similar practices. A 'mahr', either immediate or deferred, is the woman's portion of the groom's wealth (divorce) or estate (death). These amounts are usually set based on the groom's own and family wealth and incomes, but in some parts these are set very high so as to provide a disincentive for the groom exercising the divorce, or the husband's family 'inheriting' a large portion of the estate, especially if there are no male offspring from the marriage. In some countries, including Iran, the mahr or alimony can amount to more than a man can ever hope to earn, sometimes up to US$ 1000,000 (4000 official Iranian gold coins). If the husband cannot pay the mahr, either in case of a divorce or on demand, according to the current laws in Iran, he will have to pay it by installments. Failure to pay the mahr might even lead to imprisonment.

Modern customs

In many countries today, each marriage partner has the choice of keeping his or her property separate or combining properties. In the latter case, called community property, when the marriage ends by divorce each owns half. In many legal jurisdictions, laws related to property and inheritance provide by default for property to pass upon the death of one party in a marriage firstly to the spouse and secondly to the children. Wills and trusts can make alternative provisions for property succession.

In some legal systems, the partners in a marriage are "jointly liable" for the debts of the marriage. This has a basis in a traditional legal notion called the "Doctrine of Necessities" whereby a husband was responsible to provide necessary things for his wife. Where this is the case, one partner may be sued to collect a debt for which they did not expressly contract. Critics of this practice note that debt collection agencies can abuse this by claiming an unreasonably wide range of debts to be expenses of the marriage. The cost of defence and the burden of proof is then placed on the non-contracting party to prove that the expense is not a debt of the family. The respective maintenance obligations, both during and eventually after a marriage, are regulated in most jurisdictions; alimony is one such method.

Some have attempted to analyse the institution of marriage using economic theory; for example, anarcho-capitalist economist David Friedman has written a lengthy and controversial study of marriage as a market transaction (the market for husbands and wives).

Taxation

In some countries, spouses are allowed to average their incomes; this is advantageous to a married couple with disparate incomes. To compensate for this somewhat, many countries provide a higher tax bracket for the averaged income of a married couple. While income averaging might still benefit a married couple with a stay-at-home spouse, such averaging would cause a married couple with roughly equal personal incomes to pay more total tax than they would as two single persons. This is commonly called the marriage penalty.

Moreover, when the rates applied by the tax code are not based on averaging the incomes, but rather on the sum of individuals' incomes, higher rates will definitely apply to each individual in a two-earner households in progressive tax systems. This is most often the case with high-income taxpayers and is another situation where some consider there to be a marriage penalty.

Conversely, when progressive tax is levied on the individual with no consideration for the partnership, dual-income couples fare much better than single-income couples with similar household incomes. The effect can be increased when the welfare system treats the same income as a shared income thereby denying welfare access to the non-earning spouse. Such systems apply in Australia and Canada, for example.

Other considerations

Sometimes people marry for purely pragmatic reasons, sometimes called a marriage of convenience or sham marriage. For example, according to one publisher of information about "green card" marriages, "Every year over 450,000 United States citizens marry foreign-born individuals and petition for them to obtain a permanent residency (Green Card) in the United States." While this is likely an over-estimate, in 2003 alone 184,741 immigrants were admitted to the U.S. as spouses of U.S. citizens.

Some people want to marry a person with higher or lower status than them. Others want to marry people who have similar status. Hypergyny refers to the act of seeking out those who are of slightly higher social status. In most cases, hypergyny refers to women wanting men of higher status. Isogyny refers to the act of seeking out those who are of similar status.

Termination

In most societies, the death of one of the partners terminates the marriage, and in monogamous societies this allows the other partner to remarry, though sometimes after a waiting or mourning period.

Many societies also provide for the termination of marriage through divorce. Marriages can also be annulled in some societies, where an authority declares that a marriage never happened. In either event the people concerned are free to remarry (or marry). After divorce, one spouse may have to pay alimony.

Several cultures have practiced temporary and conditional marriages. Examples include the Celtic practice of handfasting and fixed-term marriages in the Muslim community. Pre-Islamic Arabs practiced a form of temporary marriage that carries on today in the practice of Nikah Mut'ah, a fixed-term marriage contract. Muslim controversies related to Nikah Mut'ah have resulted in the practice being confined mostly to Shi'ite communities.

Post-marital residence

Early theories explaining the determinants of postmarital residence (e.g., Lewis Henry Morgan, Edward Tylor, or George Peter Murdock) connected it with the sexual division of labor. However, to date, cross-cultural tests of this hypothesis using worldwide samples have failed to find any significant relationship between these two variables. However, Korotayev's tests show that the female contribution to subsistence does correlate significantly with matrilocal residence in general; however, this correlation is masked by a general polygyny factor. Although an increase in the female contribution to subsistence tends to lead to matrilocal residence, it also tends simultaneously to lead to general non-sororal polygyny which effectively destroys matrilocality. If this polygyny factor is controlled (e. g., through a multiple regression model), division of labor turns out to be a significant predictor of postmarital residence. Thus, Murdock's hypotheses regarding the relationships between the sexual division of labor and postmarital residence were basically correct, though, as has been shown by Korotayev, the actual relationships between those two groups of variables are more complicated than he expected.

In modern societies we observe a trend toward the neolocal residence.

Contemporary views on marriage

Criticisms

Main article: Criticism of marriage

Many people have proposed arguments against marriage for various reasons. These include political and religious criticisms, pragmatic reference to the divorce rate, as well as celibacy for religious or philosophical reasons.

Controversial views

Some views about marriage are controversial. Advocates of same-sex rights criticize the exclusion of homosexual relationships from legal and social recognition and the rights and obligations it provides. At the same time advocates of the traditional marriage movement oppose any attempt to define marriage to include anything other than the union of one man and one woman, claiming that to do so would "deprive the term of its fundamental and defining meaning."

See also

• Age at first marriage
• Age disparity in sexual relationships
• Feminism
• List of people with longest marriages
• Marriage privatization
• Men's Rights
• Misandry
• Radical Feminism
• Same-Sex Marriage
• Sexual conflict
• Types of marriages

Related concepts

• Adultery - Sexual intercourse between a married person and a partner other than the lawful spouse.
• Alimony - obligation of support.
• Annulment - legal procedure for declaring a marriage null and void.
• Aufruf - A ceremony in which Jews pelt the couple to be married with candy on the Shabbat before the wedding.
• Betrothal - formal state of engagement to be married.
• Brideservice
• Child marriage
• Chinese marriage
• Christian views of marriage - views of Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Protestant, and others
• Civil marriage - marriages which are constituted by a government official and not a religious congregation.
• Divorce - ending of a marriage.
• Engagement
• Family therapy/Relationship counseling
• Free love - a social movement opposed to marriage
• Head and Master laws
• Husband/Wife
• Human sexuality
• Human-animal marriage - ceremonial ritual practice in some cultures, with no legal standing
• Human sexual behavior
• Hypergamy
• Inheritance
• Islamic marital jurisprudence
• Living apart together
• Mail-order bride
• Marriage (conflict)
• Marriage gap
• Marriage in the United States
• Marriage law
• Marriageable age
• Monogamy/Polygamy
• Nikah urfi
• Ondertrouw in the Netherlands and Belgium
• Separation - a step in the ending of a marriage.
• Social unit
• Wedding
• Wedding ring

External links

• African Marriage Rituals
• Gillis, John R. (1985). For Better, for Worse: British Marriages, 1600 to the Present. Oxford University Press. ISBN 019503614X.
• 'Forever and a Day' or 'Just One Night'? On Adaptive Functions of Long-Term and Short-Term Romantic Relationships
• "Legal Regulation of Marital Relations: An Historical and Comparative Approach– Gautier 19 (1): 47– International Journal of Law, Policy and the Family". Retrieved 2007-06-13.
• "Marriage – its various forms and the role of the State" on BBC Radio 4’s In Our Time featuring Janet Soskice, Frederik Pedersen and Christina Hardyment
• "Radical principles and the legal institution of marriage: domestic relations law and social democracy in Sweden – Bradley 4 (2): 154– International Journal of Law, Policy and the Family". Retrieved 2007-06-13.
• Recordings & Photos from a College Historical Society debate on the role of marriage in modern life, featuring Senator David Norris and Senator Ronan Mullen.
• The National Marriage Project at Rutgers University