What Is Marriage

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Retrieved 26 April 2006 from. Retrieved November 14, 2011. Main article: Polygyny is widely practiced in mostly and African countries.

It is the predecessor to the wife's present-day entitlement to 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. These changes have occurred primarily in.

What Is Marriage

Swedish royal wedding clothes from 1766 at in Stockholm Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a socially or ritually recognised union between that establishes rights and obligations between those spouses, as well as between them and any resulting biological or adopted children and in-laws and other family through marriage. The definition of marriage varies around the world not only between cultures and between religions, but also throughout the history of any given culture and religion, evolving to both expand and constrict in who and what is encompassed, but typically it is principally an in which interpersonal relationships, usually , are acknowledged or sanctioned. In some cultures, marriage is recommended or considered to be compulsory. When defined broadly, marriage is considered a. A marriage ceremony is known as a. Nepali wedding Individuals may marry for several reasons, including legal, social, , emotional, financial, , and religious purposes. Whom they marry may be influenced by , , , parental choice and individual desire. In some areas of the world, , , , and sometimes , may be practiced as a cultural tradition. Conversely, such practices may be outlawed and penalized in parts of the world out of concerns of the infringement of women's rights, or the infringement of children's rights both female and male children , and because of international law. Marriage can be recognized by a , an , a religious authority, a , a local , or peers. It is often viewed as a. When a marriage is performed and carried out by a government institution in accordance with the of the jurisdiction, without religious content, it is a. Civil marriage recognizes and creates the rights and obligations intrinsic to matrimony before the state. When a marriage is performed with religious content under the auspices of a religious institution it is a religious marriage. Religious marriage recognizes and creates the rights and obligations intrinsic to matrimony before that religion. Religious marriage is known variously as in , in , in , and various other names in other faith traditions, each with their own constraints as to what constitutes, and who can enter into, a valid religious marriage. Some countries do not recognize locally performed religious marriage on its own, and require a separate civil marriage for official purposes. Conversely, civil marriage does not exist in some countries governed by a , such as , where marriages contracted abroad might not be recognized if they were contracted contrary to Saudi interpretations of. In countries governed by a , such as in and , locally performed civil marriage also does not exist within the country, preventing interfaith and various other marriages contradicting religious laws from being entered into in the country, however, civil marriages performed abroad are recognized by the state even if they conflict with religious laws in the case of recognition of , this includes recognition of not only interfaith civil marriages performed abroad, but also overseas same-sex civil marriages. The act of marriage usually creates or legal obligations between the individuals involved, and any offspring they may produce or adopt. In terms of legal recognition, most sovereign states and other jurisdictions limit marriage to couples and a diminishing number of these permit , , and. In modern times, a growing number of countries, primarily developed democracies, have lifted bans on and have established legal recognition for the marriages of , , and couples. Some cultures allow the dissolution of marriage through or. In some areas, child marriages and polygamy may occur in spite of national laws against the practice. Since the late twentieth century, major social changes in Western countries have led to changes in the demographics of marriage, with the age of first marriage increasing, fewer people marrying, and more couples choosing to rather than marry. For example, the number of marriages in Europe decreased by 30% from 1975 to 2005. Historically, in most cultures, married women had very few rights of their own, being considered, along with the family's children, the property of the ; as such, they could not own or inherit property, or represent themselves legally see for example. In Europe, the United States, and other places in the , beginning in the late 19th century and lasting through the 21st century, marriage has undergone gradual legal changes, aimed at improving the rights of the wife. These changes included giving wives legal identities of their own, abolishing the right of husbands to physically discipline their wives, giving wives property rights, liberalizing divorce laws, providing wives with of their own, and requiring a 's consent when sexual relations occur. These changes have occurred primarily in. In the 21st century, there continue to be controversies regarding the legal status of married women, legal acceptance of or leniency towards violence within marriage especially sexual violence , traditional marriage customs such as and , forced marriage, , and criminalization of consensual behaviors such as and. Around the world, primarily in developed democracies, there has been a general trend towards ensuring within marriage for women and legally recognizing the marriages of , , and couples. These trends coincide with the broader. This in turn is derived from , marier to marry , and ultimately , marītāre, meaning to provide with a husband or wife and marītāri meaning to get married. None of these men had legal rights to the woman's child. He argued that a legitimacy-based definition of marriage is circular in societies where illegitimacy has no other legal or social implications for a child other than the mother being unmarried. Collection of rights criticized Gough's definition for being too restrictive in terms of recognized legitimate offspring and suggested that marriage be viewed in terms of the different types of rights it serves to establish. In 1955 article in , 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. Anthropologist 's comparative study of marriage around the world utilizing the found a strong correlation between intensive plough agriculture, dowry and monogamy. This pattern was found in a broad swath of Eurasian societies from Japan to Ireland. In the countries which do not permit polygamy, a person who marries in one of those countries a person while still being lawfully married to another commits the crime of. In all cases, the second marriage is considered legally null and void. Besides the second and subsequent marriages being void, the bigamist is also liable to other penalties, which also vary between jurisdictions. Serial monogamy Governments that support monogamy may allow easy divorce. In a number of Western countries divorce rates approach 50%. Those who remarry do so on average three times. This can be interpreted as a form of plural mating, as are those societies dominated by female-headed families in the , and where there is frequent rotation of unmarried partners. As a series of connected households, they come to resemble the polygynous model of separate households maintained by mothers with children, tied by a male to whom they are married or divorced. Polygamy Main article: Polygamy is a marriage which includes more than two partners. When a man is married to more than one wife at a time, the relationship is called , and there is no marriage bond between the wives; and when a woman is married to more than one husband at a time, it is called , and there is no marriage bond between the husbands. A molecular genetic study of global human genetic diversity argued that sexual polygyny was typical of human reproductive patterns until the shift to sedentary farming communities approximately 10,000 to 5,000 years ago in Europe and Asia, and more recently in Africa and the Americas. A survey of other cross-cultural samples has confirmed that the absence of the plough was the only predictor of polygamy, although other factors such as high male mortality in warfare in non-state societies and pathogen stress in state societies had some impact. Marriages are classified according to the number of legal spouses an individual has. Societies show variable acceptance of polygamy as a cultural ideal and practice. According to the , of 1,231 societies noted, 186 were monogamous; 453 had occasional polygyny; 588 had more frequent polygyny; and 4 had polyandry. However, as Miriam Zeitzen writes, social tolerance for polygamy is different from the practice of polygamy, since it requires wealth to establish multiple households for multiple wives. The actual practice of polygamy in a tolerant society may actually be low, with the majority of aspirant polygamists practicing monogamous marriage. Tracking the occurrence of polygamy is further complicated in jurisdictions where it has been banned, but continues to be practiced de facto polygamy. The vast majority of the world's countries, including virtually all of the world's developed nations, do not permit polygamy. There have been calls for the abolition of polygamy in developing countries. Polygyny See also: Polygyny usually grants wives equal status, although the husband may have personal preferences. One type of de facto polygyny is , where only one woman gets a wife's rights and status, while other women remain legal house mistresses. Although a society may be classified as polygynous, not all marriages in it necessarily are; monogamous marriages may in fact predominate. To correct this condition, females had to be killed at birth, remain single, become prostitutes, or be siphoned off into celibate religious orders. Polygynous systems have the advantage that they can promise, as did the Mormons, a home and family for every woman. In some cases, there is a large age discrepancy as much as a generation between a man and his youngest wife, compounding the power differential between the two. Tensions not only exist between genders, but also within genders; senior and junior men compete for wives, and senior and junior wives in the same household may experience radically different life conditions, and internal hierarchy. Several studies have suggested that the wive's relationship with other women, including co-wives and husband's female kin, are more critical relationships than that with her husband for her productive, reproductive and personal achievement. In some societies, the co-wives are relatives, usually sisters, a practice called sororal polygyny; the pre-existing relationship between the co-wives is thought to decrease potential tensions within the marriage. Often, however, it is difficult to draw a hard and fast line between the two. Although it does not involve multiple now illegal formal marriages, the domestic and personal arrangements follow old polygynous patterns. The de facto form of polygyny is found in other parts of the world as well including some Mormon sects and Muslim families in the United States. In some societies such as the of South Africa, or the of the Sudan, aristocratic women may become female 'husbands. This is not a lesbian relationship, but a means of legitimately expanding a royal lineage by attaching these wives' children to it. The relationships are considered polygynous, not polyandrous, because the female husband is in fact assuming masculine gendered political roles. Religious groups have differing views on the legitimacy of. It is allowed in and. They do explicitly prohibit polygyny today. Polyandry Main articles: , , and is notably more rare than polygyny, though less rare than the figure commonly cited in the Ethnographic Atlas 1980 which listed only those polyandrous societies found in the Himalayan Mountains. More recent studies have found 53 societies outside the 28 found in the Himalayans which practice polyandry. It is most common in egalitarian societies marked by high male mortality or male absenteeism. It is associated with partible paternity, the cultural belief that a child can have more than one father. The explanation for polyandry in the Himalayan Mountains is related to the scarcity of land; the marriage of all brothers in a family to the same wife fraternal polyandry allows family land to remain intact and undivided. If every brother married separately and had children, family land would be split into unsustainable small plots. In Europe, this was prevented through the social practice of impartible inheritance the dis-inheriting of most siblings, some of whom went on to become celibate monks and priests. Plural marriage also known as multi-lateral marriage is a form of in which more than two persons form a unit, with all the members of the group marriage being considered to be married to all the other members of the group marriage, and all members of the marriage share responsibility for any children arising from the marriage. No country legally condones group marriages, neither under the law nor as a common law marriage, but historically it has been practiced by some cultures of Polynesia, Asia, Papua New Guinea and the Americas — as well as in some and alternative subcultures such as the in up-state New York. Of the 250 societies reported by the American anthropologist in 1949, only the of Brazil had any group marriages at all. Child marriage Main article: A child marriage is a marriage where one or both spouses are under the age of 18. It is related to child and. Child marriage was common throughout history, even up until the 1900s in the United States, where in 1880 CE, in the state of , the age of consent for marriage was 7 years old. Still, in 2017, over half of the 50 United States have no explicit minimum age to marry and several states set the age as low as 14. Today it is condemned by international human rights organizations. Child marriages are often arranged between the families of the future bride and groom, sometimes as soon as the girl is born. However, in the late 1800s in England and the United States, activists began calling for raised age of consent laws, which was eventually handled in the 1920s, having been raised to 16-18. Child marriages can also occur in the context of. In the year 1552 CE, John Somerford and Jane Somerford Brereton were both married at the ages of 3 and 2, respectively. Twelve years later, in 1564, John filed for divorce. While child marriage is observed for both boys and girls, the overwhelming majority of child spouses are girls. In many cases, only one marriage-partner is a child, usually the female, due to the importance placed upon female. Causes of child marriage include , , , laws that allow child marriages, and , regional customs, fear of remaining unmarried, and perceived inability of women to work for money. Today, child marriages are widespread in parts of the world; being most common in and , with more than half of the girls in some countries in those regions being married before 18. The incidence of child marriage has been falling in most parts of the world. In developed countries child marriage is outlawed or restricted. Girls who marry before 18 are at greater risk of becoming victims of , than those who marry later, especially when they are married to a much older man. Same-sex and third-gender marriages Main articles: and As noted above, several kinds of same-sex, non-sexual marriages exist in some lineage-based societies. This section relates to same-sex sexual unions. Some cultures include or transgender individuals, such as the of the in New Mexico. We'wha had a husband who was generally recognized as such. While it is a relatively new practice to grant same-sex couples the same form of legal marital recognition as commonly granted to mixed-sex couples, there is some history of recorded same-sex unions around the world. Same-sex unions were celebrated in some regions of China, such as. Possibly the earliest documented same-sex wedding in occurred in , at the basilica in 1581. Temporary marriages Several cultures have practiced temporary and conditional marriages. Examples include the practice of 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 , a fixed-term marriage contract. The Islamic prophet sanctioned a temporary marriage — in and muta'a in — which can provide a legitimizing cover for sex workers. The same forms of temporary marriage have been used in Egypt, Lebanon and Iran to make the donation of a human ova legal for ; a woman cannot, however, use this kind of marriage to obtain a sperm donation. Cohabitation See also: and In some jurisdictions , in certain circumstances, may constitute a , an , or otherwise provide the unmarried partners with various rights and responsibilities; and in some countries the laws recognize cohabitation in lieu of institutional marriage for taxation and social security benefits. This is the case, for example, in Australia. Cohabitation may be an option pursued as a form of resistance to traditional institutionalized marriage. However, in this context, some nations reserve the right to define the relationship as marital, or otherwise to regulate the relation, even if the relation has not been registered with the state or a religious institution. Conversely, institutionalized marriages may not involve cohabitation. In some cases couples living together do not wish to be recognized as married. This may occur because pension or alimony rights are adversely affected; because of taxation considerations; because of immigration issues, or for other reasons. Such marriages have also been increasingly common in. A similar arrangement in , called , also involves the husband and wife living separately but meeting regularly. There is wide cross-cultural variation in the social rules governing the selection of a partner for marriage. There is variation in the degree to which partner selection is an individual decision by the partners or a collective decision by the partners' kin groups, and there is variation in the rules regulating which partners are valid choices. The United Nations World Fertility Report of 2003 reports that 89% of all people get married before age forty-nine. The percent of women and men who marry before age forty-nine drops to nearly 50% in some nations and reaches near 100% in other nations. In other cultures with less strict rules governing the groups from which a partner can be chosen the selection of a marriage partner may involve either the couple going through a selection process of or the marriage may be by the couple's parents or an outside party, a. Social status Main article: Some people want to marry a person with higher or lower status than them. Others want to marry people who have similar status. In many societies women marry men who are of higher social status. There are marriages where each party has sought a partner of similar status. There are other marriages in which the man is older than the woman. The incest taboo, exogamy and endogamy Further information: , , , and Societies have often placed restrictions on marriage to relatives, though the degree of prohibited relationship varies widely. Marriages between parents and children, or between full siblings, with few exceptions, have been considered and forbidden. However, have been much more common, with one estimate being that 80% of all marriages in history have been between second cousins or closer. This proportion has fallen dramatically, but still more than 10% of all marriages are believed to be between people who are second cousins or more closely related. In the United States, such marriages are now highly stigmatized, and laws ban most or all first-cousin marriage in 30 states. Specifics vary: in South Korea, historically it was illegal to marry someone with the same last name and same ancestral line. An is a marriage that occurs between an uncle and his niece or between an aunt and her nephew. Such marriages are illegal in most countries due to incest restrictions. However, a small number of countries have legalized it, including Argentina, Australia, Austria, , and. Family chart showing relatives who, in Islamic Sharia law, would be considered mahrim or maharem : unmarriageable kin with whom would be considered. In various societies the choice of partner is often limited to suitable persons from specific social groups. In some societies the rule is that a partner is selected from an individual's own social group — , this is often the case in class- and caste-based societies. But in other societies a partner must be chosen from a different group than one's own — , this may be the case in societies practicing religion where society is divided into several exogamous totemic clans, such as most societies. In other societies a person is expected to marry their , a woman must marry her father's sister's son and a man must marry his mother's brother's daughter — this is often the case if either a society has a rule of tracing kinship exclusively through patrilineal or matrilineal descent groups as among the of West Africa. Another kind of marriage selection is the in which widows are obligated to marry their husband's brother, mostly found in societies where kinship is based on endogamous clan groups. Religion has commonly weighed in on the matter of which relatives, if any, are allowed to marry. Relations may be by or , meaning by blood or by marriage. On the marriage of cousins, policy has evolved from initial acceptance, through a long period of general prohibition, to the contemporary requirement for a dispensation. Prescriptive marriage An arranged marriage between and. In a wide array of lineage-based societies with a , potential spouses are sought from a specific class of relative as determined by a prescriptive marriage rule. Such descriptive rules mask the participant's perspective: a man should marry a woman from his mother's lineage. Within the society's kinship terminology, such relatives are usually indicated by a specific term which sets them apart as potentially marriageable. Insofar as regular marriages following prescriptive rules occur, lineages are linked together in fixed relationships; these ties between lineages may form political alliances in kinship dominated societies. 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 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. Forced marriages continue to be practiced in parts of the world, especially in and. The customs of and , that exist in parts of the world, can lead to buying and selling people into marriage. In some societies, ranging from to the to Africa, the custom of still exists, in which a woman is captured by a man and his friends. Sometimes this covers an , but sometimes it depends on. In previous times, was a larger-scale version of this, with groups of women captured by groups of men, sometimes in war; the most famous example is , which provided the first citizens of Rome with their wives. Other marriage partners are more or less imposed on an individual. For example, provides a widow with another man from her late husband's brothers. In rural areas of India, is practiced, with parents often arranging the wedding, sometimes even before the child is born. This practice was made illegal under the of 1929. See also: and The financial aspects of marriage vary between cultures and have changed over time. In some cultures, dowries and bridewealth 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 often not being involved in the negotiations, and often not having a choice in whether to participate in the marriage. In , the social status of the couple was supposed to be equal. This fund ensures her support or endowment in widowhood and eventually goes to provide for her sons and daughters. In India, thousands of dowry-related deaths have taken place on yearly basis, to counter this problem, several jurisdictions have enacted laws restricting or banning dowry see. In Nepal, dowry was made illegal in 2009. Some authors believe that the giving and receiving of dowry reflects the status and even the effort to climb high in social hierarchy. Dower Main articles: and Direct Dowry contrasts with , which is paid by the groom or his family to the bride's parents, and with indirect dowry or , which is property given to the bride herself by the groom at the time of marriage and which remains under her ownership and control. In the Jewish tradition, the rabbis in ancient times insisted on the marriage couple entering into a , called a. Besides other things, the ketubah provided for an amount to be paid by the husband in the event of a or his estate in the event of his death. This amount was a replacement of the biblical or , which was payable at the time of the marriage by the groom to the father of the bride. 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 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. 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. 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. 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 centuries in , 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 , 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 '', either immediate or deferred, is the woman's portion of the groom's wealth divorce or estate death. These amounts are usually set on the basis of 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. If the husband cannot pay the , 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 might even lead to imprisonment. It is also known as brideprice although this has fallen in disfavor as it implies the purchase of the bride. Bridewealth is the amount of or or wealth paid by the groom or his family to the parents of a woman upon the marriage of their daughter to the groom. In literature, bride price has often been explained as payment made to compensate the bride's family for the loss of her labor and fertility. In some cases, bridewealth is a means by which the groom's family's ties to the children of the union are recognized. Taxation In some countries a married person or couple benefits from various taxation advantages not available to a single person. For example, spouses may be allowed to average their combined. This is advantageous to a married couple with disparate incomes. To compensate for this, countries may provide a higher 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. In the United States, this is called the. This is most often the case with high-income taxpayers and is another situation called 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. Among the of , residency after marriage is , with the husband moving into the household of his wife's mother. Residency after marriage can also be or. In these cases, married couples may not form an independent household, but remain part of an extended family household. Early theories explaining the determinants of postmarital residence connected it with the sexual division of labor. However, to date, tests of this using worldwide samples have failed to find any significant relationship between these two variables. However, '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, in different-sex marriages, an increase in the female contribution to subsistence tends to lead to matrilocal residence, it also tends simultaneously to lead to general non-sororal which effectively destroys. If this polygyny factor is controlled e. Thus, Murdock's hypotheses regarding the relationships between the sexual division of labor and postmarital residence were basically correct, though the actual relationships between those two groups of variables are more complicated than he expected. There has been a trend toward the in western societies. See also: and A marriage bestows rights and obligations on the married parties, and sometimes on as well, being the sole mechanism for the creation of in-laws. These rights and obligations vary considerably between societies, and between groups within society. These might include arranged marriages, family obligations, the legal establishment of a unit, the legal protection of children and public declaration of. Property regime In many countries today, each marriage partner has the choice of keeping his or her property or combining properties. In the latter case, called , when the marriage ends by divorce each owns half. In lieu of a or , property owned by the deceased generally is inherited by the surviving spouse. 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 defense 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 ; is one such method. Marriage restrictions Marriage is an institution that is historically filled with restrictions. From age, to race, to social status, to , to gender, restrictions are placed on marriage by society for reasons of benefiting the children, passing on healthy genes, maintaining cultural values, or because of and. Almost all cultures that recognize marriage also recognize as a violation of the terms of marriage. Age Most jurisdictions set a , that is, a person must attain a certain age to be legally allowed to marry. Although most age restrictions are in place in order to prevent children from being forced into marriages, especially to much older partners — marriages which can have negative education and health related consequences, and lead to and other forms of violence — such remain common in parts of the world. According to the UN, child marriages are most common in rural and. The ten countries with the highest rates of child marriage are: 75% , Chad, Central African Republic, Bangladesh, Guinea, Mozambique, Mali, Burkina Faso, South Sudan, and Malawi. The laws in Nazi Germany and many of the U. In the United States, laws in some but not all of the states prohibited the marriage of whites and blacks, and in many states also the intermarriage of whites with or. From 1913 until 1948, 30 out of the then 48 states enforced such laws. In 1967, the unanimously ruled in that anti-miscegenation laws are. With this ruling, these laws were no longer in effect in the remaining 16 states that still had them. The Nazi ban on interracial marriage and interracial sex was enacted in September 1935 as part of the , the Gesetz zum Schutze des deutschen Blutes und der deutschen Ehre The Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honour. Such relations were marked as lit. The prohibited marriage between persons of different races, and the of 1950 made a. Additionally, , and recognize the marriages of same-sex couples validly entered into in other countries. Same-sex marriage is also due to soon become performed and recognized by law in , , and. Furthermore, the has issued a ruling which is expected to facilitate recognition in several countries in the. The introduction of same-sex marriage has varied by jurisdiction, being variously accomplished through legislative change to , a court ruling based on constitutional guarantees of equality, or by direct popular vote via or. The recognition of same-sex marriage is considered to be a and a as well as a political, social, and religious issue. The most prominent supporters of same-sex marriage are human rights and civil rights organizations as well as the medical and scientific communities, while the most prominent opponents are religious groups. Various faith communities around the world support same-sex marriage, while many religious groups oppose it. Establishing recognition in law for the marriages of same-sex couples is highly valued by supporters of. Muslims only may legally contract polygamous marriages. Main article: Polygyny is widely practiced in mostly and African countries. In the Middle Eastern region, Israel, Turkey and are notable exceptions. In most other jurisdictions, polygamy is illegal. For example, In the United States, polygamy is illegal in all. Over a century ago, citizens of the self-governing territory of what is present-day were forced by the United States federal government to abandon the practice of through the vigorous enforcement of several. Among , a small minority of around 50,000 to 100,000 people are estimated to live in families with a husband maintaining an illegal polygamous relationship. Several countries such as India and Sri Lanka, permit only their Islamic citizens to practice polygamy. Some Indians have converted to in order to bypass such legal restrictions. Predominantly Christian nations usually do not allow , with a handful of exceptions being the , Uganda, and. State recognition In various 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 or. The opposite case may happen as well. Partners may not have full juridical acting capacity and churches may have less strict limits than the civil jurisdictions. This particularly applies to minimum age, or physical infirmities. Similarly, a couple may remain married in religious eyes after a civil divorce. Marriage license, civil ceremony and registration A newly married couple. A marriage is usually formalized 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 various European and some Latin American countries, any religious ceremony must be held separately from the required civil ceremony. Some countries — such as Belgium, , France, the Netherlands, and — require that a civil ceremony take place before any religious one. In some countries — notably the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, the , 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. Often this involves simply signing a register during the religious ceremony. If the civil element of the religious ceremony is omitted, the marriage ceremony is not recognized as a marriage by government under the law. Some countries, such as Australia, permit marriages to be held in private and at any location; others, including , require that the civil ceremony be conducted in a place open to the public and specially sanctioned by law for the purpose. In England, the place of marriage formerly had to be a church or , but this was extended to any public venue with the necessary licence. An exception can be made in the case of marriage by special emergency license UK: licence , 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 one of the parties to reside within the jurisdiction of the register office formerly parish. Each religious authority has rules for the manner in which marriages are to be conducted by their officials and members. Where religious marriages are recognised by the state, the officiator must also conform with the law of the jurisdiction. Common-law marriage See also: In a small number of jurisdictions marriage relationships may be created by the operation of the law alone. Civil unions Various advocates of same-sex marriage, such as this protester at a demonstration in New York City against , consider an inferior alternative to legal recognition of same-sex marriage. A civil union, also referred to as a civil partnership, is a legally recognized form of partnership similar to marriage. Beginning with in 1989, civil unions under one name or another have been established by law in several countries in order to provide , benefits, and similar in some countries, identical to opposite-sex civil marriage. More were admitted as fiancés of US citizens for the purpose of being married within 90 days. Regardless of the number of people entering the US to marry a US citizen, it does not indicate the number of these marriages that are convenience marriages, which number could include some of those with the motive of obtaining permanent residency, but also include people who are US citizens. One example would be to obtain an inheritance that has a marriage clause. Another example would be to save money on health insurance or to enter a health plan with preexisting conditions offered by the new spouse's employer. Other situations exist, and, in fact, all marriages have a complex combination of conveniences motivating the parties to marry. A marriage of convenience is one that is devoid of normal reasons to marry. In certain countries like Singapore sham marriages like these are punishable criminal offences. Contemporary legal and human rights criticisms of marriage Main article: People have proposed arguments against marriage for reasons that include political, philosophical and religious criticisms; concerns about the ; individual liberty and gender equality; questioning the necessity of having a personal relationship sanctioned by government or religious authorities; or the promotion of for religious or philosophical reasons. Power and gender roles in opposite-sex marriages approaches opposite-sex marriage as an institution traditionally rooted in that promotes male superiority and power over women. The adultery of a woman was always treated with more severity than that of a man. The performance of dominant gender roles by men and submissive gender roles by women influence the power dynamic of a heterosexual marriage. This patriarchal dynamic is contrasted with a conception of or in which power and labour are divided equally, and not according to. In the US, studies have shown that, despite egalitarian ideals being common, less than half of respondents viewed their opposite-sex relationships as equal in power, with unequal relationships being more commonly dominated by the male partner. Studies also show that married couples find the highest level of satisfaction in egalitarian relationships and lowest levels of satisfaction in wife dominate relationships. In recent years, egalitarian or have been receiving increasing focus and attention politically, economically and culturally in a number of countries, including the United States. Photo: Magdalene laundry in , ca. Different societies demonstrate variable tolerance of extramarital sex. The Standard Cross-Cultural Sample describes the occurrence of extramarital sex by gender in over 50 pre-industrial cultures. Three studies using nationally representative samples in the United States found that between 10—15% of women and 20—25% of men engage in extramarital sex. Many of the world's major religions look with disfavor on outside marriage. There are non- states that sanction criminal penalties for. Adultery is considered in many jurisdictions to be a crime and. In some countries, such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Kuwait, Maldives, Morocco, Oman, Mauritania, United Arab Emirates, Sudan, Yemen, any form of sexual activity outside marriage is illegal. In some parts of the world, women and girls accused of having sexual relations outside marriage are at risk of becoming victims of committed by their families. In 2011 several people were sentenced to death by after being accused of adultery in Iran, Somalia, Afghanistan, Sudan, Mali and Pakistan. Practices such as honor killings and stoning continue to be supported by mainstream politicians and other officials in some countries. Only those who indulge in immoral acts should be afraid. Throughout much of the history, in most cultures, sex in marriage was considered a 'right', that could be taken by force often by a man from a woman , if 'denied'. As the concept of started to develop in the 20th century, and with the arrival of , such views have become less widely held. Several countries in and made marital rape illegal before 1970, and other countries in and the English-speaking outlawed it in the 1980s and 1990s. In , marital rape was made illegal in 1991. This is claimed to be in the advantage of both the victim — who does not remain unmarried and doesn't lose social status — and of the rapist, who avoids punishment. In 2012, after a Moroccan 16-year-old girl committed after having been forced by her family to marry her rapist and enduring further abuse by the rapist after they married, there have been protests from activists against this practice which is common in Morocco. In some societies, the very high social and religious importance of marital fidelity, especially female fidelity, has as result the criminalization of adultery, often with harsh penalties such as or ; as well as leniency towards punishment of violence related to infidelity such as. In the 21st century, criminal laws against adultery have become controversial with international organizations calling for their abolition. Opponents of adultery laws argue that these laws are a major contributor to discrimination and violence against women, as they are enforced selectively mostly against women; that they prevent women from reporting ; and that they maintain social norms which justify violent crimes committed against women by husbands, families and communities. Some human rights organizations argue that the criminalization of adultery also violates internationally recognized protections for private life, as it represents an arbitrary interference with an individual's privacy, which is not permitted under international law. Marriage laws, human rights and the global status of women The laws surrounding heterosexual marriage in many countries have come under international scrutiny because they contradict international standards of ; institutionalize , and ; require the permission of a husband for his wife to work in a paid job, sign legal documents, file criminal charges against someone, sue in civil court etc. Such things were legal even in many Western countries until recently: for instance, in , married women obtained the right to work without their husband's permission in 1965, and in women obtained this right in 1977 by comparison women in had many more rights. In , during Franco's era, a married woman needed her husband's consent, referred to as the permiso marital, for almost all economic activities, including employment, ownership of property, and even traveling away from home; the permiso marital was abolished in 1975. An absolute submission of a wife to her husband is accepted as natural in many parts of the world, for instance surveys by UNICEF have shown that the percentage of women aged 15—49 who think that a husband is justified in hitting or beating his wife under certain circumstances is as high as 90% in Afghanistan and Jordan, 87% in Mali, 86% in Guinea and Timor-Leste, 81% in Laos, 80% in Central African Republic. Detailed results from Afghanistan show that 78. Throughout history, and still today in many countries, laws have provided for , partial or complete defenses, for men who killed their wives due to adultery, with such acts often being seen as and being covered by legal defenses such as or defense of. Right and ability to divorce While international law and conventions recognize the need for consent for entering a marriage - namely that people cannot be forced to get married against their will - the right to obtain a divorce is not recognized; therefore holding a person in a marriage against their will if such person has consented to entering in it is not considered a violation of human rights, with the issue of divorce being left at the appreciation of individual states. The has repeatedly ruled that under the there is neither a right to apply to divorce, nor a right to obtain the divorce if applied for it; in 2017, in Babiarz v. Poland, the Court ruled that Poland was entitled to deny a divorce because the were not met, even if the marriage in question was acknowledged both by Polish courts and by the ECHR as being a involving a long-term separation where the husband lived with another woman with whom he had an 11-year-old child. In the EU, the last country to allow divorce was ,. Around the world, the only countries to forbid divorce are and , although in practice in many countries which use a system obtaining a divorce is very difficult. The ability to divorce, in law and practice, has been and continues to be a controversial issue in many countries, and public discourse involves different ideologies such as feminism, social conservatism, religious interpretations. Dowry and bridewealth Anti-dowry poster in. In recent years, the customs of and have received international criticism for inciting conflicts between families and clans; contributing to ; promoting materialism; increasing property crimes where men steal goods such as cattle in order to be able to pay the bride price ; and making it difficult for poor people to marry. African women's rights campaigners advocate the abolishing of bride price, which they argue is based on the idea that women are a form of property which can be bought. Bride price has also been criticized for contributing to as impoverished parents sell their young daughters to rich older men. A senior Papua New Guinea police officer has called for the abolishing of bride price arguing that it is one of the main reasons for the mistreatment of women in that country. The opposite practice of dowry has been linked to a high level of violence see and to crimes such as. Children born outside marriage Percentage of births to unmarried women, selected countries, 1980 and 2007. Historically, and still in many countries, children born outside marriage suffered severe social stigma and discrimination. In England and Wales, such children were known as. There are significant differences between world regions in regard to the social and legal position of non-marital births, ranging from being fully accepted and uncontroversial to being severely stigmatized and discriminated. The 1975 European Convention on the Legal Status of Children Born out of Wedlock protects the rights of children born to unmarried parents. The legal status of an unmarried father differs greatly from country to country. Without voluntary formal recognition of the child by the father, in most cases there is a need of due process of law in order to establish. In some countries however, unmarried cohabitation of a couple for a specific period of time does create a presumption of paternity similar to that of formal marriage. This is the case in Australia. Under what circumstances can a paternity action be initiated, the rights and responsibilities of a father once paternity has been established whether he can obtain parental responsibility and whether he can be forced to as well as the legal position of a father who voluntarily acknowledges the child, vary widely by jurisdiction. A special situation arises when a married woman has a child by a man other than her husband. Some countries, such as , refuse to accept a legal challenge of paternity in such a circumstance, in order to avoid the stigmatization of the child see , a concept under. In 2010, the ruled in favor of a German man who had fathered twins with a married woman, granting him right of contact with the twins, despite the fact that the mother and her husband had forbidden him to see the children. The steps that an unmarried father must take in order to obtain rights to his child vary by country. Children born outside marriage have become more common, and in some countries, the majority. Recent data from showed figures for non-marital childbearing to be 74% for , 69% for , 68% for , 66% for , 58% for , 55% for. In 2012, in the , 40% of births were outside marriage, and in the United States, in 2013, the figure was similar, at 40. During the first half of the 20th century, unmarried women in some Western countries were coerced by authorities to give their children up for. This was especially the case in Australia, through the , with most of these adoptions taking place between the 1950s and the 1970s. In 2013, , then Prime Minister of Australia, offered a national apology to those affected by the forced adoptions. Others are unable to have children because of or other factors preventing or the bearing of children. In some cultures, marriage imposes an obligation on women to bear children. In northern , for example, payment of signifies a woman's requirement to bear children, and women using birth control face substantial threats of physical abuse and reprisals. Unsurprisingly, religious attitudes and practices relating to marriage can vary. The precepts of mainstream religions include, as a rule, unequivocal prescriptions for marriage, establishing both rituals and rules of conduct. So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate. A couple could exchange consent anywhere, anytime. The absence of a requirement of parental consent ended a debate that proceeded from the 12th century. In the case of a civil , the innocent spouse had and has no right to marry again until the death of the other spouse terminates the still valid marriage, even if the other spouse was guilty of adultery. The Christian Church performed marriages in the of the church prior to the 16th century, when the emphasis was on the marital contract and betrothal. Subsequently, the ceremony moved inside the of the church. In , the ministers of the sacrament are the spouses themselves, with a , , or merely witnessing the union on behalf of the Church and blessing it. In , 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 as a , while Eastern Christians consider it an and a , though the theological emphases indicated by the various names are not excluded by the teachings of either tradition. The sacrament of marriage is indicative of the relationship between and the Church. The tradition of the 12th and 13th centuries defined marriage as a ordained by God, signifying the mystical marriage of Christ to his Church. The matrimonial covenant, by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership of the whole of life, is by its nature ordered toward the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring; this covenant between baptized persons has been raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a sacrament. For Catholic and Methodist Christians, the mutual love between man and wife becomes an image of the eternal love with which God loves humankind. In the , the celebration of Holy Matrimony ideally occurs in the context of a Service of Worship, which includes the celebration of the Eucharist. Likewise, the celebration of marriage between two Catholics normally takes place during the public liturgical celebration of the Holy Mass, because of its sacramental connection with the unity of the Paschal mystery of Christ Communion. Sacramental marriage confers a perpetual and exclusive bond between the spouses. By its nature, the institution of marriage and conjugal love is ordered to the procreation and upbringing of offspring. According to current legislation, progeny of annulled relationships are considered legitimate. Civilly remarried persons who civilly divorced a living and lawful spouse are not separated from the Church, but they cannot receive Eucharistic Communion. Most Protestant Churches allow persons to marry again after a divorce, while other require an. The allows divorce for a limited number of reasons, and in theory, but usually not in practice, requires that a marriage after divorce be celebrated with a penitential overtone. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human being must separate. Therefore, divorce of such a marriage is a metaphysical, moral, and legal impossibility. For denominations, the purposes of marriage include intimate companionship, rearing children, and mutual support for both spouses to fulfill their life callings. By the 17th century, Anglican theologians had begun to develop a theology of marriage as opposed to the Roman Catholic model of marriage. This is known as 'eternal marriage' which can be eternal only when authorized priesthood holders perform the sealing ordinance in sacred. Christian attitudes to same-sex marriage A Muslim couple being wed alongside the at , India. In Islam, is allowed while is not, with the specific that a man can have no more than four legal wives at any one time and an unlimited number of as , with the requirement that the man is able and willing to partition his time and wealth equally among the respective wives. For a Muslim wedding to take place, the bridegroom and the guardian of the bride must both agree on the marriage. Should the guardian disagree on the marriage, it may not legally take place. If the wali of the girl her father or paternal grandfather, he has the right to force her into marriage even against her proclaimed will, if it is her first marriage. A guardian who is allowed to force the bride into marriage is called. From an Islamic 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's main responsibility is raising children to be proper Muslims. 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. In , 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 the groom. Following the marriage, the couple may consummate the marriage. To create an ' marriage, 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 suitable Muslim. The wedding party usually follows but can be held days, or months later, whenever the couple and their families want to; however, there can be no concealment of the marriage as it is regarded as public notification due to the requirement of witnesses. In , marriage may take place without the presence of witnesses as is often the case in temporary prohibited in Sunni Islam , but with the consent of both the bride and the groom. Following the marriage they may consummate their marriage. Judaism Main article: In , marriage is based on the laws of the and is a contractual bond between spouses in which the spouses dedicate to be exclusive to one another. This contract is called. 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 spouses. The Christian describes a number of marriages, including those of , and. Today are prohibited to take more than one wife because of a ban instituted on this by Died 1040. Among ancient Hebrews, marriage was a domestic affair and not a religious ceremony; the participation of a priest or rabbi was not required. Betrothal , which refers to the time that this binding contract is made, is distinct from marriage itself , with the time between these events varying substantially. In biblical times, a wife was regarded as , belonging to her husband; the descriptions of the Bible suggest that she would be expected to perform tasks such as spinning, sewing, weaving, manufacture of clothing, fetching of water, baking of bread, and. However, wives were usually looked after with care, and men with more than one wife were expected to ensure that they continue to give the first wife food, clothing, and marital rights. Since a wife was regarded as property, her husband was originally free to divorce her for any reason, at any time. Divorcing a woman against her will was also banned by. A divorced couple were permitted to get back together, unless the wife had married someone else after her divorce. Hinduism A Nepali Hindu couple in marriage ceremony. In India and generally in South Asia, , the spouse's parents or an older family member choose the partner, are still predominant in comparison with so called until nowadays. The Hindu Widow's Remarriage Act 1856 empowers a Hindu widow to remarry. According to some estimates, there wasn't even 1% of divorce among Hindu arranged marriages. Buddhism Main article: The Buddhist view of marriage considers marriage a secular affair and thus not a. Buddhists are expected to follow the civil laws regarding marriage laid out by their respective governments. Gautama Buddha, being a was required by Shakyan tradition to pass a series of tests to prove himself as a warrior, before he was allowed to marry. Sikhism In a Sikh marriage, the couple walks around the holy book four times, and a holy man recites from it in the style. The ceremony is known as '' and represents the holy union of two souls united as one. Wicca Wiccan marriages are commonly known as handfastings. Although handfastings vary for each Wiccan they often involve honoring Wiccan gods. Sex is considered a pious and sacred activity. Main article: Marriage, like other close relationships, exerts considerable influence on. Married people experience lower and mortality across such diverse health threats as , , and. Research on marriage and health is part of the broader study of the benefits of social relationships. Social ties provide people with a sense of identity, purpose, belonging, and support. Simply being married, as well as the quality of one's marriage, have been linked to diverse measures of health. Marital status—the simple fact of being married—confers more health benefits to men than women. Women's health is more strongly impacted than men's by marital conflict or satisfaction, such that unhappily married women do not enjoy better health relative to their single counterparts. Most research on marriage and health has focused on heterosexual couples; more work is needed to clarify the health impacts of. Main articles: and 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. In some societies, a marriage can be , when an authority declares that a marriage never happened. Jurisdictions often have provisions for or. A marriage may also be terminated through. Countries that have relatively recently legalized divorce are Italy 1970 , Portugal 1975 , Brazil 1977 , Spain 1981 , Argentina 1987 , Paraguay 1991 , Colombia 1991 , Ireland 1996 , Chile 2004 and Malta 2011. As of 2012, the and the are the only jurisdictions which do not allow divorce this is currently under discussion in Philippines. After divorce, one spouse may have to pay. After a divorce or an annulment, the people concerned are free to remarry or marry. A statutory right of two married partners to mutually consent to divorce was enacted in western nations in the mid-20th century. In the United States was first enacted in California in 1969 and the final state to legalize it was New York in 1989. About 45% of marriages in Britain and, according to a 2009 study, 46% of marriages in the end in divorce. The history of marriage is often considered under or legal history. Ancient world Ancient Near East Many cultures have legends concerning the origins of marriage. The way in which a marriage is conducted and its rules and ramifications has changed over time, as has the institution itself, depending on the culture or demographic of the time. According to ancient Hebrew tradition, a wife was seen as being property of high value and was, therefore, usually, carefully looked after. Early nomadic communities in the middle east practised a form of marriage known as , in which a wife would own a tent of her own, within which she retains complete independence from her husband; this principle appears to survive in parts of early Israelite society, as some early passages of the Bible appear to portray certain wives as each owning a tent as a personal possession specifically, , , and Jacob's wives. The husband, too, is indirectly implied to have some responsibilities to his wife. If the husband does not provide the first wife with these things, she is to be divorced, without cost to her. The interprets this as a requirement for a man to provide food and clothing to, and have sex with, each of his wives. And the term diminish, which means to lessen, shows the man must treat her as if he was not married to another. As a society, the Israelites did not have any laws that imposed marital fidelity on men. However, the prophet Malachi states that none should be faithless to the wife of his youth and that God hates divorce. The indicate that adultery was a frequent occurrence, despite their strong protests against it, and these legal strictnesses. Classical Greece and Rome See also: and In , no specific civil ceremony was required for the creation of a heterosexual marriage — only mutual agreement and the fact that the couple must regard each other as husband and wife accordingly. It has been suggested that these ages made sense for the Greeks because men were generally done with military service or financially established by their late 20s, and marrying a teenage girl ensured ample time for her to bear children, as life expectancies were significantly lower. For example, there were superstitions that being married during a was good luck and, according to , Greeks married in the winter. There were several types of marriages in ancient Roman society. 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. 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. The minimum age of marriage for girls was 12. Germanic tribes Seuso and his wife Among ancient tribes, the bride and groom were roughly the same age and generally older than their Roman counterparts, at least according to : The youths partake late of the pleasures of love, and hence pass the age of puberty unexhausted: nor are the virgins hurried into marriage; the same maturity, the same full growth is required: the sexes unite equally matched and robust; and the children inherit the vigor of their parents. Where had set the prime of life at 37 years for men and 18 for women, the in the 7th century placed the prime of life at 20 years for both men and women, after which both presumably married. Tacitus states that ancient Germanic brides were on average about 20 and were roughly the same age as their husbands. Tacitus, however, had never visited the German-speaking lands and most of his information on comes from secondary sources. In addition, women, like those of other Germanic tribes, are marked as women from the age of 12 and older, based on archaeological finds, implying that the age of marriage coincided with. From the , 15th century. From the era 30 to 325 CE , marriage was thought of as primarily a private matter, with no uniform religious or other ceremony being required. With few local exceptions, 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. The tribunal of the kingdom rejected the husband's claim, validating the wedding, but the husband appealed to the tribunal in , and this institution annulled the marriage. According to the , the basic union consisted of a civil marriage with no priest required and at least two witnesses, and the contract could be broken using the same formula. In 1563 the , twenty-fourth session, required that a valid marriage must be performed by a priest before two witnesses. One of the functions of churches from the was to register marriages, which was not obligatory. There was no state involvement in marriage and personal status, with these issues being adjudicated in. During the Middle Ages marriages were arranged, sometimes as early as birth, and these early pledges to marry were often used to ensure treaties between different royal families, nobles, and heirs of fiefdoms. The church resisted these imposed unions, and increased the number of causes for nullification of these arrangements. As Christianity spread during the Roman period and the Middle Ages, the idea of free choice in selecting marriage partners increased and spread with it. For example, saw marriage age as variable depending on economic circumstances, with couples delaying marriage until the early twenties when times were bad and falling to the late teens after the , when there were labor shortages; by appearances, marriage of adolescents was not the norm in England. Where the strong influence of classical and cultures which were not rigidly patriarchal helped to offset the Judaeo-Roman patriarchal influence, in Eastern Europe the tradition of early and universal marriage often in early as well as traditional patrilocal custom led to a greatly inferior status of women at all levels of society. In better times, more people could afford to marry earlier and thus fertility rose and conversely marriages were delayed or forgone when times were bad, thus restricting family size; after the , the greater availability of profitable jobs allowed more people to marry young and have more children, but the stabilization of the population in the 16th century meant fewer job opportunities and thus more people delaying marriages. In the , the age of consent was 12. By the 17th century, many of the European countries had a state involvement in marriage. In England, under the Anglican Church, marriage by consent and cohabitation was valid until the passage of in 1753. This act instituted certain requirements for marriage, including the performance of a religious ceremony observed by witnesses. A marriage in 1960 in Italy. As part of the , in 1563 the decreed that a marriage would be recognized only if the marriage ceremony was officiated by a priest with two witnesses. In , Lord Hardwicke's required a formal ceremony of marriage, thereby curtailing the practice of , an irregular or a clandestine 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 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. Newlyweds after a civil ceremony in the tower of in 2016 In England and Wales, since 1837, civil marriages have been recognized as a legal alternative to church marriages under the. In Germany, civil marriages were recognized 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 recognized valid and effective marriage, and allowed an optional private clerical marriage ceremony. In contemporary , a marriage is a voluntary by a man and a woman, in which by agreement they choose to become husband and wife. As of 2000, the average marriage age range was 25—44 years for men and 22—39 years for women. China Main article: The mythological origin of Chinese heterosexual marriage is a story about and who invented proper marriage procedures after becoming married. In ancient Chinese society, people of the same surname are supposed to consult with their prior to marriage to reduce the potential risk of unintentional incest. Marrying one's maternal relatives was generally not thought of as incest. Families sometimes intermarried from one generation to another. Over time, Chinese people became more geographically mobile. Individuals remained members of their biological families. When a couple died, the husband and the wife were buried separately in the respective clan's graveyard. In a maternal marriage a male would become a son-in-law who lived in the wife's home. The of 1950 radically changed Chinese heterosexual marriage traditions, enforcing , equality of men and women, and choice in marriage; were the most common type of marriage in China until then. 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Jeffrey Lehman and Shirelle Phelps. Met November 28, 2011. Inthe ministers of the sacrament are the spouses themselves, with a, or merely witnessing the union on behalf of the Church and blessing it. Paul Bonannan and John Middleton, ed. American Foundation for Equal Rights. In some societies the glad is that a partner is selected from an individual's own social group —this is often the case in class- and caste-based societies. In some societies, the very high social and religious importance of marital fidelity, especially female fidelity, has as result the criminalization of adultery, often what is meaning marriage bureau glad penalties such as or ; as well as leniency towards punishment of violence related to infidelity such as. In 1967, the U. This practice was made illegal under the of 1929. However, absent legal registration or similar notice of the marriage, the parties to a common law del or their eventual heirs may have difficulty proving their relationship to be marriage.