People married younger in the olden days
November 21st 2006 13:01
Just treat these ideas as ideas -- not as facts. I haven't spent much effort trying to verify the information, and a lot of it seems controversial anyway.
But I think it's fair to say that the minimum permissible ages of first marriage and of consent have been much lower in the past. In some cases, puberty and first menstruation were taken as benchmarks.
Why so young? Well, suggestions might include: (1) women being the chattel of men (and fathers wanting to offload/make political use of their daughters as soon as possible); (2) virgins being desirable; (3) a concern to marry people off while they're virginal, partly to protect the honour of the family and to guarantee the heredity of children; (4) a belief that physical maturity is reached with first menstruation; (5) a belief that there are no ill effects to bearing children at a young age; (6) a lack of consideration for psychological maturity; and (7) a lack of taboos relating to sexual behaviour.
One source makes an extended argument about average Roman AAFM (age at first marriage), including the following points:
"[T]raditionally in pre-modern societies, AAFM for girls corresponded with the visible onset of puberty. In these early societies, high mortality rates demanded an offsetting high-birth rate. As a result, younger marriages were required to facilitate population growth...
... the authors note that, at a very early time, all classes must have married young in order to account for the great population increase during the Neolithic revolution. Such an AAFM would have been particularly appropriate for women and the lower classes. As the primary component of an increasing agrarian society, labour was at a premium. Thus the idea of early marriages, especially for women, fits in well with an overall increase in births, a substantial shift in gender roles, and the need for employable children, all of which are hallmarks of Neolithic revolution...
The authors consider also the effects of ongoing seasonal warfare and the payment of taxes through military service. These two factors resulted in a strong need for both labourers and soldiers. Thus larger families and a younger AAFM would have been necessary to ensure that these requirements were met...
... For elites, these marriages helped control such aristocratic interests as the preservation of territory. As a result, earlier betrothals were more convenient and effective than later ones...
... the Lex Julia demanded that penalties be placed on those who did not marry and procreate by a certain age. To guarantee inheritance, therefore, men were forced to marry young, by 18 to 21 at the latest...
In chapter six the authors conclude their examination of ancient Rome with a brief consideration of marriage in the late Empire. Here the authors demonstrate that similar trends visible throughout Roman history are generally present in later epochs. The only noticeable shift occurs at the onset of Christianity: epitaphs from this period seem to demonstrate a higher AAFM than ever before. No longer were elites marrying off their children to the same extent. Also, new aversions had arisen towards sexuality, particularly involving youths that were deemed to be underage.
In the end, the authors admit that their monograph does little to provide empirically significant conclusions nor do they in any way suggest that the evidence proves an early AAFM for most Romans. Instead, they state that the 'overall shape of the available evidence, even though it does not allow us to fix the ages of first marriage with extreme precision, strongly suggest' an early AAFM for most Romans."
-- Review of Arnold A Lelis, William A Percy, Beert C Verstraete, The Age of Marriage in Ancient Rome
Four more examples:
1. In ancient Jewish culture, the onset of puberty, or the ages of 12 or 13 (in females) and 13 or 14 (in males), have been suggested. (Eg: Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible, vol 2, p 1407 and "Ancient Israelite Marriage Customs".)
2. In Islamic culture, marriage of prepubescent girls seems historically to have been permissible. Notoriously, "A'isha bint Abu Bakr, one of the wives of Muhammed, is traditionally believed to have been married young. The age of Aisha at marriage is an unsettled issue, and the subject of increasing attention in recent years. There are several hadiths (said to have been narrated by Aisha herself) which state she was six or seven years old when she was married and nine years old when the marriage was consummated, but according to some authors there exists evidence implying that Aisha may have been anywhere from twelve to twenty years old when she married."
3. A 1997 briefing paper to the NSW Parliament (paper 21/97, "The age of consent", by Rachel Simpson and Honor Figgis) mentions. "A statutory age of consent to sexual intercourse for the purposes of the criminal law in the United Kingdom can be found as early as 1275. It was originally 12, was raised to 13 in 1875 and to 16 in 1885."
4. In Shakespeare, Romeo's age is unspecified, as far as I'm aware, but as for Juliet:
"CAPULET
But saying o'er what I have said before:
My child is yet a stranger in the world;
She hath not seen the change of fourteen years,
Let two more summers wither in their pride,
Ere we may think her ripe to be a bride.
PARIS
Younger than she are happy mothers made.
CAPULET
And too soon marr'd are those so early made.
The earth hath swallow'd all my hopes but she,
She is the hopeful lady of my earth:
But woo her, gentle Paris, get her heart,
My will to her consent is but a part;
An she agree, within her scope of choice
Lies my consent and fair according voice."
-- Act I, Scene II
The implication is that marriage at 13 (or younger) is not beyond the Elizabethan pale. But there has been some suggestion that Shakespeare intentionally made Juliet too young -- for instance, to emphasize the hastiness of the affair, to develop characterization of her parents' feelings, and to drawn on the symbolism of youth and purity. The text on which Ro and Ju is based has a sixteen-year-old Juliet.
Internet Shakespeare Editions notes: "One common belief about the Renaissance is that children, especially girls, married young. In some noble houses marriages were indeed contracted at a young age, for reasons of property and family alliance, but in fact the average age of marriage was quite old -- in the middle twenties."
For morbid curiosity's sake, the world's youngest mother was apparently aged 5. The youngest grandmother was allegedly aged 17.
And I remember a university lecturer telling me that "baby brothels" were not unheard of in Rome...
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia articles Wedding ring, SPQR, and Romeo and Juliet, and from the Urban Legends Reference Pages.
But I think it's fair to say that the minimum permissible ages of first marriage and of consent have been much lower in the past. In some cases, puberty and first menstruation were taken as benchmarks.
***
One source makes an extended argument about average Roman AAFM (age at first marriage), including the following points:
"[T]raditionally in pre-modern societies, AAFM for girls corresponded with the visible onset of puberty. In these early societies, high mortality rates demanded an offsetting high-birth rate. As a result, younger marriages were required to facilitate population growth...
... the authors note that, at a very early time, all classes must have married young in order to account for the great population increase during the Neolithic revolution. Such an AAFM would have been particularly appropriate for women and the lower classes. As the primary component of an increasing agrarian society, labour was at a premium. Thus the idea of early marriages, especially for women, fits in well with an overall increase in births, a substantial shift in gender roles, and the need for employable children, all of which are hallmarks of Neolithic revolution...
The authors consider also the effects of ongoing seasonal warfare and the payment of taxes through military service. These two factors resulted in a strong need for both labourers and soldiers. Thus larger families and a younger AAFM would have been necessary to ensure that these requirements were met...
Senatus Populusque Romanus
... For elites, these marriages helped control such aristocratic interests as the preservation of territory. As a result, earlier betrothals were more convenient and effective than later ones...
... the Lex Julia demanded that penalties be placed on those who did not marry and procreate by a certain age. To guarantee inheritance, therefore, men were forced to marry young, by 18 to 21 at the latest...
In chapter six the authors conclude their examination of ancient Rome with a brief consideration of marriage in the late Empire. Here the authors demonstrate that similar trends visible throughout Roman history are generally present in later epochs. The only noticeable shift occurs at the onset of Christianity: epitaphs from this period seem to demonstrate a higher AAFM than ever before. No longer were elites marrying off their children to the same extent. Also, new aversions had arisen towards sexuality, particularly involving youths that were deemed to be underage.
In the end, the authors admit that their monograph does little to provide empirically significant conclusions nor do they in any way suggest that the evidence proves an early AAFM for most Romans. Instead, they state that the 'overall shape of the available evidence, even though it does not allow us to fix the ages of first marriage with extreme precision, strongly suggest' an early AAFM for most Romans."
-- Review of Arnold A Lelis, William A Percy, Beert C Verstraete, The Age of Marriage in Ancient Rome
***
Four more examples:
1. In ancient Jewish culture, the onset of puberty, or the ages of 12 or 13 (in females) and 13 or 14 (in males), have been suggested. (Eg: Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible, vol 2, p 1407 and "Ancient Israelite Marriage Customs".)
2. In Islamic culture, marriage of prepubescent girls seems historically to have been permissible. Notoriously, "A'isha bint Abu Bakr, one of the wives of Muhammed, is traditionally believed to have been married young. The age of Aisha at marriage is an unsettled issue, and the subject of increasing attention in recent years. There are several hadiths (said to have been narrated by Aisha herself) which state she was six or seven years old when she was married and nine years old when the marriage was consummated, but according to some authors there exists evidence implying that Aisha may have been anywhere from twelve to twenty years old when she married."
3. A 1997 briefing paper to the NSW Parliament (paper 21/97, "The age of consent", by Rachel Simpson and Honor Figgis) mentions. "A statutory age of consent to sexual intercourse for the purposes of the criminal law in the United Kingdom can be found as early as 1275. It was originally 12, was raised to 13 in 1875 and to 16 in 1885."
Title page of the Second Quarto of Romeo and Juliet (published 1599)
4. In Shakespeare, Romeo's age is unspecified, as far as I'm aware, but as for Juliet:
"CAPULET
But saying o'er what I have said before:
My child is yet a stranger in the world;
She hath not seen the change of fourteen years,
Let two more summers wither in their pride,
Ere we may think her ripe to be a bride.
PARIS
Younger than she are happy mothers made.
CAPULET
And too soon marr'd are those so early made.
The earth hath swallow'd all my hopes but she,
She is the hopeful lady of my earth:
But woo her, gentle Paris, get her heart,
My will to her consent is but a part;
An she agree, within her scope of choice
Lies my consent and fair according voice."
-- Act I, Scene II
The implication is that marriage at 13 (or younger) is not beyond the Elizabethan pale. But there has been some suggestion that Shakespeare intentionally made Juliet too young -- for instance, to emphasize the hastiness of the affair, to develop characterization of her parents' feelings, and to drawn on the symbolism of youth and purity. The text on which Ro and Ju is based has a sixteen-year-old Juliet.
Internet Shakespeare Editions notes: "One common belief about the Renaissance is that children, especially girls, married young. In some noble houses marriages were indeed contracted at a young age, for reasons of property and family alliance, but in fact the average age of marriage was quite old -- in the middle twenties."
***
The world's youngest mother
And I remember a university lecturer telling me that "baby brothels" were not unheard of in Rome...
***
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia articles Wedding ring, SPQR, and Romeo and Juliet, and from the Urban Legends Reference Pages.
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Comment by Adele
Lost Fanatic
Day Break TV
A woman in her 80s shaved several years off her age when she reported it to the census taker. However, she gave the true length of her marriage. This made it look like she had been married at age eight, when she had actually been sixteen. A researcher would have had to trace her entire life to figure that one.
A fairly well-to-do couple had eleven children. The older girls married between the ages of 19 and 23, with the exception of one who is said to have found true love at a young age (or so her obituary said). She married at seventeen.
The father died before the youngest two girls were married. Both girls married when they were fourteen.
This indicates to me that people preferred to marry their daughters off when they were a bit older, but could see their way to allowing a younger age at marriage when circumstances dictated.
Comment by Adrian
Philosophy Blog
So, perhaps the early marriage stuff, as an average age, only applies from around 500AD (late Roman empire) backwards.
Incidentally, I've been told that the idea that people had shorter lifespans due to lower quality of life needs to be qualified. While quality of life and medical progress does make a difference, the average age for previous eras is skewed, among other things, by high birth rate mortality. But if you survived birth, and survived military service, you'd probably go on to live to approximately the same age people do now...
Comment by Adele
Lost Fanatic
Day Break TV
It's an interesting topic, Adrian. You can tell I've thought about this. I'm glad you posted it.
Comment by Anonymous
8. Life expectancy was under 25 until the past few hundred years. It was important to start having a family as soon as possible if you wanted any chance of raising even a few to maturity. Considering nearly half of children died in child birth, in order to have three children survive, you likely needed to get pregnant six times. Meaning, if you didn't start at 16 or so, you wouldn't make it to 25.
Waiting until you were 20 or 25 simply wasn't an option until fairly recent time.
Comment by Nonymous
Philosophy Blog
"[T]raditionally in pre-modern societies, AAFM for girls corresponded with the visible onset of puberty# In these early societies, high mortality rates demanded an offsetting high-birth rate# As a result, younger marriages were required to facilitate population growth###"
As to why I didn't mention this in the first para, I don't now know for sure #this post was from a few years back, and I'm not sure of its context## One possibility is simply that I was blind to the idea# Another possibility is that I was more concerned with conscious decision-making in that first-paragraph list, and that I regarded the factor in question as applying more at a social level #an unconscious impetus operating in the background, a matter of cultural mores#, than at the conscious or individual level#
Perhaps I could put it this way###
Wikipedia lists the following stats:
Upper Paleolithic -- 33
Neolithic -- 20
Bronze Age and Iron Age -- 35 plus
Classical Greece -- 28
Classical Rome -- 28
Pre-Columbian North America -- 25-30
Medieval Islamic Caliphate -- 35 plus
Medieval Britain -- 30
Early Modern Britain -- 40 plus
Early 20th Century -- 30-45
Current world average -- 67.2
And it makes the important note: "The life expectancies at birth listed below take account of infant mortality but not pre-natal mortality #miscarriage or abortion#."
Now, say that infant mortality is 50%. And say that the average lifespan in a particular culture is 25. Well, if half the population are dying by age 5, then the other half must be living till age 45.
Obviously, the pattern is going to vary a lot depending on which particular culture one is thinking about. But if, having survived childhood, you're likely to live till middle age, that in turn makes it less likely that the individual is thinking, "I've got to start having children when I'm 15, because I'll be dead by the time I'm 25." Rather, she knows that she'll probably have more time than that.
Comment by Nonymous
Philosophy Blog
Comment by Anonymous
J'aime Davidson Rudy, 30.