Marriage

Sources

Finding a Spouse. Marriages among the upper-class Romans tended to be arranged by the woman’s father and the young man or his father. Sometimes the betrothal took place years before the actual marriage. The bride-to-be may have had little say in the matter, but a mother clearly expected to be consulted, expressed her opinion, and even made marriage arrangements in her husband’s absence. An anecdote in Plutarch’s Life of Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus recounts that one day Appius Claudius Pulcher hurried into his home and announced to his wife that he had arranged a marriage for their daughter. His wife, somewhat annoyed and surprised, asked why he was in such a hurry, unless the young man was Tiberius Gracchus. Pulcher was pleased because Gracchus was indeed just the man he had chosen. These marriages tended to have political or economic purposes, as well as to satisfy the desire to continue the husband’s family line. Less is known about marriage among the lower economic classes, but arranged marriages took place among them as well, perhaps more for economic than political reasons. Tombstones indicate that men and women who worked together as slaves and developed an affection for each other married upon gaining their freedom. Slaves could declare that they were husband and wife and often masters would respect the bond and not separate the family, especially in the case of slaves living in the household. If a husband or wife received freedom, often he or she worked to secure the freedom of his or her spouse and children.

Personal Choices. This is not to say that upper-class marriages never evolved from mutual affection, but opportunities for such acquaintance were unlikely considering the difference in ages between women (twelve to sixteen) and men (twenty to thirty) for a woman’s first marriage. Subsequent unions were more likely to be personal choices. Finding a husband was not always easy. When Cicero began looking for Tullia’s third husband in 51 B.C.E, he asked the help of various friends in finding suitable candidates, in part because he was out of the country serving as the governor of Cilicia. Only a few men were available who met Cicero’s political needs, personal inclination, and his daughter’s approval. Publius Cornelius Dolabella, although not Cicero’s first choice, was the favorite of Tullia and her mother Terentia. In Cicero’s absence they were able to take the lead and arrange the engagement. Even though he had his doubts, Cicero gave his approval.

The Right to Marry. Only men and women who had conubium, the legitimate right to marry, were able to enter into a union that could produce legitimate children. Slaves did not possess conubium; so, although they entered into unions that they valued, their marriages did not have to be recognized by their owners, until the Emperor Constantine issued an edict at the beginning of the third century C.E. that prohibited owners from separating slave families and required those who had to reunite them as quickly as possible. All Roman citizens possessed conubium and could, therefore, marry each other without question about the legitimacy of their children. Roman citizens could marry Latins (residents of the Italian peninsula who had been given special rights by the Roman government), who had been awarded conubium along with their other privileges. Foreigners as well might be awarded conubium and could, therefore, marry Roman citizens. Among Roman citizens there were concerns about and even bans against marriage between certain classes at different times in Rome’s history. According to the historical tradition, there was a time in the early Republic when a law prevented patricians (families who were descended from the first patres, or senators) and plebeians from intermarrying. In 445 B.C.E., however, the lex Canuleia allowed patricians and plebeians to marry, but practice may have kept the two groups separate. During the reign of Augustus, the emperor promoted a law that forbade senators and their children and grandchildren to marry freedwomen or the children of freedmen and women who had been actors or actresses. Augustus also prohibited soldiers from marrying while they served in the army. The Emperor Septimius Severus ended this practice in 197 C.E. By that point Romans had permanent military outposts scattered around the Empire. A Roman man serving as an administrator in a province could not marry a woman from that province during his term of office. Prostitutes also did not have conubium. Finally, the parties also had to be of an appropriate age to marry: the bride had to be at least twelve; the groom, although often in his twenties, had to be at least fourteen. For those who did not have the right to marry but who chose to live together as husband and wife nonetheless, their relationship was called contubernium (literally, “the state of being tent-mates”). A freeborn man or a freedman might live as husband and wife with a slave woman. Likewise, a male slave might have a freedwoman as a wife. The state offered limited recognition to these relationships, even if they could not produce legitimate children.

Betrothal and the Dowry. Two agreements might precede a marriage, especially among the upper classes: an arrangement of sponsalia, or betrothal, and an agreement about the amount of the dowry (and the means for its return should the marriage end in divorce). The betrothal might be as simple as a verbal agreement between the girl’s father and the young man that a marriage would occur at a certain time, or it might be as elaborate as a large family party at which the young man would present the bride-to-be with a ring. The betrothal was sealed with a kiss and the joining of right hands by the couple. There was no specific amount of time between the betrothal and the marriage, until Augustus passed legislation limiting the length of a betrothal to two years. The most important event before a marriage, however, was the arrangement concerning the dowry (an amount given a woman by her father at her marriage). Although the dowry may have been a part of early Roman marriage, the first mention of the dowry in legal texts comes in 230 B.C.E. In this year a procedure was established for returning the dowry upon the divorce of the couple. The passage of this law may indicate that divorce was becoming frequent enough to need legislation, rather than provide any indication about the history of the dowry. Although the dowry belonged to the woman, her husband was allowed to treat the property as his in order to increase the value and use the revenue. Before the marriage the woman’s father and the prospective groom decided on the amount and how it would be paid. For instance, when Cicero agreed to the marriage between Tullia and Dolabella, he arranged to pay her dowry in three equal payments over three years. In theory, revenue from the dowry helped the husband provide for his wife, but evidence, again from the marriage of Tullia, suggests that was not always the case: at one point Tullia was reportedly in such financial difficulty that Cicero (who was out of the country because of the civil war between Caesar and Pompey) had to apply to his friend Atticus to take care of Tullia’s needs; apparently Terentia had mishandled the family finances or refused to help her daughter. When Cicero began divorce proceedings on Tullia’s behalf, Dolabella had to return the dowry in the same manner as he had received it. A husband could keep part of the dowry only if he proved his wife had committed adultery.

The Wedding. When a woman married, she did not alter her name. She did, however, change where she lived, what she wore, and possibly whom she looked to as a guardian. In most instances, however, a marriage occurred by the declaration that a man and woman were going to live together as husband and wife. The event was celebrated with a party for friends and family that began at the bride’s house. One ritual that the bride performed was the dedication of her childhood toys to the household gods, so signifying that she was no longer a child, but an adult. The bridal outfit consisted of a white dress with saffron-colored veil and shoes. Not all families could afford such expensive preparations, so the girl may merely have exchanged her child’s garment for the stola (“gown”) of the Roman matron. Once the celebration was over, a procession of friends and family carrying torches would accompany the new bride to the house of her husband, who was most likely still living with his parents. In addition, three young boys whose parents were still living accompanied the bride, two holding each of her hands and one carrying a special torch, the spina alba (“white wood”). The celebrants made jokes, said suggestive things, and threw nuts—all to encourage fertility for the couple. The groom left the party before the bride in order to meet her at the door of his house. When the bride arrived, she decorated the doorway with oil and wool. Some believe that the bride may have expressed her devotion to her husband by uttering the phrase “ubi tu Gaius, ego Gaia” (“Where you are Gaius, I am Gaia”) to mark her arrival to his house. The bride’s attendants (including the pronuba, or matron of honor) carried the bride across the threshold so that she would not trip and therefore bring a bad omen to the beginning of the marriage. The bridegroom then offered her a torch and water, symbolizing his willingness to provide for her well-being. A small ritual marriage-bed might be set up in the atrium of the house, and there she would place an image of her genius, in essence, her soul. The day after the wedding, the new couple was expected to provide a dinner party for the wedding guests. In their presence the new wife made her first offering to her husband’s household gods. In the days following the wedding, the couple was expected to attend other parties together. This public demonstration, like the procession on the wedding day, made it known to all that they were married.

Marriage and Manus. There were three different types of ceremonies associated with marriage that determined the degree to which a woman and her dowry came under her husband’s authority. Although a woman could own property and could buy and sell that property, she did so with the approval of her tutor, or guardian, unless she had been declared independent (sui iuris). For a married woman, her guardian was either her father or her husband. For a divorced, widowed, or orphaned woman, another man, usually a relative from her gens, served as her guardian. His job was more to protect the family’s resources than to hinder a woman from buying and selling property.

Confarreatio. The confarreatio (literally, “a sharing of far,” a sort of grain made into bread) was the most elaborate and most rare of the three ceremonies associated with marriage and was practiced only by patricians and likely substituted for the basic wedding ceremony described above. If a man wanted to serve as the Flamen Dialis, the high priest of Jupiter, the Flamen Quirinalis, the high priest of Quirinus, the Flamen Martialis, the high priest of Mars, or the rex sacrorum (the king of sacred matters), both he and his parents had to have been married through

confarreatio. In this ceremony, the husband received manus, or authority over his wife, from her father. In the ceremony itself, the bride and groom sacrificed a loaf of bread made from far to Juppiter Farreus. They performed rituals and repeated a given set of vows in front of ten witnesses, including the Pontifex Maximus and the Flamen Dialis. One account states that a sheep was sacrificed and skinned and that the couple sat on the sheepskin with their heads covered. A couple married by confarreatio could not divorce. If one of the spouses should die, the other had to step down from his or her priesthood.

Usus. The second way to establish manus was called usus. In this instance, after a man and woman announced that they were husband and wife, a husband gained manus only if his wife was never away from his home for more than three consecutive nights each year. If she did not stay away from her husband’s house, he received manus over her and her dowry. Manus became less common as the Republic came to a close but still existed enough in the early empire that a procedure (emancipatio) existed to free a woman from her husband’s control. Usus faded out as a means of marriage by the end of the second century C.E.

Coemptio. The third procedure affecting a marriage, was coemptio, a sort of ritual sale that placed a woman and her property in a man’s control in the presence of a minimum of five adult Roman male citizens as witnesses. That man could become her husband, but coemptio in and of itself did not constitute a marriage; it only conveyed manus. A man and woman who i had previously married might at some point, therefore, perform coemptio to establish the husband’s manus. A woman could, in fact, make a coemptio with a man who was not her husband in order to make that man her tutor, or guardian. Understanding coemptio is difficult because its focus is more on control of property than on establishing a marital relationship between a man and a woman. For that reason, a woman’s guardian or guardians had to approve any coemptio, but their approval was not necessary for marriage.

Purpose of Marriage. The explicit purpose of marriage was for the procreation of legitimate children. A husband could, therefore, divorce his wife if the marriage produced no children (the assumption was always that a lack of children resulted from a defect in the woman’s ability to conceive). Although some men divorced their wives for being barren, other men, such as the husband of Turia, refused to divorce their wives just because of a lack of children. The writer Pliny the Younger had a young wife who, although she became pregnant once but miscarried, never bore him any children.

Alliances. Marriage could create political and economic alliances, as well. After Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus formed the first triumvirate, Pompey married Julia, Caesar’s daughter, to add a personal dimension to their political arrangement. Likewise, Antony married Octavia, the sister of Octavius, one of his partners in the second triumvirate. Since he had produced no male heir, the Emperor Augustus used marriage to try to establish a successor to his rule. When all the other choices had died, he forced his stepson, Tiberius, to divorce the wife he loved and to marry Julia, Augustus’s only daughter. This marriage made Tiberius both his son-in-law and stepson and, therefore, his closest male relative. It also made him miserable.

Marriage Legislation. Like other governmental officials before him, Augustus became concerned because fewer people were marrying and having children. He therefore passed laws in 18 B.C.E. and 9 C.E. that favored men and women who had legitimate children and that urged men and women to marry. For Roman citizens, Augustus required men to be married by the age of twenty-five and women by the age of twenty. If a woman’s husband died or divorced her, the legislation required that she remarry within two years or a year and a half, respectively. These lengths of time allowed for the appropriate period of mourning and ensured that any children the woman might bear were recognized as her husband’s. Men, on the other hand, were expected to remarry quickly, although those whose wives had died most likely would have observed a year of mourning. Augustus required that men be married, up to the age of sixty, and women, up to the age of fifty-five, under the assumption that those were the outer limits of childbearing age.

Special Consideration. Augustus also expected the couple to have children and to raise them. Therefore, he gave special consideration and privileges to men and women who had three or more children. The children had to reach a certain age (puberty for boys and marriageable age for girls) to count. Children who were killed in war counted, regardless of their age. The more children men had, the more privileges they received: when two men were elected consul, the one with more children became the senior consul. Before Augustus’s reign, seniority was determined by age. In Rome, a man with three children no longer had to serve as a woman’s guardian. (A man who lived outside Rome had to have four or five children, depending on whether he lived in Italy or in the provinces.) Women who had three children no longer had to have a guardian. For freedwomen, four children released them from the guardianship of their former owner, or three children if they had already transferred their guardianship to someone else. Freedmen no longer owed work to their former owners once they had two children. Slave women could gain their freedom by producing four children, but because any children born while the woman was a slave were automatically also slaves and stayed in the master’s household, even if she left, the idea of consigning children to servitude for their own benefit may have prevented many slave omen from pursuing the matter.

Divorce. In the early Republic, when most (if not all) marriages conveyed manus, only husbands could initiate a divorce, and only with a just cause such as adultery, poisoning children, or compromising the security of the familia. If he divorced his wife for any other reason, his property was confiscated and half was given to his wife, half deposited in the temple of Ceres. In the earliest recorded divorce, in 307 B.C.E., Lucius Annius was removed from the Senate by the censors because he did not properly consult his friends before divorcing his wife. (The loss of his property would also have ended his eligibility for the Senate.) The expectation that Lucius should have consulted others about a private matter suggests that a husband needed some external support for his decision. A divorce in 230 B.C.E. reveals a new development: Carvilius Ruga divorced his wife because she had failed to have a child. Since the stated purpose of marriage was to produce legitimate children, the perceived sterility of a wife was deemed as just cause for a divorce. In this instance, the wife was able to reclaim her dowry and Carvilius suffered no other penalty. As marriage with manus became less common, women’s fathers or even the women themselves, if they were sui iuris (independent), were able to initiate divorce with full recovery of the dowry. In general, a father could not initiate a divorce against his daughter’s or son’s will. The exception was the emperor. Augustus acted rather freely, ordering divorces and arranging marriages to further his dynastic aims and satisfy his personal needs. He forced Agrippa, and then Tiberius, to divorce their wives to marry his daughter Julia. He commandeered Livia from her husband while she was pregnant with her second child.

Social Class. Social class also affected one’s ability to divorce: a freedwoman could not divorce her patron without his consent. Only upon a formal agreement of divorce or upon the patron’s second marriage did a freedwoman gain the right to remarry.

Divorce Procedure. The divorce procedure appears to have been rather informal—an announcement that the marriage was over and the other person should have his or her property—tuas res tibi habeto. In the late Republic, a more-formal declaration involved one party sending a freedman—someone who could testify in court, if need be—to deliver the message of divorce to the other party. Although in the late Republic and early empire one party had to inform the other of the intention to divorce, in 294 C.E. the Emperors Diocletian and Maximian ruled that formal notice did not have to be given for a divorce to be valid. It was not until 449 C.E., during the reign of Theodosius and Valentinian, that divorce again required a formal notification, this time in the form of a repudium —a statement of rejection—by one spouse or the other.

Sources

Suzanne Dixon, The Roman Family (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992).

Dixon, The Roman Mother (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1988).

Jane Gardner, Women in Roman Law and Society (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986).

Judith P. Hallett, Fathers and Daughters in Roman Society: Women and the Elite Family (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984).

Susan Treggiari, Roman Marriage: lusti Coniuges From the Time of Cicero to the Time of Ulpian (Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 1991).