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Authors: Ann Jefferson
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combination of ancestry and economic
well-being. Some who married their cousins in colonial New Mexico stated their
reasons as follows: protection and maintenance of family honor, status, purity
of the bloodline, and protection of the family patrimony. The key thing was not
to lose control over the family’s property.
If the role of the eldest son was to protect the family
property by making a favorable marriage, the role of the daughters was to
maintain their virginity, a valuable commodity among elites. Virginity was a
sign that daughters had been protected by a vigilant patriarch, and it was a
mark of high social status. Among the common people, women who were not virgins
could marry and retain their honor, at least in the estimation of their social
peers, but the property-holding classes, who believed that honor was the
exclusive property of the social elite, left no stone unturned in their efforts
to protect the virginity of daughters, and thereby the honor of the family.
Other than her virginity and the status of her family, what
made an elite woman appealing as a marriage partner was the size of her dowry.
Dowries of wealthy brides were normally made up of semi-liquid assets that
could be moved easily, things like clothing and jewelry, family furniture and
art, a few slaves, cash, or some farm animals. In 1623, the parents of doña
Inés de Guzmán of San Salvador, capital of present-day El Salvador, sent an
enslaved woman, Isabel, and Isabel’s three children along with their daughter
to Guatemala, where the four slaves formed a valuable portion of the
substantial dowry accepted by their new son-in-law, Juan de León. Generally,
brothers got the family business, often either the plantation or the mine,
along with the family home, but at times these too were part of a dowry. The
dowry was seen as advance payment of the inheritance that would come to a daughter
eventually, but paid to her early in order for her to enter into a favorable
marriage. A woman’s dowry remained her property, to be passed on to her
children upon her death or to revert to her family if there were no children.
In some cases, women won court suits that removed their property from the
management of a careless husband.
In 16th-century Brazil, it was quite common to favor
daughters by granting them large dowries that would allow them to marry well
and maintain elite status. This forced their less-fortunate brothers to find
their own way in the economy, perhaps by entering into the business of
capturing the native people of the area for sale in the slave market, or by
finding a place in the agricultural or commercial economy.
The dowry was not absolutely necessary for a favorable
marriage, and by the 1750s, it was falling out of use. In some areas of Spanish
America, the bride or her family might receive a reciprocal gift from the
bridegroom known as arras, frequently amounting to 10 percent of the
bridegroom’s net worth.
Indigenous Marriage
Marriage rites prior to the arrival of the Europeans varied
as widely as the First Nations themselves. Just to give one example, among the
pre-Columbian Pueblo groups of New Mexico, girls married at about age 17, boys
around 19. Marriage was initiated by the boy, who asked his parents for
permission to marry the chosen girl. His parents and extended family then
collected gifts for the girl’s family and presented them along with the
proposal of marriage. Those of the girl’s family who accepted a gift were
expected to reciprocate with a gift of equal value four days later.
When the Europeans came and the Roman Catholic Church took
up the project of civilizing and Christianizing the indigenous people, part of
it was to get the indigenous people formally and legally married. Some
pre-Columbian cultures had practiced polygamy and approved of premarital
relations and cohabitation. One bridegroom in the Andes even expressed the
opinion that his bride’s virginity indicated that she was not attractive
well-being. Some who married their cousins in colonial New Mexico stated their
reasons as follows: protection and maintenance of family honor, status, purity
of the bloodline, and protection of the family patrimony. The key thing was not
to lose control over the family’s property.
If the role of the eldest son was to protect the family
property by making a favorable marriage, the role of the daughters was to
maintain their virginity, a valuable commodity among elites. Virginity was a
sign that daughters had been protected by a vigilant patriarch, and it was a
mark of high social status. Among the common people, women who were not virgins
could marry and retain their honor, at least in the estimation of their social
peers, but the property-holding classes, who believed that honor was the
exclusive property of the social elite, left no stone unturned in their efforts
to protect the virginity of daughters, and thereby the honor of the family.
Other than her virginity and the status of her family, what
made an elite woman appealing as a marriage partner was the size of her dowry.
Dowries of wealthy brides were normally made up of semi-liquid assets that
could be moved easily, things like clothing and jewelry, family furniture and
art, a few slaves, cash, or some farm animals. In 1623, the parents of doña
Inés de Guzmán of San Salvador, capital of present-day El Salvador, sent an
enslaved woman, Isabel, and Isabel’s three children along with their daughter
to Guatemala, where the four slaves formed a valuable portion of the
substantial dowry accepted by their new son-in-law, Juan de León. Generally,
brothers got the family business, often either the plantation or the mine,
along with the family home, but at times these too were part of a dowry. The
dowry was seen as advance payment of the inheritance that would come to a daughter
eventually, but paid to her early in order for her to enter into a favorable
marriage. A woman’s dowry remained her property, to be passed on to her
children upon her death or to revert to her family if there were no children.
In some cases, women won court suits that removed their property from the
management of a careless husband.
In 16th-century Brazil, it was quite common to favor
daughters by granting them large dowries that would allow them to marry well
and maintain elite status. This forced their less-fortunate brothers to find
their own way in the economy, perhaps by entering into the business of
capturing the native people of the area for sale in the slave market, or by
finding a place in the agricultural or commercial economy.
The dowry was not absolutely necessary for a favorable
marriage, and by the 1750s, it was falling out of use. In some areas of Spanish
America, the bride or her family might receive a reciprocal gift from the
bridegroom known as arras, frequently amounting to 10 percent of the
bridegroom’s net worth.
Indigenous Marriage
Marriage rites prior to the arrival of the Europeans varied
as widely as the First Nations themselves. Just to give one example, among the
pre-Columbian Pueblo groups of New Mexico, girls married at about age 17, boys
around 19. Marriage was initiated by the boy, who asked his parents for
permission to marry the chosen girl. His parents and extended family then
collected gifts for the girl’s family and presented them along with the
proposal of marriage. Those of the girl’s family who accepted a gift were
expected to reciprocate with a gift of equal value four days later.
When the Europeans came and the Roman Catholic Church took
up the project of civilizing and Christianizing the indigenous people, part of
it was to get the indigenous people formally and legally married. Some
pre-Columbian cultures had practiced polygamy and approved of premarital
relations and cohabitation. One bridegroom in the Andes even expressed the
opinion that his bride’s virginity indicated that she was not attractive
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