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Marriageable age, marriage age, or the age of marriage is the general age, a legal age or the minimum age subject to parental, religious or other forms of social approval, at which a person is legitimately allowed for marriage. Age and other prerequisites to marriage vary between jurisdictions, but in the vast majority of jurisdictions, the marriage age as a right is set at the age of majority. Nevertheless, most jurisdictions allow marriage at a younger age with parental or judicial approval, especially if the female is pregnant. Among most indigenous cultures, people marry at fifteen, the age of sexual maturity for both the male and the female. In industrialized cultures, the age of marriage is most commonly 18 years old, but there are variations, and the marriageable age should not be confused with the age of majority or the age of consent, though they may be the same.
The 55 parties to the 1962 Convention on Consent to Marriage, Minimum Age for Marriage, and Registration of Marriages have agreed to specify a minimum marriage age by statute law‚ to override customary, religious, tribal laws and traditions. When the marriageable age under a law of a religious community is lower than that under the law of the land, the state law prevails. However, some religious communities do not accept the supremacy of state law in this respect, which may lead to child marriage or forced marriage. The 123 parties to the 1956 Supplementary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery have agreed to adopt a prescribed "suitable" minimum age for marriage. In many developing countries, the official age prescriptions stand as mere guidelines. UNICEF, the United Nations children's organization, regards a marriage of a minor (legal child), a person below the adult age, as child marriage and a violation of rights.[1]
Until recently, the minimum marriageable age for females was lower in many jurisdictions than for males, on the premise that females mature at an earlier age than males. This law has been viewed by some to be discriminatory, so that in many countries the marriageable age of females has been raised to equal that of males.[2]
History and social attitudes
Classical antiquity
Greece
In Greece females married as young as 14 or 16.[3] In Spartan marriages, females were around 18 and males were around 25.[4]
Rome
In the Roman Empire, the Emperor Augustus introduced marriage legislation, the Lex Papia Poppaea, which rewarded marriage and childbearing. The legislation also imposed penalties for both men and women who remained unmarried, or who married but for whatever reason failed to have children. For men it is between the ages of 25 and 60 while for women it is between ages 20 and 50.[5] Women who were Vestal Virgins were selected between the ages of 6 and 10 to serve as priestesses in the temple of goddess Vesta in the Roman Forum for 30 years, after which they could marry.[6]
Noblewomen were known to marry as young as 12 years of age,[7] whereas women in the lower social classes were more likely to marry slightly further into their teenage years.[8][9] The father had the right and duty to seek a good and useful match for his children, and might arrange a child's betrothal long before he or she came of age (age of maturity).[10] To further the interests of their birth families, daughters of the elite would marry into respectable families.[11] If a daughter could prove the proposed husband to be of bad character, she could legitimately refuse the match[11]
In Roman law, age of majority varied from being 25 or as high as 30, though the age of marriage was 12 years for females and 14 years for males, and age of betrothal was 7 years for both males and females. The age of lawful consent to a marriage was 12 for girls and 14 for boys.[7]
Ancient Roman law required brides to be at least 12 years old. In ancient Roman law, first marriages to brides aged 12–25 required the consent of the bride and her father, but by the late antique period, Roman law permitted women over 25 to marry without parental consent.[12]: 29–37
Historically, individuals were allowed to enter into a marriage contract at a very young age. This coincided with signs of puberty, such as the start of menstruation for a female and the growth of pubic hair for a male. In Ancient Rome, the appropriate minimum age for marriage was regarded as 14 for males and 12 for females.[13]
43% of Pagan females married as young as 12-15 years and 42% of Christian females married as young as 9-12 years.[14]
In late antiquity, most Roman women married in their late teens to early twenties, but noble women married younger than those of the lower classes, as an aristocratic girl was expected to be virgin until her first marriage.[8] In late antiquity, under Roman law, daughters inherited equally from their parents if no will was produced.[12]: 63 In addition, Roman law recognized wives' property as legally separate from husbands' property,[12]: 133–154 as did some legal systems in parts of Europe and colonial Latin America.
In 380 C.E., the Emperor Theodosius issued the Edict of Thessalonica, which made Nicene Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire. The Holy See adapted Roman law into Canon law.[13]
Medieval Europe
After the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the rise of the Holy Roman Empire, manorialism also helped weaken the ties of kinship and thus the power of clans. As early as the 9th century in northwestern France, families that worked on manors were small, consisting of parents and children and occasionally a grandparent. The Roman Catholic Church and State had become allies in erasing the solidarity and thus the political power of the clans; the Roman Catholic Church sought to replace traditional religion, whose vehicle was the kin group, and substitute the authority of the elders of the kin group with that of a religious elder. At the same time, the king's rule was undermined by revolts by the most powerful kin groups, clans or sections, whose conspiracies and murders threatened the power of the state and also the demands by manorial Lords for obedient, compliant workers.[15]
As the peasants and serfs lived and worked on farms that they rented from the lord of the manor, they also needed the permission of the lord to marry. Couples therefore had to comply with the lord of the manor and wait until a small farm became available before they could marry and thus produce children. Those who could and did not delay marriage were presumably rewarded by the landlord and those who did not marry were presumably denied that reward. For example, marriage ages in Medieval England varied depending on economic circumstances, with couples delaying marriage until their early twenties when times were bad, but might marry in their late teens after the Black Death, when there was a severe labour shortage;[16]: 96 by appearances, marriage of adolescents was not the norm in England.[16]: 98–100
In medieval Western Europe, the rise of Catholicism and manorialism had both created incentives to keep families nuclear, and thus the age of marriage increased; the Western Church instituted marriage laws and practices that undermined large kinship groups. The Roman Catholic Church prohibited consanguineous marriages, a marriage pattern that had been a means to maintain clans (and thus their power) throughout history.[17] The Roman Catholic Church curtailed arranged marriages in which the bride did not clearly agree to the union.[18]
Male and female adolescents needed parental consent to marry because they were under the age of majority, 21 years old. In the 12th century, the Roman Catholic Church drastically changed legal standards for marital consent by allowing daughters over 12 years old and sons over 14 years old to marry without their parents' approval, even if their marriage was made clandestinely.[19] Parish studies have confirmed that in the late medieval period, females did sometimes marry without their parents' approval in England.[20]
In the 12th century, Canon law jurist Gratian, stated that consent for marriage could not take place before the age of 12 years old for females and 14 years old for males; also, consent for betrothal could not take place before the age of 7 years old for females and males, as that is the age of reason. The Church of England, after breaking away from the Roman Catholic Church, carried with it the same minimum age requirements. Age of consent for marriage of 12 years old for girls and of 14 years old for boys were written into English civil law.[13]
The first recorded age-of-consent law, in England, dates back 800 years. The age of consent law in question has to do with the law of rape and not the law of marriage as sometimes misunderstood. In 1275, in England, as part of the rape law, the Statute of Westminster 1275, made it a misdemeanor to have sex with a "maiden within age", whether with or without her consent. The phrase "within age" was interpreted by jurist Sir Edward Coke as meaning the age of marriage, which at the time was 12 years old.[21] A 1576 law was created with more severe punishments for having sex with a girl for which the age of consent was set at 10 years old.[22] Under English common law the age of consent, as part of the law of rape, was 10 or 12 years old and rape was defined as forceful sexual intercourse with a woman against her will. To convict a man of rape, both force and lack of consent had to be proved, except in the case of a girl who is under the age of consent. Since the age of consent applied in all circumstances, not just in physical assaults, the law also made it impossible for an underage girl (under 12 years old) to consent to sexual activity. There was one exception: a man's acts with his wife (females over 12 years old), to which rape law did not apply.[23] Jurist Sir Matthew Hale stated that both rape laws were valid at the same time.[24] In 1875, the Offence Against the Persons Act raised the age to 13 years in England; an act of sexual intercourse with a girl younger than 13 was a felony.[25]
There were some fathers who arranged marriages for a son or a daughter before he or she reached the age of maturity, which is similar to what some fathers in ancient Rome did. Consummation would not take place until the age of maturity. Roman Catholic Canon law defines a marriage as consummated when the "spouses have performed between themselves in a human fashion a conjugal act which is suitable in itself for the procreation of offspring, to which marriage is ordered by its nature and by which the spouses become one flesh."[26] There are recorded marriages of two- and three-year-olds: in 1564, a three-year-old named John was married to a two-year-old named Jane in the Bishop's Court in Chester, England.
Modern history
The policy of the Roman Catholic Church, and later various protestant churches, of considering clandestine marriages and marriages made without parental consent to be valid was controversial, and in the 16th century both the French monarchy and the Lutheran Church sought to end these practices, with limited success.[27]
In most of Northwestern Europe, marriages at very early ages were rare. One thousand marriage certificates from 1619 to 1660 in the Archdiocese of Canterbury show that only one bride was 13 years old, four were 15, twelve were 16, and seventeen were 17 years old; while the other 966 brides were at least 19 years old.[28]
In England and Wales, the Marriage Act 1753 required a marriage to be covered by a licence (requiring parental consent for those under 21) or the publication of bans (which parents of those under 21 could forbid). Additionally, the Church of England dictated that both the bride and groom must be at least 21 years of age to marry without the consent of their families. In the certificates, the most common age for the brides is 22 years. For the grooms 24 years was the most common age, with average ages of 24 years for the brides and 27 for the grooms.[28] While European noblewomen often married early, they were a small minority of the population,[29] and the marriage certificates from Canterbury show that even among nobility it was very rare to marry women off at very early ages.[28]
The minimum age requirements of 12 and 14 were eventually written into English civil law. By default, these provisions became the minimum marriage ages in colonial America.[13] On the average, marriages occurred several years earlier in colonial America than in Europe, and much higher proportions of the population eventually got married. Community-based studies suggest an average age at marriage of about 20 years old for women in the early colonial period and about 26 years old for men.[30] In the late 19th century and throughout the 20th century, U.S. states began to slowly raise the minimum legal age at which individuals were allowed to marry. Age restrictions, as in most developed countries, have been revised upward so that they are now between 15 and 21 years of age.[13]
Before 1929, the Scottish law adopted the Roman law in allowing a girl to marry at twelve years of age and a boy at fourteen, without any requirement for parental consent. However, in practice, marriages in Scotland at such young ages was almost unknown.[31]
France
In France, until the French Revolution, the marriageable age was 12 years for females and 14 for males. Revolutionary legislation in 1792 increased the age to 13 years for females and 15 for males. Under the Napoleonic Code in 1804, the marriageable age was set at 15 years old for females and 18 years old for males.[32] In 2006, the marriageable age for females was increased to 18, the same as for males. In jurisdictions where the ages are not the same, the marriageable age for females is more commonly two or three years lower than that of males.
Central Europe
In 17th century Poland, in the Warsaw parish of St John, the average age of women entering marriage was 20.1, and that of men was 23.7. In the second half of the eighteenth century, women in the parish of Holy Cross married at 21.8, while men at 29.[33]
Eastern Europe
In medieval Eastern Europe, the Slavic traditions of patrilocality of early and universal marriage (usually of a bride aged 13–15 years, with menarche occurring on average at age 14) lingered;[34] the manorial system had yet to penetrate into Eastern Europe and generally had less effect on clan systems there. The bans on cross-cousin marriages had also not been firmly enforced.[35]
In Russia, before 1830 the age of consent for marriage was 15 years old for males and 13 years old for females[36] (though 15 years old was preferred for females, so much so that it was written into the Law Code of 1649).[37] Teenage marriage was practised for chastity. Both the female and the male teenager needed consent of their parents to marry because they were under 20 years old, the age of majority. In 1830, the age of consent for marriage was raised to 18 years old for males and 16 years old for females[36] Though 18 years old was preferred for females, the average age of marriage for females was around 19 years old.[38][39]
Mesoamerica
Aztec society
Aztec family law generally followed customary law. Men got married between the ages of 20-22, and women generally got married at 15 to 18 years of age.[40]
Mayan civilization
Maya family law appears to have been based on customary law. Maya men and women usually got married at around the age of 20, though women sometimes got married at the age of 16 or 17.[41]
Marriageable age as a right vs exceptions
In majority of countries, a right to marry at age 18 is enshrined along with all other rights and responsibilities of adulthood. However, most of these countries allow those younger than that age to marry, usually with parental consent or judicial authorization. These exceptions vary considerably by country. The United Nations Population Fund stated:[42]
In 2010, 158 countries reported that 18 years was the minimum legal age for marriage for women without parental consent or approval by a pertinent authority. However, in 146 countries, state or customary law allows girls younger than 18 to marry with the consent of parents or other authorities; in 52 countries, girls under age 15 can marry with parental consent. In contrast, 18 is the legal age for marriage without consent among males in 180 countries. Additionally, in 105 countries, boys can marry with the consent of a parent or a pertinent authority, and in 23 countries, boys under age 15 can marry with parental consent.
In recent years, many countries in the EU have tightened their marriage laws, either banning marriage under 18 completely, or requiring judicial approval for such marriages. Countries which have reformed their marriage laws in recent years include Sweden (2014), Denmark (2017), Germany (2017), Luxembourg (2014), Spain (2015), Netherlands (2015), Finland (2019) and Ireland (2019). Many developing countries have also enacted similar laws in recent years: Honduras (2017), Ecuador (2015), Costa Rica (2017), Panama (2015), Trinidad & Tobago (2017), Malawi (2017).
The minimum age requirements of 12 years old for females and 14 years old for males were written into English civil law. By default, these provisions became the minimum marriage ages in colonial America. This English common law inherited from the British remained in force in America unless a specific state law was enacted to replace them. In the United States, as in most developed countries, age restrictions have been revised upward so that they are now between 15 and 21 years of age.[13]
In Western countries, marriages of teenagers have become rare in recent years, with their frequency declining during the past few decades. For instance, in Finland, where in the early 21st century underage youth could obtain a special judicial authorization to marry, there were only 30–40 such marriages per year during that period (with most of the spouses being aged 17), while in the early 1990s, more than 100 such marriages were registered each year. Since 1 June 2019 Finland has banned marriages of anyone under 18 with no exemptions.[43][44]
Relation to the age of majority
Marriage age as a right is usually the same with the age of majority which is 18 years old in most countries. However, in some countries, the age of majority is under 18, while in others it is 19, 20 or 21 years. In Canada for example, the age of majority is 19 in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, British Columbia, Newfoundland and Labrador, Northwest Territories, Yukon and Nunavut. Marriage under 19 years in these provinces requires parental or court consent (see Marriage in Canada). In USA for example, the age of majority is 21 in Mississippi and 19 in Nebraska and requires parental consent. In many jurisdictions of North America, marriages by marriage minors become legally emancipated.[45]
