A History of Matrimonial Institutions, Vol. 1 of 3Howard, George Elliott
History
A History of Matrimonial Institutions, Vol. 1 of 3
Howard, George Elliott
Families; Marriage -- History
Especially interesting among uncivilized or backward races are the
effects of divorce with respect to second marriage or the remarriage
of the parties to one another. Everywhere, apparently, the man
who puts away his wife or has been divorced by her is allowed to
contract a second marriage immediately, or, at any rate, after a
very short interval.[813] This follows almost as a matter of course
where wife-capture or wife-purchase exists, or where polygyny
prevails.[814] But with regard to the second marriage of a divorced
woman usage greatly varies. Among a number of peoples she is free
to marry again, if she likes, even when she is responsible for the
separation.[815] Generally, however, her freedom is restricted
in this regard; and this is especially apt to be the case where
wife-purchase exists; for then the legal rights of the husband
in the woman are by no means extinguished by the dissolution of
marriage. Her status as a wife must thus be distinguished from her
position as property or as the object of contract. Accordingly
for this or some other reason the woman who puts away her husband
is sometimes absolutely forbidden to form a second marriage. Such
is the case among peoples so little advanced as the Ashantees and
Hottentots; while the Banjun wife who divorces her husband may
not marry again in the same village where she found her first
spouse.[816] Still more rigorous is the rule in Samoa, where the
divorced woman is forbidden to remarry even after her husband's
death.[817] Between the extremes of entire freedom and entire
prohibition the remarriage of a woman is hampered by a variety of
conditions, some simple and others severe. The Kafir woman may be
married again by her father when she has divorced her husband with
consent of the tribal chief. Sometimes the second marriage depends
on the return of the marriage-gift or the purchase price; or the
woman must wait a certain period, as three months or a year, before
contracting it.[818] In several instances, doubtless as the result
of purchase, after returning to her father's house she remains at
her husband's disposal until he formally sets her free; while in yet
other cases she may be reclaimed by him within a certain definite
time. So with the old Arabians the purchased wife was looked upon as
the husband's property, and hence divorce did not release her from
his claims.[819] In Islam, as already explained, where the ancient
Arabian rule of triple declaration of divorce still survives, a man
who has divorced his wife by a single or even a second declaration
of the formula "can take her again within three months without
asking her consent."[820] Among the Bedouins, in like spirit, when
the divorce takes place at the instance of the woman, the man
may refuse to repeat the formula of separation without which she
cannot contract a second marriage.[821] Very frequently the second
marriage, whether of a widow or a divorced woman, is not looked upon
as so important as the first.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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