Marriage

Marriage—also known as matrimony or wedlock—is a union between spouses that is typically recognized by culture and often by law. This union creates specific rights and duties not only between the partners themselves, but also between them and any children they may have, and between them and their in-laws. While marriage is found in nearly every human society, its exact definition shifts across different cultures, religions, and historical periods.

The word "marriage" entered English around 1300, borrowed from Old French *mariage*, which itself traces back to the Latin verb *maritāre* ("to marry"). The related term "matrimony" also appeared around 1300, coming from Old French *matremoine* and ultimately from Latin *mātrimōnium*, a word built from *māter* ("mother") plus a suffix indicating an action or state.

Anthropologists have long struggled to settle on a single definition of marriage that covers all the diverse practices found worldwide. Even within Western culture, definitions have swung widely. In 1891, Edvard Westermarck described marriage as a lasting bond between a male and a female that extends beyond reproduction until after the child is born. By 1936, he had abandoned that view, instead calling marriage a relation between one or more men and one or more women that is recognized by custom or law. The 1951 handbook *Notes and Queries* defined it as a union between a man and a woman that makes children born to the woman the legitimate offspring of both partners. Later, Kathleen Gough modified this to include a woman and one or more other persons, after observing the Nuer people of Sudan, where a woman could act as a husband in a "ghost marriage." Studying the Nayar of India—a polyandrous society—Gough found that the husband role was split between a non-resident "social father" and the woman's lovers, none of whom had legal rights to her child. This led her to drop sexual access as a necessary element and define marriage purely in terms of offspring legitimacy. Economic anthropologist Duran Bell criticized that approach, noting that some societies do not require marriage for a child to be considered legitimate, making the definition circular in those contexts.

Edmund Leach argued that no single definition fits all cultures. Instead, he proposed viewing marriage as a collection of rights that vary by society. In a 1955 article, he listed ten such rights: establishing a legal father for a woman's children; establishing a legal mother for a man's children; giving each spouse a monopoly on the other's sexuality; giving each spouse rights to the other's domestic and other labor; giving each spouse partial or total control over the other's property; creating a joint property fund for children; and forming a socially significant relationship between a husband and his wife's brothers. Notably, the monopoly on sexuality generally does not include the right to sexual access—in many countries, that is considered marital rape.

Marriage takes many forms, shaped by the cultural and religious values of the people involved and the expectations of their society. It may be recognized by a state, an organization, a religious authority, a tribal group, a local community, or peers, and is often treated as a legal contract. Around the world, there has been a general push for equal rights for women within marriages, as well as greater acceptance of interethnic, interracial, interfaith, interdenominational, interclass, intercommunity, transnational, and same-sex couples. Ongoing debates focus on the legal status of married women, tolerance of violence within marriage, customs like dowry and bride price, the minimum age for marriage, and whether premarital or extramarital sex should be criminalized.