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126-565: The word is of Germanic origin from the Proto-Germanic word wībam , which translates into "woman". In Middle English , it had the form wif , and in Old English wīf , "woman or wife". It is related to Modern German Weib (woman, female), Danish viv (wife, usually poetic), and Dutch wijf (woman, generally pejorative , cf. bitch ). The original meaning of the phrase "wife" as simply "woman", unconnected with marriage or

252-472: A concubine was a woman who was in an ongoing, usually matrimonially oriented relationship with a man who could not be married to her, often due to a difference in social status. The term wife is most commonly applied to a woman in a union sanctioned by law (including religious law ), but not to a woman in an informal cohabitation relationship, which may be known as a girlfriend, partner, cohabitant, significant other, concubine , mistress , etc. However,

378-407: A profession and they (or their husbands) can take time off from their work in a legally procured system of ante-natal care , statutory maternity leave , and they may get maternity pay or a maternity allowance . The status of marriage, as opposed to unmarried pregnant women, allows the spouse to be responsible for the child, and to speak on behalf of their wife; a partner is also responsible for

504-429: A Christian husband only if she has committed adultery (Matthew 5:32). The New Testament allows a Christian widow to (re)marry a man she chooses (1 Cor 7:39) but forbids a divorced Christian woman to remarry because she would be committing adultery if she did (Matthew 5:32). As such she is to remain unmarried and celibate or be reconciled with her husband (1 Cor 7:1-2 & 8-9 and 1 Cor 7:10-11). A Christian wife can divorce

630-653: A brother of the deceased husband is a common widow inheritance tradition that many traditional cultures promote. Many modern legal systems in Sub-Saharan Africa, such as in Tanzania, have attempted to combat the customary law that enforces structures of inheritance and disinheritance . However, poor application and enforcement of the modern legal systems ensures that customary law remains the default in countries such as Ghana, Nigeria, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Widow inheritance traditions are exacerbated by

756-451: A brother of the deceased husband, returning to the widow's parents' home or a more exploitive inheritance to professional traveling widow inheritors. The prevalence of each form varies between sub-Saharan regions and across ethnic groups, and patterns of kinship and inheritance patterns cannot be ascribed uniformly because of stark differences in ethnic traditions. For example, in Kenya, for

882-667: A common history of pre-Proto-Germanic speakers throughout the Nordic Bronze Age . The Proto-Germanic language developed in southern Scandinavia (Denmark, south Sweden and southern Norway) and the northern-most part of Germany in Schleswig Holstein and northern Lower Saxony, the Urheimat (original home) of the Germanic tribes. It is possible that Indo-European speakers first arrived in southern Scandinavia with

1008-487: A common situation in the following summation of expert evidence provided to them: ...if the man died without the couple having had children, it would be much more likely that the family [of the deceased husband] would challenge the widow's inheritance rights... In rural settings, widows are at a particular disadvantage where the husband's family is much more likely to go directly to traditional courts [using customary law], which "always rule against widows". In an urban setting

1134-400: A couple will develop a mutually dependent relationship where the woman's income is needed, but at the same time the woman will do the majority of the housework. At the beginning of the 1970s the traditional dynamic was that women performed domestic labor and that men worked for income due to the economic pressures in place. Eventually, second wave feminism challenged this dynamic. Starting in

1260-432: A dialect of Proto-Indo-European that had lost its laryngeals and had five long and six short vowels as well as one or two overlong vowels. The consonant system was still that of PIE minus palatovelars and laryngeals, but the loss of syllabic resonants already made the language markedly different from PIE proper. Mutual intelligibility might have still existed with other descendants of PIE, but it would have been strained, and

1386-408: A factor to consider in a property settlement , it may affect the status of children, the custody of children ; moreover, adultery can result in social ostracism in some parts of the world. In addition, affinity rules of Catholicism, of Judaism and of Islam prohibit an ex-wife or widow from engaging in sexual relations with and from marrying a number of relatives of the former husband. In parts of

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1512-466: A husband with other wives. As a result, divorce was relatively uncommon in the pre-modern West, particularly in the medieval and early modern period , and husbands in the Roman, later medieval and early modern period did not publicly take more than one wife. In pre-modern times, it was unusual to marry for love alone, although it became an ideal in literature by the early modern period. In the 12th century,

1638-528: A husband/wife, is preserved in words such as " midwife ", " goodwife ", " fishwife " and " spaewife ". After marriage, it is generally expected in many cultures that a woman will take her husband's surname , though this is not universal. A married woman may indicate her marital status in a number of ways: in Western culture , a married woman would commonly wear a wedding ring , but in other cultures, other markers of marital status may be used. A married woman

1764-475: A larger scope of linguistic developments, spanning the Nordic Bronze Age and Pre-Roman Iron Age in Northern Europe (second to first millennia BC) to include "Pre-Germanic" (PreGmc), "Early Proto-Germanic" (EPGmc) and "Late Proto-Germanic" (LPGmc). While Proto-Germanic refers only to the reconstruction of the most recent common ancestor of Germanic languages, the Germanic parent language refers to

1890-555: A late stage. The early stage includes the stress fixation and resulting "spontaneous vowel-shifts" while the late stage is defined by ten complex rules governing changes of both vowels and consonants. By 250 BC Proto-Germanic had branched into five groups of Germanic: two each in the West and the North and one in the East. The following changes are known or presumed to have occurred in

2016-652: A marriage. In Pashtun communities, the code known as Pashtunwali requires a widow to marry her dead husband's brother or cousin regardless of her will. The code also requires her children to be treated as children of the new husband. The Taliban campaigned against the practice as being against shariah law . The circumstances of widows in Sub-Saharan African nations are complicated by both economic challenges and traditional social expectations. As of 2015, over 9 million widows face extreme poverty in sub-Saharan Africa. In many nations, policy contributes to

2142-588: A means of maintaining stability for their families. These widow inheritance traditions often include "cleansing" rituals, depending on the traditional culture of a given region. In many Sub-Saharan regions, such as within the Ovambo culture of Namibia, formal and informal structures of gender inequality force widows to sacrifice their independence for inheritance traditions within the late husband's family or externally. Widow inheritance often emerges to combat property loss and social rejection and to forced remarriage to

2268-493: A new marriage law which guaranteed gender equality between the spouses, women in Greece are required to keep their birth names for their whole life. Traditionally, and still in many cultures, the role of a wife was closely tied to that of a mother , by a strong expectation that a wife ought to bear children, while conversely, an unmarried woman should not have a child out of wedlock . These views have changed in many parts of

2394-546: A non-Christian husband if he wants a divorce (1 Cor 7:12-16). Christian husbands are to love their Christian wives as Christ loved the Church (Ephesians 5:25) and as he loves himself (Ephesians 5:33). The Christian wife is to respect her husband (Ephesians 5:33). Christian husbands are to not be harsh with their Christian wives (Colossians 3:19) and to treat them as a delicate vessel and with honor (1 Peter 3:7). Women in Islam have

2520-468: A partner to engage with in the ritual. Many widows are aware of the greater risk for HIV that they face by engaging in "cleansing" and inheritance rituals, but the pressure of cultural expectations and ensuring livelihood needs are met complicates their ability to avoid contracting the disease. Attempts to modify the law in many Sub-Saharan African nations have been in response to the HIV/AIDS concerns of

2646-423: A prevalence of female celibacy never yet documented for any other major traditional civilization. In addition, early modern Western women married at quite high ages (typically mid to late 20s) relative to other major traditional cultures. The high age at first marriage for Western women has been shown by many parish reconstruction studies to be a traditional Western marriage pattern that dates back at least as early as

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2772-457: A range of rights and obligations (see main article Rights and obligations of spouses in Islam ). Marriage takes place on the basis of a marriage contract . The arranged marriage is relatively common in traditionalist families, whether in Muslim countries or as first or second-generation immigrants elsewhere. Women in general are supposed to wear specific clothes, as stated by the hadith , like

2898-445: A result of the socioeconomic consequences of widow inheritance. When a widow is faced with disinheritance practices, the consequences of the loss of income after the husband's death extend to the children. The lack of welfare provisions for the family, especially healthcare, childcare, and education, have severe impacts on the wellbeing and development of children . In extreme scenarios, disinheritance and "grabbing" can also involve

3024-519: A spouse without reference to gender. Among the last European countries to establish full gender equality in marriage were Switzerland, Greece, Spain, and France in the 1980s. In various marriage laws around the world, however, the husband continues to have authority. For instance, the Civil Code of Iran states in Article 1105: "In relations between husband and wife; the position of the head of

3150-428: A standard adopted by Roman Catholic canon law . 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. 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. To further

3276-409: A suitable family (family of same caste, culture and financial status), the boy and the girl see and talk to each other to decide the outcome. In recent times however the western culture has had significant influence and the new generations are more open to the idea of marrying for love. Indian law has recognized rape, sexual, emotional or verbal abuse of a woman by her husband as crimes. In Hinduism ,

3402-501: A throne be brought and he had her sit at his right hand, which is in stark contrast to when she was Queen consort and bowed to King-Prophet David when she entered. Prophet Jeremiah portrays a Queen mother as sharing in her son's rule over the kingdom in Jeremiah 13:18-20 . The wife of Prophet Isaiah was a Prophetess. Isaiah 8:3 There is a widely held expectation, which has existed for most of recorded history and in most cultures, that

3528-406: A widow refuses inheritance from a professional widow inheritor, frequently out of fear of HIV/AIDS, she is often forced off her husband's land. HIV/AIDS concerns are further exacerbated in those conditions, as widows are often pushed into sex work to make a living as employment prospects for both women and widows can be difficult. The practice of "cleansing" is recognised as a serious concern for

3654-499: A wife is known as a Patni or Ardhangini (similar to "the better half") meaning a part of the husband or his family. In Hinduism, a woman or man can get married, but only have one husband or wife respectively. In India, women may wear vermilion powder on their foreheads, an ornament called Mangalsutra ( Hindi : मंगलसूत्र ) which is a form of necklace, or rings on their toes (which are not worn by single women) to show their status as married women. China 's family laws were changed by

3780-408: A wife is not to have sexual relations with anyone other than her legal husband. A breach of this expectation of fidelity is commonly referred to as adultery or extramarital sex . Historically, adultery has been considered to be a serious offense , sometimes a crime, and a sin . Even if that is not so, it may still have legal consequences, particularly as a ground for a divorce . Adultery may be

3906-399: A woman in a so-called common law marriage may describe herself as a common law wife, de facto wife, or simply a wife. Those seeking to advance gender neutrality may refer to both marriage partners as "spouses". In response to this naming change, many countries and societies are rewording their statute law by replacing "wife" and "husband" with "spouse". A former wife whose spouse is deceased

Wife - Misplaced Pages Continue

4032-410: Is a widow . The status of a wife may be terminated by divorce , annulment , or the death of a spouse. In the case of divorce, terminology such as a former wife, former-wife or ex-wife is often used. In regard to annulment, such terms are not strictly accurate. This is because annulment, unlike divorce, is usually retroactive , meaning that an annulled marriage is considered to be invalid from

4158-457: Is a current custom in several Sub-Saharan Africa nations and ethnic groups. A form of widow inheritance is part of Mosaic law in which it is known as levirate marriage (see yibbum ). A feature of that practice is that the dead husband's brother must marry his dead brother's widow. That applies, however, only if the widow (and consequently the deceased husband) has no children. However, there are mechanisms whereby either party may avoid such

4284-419: Is commonly given the title " Mrs ", but some married women prefer to be referred to as " Ms ", a title which is also used by preference or when the marital status of a woman is unknown. A woman on her wedding day is usually described as a bride . Occasionally, this naming is considered appropriate after the wedding ceremony or the honeymoon , though she is typically called a wife within the marriage. If she

4410-526: Is commonly viewed as contributing to the rapid spread of HIV . Widows are often expected to fulfill various sexual rituals within her community, as is common in the Luo community, such as sexual intercourse during the establishment of a home, during agricultural cycles , or during funeral or marriage ceremonies. If a widow has not been inherited by her brother-in-law but is rather a professional widow-inheritor, her risk of contracting HIV increases as she must find

4536-676: Is encouraged in many rural communities such as the Luo in Kenya and Tanzania and the Igbo in Nigeria. Cleansing occurs since it is believed to free the widow from a supernatural connection to her dead husband's spirit. It is very common for such "cleansing" procedures to be the only choice that widows have in the wake of their husband's death, as without a proper cleansing, the widow and her family will be socially rejected. The rituals are frequently traumatic violations in which widows may be forced to drink

4662-844: Is enforced in the Luo in Kenya, as a woman must engage in sexual intercourse without a condom to achieve purity before she can remarry. Many men have commercialized and exploited the practice by becoming professional widow inheritors, as many in-law relatives of widows are less inclined to perform the "cleansing" practices themselves for fear of contracting HIV from the widow. It is becoming common in Kenya for professional widow-inheritors to receive compensation for completing inheritance practices. Professional inheritors travel to different communities to inherit widows for financial gain, and often coerce widows to comply with sexual rituals in exchange for providing support. Many widows enter an inheritance contract for companionship and social, economic, and emotional support, and widow inheritance for these purposes

4788-472: Is generally long-term and monogamous . Widow inheritance for the purpose of executing a sexual ritual or "cleansing" is generally short-term and often involves more inheritors. "Cleansing" is a form of ritual purification rites being culturally prescribed for women after the death of her husband and often involving forced sexual intercourse with a male "inheritor" of the widow. The practice has not been systematically outlawed across Sub-Saharan Africa but rather

4914-807: Is largely a matter of convention. The first coherent text recorded in a Germanic language is the Gothic Bible , written in the later fourth century in the East Germanic variety of the Thervingi Gothic Christians , who had escaped persecution by moving from Scythia to Moesia in 348. Early West Germanic text is available from the fifth century, beginning with the Frankish Bergakker runic inscription . The evolution of Proto-Germanic from its ancestral forms, beginning with its ancestor Proto-Indo-European , began with

5040-492: Is marrying a man, her partner is known as the bridegroom during the wedding and within the marriage is called her husband . If she is marrying a woman, each partner is referred to as a wife. In the older customs, which are still followed by the Roman Catholic ritual, the word bride actually means fiancée , and applies up to the exchange of matrimonial consent (the actual marriage act). From that point, even while

5166-606: Is often required to engage in ritual sex during the establishment of homes and during food production seasons, often to protect the widow or her family members. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) was adopted in 1979 by the United Nations General Assembly and has been ratified by 189 states, including the African nations except Somalia (where

Wife - Misplaced Pages Continue

5292-656: Is scarce, low paid and often socially unacceptable. In many regions, female financial independence is difficult to achieve, and a single woman is also socially unacceptable. A severe lack of state welfare provisions, such as healthcare , childcare systems and education, encourage widows to find other modes of financial stability. Those factors greatly contribute to the perseverance of widow inheritance traditions. Widows are motivated to remarry and partake in widow inheritance traditions because of disinheritance practices in Sub-Saharan Africa. Disinheritance occurs when widows are dispossessed by their late husband's family, which can take

5418-413: Is termed Pre-Proto-Germanic . Whether it is to be included under a wider meaning of Proto-Germanic is a matter of usage. Winfred P. Lehmann regarded Jacob Grimm 's "First Germanic Sound Shift", or Grimm's law, and Verner's law , (which pertained mainly to consonants and were considered for many decades to have generated Proto-Germanic) as pre-Proto-Germanic and held that the "upper boundary" (that is,

5544-695: Is the reconstructed proto-language of the Germanic branch of the Indo-European languages . Proto-Germanic eventually developed from pre-Proto-Germanic into three Germanic branches during the fifth century BC to fifth century AD: West Germanic , East Germanic and North Germanic . The latter of these remained in contact with the others over a considerable time, especially with the Ingvaeonic languages (including English ), which arose from West Germanic dialects, and had remained in contact with

5670-564: Is the question of what specific tree, in the tree model of language evolution, best explains the paths of descent of all the members of a language family from a common language, or proto-language (at the root of the tree) to the attested languages (at the leaves of the tree). The Germanic languages form a tree with Proto-Germanic at its root that is a branch of the Indo-European tree, which in turn has Proto-Indo-European at its root. Borrowing of lexical items from contact languages makes

5796-473: Is to be between one woman and one man, that God Himself joined them and that no human is to separate them, according to Christ's words (Matthew 19:4-6). The New Testament states that an unmarried Christian woman is to be celibate or is to become the Christian wife of one husband to avoid sexual immorality and for his sexual passion (1 Cor 7:1-2 & 8–9). The New Testament permits divorce of a Christian wife by

5922-548: Is typical not of Germanic but Celtic languages. Another is * walhaz 'foreigner; Celt' from the Celtic tribal name Volcae with k → h and o → a . Other likely Celtic loans include * ambahtaz 'servant', * brunjǭ 'mailshirt', * gīslaz 'hostage', * īsarną 'iron', * lēkijaz 'healer', * laudą 'lead', * Rīnaz 'Rhine', and * tūnaz, tūną 'fortified enclosure'. These loans would likely have been borrowed during

6048-742: The Communist revolution; and in 1950, the People's Republic of China enacted a comprehensive marriage law including provisions giving the spouses equal rights with regard to ownership and management of marital property. In Japan , before enactment of the Meiji Civil Code of 1898, all of the woman's property such as land or money passed to her husband except for personal clothing and a mirror stand. See Women in Japan , Law of Japan Christian marriage as based on biblical teachings and conditions,

6174-677: The Corded Ware culture in the mid-3rd millennium BC, developing into the Nordic Bronze Age cultures by the early second millennium BC. According to Mallory, Germanicists "generally agree" that the Urheimat ('original homeland') of the Proto-Germanic language, the ancestral idiom of all attested Germanic dialects, was primarily situated in an area corresponding to the extent of the Jastorf culture . Early Germanic expansion in

6300-503: The Funnelbeaker culture , but the sound change in the Germanic languages known as Grimm's law points to a non-substratic development away from other branches of Indo-European. Proto-Germanic itself was likely spoken after c. 500 BC, and Proto-Norse , from the second century AD and later, is still quite close to reconstructed Proto-Germanic, but other common innovations separating Germanic from Proto-Indo-European suggest

6426-475: The Nandi , it is infrequent for a widow to participate in levirate marriage , but for the Luo , widow inheritance is a cultural requirement. Inheritance is often distinct from marriage, as "cleansing" practices often are a prerequisite for a widow after the death of her husband. Widows are then inherited by a man, often her late-husband's brother, after she has been "cleansed", or ritually purified. This tradition

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6552-467: The New Testament in regard to their view on the position of a wife in society as well as her marriage. The New Testament condemns divorce for both men and women (1 Cor 7:10–11) and assumes monogamy on the part of the husband: the wife is to have her "own" husband, and the husband is to have his "own" wife (1 Cor 7:2). In the medieval period, this was understood to mean that a wife should not share

6678-637: The Norse . A defining feature of Proto-Germanic is the completion of the process described by Grimm's law , a set of sound changes that occurred between its status as a dialect of Proto-Indo-European and its gradual divergence into a separate language. The end of the Common Germanic period is reached with the beginning of the Migration Period in the fourth century AD. The alternative term " Germanic parent language " may be used to include

6804-681: The Pre-Roman Iron Age (fifth to first centuries BC) placed Proto-Germanic speakers in contact with the Continental Celtic La Tène horizon . A number of Celtic loanwords in Proto-Germanic have been identified. By the first century AD, Germanic expansion reached the Danube and the Upper Rhine in the south and the Germanic peoples first entered the historical record . At about the same time, extending east of

6930-621: The Vistula ( Oksywie culture , Przeworsk culture ), Germanic speakers came into contact with early Slavic cultures, as reflected in early Germanic loans in Proto-Slavic . By the third century, Late Proto-Germanic speakers had expanded over significant distance, from the Rhine to the Dniepr spanning about 1,200 km (700 mi). The period marks the breakup of Late Proto-Germanic and

7056-421: The hijab , which may take different styles depending on the culture of the country, where traditions may seep in. The husband must pay a mahr to the bride. Traditionally, the wife in Islam is seen as a protected, chaste person that manages the household and the family. She has the ever-important role of raising the children and bringing up the next generation of Muslims. In Islam, it is highly recommended that

7182-434: The obligation to accept the man put forward by the family with no real prospect of turning him down if her birth family does not accept her back into its home. The custom is sometimes justified on the basis that it ensures that the wealth does not leave the patrilineal family. It is also sometimes justified as a protection for the widow and her children. The practice has existed in varied cultures and historical periods and

7308-484: The "lower boundary" was the dropping of final -a or -e in unstressed syllables; for example, post-PIE * wóyd-e > Gothic wait , 'knows'. Elmer H. Antonsen agreed with Lehmann about the upper boundary but later found runic evidence that the -a was not dropped: ékwakraz … wraita , 'I, Wakraz, … wrote (this)'. He says: "We must therefore search for a new lower boundary for Proto-Germanic." Antonsen's own scheme divides Proto-Germanic into an early stage and

7434-443: The 1980s, correlations between higher income of women and higher rates of divorce began decreasing. The economic independence theory establishes that if one side of the couple provides more than 60% of the total income of the couple, there is a dependence effect. Therefore, in recent decades women have had a major increase in their economic independence. At the same time, women have had to wrestle with other economic decisions, such as

7560-436: The 20th century, women could in some regions or times sue a man for wreath money when he took her virginity without taking her as his wife. If a woman did not want to marry, another option was entering a convent as a nun . to become a " bride of Christ ", a state in which her chastity and economic survival would be protected. Both a wife and a nun wore Christian headcovering , which proclaimed their state of protection by

7686-556: The 2nd century CE, as well as the non-runic Negau helmet inscription, dated to the 2nd century BCE), and in Roman Empire -era transcriptions of individual words (notably in Tacitus ' Germania , c. AD 90 ). Proto-Germanic developed out of pre-Proto-Germanic during the Pre-Roman Iron Age of Northern Europe. According to the Germanic substrate hypothesis , it may have been influenced by non-Indo-European cultures, such as

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7812-580: The AIDS Care and Prevention Department at Chikankata Hospital found success in encouraging alternative ritualistic methods of "cleansing" that do not involve sexual practices, and the chiefs in the Chikankata District area eventually outlawed ritual cleansing by sexual intercourse in the 1990s. Premature widowhood results in a higher number of widows with dependent children, and the children of widows are often faced with dire experiences as

7938-618: The Celtic Hallstatt and early La Tène cultures when the Celts dominated central Europe, although the period spanned several centuries. Widow inheritance Widow inheritance (also known as bride inheritance ) is a cultural and social practice whereby a widow is required to marry a male relative of her late husband, often his brother. The practice is more commonly referred as a levirate marriage , examples of which can be found in ancient and biblical times . The practice

8064-429: The Germanic subfamily exhibited a less treelike behaviour, as some of its characteristics were acquired from neighbours early in its evolution rather than from its direct ancestors. The internal diversification of West Germanic developed in an especially non-treelike manner. Proto-Germanic is generally agreed to have begun about 500 BC. Its hypothetical ancestor between the end of Proto-Indo-European and 500 BC

8190-399: The HIV/AIDS crisis, it also contributes to the transmission of HIV/AIDS as professional inheritors move from village to village performing "cleansing" rituals. Additionally, it is frequent that using a condom during a sexual rite is considered to break the custom of inheritance, and condoms are largely avoided in inheritance relationships. In many circumstances, such as for Luo in Kenya, if

8316-473: The HIV/AIDS pandemic, and there is a link between widow inheritance, property rights and the spread of the disease. Professional inheritance and "cleansing" traditions have been linked to the spread of HIV/AIDS in Kenya, and in many African countries, including Uganda , Malawi , Zambia , Ghana , Senegal , Côte d'Ivoire , Republic of the Congo , Democratic Republic of Congo and Nigeria , Widow inheritance

8442-548: The High Middle Ages. In addition, local customary law influenced wives' property rights; as a result, wives' property rights in the pre-modern West varied widely from region to region. Because wives' property rights and daughters' inheritance rights varied widely from region to region due to differing legal systems, the amount of property a wife might own varied greatly. Under the English common law system, which dates to

8568-451: The Laws of Zambia regardless of consent by the deceased husband's family. In Tanzania , widows are given equal rights to inheritance under the constitution , but customary law overrules the nation's legislation, especially in rural areas. Customary law requires widow inheritance practices although Tanzania largely condemns inheritance in national rhetoric. Although inheritance of a widow by

8694-526: The Roman Catholic Church drastically changed legal standards for marital consent by allowing daughters over 12 and sons over 14 to marry without their parents' approval, even if their marriage was made clandestinely. Parish studies have confirmed that late medieval women did sometimes marry against their parents' approval. The Roman Catholic Church's policy of considering clandestine marriages and marriages made without parental consent to be valid

8820-531: The basis of a Jewish marriage contract, called a Ketubah . There is a blur of arranged marriages and love marriages in traditional families. Married women, in traditional families, wear specific clothes, like the tichel . Once, a man called Shechem, a Hivite, offered a dowry to get an Israelite wife, but was rejected, since he was not an Israelite himself. Genesis 34 In ancient times there were Israelite women who were Judge, Queen regnant , Queen regent , Queen mother , Queen consort , and Prophetess: Deborah

8946-412: The beginning as though it had never taken place. In the case of the death of the other spouse, the term used is widow . The social status of such women varies by culture. In some places, they may be subject to potentially harmful practices, such as widow inheritance or levirate marriage , or social stigmatization. In some cultures, the termination of the status of wife makes life itself meaningless. In

9072-489: The beginning of the (historiographically recorded) Germanic migrations . The earliest available complete sentences in a Germanic language are variably dated to the 2nd century AD, around 300 AD or the first century AD in runic inscriptions (such as the Tune Runestone ). The language of these sentences is known as Proto-Norse , although the delineation of Late Common Germanic from Proto-Norse at about that time

9198-498: The best character and the best of you are those who are best to their wives." Traditionally, Muslim married women are not distinguished from unmarried women by an outward symbol (such as a wedding ring). However, women's wedding rings have recently been adopted in the past thirty years from Western culture. Women in Judaism have a range of rights and obligations ( see main article Jewish views on marriage ). Marriage takes place on

9324-584: The case of those cultures that practice sati , a funeral ritual within some Asian communities, a recently widowed woman intentionally commits suicide by fire , typically upon the husband's funeral pyre . The legal rights of a wife have been subject to debate since the 19th century in many jurisdictions. The subject was in particular addressed by John Stuart Mill in The Subjection of Women (1869). Historically, many societies have given sets of rights and obligations to husbands that differ vastly from

9450-490: The cleansing is executed. Women who violate those norms may face severe social stigma and repercussions in their community. Widow inheritance relationships centre on "cleansing" the widow after the death of her husband, as well as fulfilling the goal of furthering the late husband's lineage. Sexual intercourse can function as a means of "cleansing" by bearing children for the husband's family, sexual companionship and other sexual rituals that are associated with widows. A widow

9576-423: The confiscation of children by the husband's family. If a widow is disinherited or homeless after the death of her husband, she faces risks of acute malnutrition , rape , prostitution , debilitating and fatal diseases, and exposure to adverse weather conditions. Those risks extend to widows' children if they remain with their mother post-disinheritance, and those hazards are compounded with loss of education and

9702-536: The continent, and such traditions are reported across many nations in the region. Widows face a lack of legal rights to family property because of gender-discriminatory legal systems. They are unlikely to have the resources to use legal systems as a means of fighting traditional power structures. There are many formal and informal rules concerning the inheritance of property, particularly land for rural women , that inhibit stable economic conditions. Those limitations cause widows to be coerced into inheritance traditions as

9828-498: The dates of borrowings and sound laws are not precisely known, it is not possible to use loans to establish absolute or calendar chronology. Most loans from Celtic appear to have been made before or during the Germanic Sound Shift . For instance, one specimen * rīks 'ruler' was borrowed from Celtic * rīxs 'king' (stem * rīg- ), with g → k . It is clearly not native because PIE * ē → ī

9954-519: The death of their husbands. Widow inheritance traditions dramatically increase the risk of infection with HIV and other sexually-transmitted diseases, such as Hepatitis B , for the widow and the widow inheritor. As the HIV/AIDS epidemic began in the 1970s, the practice of widow inheritance evolved in response to the increased risk. Primarily, premature widowhood increased prevalence dramatically as many men died of HIV/AIDS . Secondarily, brothers of

10080-414: The development of a separate common way of speech among some geographically nearby speakers of a prior language and ended with the dispersion of the proto-language speakers into distinct populations with mostly independent speech habits. Between the two points, many sound changes occurred. Phylogeny as applied to historical linguistics involves the evolutionary descent of languages. The phylogeny problem

10206-432: The earlier boundary) was the fixing of the accent, or stress, on the root syllable of a word, typically on the first syllable. Proto-Indo-European had featured a moveable pitch-accent consisting of "an alternation of high and low tones" as well as stress of position determined by a set of rules based on the lengths of a word's syllables. The fixation of the stress led to sound changes in unstressed syllables. For Lehmann,

10332-480: The entire journey that the dialect of Proto-Indo-European that would become Proto-Germanic underwent through the millennia. The Proto-Germanic language is not directly attested by any complete surviving texts; it has been reconstructed using the comparative method . However, there is fragmentary direct attestation of (late) Proto-Germanic in early runic inscriptions (specifically the Vimose inscriptions , dated to

10458-496: The erosion of unstressed syllables, which would continue in its descendants. The final stage of the language included the remaining development until the breakup into dialects and, most notably, featured the development of nasal vowels and the start of umlaut , another characteristic Germanic feature. Loans into Proto-Germanic from other (known) languages or from Proto-Germanic into other languages can be dated relative to each other by which Germanic sound laws have acted on them. Since

10584-511: The eyes of the law. These grabbing traditions are prevalent in Angola , Botswana , RotC , DRC , Eswatini, Ivory Coast , Ghana, Kenya , Lesotho , Malawi , Namibia , Nigeria , Rwanda , Senegal , Tanzania, Uganda , Zambia and Zimbabwe . Widow inheritance and re-marriage becomes a necessary "safety net" for widows that do not have other options to maintain livelihood. Widow inheritance can take many different modes: forced remarriage to

10710-428: The family is the exclusive right of the husband" . In some parts of the world, traditional payments or exchanges are typically made, including: The purpose of the dowry varies by culture and has varied historically. In some cultures, it was paid not only to support the establishment of a new family, but also served as a condition that if the husband committed grave offenses upon his wife, the dowry had to be returned to

10836-413: The family's blood line to inherit her late husband's estate, she was required to marry within the family. In different cultures, that can have various forms and functions that serve in relative proportions as a social protection for and control over the widow and her children. She may have the right to require her late husband's extended family to provide her with a new man, or she may conversely have

10962-617: The form of losing control of family land, outright eviction, abandonment of familial relations and (in more dire conditions) confiscation of the children by the late husband's family. Rural Sub-Saharan African women face a level of disinheritance that is higher than in any other global region. Sub-Saharan widows, particularly in Kenya and Nigeria , experience a higher prevalence of eviction risk by relatives. Disinheritance and property theft have been reported by both rural and urban Nigerian widows . The Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada depicts

11088-545: The history of Proto-Germanic in the wider sense from the end of Proto-Indo-European up to the point that Proto-Germanic began to break into mutually unintelligible dialects. The changes are listed roughly in chronological order, with changes that operate on the outcome of earlier ones appearing later in the list. The stages distinguished and the changes associated with each stage rely heavily on Ringe 2006 , Chapter 3, "The development of Proto-Germanic". Ringe in turn summarizes standard concepts and terminology. This stage began with

11214-462: The husband upon getting married. For some, this is a controversial practice, due to its tie to the historical doctrine of coverture and to the historically subordinated roles of wives. Others argue that today this is merely a harmless tradition that should be accepted as a free choice. Some jurisdictions consider this practice as discriminatory and contrary to women's rights, and have restricted or banned it; for example, since 1983, when Greece adopted

11340-453: The husband's brother, who often remains living with his own wife and children. In those scenarios and others that involve professional widow inheritors, children grow up with the absence of a father figure, and these can be damaging to mental health and development. The stigma that surround widows before and after "cleansing" and widow inheritance extend to the children as well. Children are often ostracized from their peers when their mother

11466-560: The husband's family and disinheritance practices of eviction are illegal in Namibia , the practices continue because of the country's fragile legal system. Namibia has seen legislation changes in the past decades to account for women's rights after the death of her husband, especially in the proposal of the Communal Land Reform Act of 2002 . Some African nations have enacted legislation in the past two decades to combat

11592-401: The inability of widows to acquire economic independence after the death of their husbands. A widow may need to abide by widow inheritance traditions and remain with the husband's family, often requiring her to marry the husband's brother, to ensure that she remains in possession of property. Widow inheritance traditions are particularly prevalent in Sub-Saharan Africa compared to the rest of

11718-434: The interests of their birth families, daughters of the elite would marry into respectable families. If a daughter could prove the proposed husband to be of bad character, she could legitimately refuse the match. The age of lawful consent to a marriage was 12 for maidens and 14 for youths. In late antiquity, Most Roman women seem to have married in their late teens to early twenties, but noble women married younger than those of

11844-422: The later medieval period, daughters and younger sons were usually excluded from landed property if no will was produced. Under English common law, there was a system where a wife with a living husband ("feme couvert") could own little property in her own name. Unable to easily support herself, marriage was very important to most women's economic status. This problem has been dealt with extensively in literature, where

11970-474: The lower classes, and an aristocratic maiden was expected to be virgin until her first marriage. In late antiquity, under Roman law, daughters inherited equally from their parents if no will was produced. In addition, Roman law recognized wives' property as legally separate from husbands's property, as did some legal systems in parts of Europe and colonial Latin America. Christian cultures claim to be guided by

12096-586: The mid-16th century. In the 20th century, the role of the wife in Western marriage changed in two major ways; the first was the breakthrough from an "institution to companionate marriage"; for the first time since the Middle Ages, wives became distinct legal entities , and were allowed their own property and allowed to sue. Until then, partners were a single legal entity, but only a husband was allowed to exercise this right, called coverture . The second change

12222-637: The most important reason for women's limited power was the denial of equal education and equal property rights for females. The situation was assessed by the English conservative moralist Sir William Blackstone : "The husband and wife are one, and the husband is the one." Married women's property rights in the English-speaking world improved with the Married Women's Property Act 1882 and similar legal changes, which allowed wives with living husbands to own property in their own names. Until late in

12348-447: The ownership, acquisition, enjoyment and disposition of property." Although CEDAW broadly rejects widow inheritance in the eyes of the law, informal practice and more localized law has not followed that international guidance. Although many African nations practice widow inheritance without explicit legalization, Zambia 's custom of widow inheritance was explicitly legalised by the 1926 Deceased Brothers Married Widows Act, Chapter 57 of

12474-413: The period marked the definitive break of Germanic from the other Indo-European languages and the beginning of Germanic proper, containing most of the sound changes that are now held to define this branch distinctively. This stage contained various consonant and vowel shifts, the loss of the contrastive accent inherited from PIE for a uniform accent on the first syllable of the word root, and the beginnings of

12600-496: The postponement of motherhood . In Indo-Aryan languages , a wife is known as Patni , which means a woman who shares everything in this world with her husband and he does the same, including their identity. Decisions are ideally made in mutual consent. A wife usually takes care of anything inside her household, including the family's health, the children's education, a parent's needs. The majority of Hindu marriages in rural and traditional India are arranged marriages. Once they find

12726-523: The prevalence of premature widowhood across Sub-Saharan Africa, such as in Igbo people in Nigeria. Premature widowhood is linked to severe consequences of poverty, as there are intergenerational implications of young women with dependent children facing widowhood. Women who were dependent on their husbands as their source of income face major challenges if they become widows, as there are many places like Kenya in Sub-Saharan Africa in which women's paid employment

12852-552: The reduction of the resulting unstressed syllables. By this stage, Germanic had emerged as a distinctive branch and had undergone many of the sound changes that would make its later descendants recognisable as Germanic languages. It had shifted its consonant inventory from a system that was rich in plosives to one containing primarily fricatives, had lost the PIE mobile pitch accent for a predictable stress accent, and had merged two of its vowels. The stress accent had already begun to cause

12978-516: The regular courts [civil courts] may rule in her favour, but the widow will often face the obstacles of getting the property back from the family. The disinheritance of widows has been coined as "grabbing" across Sub-Saharan Africa. The term "grabbing" refers to the immediate actions of eviction and property theft, and those customs are often enabled and bolstered by legal systems. For example, in Eswatini , widows are not given any rights to property in

13104-539: The relative position of the Germanic branch within Indo-European less clear than the positions of the other branches of Indo-European. In the course of the development of historical linguistics, various solutions have been proposed, none certain and all debatable. In the evolutionary history of a language family, philologists consider a genetic "tree model" appropriate only if communities do not remain in effective contact as their languages diverge. Early Indo-European had limited contact between distinct lineages, and, uniquely,

13230-401: The rest of the very ceremony is ongoing, the woman is a wife and no longer considered as a bride. Hence, the bridal couple is no longer referred to as such, but instead as the newlywed couple or " newlyweds ". Unlike mother , a term that puts a woman into the context of her children, "Wife" refers to the institutionalized relation to the other spouse. In some societies, especially historically,

13356-426: The rights of marriage. Much more significant than the option of becoming a nun, was the option of non-religious spinsterhood in the West. An unmarried woman, a feme sole , had the right to own property and make contracts in her own name. As first demonstrated quantitatively by John Hajnal, in the 19th and early 20th centuries the percentage of non-clerical Western women who never married was typically as high as 10–15%,

13482-406: The risk of child labour. When widows are inherited, it often has the purpose of keeping the property of the husband and the husband's male children inside the family. In many remarriages and widow inheritance traditions that involve the husband's brother, he will require sexual relations to produce children in the name of the dead husband, and the widow remains living with her children apart from

13608-511: The separation of a distinct speech, perhaps while it was still forming part of the Proto-Indo-European dialect continuum. It contained many innovations that were shared with other Indo-European branches to various degrees, probably through areal contacts, and mutual intelligibility with other dialects would have remained for some time. It was nevertheless on its own path, whether dialect or language. This stage began its evolution as

13734-401: The sets of rights and obligations given to wives. In particular, the control of marital property, inheritance rights, and the right to dictate the activities of children of the marriage, have typically been given to male marital partners. However, this practice was curtailed to a great deal in many countries in the twentieth century, and more modern statutes tend to define the rights and duties of

13860-661: The social justice concerns of widowhood. The Criminal Code Amendment Act of Ghana criminalized subjecting a woman to widowhood rites , and those who violate this act are guilty of misdemeanors in the eyes of the law. In Nigeria, in Enugu State , the Prohibition of the Infringement of a Widow's and a Widower's Fundamental Rights Law of 2001, outlawed compelling a widow or widower to vacate the matrimonial home and gave widows options other than inheritance practices after

13986-579: The water in which their dead husband's body was washed and are coerced into sex with a relative or inheritor. In extreme circumstances, widows may be required to "have sex with their husband's dead body" to complete a cleansing ritual. Theoe traditions are rooted in spiritual fears of contamination, and have been reported in a number of countries of Sub-Saharan Africa. The superstitions of "evil spirits" inhabiting widows before "cleansing" are norms in many communities, and widows are often not permitted to work or interact with those outside their families until

14112-399: The widow's late husband were more reluctant to partake in "cleansing" rituals due to the high mortality rate of the disease. Many of these young widows suffered from HIV/AIDS themselves, and professional widow-inheritance emerged as a response to the growing demand for widow-inheritance traditions to continue despite the new risks. Although professional widow-inheritance began as a response to

14238-414: The widow-inheritance custom, known as Dumaal , is practiced) and Sudan . CEDAW includes a provision on Widow inheritance that asserts that "State Parties shall take all appropriate measures to eliminate discrimination against women in all matters relating to marriage and family relations and in particular shall ensure, on a basis of equality of men and women: the same rights for both spouses in respect of

14364-500: The widow-inheritance practice, rather than concerns regarding the emotional trauma of inheritance "cleansing". However, modifications to formal law are often ineffective without informal implementations of changes to traditional practices. Health officials in Malawi unsuccessfully banned widow "cleansing" but persuaded some traditional leaders to encourage condom usage and punish cleansers who force women into unprotected sex. In Zambia ,

14490-527: The wife or her family. Due to this condition, the dowry was often made inalienable by the husband during the marriage. Today, dowries continue to be expected in parts of South Asia such as India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka, and conflicts related to their payment sometimes result in violence, such as dowry deaths and bride burning . In some cultures, particularly in the Anglophone West , wives often change their surnames to that of

14616-427: The wife remains at home although they are fully able to own property or work. The husband is obligated to spend on the wife for all of her needs while she is not obligated to spend even if she is wealthy. Muhammad is said to have commanded all Muslim men to treat their wives well. There is a hadith by Al-Tirmidhi , in which Muhammad is said to have stated "The believers who show the most perfect faith are those who have

14742-420: The wife's child in states where they are automatically assumed to be the biological legal parent. Vice versa, a wife has more legal authority in some cases when she speaks on behalf of a spouse than she would have if they were not married, e.g. when her spouse is in a coma after an accident, a wife may have the right of advocacy. If they divorce , she also might receive—or pay— alimony (see Law and divorce around

14868-407: The world ). The effect of women's income on heterosexual relationships’ dynamics depends on several factors. If the couple has strong traditional values, the income of women will affect men's gender identity and affect their well-being. If they have strong liberal values, the income of a woman will make the woman the provider of the house and put the man in a more domestic role. However, in most cases

14994-1063: The world, adultery may result in violent acts, such as honor killings or stoning . Some jurisdictions, especially those that apply Sharia law , allow for such acts to take place legally. As of September 2010, stoning is a legal punishment in countries such as Saudi Arabia , Sudan , Iran , Yemen , the United Arab Emirates , and some states in Nigeria as punishment for zina al-mohsena ("adultery of married persons"). Proto-Germanic Pontic Steppe Caucasus East Asia Eastern Europe Northern Europe Pontic Steppe Northern/Eastern Steppe Europe South Asia Steppe Europe Caucasus India Indo-Aryans Iranians East Asia Europe East Asia Europe Indo-Aryan Iranian Indo-Aryan Iranian Others European Proto-Germanic (abbreviated PGmc ; also called Common Germanic )

15120-564: The world. Children born outside marriage have become more common in many countries. Although some wives in particular in Western countries choose not to have children , such a choice is not accepted in some parts of the world. In northern Ghana , for example, the payment of bride price signifies a woman's requirement to bear children, and women using birth control are at risk of threats and coercion. In addition, some religions are interpreted as requiring children in marriage; for instance, Pope Francis said in 2015 that choosing not to have children

15246-618: Was "selfish". Many traditions like a dower, dowry and bride price have long traditions in antiquity. The exchange of any item or value goes back to the oldest sources, and the wedding ring likewise was always used as a symbol for keeping faith to a person. In ancient Rome, The Emperor Augustus introduced marriage legislation, the Lex Papia Poppaea , which rewarded marriage and childbearing. The legislation also imposed penalties on young persons who failed to marry and on those who committed adultery. Therefore, marriage and childbearing

15372-532: Was controversial, and in the 16th century both the French monarchy and the Lutheran church sought to end these practices, with limited success. The New Testament made no pronouncements about wives' property rights, which in practice were influenced more by secular laws than religion. Most influential in the pre-modern West was the civil law , except in English-speaking countries where English common law emerged in

15498-426: Was instituted as a means for the widow to have someone to support her and her children financially and to keep her late husband's wealth within the family bloodline. When the practice was initiated, women were responsible for the house chores, and men were the providers. If a woman lost her husband, she would, therefore, have no one to provide for the remaining family. Because her in-laws would not want someone outside of

15624-579: Was made law between the ages of twenty-five and sixty for men, and twenty and fifty for women. 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 time they could marry. Noble women were known to marry as young as 12 years of age, whereas women in the lower classes were more likely to marry slightly further into their teenage years. Ancient Roman law required brides to be at least 12 years old,

15750-432: Was the drastic alteration of middle and upper-class family life, when in the 1960s these wives began to work outside their home, and with the social acceptance of divorces the single-parent family, and stepfamily or "blended family" as a more "individualized marriage". Today, some women may wear a wedding ring in order to show her status as a wife. In Western countries today, married women usually have an education ,

15876-713: Was the wife of an Israelite man whose name was Lapidoth, which means "torches." Deborah was a Judge and a Prophetess. Esther was the Jewish wife of a Persian King named Ahasuerus. Esther was Queen consort to the King of Persia and at the same time she was Queen regnant of the Jewish people in Persia and their Prophetess. Bathsheba was the Queen consort of King-Prophet David and then the Queen mother of King-Prophet Solomon. He rose from his throne when she entered and bowed to her and ordered that

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