So, I feel terrible that this post is going up so late. It's been one of those weeks. But, at least I'm getting a post up right? :) So, as I was reading Romeo and Juliet, it struck me how very young the two protagonists of the story are! Juliet is a mere fourteen years old. And Lady Capulet makes it seem that she's an old maid for not yet being married!
"Well, think of marriage now; younger than you,
Here in Verona, ladies of esteem,
Are made already mothers: by my count,
I was your mother much upon these years
That you are now a maid."
It would seem that young marriage was a common occurrence in Shakespeare's time. I went to the library and did a little digging, and happened across a book titled "Understanding Shakespeare's England". This book highlights the viewpoints and practices that were common at the time Shakespeare authored his works. I went to the section on marriage, and found some interesting facts about marriage practices of the time. Here is a brief list gleaned from the text for your convenience:
1. Elizabethans seldom married for love alone. They considered many other factors in the decision to marry. The idea of getting married to someone that they weren't head over heels for didn't repulse them as it does us in this present day. The middle-class Elizabethan couple may have come fairly close to marry for love.
2. Parents did have total control over who their children would marry. Often the parents loved their children enough to at least have some concern in what they thought, however if they wanted to use their children as pawns for personal advancement, they could and would.
3. The mean age for brides was just under twenty-four years old, and for bridegrooms was just under twenty-seven. Aristocrats tended to marry younger, average age for brides being just over nineteen and for grooms just over twenty-four.
4. The source of Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" was Arthur Brooke's "The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet. In this work, Juliet's age is specified as sixteen. While this is still very young, Shakespeare purposefully takes off another two years in his adaptation and makes Juliet a mere fourteen.
5. The betrothal of a couple was considered very binding in Elizabethan society, and it seems to have legitimized the sex life of the couple that was to be married. It wasn't uncommon for Elizabethan brides to be pregnant at the time they actually said their vows. This had no repercussions for the couple so long as they did indeed get married.
6. Elizabethan newleyweds didn't go on a honeymoon. They would ceremoniously be put to bed in the house that had the wedding feast.
7. Brides could be married in while, however it was not as customary as it is today. The connection between white and purity/virginity had not yet come together. A popular color to be wedded in was russet.
8. Marriage was an emblem of harmony, concord, and reconciliation of disparate elements into a perfected whole. Canon law recognized marraige as a sacrament, not merely a civil contract. Divorce was not part of the Elizabethan experience.
