Viking Weddings, Part 4

Gunnora Hallakarva gunnora at bga.com
Wed Sep 11 01:39:31 PDT 1996


Courtship, Love and Marriage in Viking Scandinavia
Part IV: Negotiating the Marriage
======================================================

        As when bringing a legal suit or conducting a sale, those who sought
a marriage often took with them men of prestige, power, and wealth to act
for them as a broker or advocate when making the proposal of marriage (Jesse
Byock, Feud in the Icelandic Saga.  Berkeley:  U of California P, 1982. p.
75).  Such sponsors not only acted as woitnesses to the *handsal* or formal
agreement of betrothal sealed by a hand-clasp, but the promise of their
support and political influence formed a part of the inducement for the
bride's kinfolk to accept the proposal.  Once it was agreed that an alliance
between the two families would be satisfactory, the next step was to
negotiate the *bru(dh)kaup* or bride-price (Foote and Wilson, p. 113).  The
bride-price consised of three payments:  from the groom would come the
*mundr* and *morgengifu*, while the bride's family provided the *heiman fylgia*.

        The *mundr* was what most modern sources refer to as "bride-price."
It was a payment to the father of the bride for control of the *mundium*, a
Latin term for the right of protection and legal guardianship which was held
by her father or other kinsman until she was married (Ibid.).  Other
Germanic terms occasionally encountered which are roughly synonymous with
*mundr* are *dos* [used by the Continental Germanic tribes] (P. D. King.
Law and Society in the Visigothic Kingdom.  Cambridge:  Cambridge U.P.
1972.  p. 225) and *handgeld* [found in Anglo-Saxon laws] (Ibid.).  The
*mundr* was calculated to be similar in worth to the girl's dowry [*heiman
fylgia*], but was set at a statutory minimum of eight ounces of silver in
Iceland and twelve ounces in Norway.  This was the "poor-man's-price" that
was the minimum amount which would render the children of the union
legitimate in law (Foote and Wilson, p. 113).  The reason that a minimum
payment was required went back to the Vikings' concern for the economic
support of any children produced by the couple:  a man who could not afford
the "poor-man's-price" had no hope of supporting his offspring, and should
therefore not marry (Jacobsen, Sexual Irregularities, p. 75).  In addition
to ensuring the economic soundness of the marriage, payment of the *mundr*
served to compensate the bride's family for the loss of her labor at the
homestead.

        While the minimum *mundr* was set to 8 to 12 ounces, the amount
could certainly be much more, again being about equal to the girl's dowry in
most cases.  Tacitus records that a Germanic groom brought to the marriage
"oxen, a horse with its bridle, or a shield, spear and sword" (Tacitus.  The
Agricola and the Germania.  trans. Harold Mattingly.  NY: Penguin.  1970.
p. 116).  In Norway, one *mundr* was "twelve *oras*, the worth of four to
five cows" (Jacobsen, Position of Women, p.111), while under the reign of
Knut, and English suitor paid one full pound of gold to induce his bride to
accept his suit (Jo Ann Macnamara and Suzanne Wemple.  "The Power of Women
through the Family in Medieval Europe, 500-1100." in Clio's Consciousness
Raised: New Perspectives on the History of Women.  eds. Mary Hartman and
Lois Banner.  NY:  Harper & Row, 1974.  p. 106).  The balance of the *mundr*
was usually payable at the time of the wedding ceremony in Germanic
cultures, but often an *arrha*, a pledge or "down-payment" was made as an
earnest of good faith during the negotiations (Suzanne Wemple.  Women in
Frankish Society:  Marriage and the Cloister 500-900.  Philadelphia:  U of
Pennsylvania P, 1981.  p. 32).

        A second sum payable by the groom after the consummation of the
wedding was also set at the negotiations:  this was the *morgen-gifu*, the
"morning-gift," also known as bench-gift, bride-veil-fee, or extra-gift.
The morning-gift was given to the woman as compensation for her sexual
availability to her husband, or for her virginity of she were a maiden
(Foote and Wilson, p. 113).  The morning-gift was usually calculated in
relation to the woman's dowry, being anywhere from one-third or one-half, to
equal in amount to the dowry (Jacobsen, Position of Women, p.111;  Foote and
Wilson, p. 113).  The morning-gift was probably also related to the woman's
*wergeld*, since pregnancy generally represented the most substantial hazard
to health and life a woman was likely to face.  The morning-gift served to
ensure the wife's financial support during the marriage, and thus she always
had the use or *usufruct* of the morning-gift, and often owned it outright
from the time it was given (McNamara and Wemple, p. 106).  The morning-gift
usually included clothing, jewelry and household goods, livestock and
slaves, and many times land and estates: an Anglo-Saxon woman in the reign
of King Alfred received five hides of land as her morning-gift (over five
hundred acres).  The largest recorded morning-gift seems to have been that
given by King Gorm to his wife Thyre:  he gifted her with the entire land of
Denmark, according to Saxo Grammaticus (Birgit Strand, "Women is *Gesta
Danorum*," in Saxo Grammaticus: A Medieval Author Between Norse and Latin
Culture.  ed. Karsten Friis-Jensen.  Copenhagen:  Museum Tusculanum Press,
1981.  p. 159).  

        The final sum set during the marriage negotiations was the *heiman
fylgia*, the bride's "accompaniment from home," or dowry (Foote and Wilson,
p. 113).  The dowry represented a girl's portion of her father's
inheritance:  although she did not inherit funds as her brothers did, the
dowry allowed her to also share in the family's wealth (Jacobsen, Position
of Women, p. 37).  The dowry was administered by the husband, but he kept it
as atrust which could not be spent unwisely nor squandered.  The dowry could
not be confiscated with the husband's other goods during outlawry
proceedings, nor could he use it in the repayment of debts (Ibid., pp.
42-43).  The dowry was intended in part for the wife's maintenance during
the marriage, but was reserved primarily as a sort of annuity which would be
used to support her and her children if she became a widow.  Consequently
the dowry was returned to the wife in the event of a divorce (Ibid. p. 55).  

        Once the financial negotiations were completed, the arrangement was
sealed with the *handsal*.  probably the witnesses would number at least six
men, "since the oral agreement reached would have validity only as long as
the witnesses were alive" (Frank, p. 475-476).  There was a set formula to
be spoken by the bridegroom over the *handsal*, which sealed the contract:

        We declare ourselves witnesses that thou, N.N., bondest me 
        in lawful betrothal, and with taking hold of hands thou promisest 
        me the dowry and engagest to fulfill and observe the whole of 
        the compact between us, which has been notified in the hearing 
        of witnesses without duplicity or cunning, as a real and authorized 
        compact (Williams, 93).

With this, the legalities were finished and the formal contract made.

=====================================================
See the next post for Part V: Reconstructing the Wedding Ceremony, including
Introduction, Section A:Setting a Date, and Section B:Preparations for the
Wedding Ceremony

If you wish to print any or all of this paper in a newsletter for the S.C.A.
or Asatru, please contact me for permission first.  In general, I will grant
permission so long as a copy of the publication that my work appears in is
mailed to me for my files. 

::GUNNORA::


Gunnora Hallakarva
Herskerinde
===========================================
Ek eigi visa (th)ik hversu o(dh)lask Lofstirrlauf-Kruna
heldr hversu na Hersis-A(dh)al





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