Arzontadron Marriage

Arzontadron marriage customs are quite different from those of any other nation of Atragam. Firstly, instead of marriage being a ceremony between the husband and wife themselves, it is a ceremony between their guardians; the couple are not present and are usually not informed of their marriage for some years after the event. So there are four important stages in the marriage process: the engagement, the marriage itself, the formal announcement, and finally, the moment when the wife is ready to move in with the husband's family.

(It should be explained that the Arzontadrons have a rigid system of laws determining who one's guardian is. The guardian of a man or an unmarried woman is normally the father, but if he dies then the role passes in turn to the mother, the paternal grandfather, his older brothers in order of age, the father's older brothers in order of age, one's own older brothers in order of age, and only if all of the above are dead to the mother's relatives. A guardian can, however, override the chain of precedence by granting guardianship to a particular person in his will; then if the new guardian dies as well, the guardianship is passed on through his family as though the person in question were his child. As for married women, their guardianship is given to the husband's guardian when the marriage is officially announced.)

Engagement

It is not uncommon for parents to start planning a child's marriage very soon after birth; however, the actual engagement process is not begun until the child is at least five, because a high rate of infant mortality makes it too risky to begin the process any earlier. Most engagements last two or three years; it is a complicated process because the husband's family has to negotiate a bride price, the money for which may have to be raised by loaning from a family who are planning a marriage with one of their daughters. Alternatively, two families who are close enough in economic status may avoid the hassle of bride price payments by arranging a double marriage involving one boy and one girl from each family (more often cousins than brother and sister). In such double marriages, the two marriages are always “linked” and must be contracted together and announced together.

Engagements can be entered into for a variety of reasons. The most general reason is of course to begin arrangements for keeping the family line going and producing more children; but reasons for choosing a particular family to make an engagement with include economic alliance, existing friendship, or settlement of a feud. There is a superstition that people born on the same day have a spiritual connection, and if two such people are of opposite sexes it is not uncommon for their families to use this as an excuse to marry them.

Marriage

The marriage ceremony itself is a formal ceremony attended by the adult generations of both extended families; it is also an excuse for the families to celebrate their connection by hosting a large feast. The ceremony is always held on neutral territory at the local temple so that the families' children do not have to be involved – both those actually being married and their siblings. There is a very strong taboo against knowing whom one is married to before the actual announcement, and children below a certain age cannot be trusted with such a big secret.

The average age for a first marriage is around seven or eight, and the average age difference if a marriage is the first marriage for both partners is under two years, with age differences over five years being very uncommon. Larger age differences do sometimes occur, however, in cases where one partner was previously engaged to someone else and that engagement was broken (or the person died) and a new engagement had to be negotiated.

Half of the agreed bride price is paid when the couple are married, and the other half when the announcement is made. If either partner dies before the announcement, the second half is not paid, but the bride's family retains the first half. Once contracted, a marriage cannot be broken for any reason other than death.

Announcement

The formal announcement of a marriage takes place in the following manner. The husband's family invite the wife's entire extended family to have dinner with them. (Such dinners between two families are an important part of social life, and do not only happen in connection with marriage announcements; the custom is always that the families sit at a long table, one family on each side.) When the food is eaten, the husband's guardian will rise and pronounce the formula: “We now welcome our new daughter __ as the wife of __”, and the couple (who will have been seated opposite each other) are expected to kiss.

For a first marriage, the couple are on average thirteen or fourteen when the announcement is made. After the announcement, they are expected to start visiting each other regularly, giving each other gifts and getting used to spending time together. The families will always make it possible for them to sleep together when they are ready for it. The couple are usually allowed to decide for themselves when it is time for the wife to move in with her husband's extended family, although if she becomes pregnant she is expected to make the move before the baby is born. Typically, the period from the announcement to moving in together will take less than two years.

Remarriage

The Arzontadron consider it very important to have children, so if one partner in a marriage dies while the other is still of a suitable age, it is very common that the survivor's guardian will arrange a second marriage for them. If the survivor is the wife, her husband's guardian will arrange for her to marry one of her husband's brothers or cousins so that her children can remain within the same extended family. Two adults who both have children already cannot normally marry each other, since a woman with children would command a very high bride price, so remarriage partners are most commonly older children or teenagers – someone who does not yet have their own children but will be able to start producing them within a couple of years.

The whole process, going from engagement to marriage to announcement to living together, is usually much quicker for second marriages, although it is not considered appropriate for the announcement of a second marriage to occur within a year of the first spouse's death.

Class differences

A couple of the customs outlined above are different among the wealthy classes. Firstly, it is more common for a husband, once he reaches fifteen, which is considered the age of adulthood, to be given his own house rather than continue living with the extended family. Once a husband has his own house, he is entitled to request that his wife move in with him, although he has to give her a reasonable period of notice (a couple of months).

Secondly, if an adult man and woman whose spouses have both died wish to marry each other, they can do so if the husband is the owner of his house and he is prepared to pay the required bride price himself. Naturally, they do still need their guardians' consent, since it is their guardians who must actually perform the ceremony of marriage. This is the one and only type of marriage in which the partners do know each other's identities from the outset; there must still, however, be an announcement ceremony to announce the marriage to their extended families before they can move in together.

Sex and marriage

The Arzontadrons, in compensation for depriving their children of any choice in marriage, are very permissive about sexual relations outside marriage. They believe that marriage is a matter of duty to the family, so one should not have sexual relations with others to the extent that one neglects or ceases to enjoy sleeping with one's partner, but beyond that a person is free to do as they like. A woman's children are considered to belong to her and her husband regardless of who their biological father might be, so if a woman is made pregnant by someone other than her husband, he is in fact doing him a favour. However, it is very strongly condemned for a person's first sexual experience to be with anyone other than their spouse.