Page 171 - UAE Truncal States_Neat
P. 171

Chapter Four

                 is lasting and successful, this is usually the beginning of further
                 marriages between the families in subsequent generations.
                   II was customary to marry girls off as soon as possible after they
                 had reached puberty; they were brought up to see marriage and
                 childbearing as the most desirable status, which they should attain
                 as soon as possible. Parents and brothers seemed to fear that a
                 marriageable girl in the household was a liability, because there was
                 always the very faint chance that she might succumb to someone’s
                 seduction and bring disgrace to the family. Once she was married,
                 her conduct became the responsibility of the husband, although
                 misdemeanour was seen as a blot on the honour of her father’s
                 family, and it was up to them rather than to the husband—who
                 would probably divorce her—to punish or to forgive. Many girls
                 were therefore married at the age of thirteen to husbands who were
                 themselves only about sixteen years old; but because such marriages
                 usually took place within the fold of the extended family the girl
                 remained within that family group. She might continue to live with
                 the same female relatives as before the marriage, she might even
                 continue to live in the same household as her mother, but in any event
                 she would be living near to the family that she had grown up with,
                 the female members of which would help with the problems
                 associated with setting up a new household or with pregnancy and
                 child-bearing. Finding suitable partners for marriage, contacting the
                 respective parents and arranging the economic aspects of a marriage
                 was customarily done within the female world of related and friendly
                 hurum. On some occasions, however, the services of known female
                 go-betweens (liberated slave women, servants, midwives or healers)
                 were employed. A girl was always asked for her consent to the
                 marriage in front of the mufawwa' or another trusted and well-
                 known male witness or before a group of people.4'1 But very young
                 girls were usually too dependent on their fathers and too obedient to
                 their parents and brothers to withhold this consent. In many cases
                 the two partners grew up playing together when they were children,
                 and had a good idea of each other’s personalities.
                   If the arranged marriage was not successful, it was in principle the
                 husband’s privilege alone to initiate divorce proceedings. He could
                 even  just tell his wife that he wanted to divorce her, in which case she
                 had to take her own belongings and her smaller children and go back
                 to her father’s house; usually boys over the age of seven stayed with
                 the fathers, and girls remained with the mothers until puberty.

                 U6
   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176