2007-08-20 12:56:17 · 5 answers · asked by Sean 2 in Society & Culture ➔ Other - Society & Culture
Official marriages started the day the first caveman thumped the first cavewoman on the head with a club and dragged her back to his cave.
2007-08-20 13:01:02 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
All societies have a form of marriage. Marriage is political not religious although religions have taken them over. Marriages are designed to form alliances between groups that otherwise might fight each other.
People in many societies are in exogamous clans or moieties or both. You cannot marry someone in your own clan or moiety. This forces men to marry women from other clans thus providing the necessary alliances.
Religions took over the marriages in some societies (but not all) adding a spiritual level to the political level. In general though, the civil marriage is the oldest and most widespread with the religious marriage coming along later.
Marriages would have started when people recognised ownership of property or hunting rights over certain lands etc. The marriages brought with them permissions for families to use each other's land rather than fight over it. Tribal access to land for hunting and gathering predates agriculture and domestication of livestock by thousands of years. Modern humans have been around for 200,000 years or so. I would expect some form of marriage ceremony to have developed at least 40,000 years ago, probably much earlier.
2007-08-20 20:09:46 · answer #2 · answered by tentofield 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
B4 written history so there is no way to give a date. All groups of people have some sort of marriage ceremony.
2007-08-20 20:05:22 · answer #3 · answered by bhappy 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
started when the hillbilly got his girl pregnant and the dad found out, and forced him to marry her with a shot gun to his back.
2007-08-20 20:03:02 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
the day that brooms were invented to jump through
2007-08-20 20:15:37 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋