Talk:Manus marriage

Expand and correct but it's done

(I titled this topic/section and added the sig information per the talk page's history. Nick Levinson (talk) 19:55, 20 July 2013 (UTC) (Reformatted sig info: 20:04, 20 July 2013 (UTC)))

This wiki needs to be expanded and corrected. Hi Professor, I just made minor adjustments here and there it's 4:30pm November 25,2009 but finished it all up by 3:00. Take care. Shaikhakz (talk), November 2009

possible addition on a woman's legal independence in marriage

Some of the following, maybe all of it, or something like it, may belong in this article and/or in the Roman law article (I'm posting to both talk pages) or perhaps elsewhere:

A woman in manu had little independent legal standing, but a freeborn Roman woman was regarded as a citizen,<ref>Frier, Bruce W., & Thomas A.J. McGinn, A Casebook on Roman Family Law (Oxford University Press, 2004), pp. 31–32 & 457 & passim.<br />  Sherwin-White, A.N., Roman Citizenship (Oxford University Press, 1979), pp. 211 & 268.</ref> and not as property with a transferrable right of ownership; the essential distinction in the Roman "law of persons"{{Efn|[[Legal personality]], a person's capacity to have legal rights and obligations under a given system of law}}{{Efn|[[Roman law]], the legal system of ancient Rome, including personal law}} was that all human beings were either free (liberi) or slaves (servi).<ref>Frier, Bruce W., and Thomas A.J. McGinn, A Casebook on Roman Family Law, op. cit., p. 14, citing Gaius, Institutiones 1.9 = Digest 1.5.3.</ref> Only free people in good legal standing could contract a lawful marriage, and men were often prohibited by law from marrying women of markedly lower social status.<ref>Millar, Fergus, Empire and City, Augustus to Julian: Obligations, Excuses and Status, in Journal of Roman Studies, 73 (1983), p. 88.</ref> In the better-documented historical period, and certainly by the time of Cicero and Caesar, manus marriage had become virtually obsolete; a woman remained legally part of her birth family and was never placed under the authority of her husband.<ref>Frier, Bruce W., and Thomas A.J. McGinn, A Casebook on Roman Family Law, op. cit., pp. 19–20.<br/>  Rawson, Beryl, The Roman Family, in The Family in Ancient Rome: New Perspectives (Cornell University Press, 1986), p. 15.</ref>

It's from a recent revision of the wife selling article (not the first appearance of similar content), with a little editing; it didn't belong there. I'd rather that someone else made the judgment for this article, as I haven't gotten the source.

Nick Levinson (talk) 19:59, 20 July 2013 (UTC)

Since wives were not bought and sold in ancient Rome (which was the point of correcting the horrendous misunderstandings at wife selling), you are right that it didn't belong there. Again, ancient Roman "wife selling" did not exist, and shouldn't be presented as such in the other article. Cynwolfe (talk) 20:49, 20 July 2013 (UTC)

The point of this topic is to present content for consideration for inclusion in this article. As to the wife selling article, your own additions (inter alia) showed that it did occur, and I thank you for providing evidence. If you have an opinion on the editing of this article as discussed in this topic, feel free to edit or respond accordingly. Nick Levinson (talk) 21:41, 20 July 2013 (UTC)