Herald of Steel

Strictly speaking, all the various rituals and ceremonies that had been performed were not necessary for the marriage to be valid.

Strictly speaking, to make any marriage valid in the eyes of Adhanian law, the only thing that was needed was a public statement from the boy and girl’s guardian, letting the people in the vicinity know that this boy and girl was now man and woman.

But the reasons why the many rituals and ceremonies existed were both cultural, designed to make the day more merry and memorable, and religious, as it was believed that performing such acts would draw the favor of the gods and bestow thier blesings on the newlyweds, resulting in peace and harmony in the house.

And the reason behind Alexander’s lavish and extravagant wedding was purposed to awe and impress his guests and retailers.

And in this endeavor, he seemed to have been mostly successful up until now, as along with Theocles’s phrase, came an accompanying cheer and applause, while the couple smiled and held hands.

This would be a day for both of them to remember.

As a side note, the custom behind Theocles’s phrase ‘Is there anyone among us who thinks this union should not be graced by the gods’ was rooted in pragmatism.

This phrase had been invented due to a necessity because once there was a rampant culture among nobles to steal a commoner’s or peasant’s wife.

And thus this phrase was directed at anyone claiming to already be the spouse of the woman in question.

There was also the rare occurrence where a woman would run away from her family or lie about her marital status to hitch a ride onto a noble’s lap, and this tradition helped curb that too.

The putting of the ring on the bride’s finger was usually the climax of the marriage ceremony, but Alexander had another extra step to add.

So he first addressed the crowd thanking them, “Gentlemen, and esteemed guests,” Alexander very conspicuously left the ‘Ladies’ part as per the norms of the time,

“Thank you for coming and attending this humble wedding of mine out of your busy schedule,” His last words drew a light smile from the crowd as then Alexander got to the main point of his speech.

“As you know it is customary in a wedding ceremony for the groom to give money to the bride’s father.

“This is done as a symbol of buying his daughter from him.”

“And thus a husband is legally like a father to his bride, holding the same authority of life and death over her as her guardian did. He can manage her finances, properties, and inheritance to his wishes.”

Alexander finished giving the background of Adhanian, or more specifically the Ramuh’s faith interpretation of marriage and gender norms.

Then Alexander gave his new religion’s interpretation of this sacred act,

“In many aspects of marriage, the rules decreed in our religion of Gaia agree with that of Ramuh.”

“A husband works hard all day long and naturally deserves more control of the family. He is the head and leader after all,” Alexander made these points clear to show that his religion was not too different from Ramuh’s so as to not cause a strong backlash from the usually conservation populace of the city.

“But there are small instances where our faiths do differ,” Alexander declared in a quick, sharp tone, as in a single breath he described, “And that is that instead of giving the money to the bride’s father, the groom will give money directly to his bride!”

This produced some eyebrows and hushed whispers among the crowd, spreading to even among some of the newly converted council members.

This announcement was quite the controversial one and Theocles hid a breath of helplessness seeing this.

The archpriest recalled that when Alexander said that this was the decree of the goddess, he of course did not dare reject it, but Theocles had asked his lord to hold off on that announcement for a few years, letting the new converts get used to their new way of life before burdening them with this custom.

And the exact word that Theocles used was that, ‘burden’.

Because you see, very crude and almost immorally speaking, raising children was a kind of investment for the people of this time.

Sons were so much celebrated because boys could work and earn money, of which they could spend a portion of to look after their parents.

So feeding, clothing, and raising a son was worth it because it was an investment for the parents for their retirement and old man.

Good, strong, healthy sons were the 401k of ancient times. 𝘰𝑣𝘭.𝗇𝓔t

But for the girls, they were the complete opposite.

They could not work the fields, they could barely earn any money, and worse, when they were of age, they would leave their parents to serve their husbands.

In the twisted, pragmatic eyes of the girl’s parents, girls were the human equivalent of crow’s eggs that they, represented in this analogy as a cuckoo were forced to raise.

So from their perspective, it was a waste of good food, money, and cloth to raise a daughter because she was destined to become another man’s possession, wasting all of one’s investment to benefit an unknown stranger.

These were the sad economic circumstances that gave birth to a lot of gender norms of the time which developed into problems for the people of the 21st century.

Problems such as the convention that women would stay at home and look after the house, as was done for 99% of human history due to the economic structure of the times.

Problems such as pay discrimination based on gender, because throughout almost the entirety of our history, we have been an agrarian society, and so our brain has been wired to think that since women are less stronger than men, they can work less of the field per day, and so they deserve less pay.

Problems such as the birth of the culture of female infanticide both in Adhania and in Alexander’s previous timeline.

And it was a practice that sadly persisted in both the city Alexander currently resided in and the modern times he once lived in, with India being the most notable one, where more than 2,000 babies were aborted every day after they were found to be female.

While in some parts of Adhania, a female girl being born was a cause of great shame and humiliation for the family, as it was seen as a curse and sign of misfortune, and proof that the gods were dissatisfied with that family.

Problems such as only men being on high-level posts, because it would be typically only men who had the time to go out of the house and do other things, as women would be typically needed to take care of the house.

All these conventions, or as the feminists say, ‘The rise of the patriarchy’ did not happen because one day all the men got together in one giant hall and had a meeting where they agreed to suppress and oppress the other gender with some grand diabolical masterplan in mind.

No, they occurred naturally due to the economic hardships and circumstances of the time where each person acted in his own self-interest.

And such hardships gave rise to customs such as the groom giving money to the bride’s father as a kind of reimbursement for all his efforts in raising a good, healthy daughter.

And it even gave rise to completely opposite customs such as in Thesos and India, where in the latter’s case the concept of dowry to this day persisted despite the government’s efforts to ease it.

The reason behind the dowry, which was a complete 180 of Adhania’s custom and involved the bride’s father actually giving money to the groom, was that because the woman cannot work, the bride’s father should give money to the groom to look after this ‘burden’.

This was another form of twisted logic pertaining to the economic situation of the times and was followed by many groups and races.

Theocles had explained these situations in detail to Alexander and had said, “My lord, I know many fathers who raise their daughters well because they believe they will get a good amount of money by marrying her. So, this is a form of protection for them.”

“And I fear that giving the money to the bride and stopping the father from getting anything might make the treatment of the girls get worse, and even cause female infanticide to rise.”

And Theocles lastly finished by saying, “Not to mention that because women have no right to own money or property, it will likely all end up in the husband’s pocket, making the custom quite….ummm weak.”

Thoecles quickly stopped himself from saying the word ‘useless’.

And Theocles made some fantastic points no doubt.

But Alexander gave Theocles the same answer as he gave the crowd, “The reason for giving the bride money is because women generally have no income of their own, And this will allow them to spend out of their own pockets to buy sweets for their children, give gifts to her parents, and spend on small things on herself such as a necklace or jewelry without having no hanker their husbands for it.”

“And it could be even a source of emergency funds if the husband is not close by at the moment, such as being at war,” Alexander reasoned, which calmed much of the crowd, mostly concerned men who feared what their wives might do with the money.

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