61.—How the Jassen have their marriages.
Inter illas gentes, Gargetter et Jassen, nuptiæ explentur hac conditione, videlicet mater puellam suam intactam esse asserit, sed ni reapse sit virgo, conjugium non conficitur. Quando igitur de nuptiis agitur, cantibus comitantur puellam ante thalamum, et ibi se ponere jubent; succedit inde sponsus cum adolescentulis, et gladio stricto percutit thalamum, et prope illum se se ponit una cum adolescentulis, et comedunt et bibunt, et se oblectant inter choreas et cantus. Et quum ita solatia cesserint, sponsum denudant usque ad subuculam suam, et egredientes relinquunt cum sponsa. Postea venit sponsi frater, et nonnullus ex amicis intimis, et ante ostium excubat stricto ense; et quum sponsus sponsam virginem non invenit, hoc matri ejus palam facit. Deinde mater sponsi cum amicis suis ante thalamum adstat, observant panniculos, et si nullum virginitatis signum inveniunt, omnes incipiunt se contristare; quum vero pater et mater sponsi cum amicis suis mane adveniunt, ut festa conjugalia concelebrent, mater sponsi manu regit poculum in una parte perforatum, et implet vino claudens foramen digito, et inde matrem sponsæ invitat ut libat amovens digitum e foramine, et sic vinum extra fluit; tum mater sponsi dicit matri sponsæ: Ita evenit de filia tua. Hoc summo dedecori est parentibus sponsæ, quam tradunt eis ut secum ducant, dicentes, se velle nubere filis intactam puellam, sed non ita evenisse de eorum filia. Then come their priests and the chief [persons] that are there, and invite the bridegroom’s father and mother, and then they go to their son the bridegroom, and ask him whether or no he will have her? If he says, “Yes”, she is given to him by the priests, and the other persons who have interceded for her. But if he says, “No”, then they are in all things separated; and whatever he has brought to her, she gives the whole back to him; and whatever clothes he has given her, she must give back to him; after which, he can take another wife, and she another husband.[(1)] There are many people in Ermenia, who have this custom. The Infidels call the Gorgiten, Kurtzi; and the Jassen they call Affs.