[898] His Eheschliessung (1875) called forth the Verlobung und Trauung (1876) of Friedberg; also a critique by Meyer, in the Jenaer Lit. Ztg., Jan., 1876, 501 ff. Sohm defends his position in Trauung und Verlobung (1876), 15 ff.; in his Zur Trauungsfrage, 11 ff.; and in the Strassburger Festgabe für Thöl, 84, 98 n. 27. The views of Sohm and others are examined by Habicht, Altdeutsche Verlobung (1879), who concludes (75) that "Die Verlobung ist nicht Beginn der Ehe, aber die rechtliche Grundlage und nothwendige Voraussetzung derselben." The Trauung is "fulfilment of the betrothal" and "constitutes the beginning of the marriage." Lehmann, Verlobung und Hochzeit (1882), examines the problem from the standpoint of northern law, and reaches the analogous result (124, 125) that the "betrothal is a primary and independent, the nuptials (Hochzeit) a secondary and dependent, act for joining in marriage (Eheschliessungsact); the betrothal is the real Eheschliessungsact, the nuptials an Ehevollziehungsact." Sohm's view is adopted by Spirgatis, Verlobung und Vermählung, 4 f.; it is attacked by Scheurl, Kirchliches Eheschliessungsrecht, 35 ff.; it is regarded as extreme (übertrieben), though in spirit right, by Schubert, Die evangelische Trauung, 15 n. 2; Loening, Gesch. d. deut. Kirchenrechts, II, 581, 600 n. 1; both betrothal and tradition are essential to a German marriage according to Sehling, Unterscheidung der Verlöbnisse, 30; while Heusler holds that neither betrothal nor tradition, but the copula carnalis, is the essential point: Institutionen, II, 284. Cf. Klein, Das Eheverlöbniss, 130-34; Schroeder, Rechtsgeschichte, 296, 297, and authorities there cited; and Dieckhoff, Kirchliche Trauung, 66, 67, note, 97, who favors and summarizes Sohm's view.
[899] Pollock and Maitland, II, 368. Cf. Dargun, Mutterrecht und Raubehe, 23 ff.
Besides the normal or full marriage of free men and women, just described, the law-books recognize concubinage, so-called "marriages" between the unfree, and unions between the free and the unfree. The church, by giving them a sacramental sanction, constantly strove to raise these irregular connections to the rank of genuine wedlock. See especially Koehne, "Die Geschlechtsverbindungen der Unfreien," in Gierke's Untersuchungen, XXII, 1-23; and the literature on the subject mentioned in the Bibliographical Note at the head of this chapter.
[900] That free marriage sometimes occurred is, of course, a conjecture. But see Dargun, Mutterrecht und Raubehe, 24 ff.; and Kohler, in ZVR., VI, 321, for the alleged survival of marriage ohne Mundium, which they assume to be a survival of Mutterrecht. This assumption, of course, is doubtful. Cf. Unger, Die Ehe, 105, 106. See chap. iv, above.
[901] "So long as marriage was a strictly civil [lay] ceremony, as well as a purely civil engagement, the bride's father or guardian performed the rite. It was he who took her by the neck and shoulders, and gave her to the bridegroom. He gave the symbolic shoe. In the Danish matrimonial rite of a subsequent period the father's part was even more impressive. In language, never in later times permitted to our English clergy, he declared himself the actual maker of the marriage, when, on hand-fasting the bride and groom, he said to the latter, 'I join this woman to you in honour to be your wife, with a right to half of your bed and keys, and to a third of your goods acquired or to be acquired, according to the law of the land and St. Eric. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.'"—Jeaffreson, Brides and Bridals, I, 53. Cf. on the Danish "hand-fasting" Brand, Popular Antiquities, II, 87, 88; Bullinger, Christen State of Matrimonye, 43.
[902] Sohm, Eheschliessung, 50; cf. Lehmann, 13.
[903] "Processvormundschaft": Sohm, op. cit., 52.
[904] Tacitus, Germania, cc. 18, 19.
[905] These codes sometimes fixed a term within which a widow may not marry, but a second marriage is treated as entirely legal: Lex salica, c. 44: Behrend, 57-59; Lex saxonum, tit. vii, 3, 6: Walter, Corp. juris germ., I, 387; Lex wisigothorum, lib. iii, tit. 2, c. 1, tit. 4, c. 2, 7: Walter, I, 470, 471, 477, 478; Lex burgund., tit. 24, c. 1, tit. 52: Walter, I, 316, 330; Edictum Rotharis, cc. 178, 182, 188: Walter, I, 710, 711, 714; Æthelberht, 76; Æthelred, V, 21; Canute, 73, 74: Schmid, Gesetze, 8, 224, 310, 312. Cf. Habicht, Altd. Verlobung, 16 ff.; Sohm, Eheschliessung, 63, who differ as to the interpretation of the much-disputed c. 44, lex sal. de reipus; Grimm, Rechtsalt., 452; Schroeder, Güterrecht, I, 56, 57.
[906] Habicht, Altdeutsche Verlobung, 26, 27. The Saxon and Lombard laws allow the widow to appeal to her own family in case her legal tutor—that is, her deceased husband's family—will not consent: Habicht, 17, 18. On the freedom of the English widow see Roeder, Die Familie bei den Angelsachsen, 26 ff.