[965] Dieckhoff, Die kirch. Trauung, 29 ff., 45, 46 ff., 65 ff.; idem, Civilehe und kirch. Trauung, 14 ff. Much earlier, Moy, Eherecht der Christen, 216, 217, had taken the same view.
[966] Dieckhoff, Die kirch. Trauung, 35 ff.: sacramentaria of Popes Leo, Gelasius, and Gregory I. These, he thinks, show not merely a "divine benediction of the marriage already concluded, but essentially a divine joining in marriage." These services are also contained in Daniel, Codex liturgicus, I, 257 ff.; and that of Gelasius in Martene, De ritibus, II, 127.
[967] Charles the Great in the Capitulary of 802, c. 35, Walter, Corpus juris germ., II, 167, prescribes the benediction of the nuptials by a priest; but this is thought to have had little effect. The benediction is also required by several false capitularies: Friedberg, Eheschliessung, 58, 59. On this decree of 802 see also Schubert, Die evangel. Trauung, 19; Beauchet, Étude, 30, 31.
[968] Surtees Society Publications, LXIII, Appendix, 157 ff. In the Ordo of Archbishop Egbert, for instance, a blessing is invoked upon the parties, the bridal chamber, and the marriage bed; and the other Ordines there printed are of the same general character.
[969] It need not surprise us that these phases of evolution chronologically overlap each other; for social development is seldom uniform.
[970] Haustrauung: Sohm, Eheschliessung, 158.
[971] Also ad valvas ecclesiae, in facie ecclesiae, in conspectu ecclesiae, ad fores ecclesiae, etc.
[972] "By performing the civil rite outside the walls of the church they declared the fundamental nature of the matrimonial contract, and asserted the doctrine of the common law of the land respecting its meaning and purpose."—Jeaffreson, Brides and Bridals, I, 53. This view is of course rejected by Dieckhoff, Die kirch. Trauung, 76, note, 79 ff., who regards the ecclesiastical transaction as a real ecclesiastical celebration necessary to the marriage in the eyes of the church. Cf. Bierling, "Kleine Beiträge," ZKR., XVI, 288 ff., who criticises Dieckhoff (Civilehe und kirch. Trauung), and agrees with Sohm (Zur Trauungsfrage, 10) that the ecclesiastical transaction must not be confused with ecclesiastical marriage.
[973] Glanville, Tractatus, lib. vi, c. 1: Phillips, II, 381. "The term dower is used in two senses. Dower in the sense in which it is commonly used means that which any free man at the time of his being affianced (tempore desponsationis) gives to his bride at the church door": Glanville, vi, c. 1, as translated by John Beames (London, 1812). Cf. also Selden, Fleta, lib. v, c. 23, pp. 340, 341; Bracton, De legibus, lib. ii, c. 39 (fol. 92), Vol. II, 48; Horne, The Mirror of Justices (ed. Whittaker, London, 1895), 11; Fitzherbert, New Natura Brevium (Dublin, 1793), 352 (150); Hengham, Summa parva, c. ii: "Brevia de dote ad ostium ecclesiae;" Selden, Uxor ebraica, 198, or in Opera, III, 680.
That the gifta, or celebration as a temporal act, should take place before the church door is thoroughly in harmony with the early view that there purification or preparation should be made for the rites or service within the sanctuary. The atrium sometimes seems to be regarded as the medial ground between the world on the one hand and the sacred temple of God on the other; see, for example, Old Eng. Homilies, I, 72, 73: children are to be baptized in holy church, "and their godfathers and godmothers are to answer for them at the church-door, and enter into pledges (covenants) at the font-stone, that they should be believing (faithful) men." This passage is referred to in Mätzner, Altenglisch. Sprachproben (Berlin, 1878), II, 578, at "chirchedure." Gregory, in his Pastoral Care, 104, 105, referring to the brazen basins before the Temple supported by twelve oxen, says the bishops when they "descend to wash the sins of their neighbors, when they confess, they support, as it were, the basin before the church-door." According to the Capitula et fragmenta Theodori, Thorpe, Ancient Laws (folio), 313, "Si in atrio ecclesiae quislibet injuriaverit aliquem presbyterum, vel ibidem aliquod sacrilegium perpetraverit, altari et Domino componatur." With this compare Æthelred, Laws, VII, 13: Thorpe, Ancient Laws (folio), 142; Grimm, Wörterbuch, s. v. "Kirchthor;" Murray, New Eng. Dict., Part V, 406, at "church-door;" Ormulum, I, 43, ll. 1326, 1327; Chaucer, Prolog., 460: "Housbondes at chirche dore she hadde fyve." See also Warnkönig and Stein, Französische Verfassungsgeschichte, II, 257; Weinhold, Deutsche Frauen, I, 377, 378; Whitgift, Works, II, 461-64; Brand, Pop. Ant., II, 133-35; Jeaffreson, Brides and Bridals, I, 46-59; Spirgatis, Verlobung und Trauung, 20, 21; Schubert, Die evangel. Trauung, 20.