Special wedding-rings, as we understand them, were not used at an early period, the espousal ring being employed at the wedding ceremony also. At a later time, a signet was set in the anulus pronubus, or betrothal ring, to signify that the spouse was to have the right of sealing up the household goods, and occasionally a small key formed part of the ring, with a similar significance. We have a testimony to this view in the words of the marriage ceremony: “With all my worldly goods I thee endow.” The wives of our day are quite disposed to accept this passage in its literal sense, although some may incline to a more liberal interpretation of the promise to love, honor and obey their husbands. The ring as a pledge of love is said to be first mentioned in Roman literature by Plautus in his “Miles Gloriosus” (Act IV, sc. i, v. 11); this passage, however, does not refer to a nuptial ring, but rather to a love token.
Somewhat distantly related to the betrothal or wedding rings were those given by lovers to the objects of their affection. Of such a ring the Roman poet Ovid writes, apostrophizing it as “a ring soon destined to encircle the finger of a beauteous girl, a ring having no worth except the love of the giver.” It was to be a gift to the poet’s ladylove Corinna.[334] The ring sent by a fair lady, as a token of love to a handsome soldier, in the “Miles Gloriosus” of Plautus was also of this class.
The custom of placing the betrothal or wedding ring upon the fourth finger seems undoubtedly to owe its origin to the fancy that a special nerve, or vein, ran directly from this finger to the heart. Macrobius, in his Saturnalia,[335] alludes to the belief in the following words: “Because of this nerve, the newly betrothed places the ring on this finger of his spouse, as though it were a representation of the heart.” Macrobius asserts that he derived his information from an Egyptian priest.
It has been conjectured that this was not the real source of the custom, but that in the church service it was usual for the Christian priest to touch three fingers successively with the ring while saying: “In the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Ghost,” and then to place it upon the last finger touched. We know that this was the usage in the bestowal of episcopal rings, and later with wedding rings, but the express statement cited from the pagan writer Macrobius shows that in the earlier marriage or betrothal ceremony this custom must have had an entirely different origin.
During the reign of George I of England it was not unusual to wear the wedding ring on the thumb, although it had been placed on the fourth finger at the marriage ceremony. Possibly this custom may have arisen because exceptionally large wedding rings were favored by fashion at that time. That wedding rings were often worn on the thumb in the middle of the seventeenth century is proved by the lines from Samuel Butler’s Hudibras quoted on another page.[336]
PORTRAIT OF AN UNKNOWN WOMAN BY PANTOJA DE LA CRUZ
Rings on thumb and index of right hand, and on fourth and little fingers of left hand Museo del Prado, Madrid
PORTRAIT OF THE EMPRESS MARY, DAUGHTER OF CHARLES V AND WIFE OF MAXIMILIAN II, BY JUAN PANTOJA DE LA CRUZ