The old Athenian laws ordered that men should be thirty-five and women twenty-six, before they married; but Plato considered thirty a suitable age for the bridegroom, and other writers approved of brides as young as eighteen, or fifteen. Grecian women never changed the name they received when infants: thus Xantippe would be distinguished from another of the same name, by being called Xantippe, the wife of Socrates.
In the primitive ages women were purchased by their husbands, and received no dowry from relations; but with the progress of civilization and wealth this custom disappeared, and wives were respected in proportion to the value of their marriage portion. Medea, in Euripides, complains that women were the most miserable of the human race, because they were obliged to buy their own masters at a dear rate. Those who brought no dowry were liable to be spoken of contemptuously, as if they were slaves rather than lawful wives. Hence, when men married women without fortune, they generally gave a written instrument acknowledging the receipt of a dowry. Those who received munificent portions required a greater degree of respect, and expected additional privileges on that account. Hermione, in Euripides, is enraged that the captive Andromache should pretend to rival her in the affections of Pyrrhus; and she thus addresses her:
“With these resplendent ornaments of gold
Decking my tresses, in this robe arrayed,
Which bright with various tinctured radiance flames,
Not from the house of Peleus or Achilles
A bridal gift, I come. In Sparta this
From Menelaus, my father, I received
With a rich dowry: therefore I may speak
Freely, and thus to you address my words.