Consanguinity and dispensations

Moderator: MOD_nyhetsgrupper

Svar
Gjest

Consanguinity and dispensations

Legg inn av Gjest » 12 aug 2005 10:36:01

Todd Whitesides interestingly quoted p. 133 of A History of Private Life II:
Revelations of the Medieval World (Georges Duby, Editor) (1988)
< "the (surviving) party to the espousal is not free to (re)marry a brother,
<sister, or other relative of the other party....Relations by affinity (that
is,
<marriage) were taboo to the fourth canonical degree, and the more
frequently <invoked relations of consanguinity were taboo to the seventh degree."
I wonder whether any of our group historians could enlighten us on the
following questions:-
1. Are there any examples of relationships in degrees greater than the third
degree
having been held to result in the annulment of the marriage of the related
parties?
2. How did the "taboo" affect the legitimacy of children of the void
"marriage"?- we hear that both Henry VIII's daughters Mary and Elizabeth were treated
as illegitimate at different times, but the affinity of Henry VIII with
Katherine of Aragon was extremely close, she having been betrothed to Henry's elder
brother
3. Was there any principle on which the ecclesiastical authorities dispensed
with the consanguinity obstacle in advance of a marriage; or was it merely a
question of buying an indulgence?
4. Did the authorities keep records of the evidence offered by the parties as
to their kinship or affinity, in cases of applications for dispensations and
nullity decrees?
Do such records survive?
5. Are there examples of refusal of a dispensation? What was the closest
degree of kinship or affinity which was indulged?
6. To what extent were the rules modified, and thereafter enforced, in
England after the Reformation? (The Book of Common Prayer contained a splendid,
almost Levitican, Table of Kindred and Affinity which used to warn us not to
"uncover the nakedness" of our wives' grandmothers- perish the thought!)
7. The discussions on list have revealed innumerable cases of marriages which
appear to have infringed the rules. How was it possible for example for
Margaret Furnaux to arrange the marriage of her daughter Isabel Beaupre to John
Longland, son of her second husband Sir Hugh Longland? Or for Hawise Muscegros to
marry Sir John Ferrers, close relation (perhaps nephew) of her stepmother
Agnes? Were dispensations obtained for such marriages?
8. Are there any good books which deal with these and similar topics?
MM

Chris Phillips

Re: Consanguinity and dispensations

Legg inn av Chris Phillips » 12 aug 2005 11:27:00

Millerfairfield@aol.com wrote:
7. The discussions on list have revealed innumerable cases of marriages
which
appear to have infringed the rules. How was it possible for example for
Margaret Furnaux to arrange the marriage of her daughter Isabel Beaupre to
John
Longland, son of her second husband Sir Hugh Longland? Or for Hawise
Muscegros to
marry Sir John Ferrers, close relation (perhaps nephew) of her stepmother
Agnes? Were dispensations obtained for such marriages?

I think I'll have to leave most of your questions to wiser heads, but the
rules governed only blood relationships* - either between spouses, or
between successive spouses of the same person. There was no impediment to
marriages like the ones you mention (and I think marriages between
step-siblings were very common).

*Actually, I believe there could also be problems caused by "spiritual
affinity", which could arise through someone being a child's godparent.

Chris Phillips

Gjest

Re: Consanguinity and dispensations

Legg inn av Gjest » 12 aug 2005 19:08:02

In a message dated 8/12/2005 1:34:09 AM Pacific Daylight Time,
Millerfairfield@aol.com writes:


as illegitimate at different times, but the affinity of Henry VIII with
Katherine of Aragon was extremely close, she having been betrothed to
Henry's elder
brother

But wasn't this handled until the "Levitical" exception which was that if a
brother died without heirs, the living brother could marry the widow in order
to raise up an heir as s stand-in for the dead brother?
That was always my understanding.
Will Johnson

John P. Ravilious

Re: Consanguinity and dispensations

Legg inn av John P. Ravilious » 12 aug 2005 21:19:26

Dear MM,

An interesting area, of major concern to all studying medieval
genealogy. The best example I can think, of a relationship in th
4th-5th degrees that was annulled, was the marriage of Louis VII of
France and Eleanor of Aquitaine. The daughters of this union were
certainly held legitimate under the terms of the annulment.
See the thread <Degrees of Consanguinity> from 1997, in
particular Nat Taylor's post of 3 December 1997 (copied below).
Cheers,
John


Dec 3 1997, 4:00 am

Newsgroups: soc.genealogy.medieval, alt.talk.royalty,
soc.history.medieval
From: ntay...@fas.harvard.edu (Nathaniel Taylor)
Date: 1997/12/03
Subject: Re: Degrees of Consanguinity


"D. Spencer Hines" <shi...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
....

What would you say, or more to the point, what did The Church say about the
impact of these limiting criteria on the marriages of Eleanor of Aquitaine
to Louis VII and Henry II?


Louis VII's marriage to Eleanor was not thwarted by the Church, and may

have raised few eyebrows, as they were only related in the fifth degree

(in an unequal number of generations--4 and 5 respectively--from Robert

the Pious), and many churchmen at that time were arguing that 4 degrees

was sufficient prohibition (though this didn't become official again
until
1215). Once Louis decided to repudiate her, he had an assembly of
toady
bishops declare the marriage annulled at Beaugency on the Tuesday
before
Palm Sunday, 1152 (18 March). The consanguinity was only made an issue
by
clerics after it was the clear will of the king, who had begun
preparing
for the divorce the previous autumn by removing troops from Aquitaine.
With Henry and Eleanor, who were also related in the fifth degree, the
issue of consanguinity never seems to have come up among the clergy
against Henry's will, though the chronicler Gervase of Canterbury
reports
that Henry contemplated divorcing Eleanor in 1175 in the aftermath of
the
rebellion. (For these data see W. L. Warren's _Henry II_ [Berkeley,
1973],
42-44, 601).

But even royal could not always contain clerical opposition to
consanguineous marriages. In two famous earlier cases, bishop Ivo of
Chartres and archbishop Anselm of Canterbury prevented Henry I from
marrying two of his illegitimate daughters to two individuals who were
related to her in the *sixth* degree (R. W. Southern, _The Making of
the
Middle Ages_ [Yale,1953], 79-80).


Looking at it another way, I imagine that some actual medieval
marriages
which are now known to be consanguineous, especially given the most
inclusive method of reckoning prohibited degrees, might not necessarily

have been *known* to be consanguineous by the parties involved. Seven
generations *in all lines* was probably beyond the capability of most
nobles (let alone others) in the twelfth century. I don't know all the

people who are potentially my sixth cousins (my wife turned out to be
my
tenth cousin, but nobody but I would ever have known that).


At other times, I'm sure no one opposed known consanguineous marriage,
for
political reasons, or because people who were living in consanguineous
glass houses of their own could not start throwing stones. Therefore I
am
always leery of genealogical arguments of the form "X cannot be the
daughter of Y, because if they had been, then the marriage of X and Z
would have been canonically prohibited; but X and Z were married, and
no
evidence of a dispensation survives for the marriage."


Nat Taylor

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

Gjest

Re: Consanguinity and dispensations

Legg inn av Gjest » 13 aug 2005 17:01:39

In medieval England, Church law determined if a marriage was allowed --
although the question often did not arise unless someone challenged the
legitimacy of the children for inheritance. Church law changed from
time to time, but generally, marriage within the fourth degree was
forbidden. By Church figuring, "fourth degree" is third cousin --
after about A.D. 1000; before that, fourth degree was first cousin.
For a discussion of consanguinity as the Church understood it:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/04264a.htm
For English marriage law as it was understood early in the 14th century
(Bracton):
http://hlsl.law.harvard.edu/bracton/Unf ... m#TITLE140
For Blackstone's explanation of Henry VIII's law about consanguinity:
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/black ... k1ch15.htm

Cece

Gjest

Re: Consanguinity and dispensations

Legg inn av Gjest » 14 aug 2005 09:37:02

Cecelia Armstrong kindly posted some very helpful comments and references on
this topic. Thank you, Cecelia
MM

Svar

Gå tilbake til «soc.genealogy.medieval»