Concubinage

Concubinage, the state of cohabitation of a man and woman without the sanction of a formally legal marriage. We find examples in the Old Testament, showing that it was permissible as a relief from a childless marriage. The Roman concubinatus was a permanent relation affording freedom from many of the severe marriage restrictions of the civil law. It was a perfectly respectable arrangement, and the woman had a footing in law, although a less dignified position socially than a wife. The offspring, called natural children, came to have limited rights of succession, and could be completely legitimated by subsequent marriage. Augustus, with a view to promote regular marriages, and check the growing licentiousness, enacted a comprehensive marriage-law (Lex Julia et Papia Poppæa), which confined concubinage to women of low rank or who had lost their station. Christianity required the complete sanctity of marriage, although the civil law long continued to tolerate separation at pleasure. In the eastern empire concubinage was entirely prohibited by the Emperor Leo. The ancient laws of the Germans recognised, along with regular marriage, a similar informal connection of the sexes still not unknown as Morganatic Marriage (q.v.). The barragania of medieval Spain and the hand-fasting of our own ancestors were merely forms of concubinage. See CELIBACY and MARRIAGE.