Bridezilla’s Revenge
The modern contemporary romanticization of marriage would be unrecognizable to the majority of the past. Through most of human history, marriage has been a practical economic and political institution, the betrothed had little control. From the early Middle Ages to the 18th century, marriages for upper-class Europeans were the way that families raised funds, sealed political alliances and made sure that no former lovers or illegitimate children could make claims on their wealth. Elite weddings were extravagant affairs that involved expensive negotiations and festivities, often carried out over months. But these elaborate weddings were not about the personal relationship between bride and groom, who might have never met—and might actually have been in love with someone else.
In the middle classes, marriage was predominantly a business proposition. It was one of the main ways that men raised capital, and the only way that women established economic security. Right up through the 1700s, the dowry a wife brought to marriage was often the biggest infusion of cash and property a man would ever acquire—and endowing a daughter placed a much heavier strain on a woman's family than any modern wedding.
Even in the lower classes, marriage had more to do with practical needs than individual love. Most farms and businesses required both a man and a woman to run them, so partners were chosen with an eye toward their value as workers. Because neighbors depended on each other for loans, labor and joint village activities, building fences and homes.
By the second half of the 18th century, leading sectors of European society toyed with the radical idea that marriage should be based on the love and free choice of both partners. Marriage was more often seen as the union of soul mates in the 19th century, but wedding rituals remained highly formulaic. Fathers walked their daughters down the aisle to represent a woman's transfer from her father's to her husband's protection. Brides wore white to symbolize their purity. Wedding vows emphasized the man's duty to provide and protect, and usually included the wife's promise to obey.
What is really new about weddings today is not the price tag but the preoccupation with a personalized ceremony. In the 1950s and 1960s, marriage was bought off the rack, so to speak. Nearly everyone married, almost always at an early age. Idealization of love notwithstanding, marriage was as much a union of two gender roles as of two individuals. The rules were clear cut. Wives were to be homemakers. Husbands breadwinners. As a result, most 1950s weddings were as conventional as the unions they initiated. From the vows to the music to the cake decorations, weddings were variations on the same theme, depending on how much money was available.
Today, each partner brings independent habits, tastes, resources and skills to the new relationship. Men and women now expect to negotiate a marriage that meets the individual needs of both partners. For most people, these changes are extremely liberating, and marriages that succeed can be much more rewarding and fulfilling than those of the past.
But marriage is also less stable. Couples are no longer held together by pressures from in-laws or society, women can support themselves, and men are no longer ostracized if they do not marry or are divorced.
So perhaps we should cut anxious brides and grooms some slack. Tasteful or garish, simple or ostentatious, weddings today are the first chance a couple gets to announce to the world their chosen joint identity. Couples are preoccupied with getting each detail right because they are struggling to reflect the uniqueness of their relationship—and the hope that it will be strengthened, rather than undermined, by their individual identities and ambitions.
Psychology Today
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