MARRIAGEABLE AGES IN EUROPE.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 1969, 27 April 1875, Page 3

MARRIAGEABLE AGES IN EUROPE.

" "Reports-from Her '■'MjS^SSf^sysgrSS&ay t&tives abroad, showing the earliest age afc ■which marriages can be legally solemnised in each of the States of the continent of Europe, hare been presented to the House-of Commons in pursuance of their address dated June,.15,1874. In Austr.a, the age of discretion, both for males and females, is fourteen, and this period of life must bo reached on both sides before a marriage "can be valid. In Hungary, however, the marriage laws are entirely ecclesiastical, and males of the Roman Catholic confession cannot contract marriage until they, have completed their fourteenth year, nor females till they are twelve years of age. The Orthodox Greek Church follows the same rule : but Protestants consider males under the age of eighteen and females under the age of fifteen unable to contract valid marriages. .In Cisleithania, Jews are subject to the civil law; but in Hungary there is no restriction as to the age at which they may marry. In Russia, eighteen years for males and sixteen for females are the periods of life at which marriage may be legally contracted. In Turkey there is no general law on the subject of marriageable ages. The Italian law fixes eighteen' years for males and fifteen years for females as the earliest time of life at which marriages may be solemnised. Prussia, by the statute of December, 1872, sanctions marriage in the case of males on the completion of their eighteenth year, and; the fourteenth year in the case of females, no exception being allowed to these provisions. The law in-France states the earliest age at which marriages can be contracted to be eighteen years in the case of males and fifteen in the case of females, but powers of dispensation are reserved by the code. Under the old Monarchy boys could marry at the age £.. of fourteen and girls at twelve, as under Roman and even Athenian law. JShe Belgian code is the same as the French in determining the ages of; eighteen and fifteen severally as those at which men and woman may marry, and in leaving a right of dispensation. Bavaria has four sets of law on the subject. Under the Landrecht the lawful age for males is fourteen and for females twelve. In the district in which the Gemeines RecM prevails the limits of age are the same. The more advanced ages of eighteen for male 3 and fourteen for females are in those parts of Bavaria in; which the Prussian Landrecht rules; and in those districts which acknowledge the French " Code Civile " the ago for males is eighteen and for females fifteen, as in France and Belgium. Leaving to the Minister of Justice the faculty of granting a dispensation, the law in Denmark fixes •the age of twenty for the man and sixteen - for the girl as the earliest at which persons can marry. In Greece, males cannot marry before fourteen years of age nor females, before twelve; while, in the lonian Islands, sixteen and fourteen years are. respectively the legal ages. A bill has been, or is about to be introduced into the Athenian Chamber, appointing fifteen as the earliest age for males and twelve for females. In Hesse Darmstadt and Baden, the standard of marriageable ages is curiously high. The consent of parents is necessary in the case of men until they have completed their twentyfifth year j -in. that of women until they are twenty-one. In the event of parents refusing their consent, respectful .summonses can be made by the children, and ' and the law requires three such summonses from men who have,not, attained their thirtieth year, and women who are

not twenty-five years of age, and two summoneses only after that age. The earliest age at which the law of Baden, under any conditions, allows the population to marry is eighteen years for men and fifteen for girls. The completion of eighteen years by males and sixteen by females is necessary for valid marriage in the Netherlands. In Saxe Coburg Gqtha, no male is permitted to marry before he has attained his twenty-first year. Cases occur where exceptions are made, namely, when the parents of a young man are from illness or age, no longer capable of managing a farm or other business, and it becomes necessary that a wife should assist in the household. Such exceptions, however, can only be granted by the Government, to whom the petitioner must apply. As regards females, all that is necessary is, that at the age of fourteen years they should be confirmed before leaving school. It seldom happens that a girl marries before her seventeenth year. By the law of June, 1870, the legal ages of marriage in Spain are fourteen for males and twelve for females. It is the same in Portugal, with this qualification that minors—that is, persons of either sex under twenty-one years of age—cannot contract marriage without the consent of their parents. In Wurtemburg no subject, male or female, can be legally married, unless of the full age of twentyone years, without the consent of parents, and in the case of males* a special dispensation from the administrative authorities. This dispensation is granted only unter exceptional circumstances, and-the requirements of military service alone render it practically impossible in most cases for any man to marry before he is of age. The marriageable ago for females is fixed by Wurtemburg Jaw at the completion of the fourteenth year, and under that age no marriage can be legally solemnised. The principle which underlies the provision of the law in regard, to males is. that the marriagecontract minors are legally incompetent to conclude, whereas females are supposed to acquire majority by marriage. In Saxony the legal age. for the marriage of males is eighteen, for females sixteen years. According to the amended paragraph of the new German Civil Marriage Bill the ages would be respective by twenty and sixteen yearß, instead of eighteen and fourteen as in the draft of the bill. In Eoumania the legal age for marriage is eighteen years in the case of malas and , fifteen, in , that .of females. There is much variation of the marriage law in Switzerland as to the agea of contracting paxiies, which in some cantons is as high:as twenty years for males and seventeen for. females, and in others as low as fourteen for males and twelve for females. Consent of parents is; also required up to twenty-five years in. Uri, in Schaffhouse, in. Appenzell, nr Tessin, and in Geneva;— Home News. „