54: Shave Your Head and Get In the Closet: Dark History of Marriage

2022/9/14

Chapters

The episode begins with Bailey discussing the awkward traditions of weddings, such as the cake smash and garter toss, and questions the origins of these practices.

This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

It's easy and you can save money by doing it from your phone. Drivers who save by switching to Progressive save nearly $750 on average. And auto customers qualify for an average of seven discounts. Discounts for having multiple vehicles on your policy, being a homeowner and more.

So just like your favorite podcast, Progressive will be with you 24-7, 365 days a year, so you're protected no matter what. Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive.

Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customer surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary. Discounts not available in all states and situations. This is an ad by BetterHelp. What are your self-care non-negotiables? The things you know make you feel better even when it's impossible to make time for them.

Like that workout you try to squeeze in between kids' activities, work, and everything else you have going on, and before you know it, it gets pushed to tomorrow. Sound familiar? But it's the moments when you feel like you have no time for yourself when those non-negotiables are more important than ever. Those are the things that keep you strong, healthy, motivated, and prepared to take on everything life demands of you. So why not make therapy one of them?

BetterHelp Online Therapy makes it easy to get started with affordable phone, video, or live chat sessions you can do from anywhere, and the option to message your therapist between sessions if anything comes up. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash darkhistory today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash darkhistory.

Hi friends, I hope you're having a wonderful day today. My name is Bailey Sarian and I'd like to welcome you to my study or, you know, just my podcast, Dark History. Hi, this is a chance to tell the story like it is and to share the history of stuff we honestly would never think about. I just need you to sit back, relax, and we're going to talk about that hot, juicy history goss. Okay, so maybe you can tell by my beautiful veil. I'm getting married. It's my wedding day.

Aren't you excited for me? Great. Okay, so the other day, not even the other day, let's say a month ago. So about a month ago, I went to a wedding. I love weddings, especially if it's an open bar. I'm there. Okay.

They're fun. But, you know, one of those things that happens, you're hanging out in the banquet hall, right? And the cake comes out and everyone's like, yeah, cake. And it's cake time, right? So the bride and the groom, they stand up to go to the cake and cut it. The groom grabs the slice, the cake, picks it up.

smashes it into the wife's face. It's like, why? She just spent a bunch of money on her makeup and her hair and her dress and he just...

but that's fine. It's not my wedding day. I mean, today it is, but you know. And then after that, the bride takes a seat on a chair while the groom climbs under her dress to get the garter with his teeth. And I'm sitting next to grandma like, grandma, cover your eyes. Oh my God. You know, what the hell is happening here, grandma? And honestly, when you think about it, it's like weddings are awkward and it just kind of seems like a series of

Unfortunate events almost? As a viewer, cringe around every corner. The cake being smashed, the whole garter thing. It's just weird. Oh, and then like if there's a choreographed dance. I'm sorry. I know you guys put a lot of work into it, but that's different. That's a choice. I shouldn't hate on that. Okay, hold on. Cringe around every corner. The money being spent on weddings, the food, the dancing, the lights, the garter, the...

Tuxedos, all of it, right? It's just such a performance. For who? For everyone else, it seems. So naturally, I'm like, there has to be a reason as to why we're doing all this weird stuff, right? The whole wedding dress, garter belt, everything. What the hell is it all about? I wanna know. I opened up my laptop.

get to googling and you know google never disappoints okay because everything about weddings is so unfortunate ah when i tell you about where all of this ceremony stuff comes from you're gonna be like oh god

Yeah, you see, almost every single wedding tradition that we know today comes from an ancient practice that probably should have disappeared. But America, we took it, we ran with it, we made it our own. And that's cool. But, you know, you're not going to look at weddings the same. Sorry to ruin. I'm not ruining it. I'm just sprinkling in some knowledge. That's it.

I do need to add a disclaimer to, I should add a disclaimer to all of my dark history episodes moving forward because a lot of what I'm sharing today about weddings, history tends to focus on the rich and powerful people. So because of how it's been recorded, we don't know a ton about like the everyday person or how they viewed and practiced marriage. I wish we did, but that's why it's called his-tory history.

No, literally. That's what history stands for. His story. Yeah, did you know that? Joke's on us, because I didn't know that, and I Googled it, and I was like, is that real? Yep. So this is a very one-sided perspective is what I'm saying. You know, like, you get it. Let's get into marriage. Yeah, my favorite. The year is 1200 BCE, and we are in ancient Mesopotamia.

Did I say that right? I think I did. We're gonna be talking about the Babylonians. Yeah, this is when I had like a flashback because I was like, "Remember the Babylonians? Sixth grade history?" Yeah, I remember. It was all about the Babylonians. And then just one day, it was like, "What happened?" You just never hear of them ever again. They like,

Yeah, you get it. But they actually had some very interesting views on marriage. You see, the Babylonians had a king named Hammurabi, who was a very super influential person, and everybody looked up to him. Okay, this guy Hammurabi, he essentially created a code of conduct for the Babylonians. Essentially, they were rules that everyone should follow.

There were different rules or laws for crimes, for property, ownership, and how to conduct your business. The Hammurabi Code had 282 rules that were carved into stone. It reminded me, don't come for me, but it just reminded me of the Ten Commandments with the stone and stuff, but there was no burning bush. There's one rule that I'm sure all of us know today that actually came from the Hammurabi Code. Yeah, let me tell you. It's the eye for an eye rule.

You know, eye for an eye. If you don't know what that is, think of Aladdin when Jasmine went to steal fruit and then the fruit owner was like, "Hey, you can't steal that." And then he grabs her hand and he's about to chop her hand off. And then Aladdin came like save the day. And she was like, "Oh my God, I love him." It just restored balance and community. I took from you so therefore you can take from me. Hammurabi's code. But this is about weddings, Bailey, not Aladdin. Sorry. I should start another channel where I deep dive into Aladdin

Part 1, 2, and 3. And the television program. That would be fun. But another big part of Hammurabi's code had a bunch of rules about family and marriage. Now, the year 2350 BC was the first recorded marriage in history. Yep, way to go Babylonians, breaking history or starting history.

Yeah. And this was the first time that we know of where marriage had rules and essentially a contract was involved. An important part of that contract was the fact that the Babylonians viewed marriage as strictly for procreation. Had nothing to do about love, nothing about being cute, no dress, no party, nothing. They believed that women were here on this planet to have babies and babies only, point blank, period.

Thank you. Which speaking of periods, the girls in the community, once they hit puberty, that's when they were considered a woman and they were ready to be married off. So usually these women, I'm using quotes here, were like 11 and 12 years old. So just real young,

ripe and ready, I guess. The Babylonians had a very interesting way of finding wives. They would gather all of the women in a temple who were ready to be married off. So a bunch of 11 and 12 year olds. They're like, "Come, cometh wives, soon to be wives." So they go inside this temple, okay? And they have a little stage where they would bring one lady up at a time. All the men would gather around and have an auction essentially.

The host of the auction would be like, "This is Bertha. She's a Virgo. She gets kind of crazy. You know, she likes long walks on the beach. She hates to be thrown into a river. Loves kids. Go ahead, Bertha. Take a lap." You know? See that back end, Bertha. And then the wealthy and the rich would be able to bid on the most beautiful women first. Beautiful. You know, you get it. It's like subjective. Okay, great, really. Babylonian tens, the hotties, obviously.

they went real quick okay now i'm not being mean because this is literally what they did but for example the less attractive women who maybe were not selling as quickly they would throw in a little cash bonus like hey this is olga okay she's beautiful if you squint if you squint your eyes she's real cute and if you take her you get this cash bonus she gets even more gorgeous with the money so hey you may have gotten a babylonian four but you got some money too

I mean, that's cool, I guess. I don't know. I'm trying to see the positive here.

Once you bid on your woman and won her, now you were engaged to be wed. The Babylonians took engagement very seriously. One of the first things that had to be done was that the man would give a gift to the woman's family. It was kind of like a security deposit. Now this gift was usually money, but it could be anything of value. So livestock, property, sandals, I'm not sure. But let's say a guy got cold feet and he was like, "You know what? I actually wanna get out of this marriage."

He would lose whatever deposit he had put down. Plus he would lose the money he spent at the auction. That's like if someone breaks off an engagement today and they're like, sorry, babe, I'm keeping the ring. You know, same thing. There was no return policy. Not 100% sure how the ceremony went down. But what we do know is that once marriage happened, the next step for the happy couple would be to sign a marriage contract in front of witnesses, which then would make it official. I don't know.

Now, once the partnership was indeed official, the groom would pull the wedding veil over the wife's face, like pull it down, and literally shout to the streets, she is my wife.

like just making a loud announcement. You know how today we lift the wedding veil over the bride? Well, back then the Babylonians, they put that shit down over the bride and this let people know like, hey, this woman, she's not available. Don't be looking at her. Nope, she's not on the market. Which that had me thinking like the veil kind of makes more sense if you're putting it down. The whole unveiling thing.

We'll get into that, whatever. So now it was time to have a little feast. Kind of like what we do today at a reception. Everyone would get together, eat some food, celebrate. And once the celebration was over, the newlywed couple would head on over to the father-in-law's house where it was expected for the newlyweds to partake in some sexual relations. You know? And the girl was expected to

to get pregnant on the wedding night. That was the only reason they were getting married in the first place, to procreate, like I said. Now, she didn't get pregnant. Luckily, the Babylonians, oh, they actually did have a great return policy. Yeah. You see, if you didn't get pregnant, you could take in your wife and be like, "She brokey, no worky. I want a refund. No babies come out, you know, I don't know." And if the man decided to return the wife, he would get his money back and they would act like nothing ever happened.

On the other hand, for the woman, because she didn't get pregnant and now she has one marriage under her belt, she was considered damaged goods and it would bring shame to the whole damn family. That's what we do best, ladies. Bring in shame to the family. You know? Cool. Now, on the other hand, let's say a man gets married and his wife doesn't get pregnant within the first month.

But, you know, he's like, "I got a total babe. Like, I don't wanna, I don't wanna return her." You know, like maybe she makes some great sheep's meat flatbread. And he's like, "I don't wanna return her. I wanna keep her. I like that flatbread." So naturally he wants to keep her around and be the wife, but he needs a baby. So what does he do? Well, lucky for him, Babylonian men were allowed to have many side pieces or mistresses essentially living in their house as they could afford.

Having a mistress was expensive. I mean, you had to feed them, take care of them, take them on walks, water them, provide shelter. It's just a lot of work, you know? And these guys were essentially like Babylonian sugar daddies. Now, it wasn't so that the husband could have sex for fun.

with his mistresses, it was strictly because he needed a child or he wouldn't be seen as a man in his community. So if a mistress got pregnant and had a kid, the baby was then taken from her, given to the first wife, and they would pretend that it was their baby, not the mistress's baby, proving to the community that they could procreate. It sounds exactly like "Handmaid's Tale." Have you guys watched that show?

I don't know why you guys like it so much. It's pretty fucked up. You kept telling me to watch it and then I did and then I couldn't sleep and I was getting all depressed and I spiraled and I was like, why am I watching this? Are you guys okay? Anyways, it was like that. Just like that.

Now, it was rare, but there were wives who maybe decided to fuck around. And if the wife was caught cheating, she was in trouble. Because in Hammurabi's code, it said that the cheating wife and her lover, well, they would have to be bound together with rope, then thrown into the river nearby where they were left to drown. The end.

Now the man, on the other hand, was allowed to have lots of mistresses, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, same shit, different era. Fun fact though, lots of rules in Hammurabi's code said that if you disobeyed, you would get thrown in the river. I guess it was just like a catch-all. Throw 'em in the river, Barbara.

'Cause it happens a lot throughout history. The river, people get thrown in there. What was that about? We'll have to do it. Dark history of being thrown in the river. In Babylonia around this time, divorce, not really a thing, but it did happen sometimes. You see, if you were lower class and you couldn't afford to get a mistress, there was always the option for divorce, but that would also bring a lot of shame to the family. So just shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame. And that's like a big deal. Shame, you know?

Shame. Okay, great. Now this may seem a little cray, right? Marrying young, wife auctions, mistresses, throwing women into the river. But you have to remember like this was their normal and like nobody really questioned it. I mean, honestly, a round of applause for the Babylonians for being the first. They invented divorce. They invented like marriage, marriage contract.

They invented like the idea of having mistresses. Did they? No, but they invented divorce and like marriage in general. So that's pretty cool. So next time you're getting a divorce or you're at the altar saying your I do's, make sure to give a big thank you to the Babylonians for inventing that thing you're doing.

Thanks, Beth.

This is an ad by BetterHelp. What?

What are your self-care non-negotiables? The things you know make you feel better, even when it's impossible to make time for them. Like that workout you try to squeeze in between kids' activities, work, and everything else you have going on, and before you know it, it gets pushed to tomorrow.

Sound familiar? But it's the moments when you feel like you have no time for yourself when those non-negotiables are more important than ever. Those are the things that keep you strong, healthy, motivated, and prepared to take on everything life demands of you. So why not make therapy one of them?

BetterHelp Online Therapy makes it easy to get started with affordable phone, video, or live chat sessions you can do from anywhere, and the option to message your therapist between sessions if anything comes up. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit BetterHelp.com slash DarkHistory today to get 10% off your first month.

That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash dark history. My listeners can go to ZipRecruiter.com slash dark history. That's ZipRecruiter.com slash dark history. D-A-R-K-H-I-S-T-O-R-Y.

ZipRecruiter.com/darkhistory. ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. So now we're in the year 1100 BC. And once again, we're in fricking Greece. We always end up here with the ancient Greeks, don't we? Yeah. Well, once again, they're having a little bit more fun 'cause that's what the Greeks do. They're free spirits and you just couldn't hold them down, okay? If we learned anything from the dildo episode, they were living, laughing, and loving.

Everyone. I mean, even on ships. I'm looking at you, Caligula. Anyways. So the Greeks also viewed marriage as a business decision, but now it was also a way to social climb.

So your marriage would be set up by your father who wanted to marry his daughter off into a family of wealth and status because it would make the family look good. And that's honestly what it was all about. Like your father would go around town like, oh, my daughter is going to marry into the olive oil family and just humble brags everywhere. And it would raise his status. Now, once again, women were eligible to get married once they hit puberty. So usually between the ages of 11 and 14.

Now, it's kind of funny. This was kind of funny. It made me giggle a little because men were not allowed to get married between the ages of 14 to 25. Not allowed to get married because the Greeks believed men were essentially stupid during the timeframe of their life. Look, that's what they said, not me. Don't come for me. But I can get behind that.

So most of these potential husbands were much, much older than their brides to be. So again, like the father of a young daughter could walk over to like Leonardo's olive farm. You know, he sees that this man has a lot of land. It's just rows and rows of trees. Now this is like a very wealthy family. They've got that olive oil money. And he says, "Your son, Alexander, I see he's 30 now. Not dumb anymore?" "Well, I have a daughter. She's just shy of 13 and currently bleeding."

Big day. Anyway, so the fathers would end up setting up the couple, let's say Athena and Alexander. Athena would be sent to the temple with all of her childhood stuff, and this is when she would have to burn all of it before going through with the marriage. Now, this was a very symbolic moment to them. In my opinion, it kind of seemed like the girl was getting rid of her previous life and starting a new one with her husband. I'm sure they didn't really have that much stuff back then, but, you know, she probably...

had like a pet rock or something next up some couples would get rings oh yeah some people had wedding rings back then they were gold and sometimes they would even get personalized engravings on them like it would be the husband and the wife engraved on the ring i would highly suggest to take two seconds and google it because they're actually stunning they went off all the way off and fun fact the tradition of wearing the wedding ring on your fourth finger the ring finger

Now that ties back all the way to ancient Greece. They believed that there was a special vein called the vein of love and this vein went from your heart all the way to your ring finger on your left hand. They believed putting a ring on this finger was symbolic of love but also by constricting this vein with the ring the Greeks believed you would stay loyal to the person you were married to. It was kind of cute. I think it's cute. I was like aww.

And then it turns out like there's actually no vein that connects to your heart. But like, don't tell them that. Don't ruin it for them. They loved it. And I love that for them. Cute. So over in the town, just a hop, skip and a jump away was Sparta. Things were a bit different over there. Not so much of a party. Their whole lives revolved around war. So marriage just kind of fit in where it could.

but their wedding rituals were quite unique. Spartan bride would be between the age of 18 to 20 years old and would prepare for her big day by shaving her head and dressing up in her future husband's clothes. Yeah, I don't know. I couldn't really find an answer on this one, like as to why they did, why they shaved their head and the husband's clothes.

But there's some theories out there that like it could be a way for the woman to shed like her previous life by removing her hair and by dressing up as her husband. She's now showing everybody that she's a reflection of him and no longer her own individual self. That's a theory. I don't know if there's truth in there. It sounded legit. That's why I'm bringing it up.

But use your imagination. I don't know. So after the ceremony, if you call it that, the couple would do this weird thing. It was like a seven minutes in heaven situation where the wife, she would be taken to a dark room, still wearing the husband's clothes. And she'd like wait in this dark room for a couple of minutes. Okay. They're like, we'll be back.

So then the door would open and then the husband would come in, shut the door, room is pitch black, and he would chase her around the room so he could ritualistically capture her. I don't know. Then they would have sexual relations.

Yeah, I don't know. Again, I don't know what that was about, but it sounds kind of hot. I don't know. So after the couple was married, usually the men were always gone, involved again in some kind of war. Now, this would leave the new wife in charge. She was considered the head of the household if the husband was not around, which compared to the others, this was a kind of risky move for them putting a woman in charge. But...

She was, and she would manage the property and she would manage any of the laborers who worked and maintained the land. A lot of those workers were enslaved laborers and she was in charge. I mean, the Spartan women were given a lot more power compared to other Greek women at the time, but they were way more strict. So it's just, it's such a, it's such a, I don't know what that's called, but it's a, it doesn't make sense, but it makes sense.

This was the first time where we see a wife holding authority over her husband's household and land. You go girl, work that pussy out, girl. Spartan husbands could not live with their wives until they were done with their military service, which would usually be around the age of 30. Which is kind of nice though. You don't need them around. Until then, they would visit their wives secretly. So usually in the middle of the night, the men who were away at war, they would sneak away from their military camp

and they would break into their own house to have sex with their wife. Cheating was still a no-no for the women, and if wives did cheat, ooh, it was very serious and a very bad reflection on the men, not the women, the men.

But the Spartan husbands, they could do whatever the hell they wanted, you know? Which leads to the term soulmates. Again, love this. Comes from the Greeks. Well, their thought process here was you married for the purpose of procreation, but the one that you actually loved...

would be your soulmate. Aww, isn't that special? I thought that was so special. So you could have a husband and a soulmate. The best of both worlds. And a lot of these affairs were between two men. Oh yeah. If you're a man who loves another man, that's your soulmate, right? Now let's say you're a lady who loves other ladies. You love an Arby's sandwich, you know?

so you get to talking with your girlfriends and you're like hey girl have you heard of this island where you can like go and just hang out with other women like there's no men around and you're like what no what is that well there was this island out there called lesbos yeah no literally where all the best lesbians could go and find their own version of a soul mate yeah a whole oh i think i had their own island

The Greeks seemed to be free and fluid when it came to love, but marriage was still like this strict binding contract, mainly again for procreation, not so much about love. Love was for soulmates, which again is kind of romantic,

I don't know. But we can thank the Greeks for two things. One, they brought us soulmates and that's special. Two, they also brought the wedding ring. Special, we love that. Thanks Greeks. Well, I can talk about the Greeks all damn day, but now we are going to move forward to see how the Romans viewed marriage. And let me tell you, the Romans brought their own flavor to the idea of marriage as the Romans always did.

Okay, so let's say you're a 12-year-old Roman woman. Similar to the Greeks, the Romans viewed marriage mainly as a business transaction because back then in 509 BCE, I'm sure you can imagine 509 BCE,

Use your imagination. Anyways, back then it was all about status and procreation took a back seat. Babies were definitely still important, but people were mainly focused on money because to them, money meant power. Money was everything. And in ancient Rome, just like the previous stories, once a girl hit puberty, she was ready to be a bride.

The father would arrange who she was going to marry, and usually he would try and find a suitor who had a bunch of land to his name or came from a wealthy family. So the father would pick who he felt was the best for his daughter, but most of all was going to make the family look super good and super rich.

Now, why would the father be making these decisions? Well, you know, 'cause he's considered the man of the household who made all of the decisions, even right down to their children. Plus on top of that, the Romans literally believed that women had weak judgment. We do. We're so helpless and stupid. Usually the father would be worried that she'd marry some loser, you know, because he was nice to her and he didn't want that. He wanted land. He wanted money, not love.

Most Roman men would get married around the age of 26 because just like the Greeks, they believed that men mentally were just not ready before then. Once a fine man was found, daddy would set the wedding date. And sometimes the woman, or I should say the 12-year-old, would have to travel pretty far to get to her husband's house. And she would have to travel with her dowry.

So dowry is like, essentially she would be carrying a box of all of her valuables that she was going to give and bring to her husband. It's like showing up, like here's my investment into this whole marriage thing. I've got rings, I've got paper, I've got a collage with stones and stuff. Here's what I got, marry me.

So the bride, she would have to travel with her box of valuables and with a group of women who we would call today bridesmaids. Oh yes. Now this part was like really fascinating to me. The Roman women had bridesmaids for their big day. Now they were important because one, you needed at least 10 people to witness your marriage in order for it to count. And then two, your bridesmaids, they were essentially your bodyguards. Yeah.

You're probably thinking, what? Yeah, bridesmaids were their bodyguards.

Buff up ladies, because we need bodyguards. Now back then it was actually kind of normal for men to see a beautiful woman just walking around minding her own business and then they're like, "Ooh, she's hot." And they'd go up to her, snatch her, literally kidnap her, okay? Carry her out, keep her somewhere hidden out of sight until her family stopped looking for her or until she got pregnant. Obviously not ideal.

So once the bride-to-be had their bridesmaids picked out, their job was to protect the bride, have her back, to prevent any kidnappings from happening. You know?

So leading up to the wedding day, the bridesmaids and the bride, they would all dress the same, exactly the same. And they did this to make sure that nobody would kidnap and take the real bride-to-be or her valuables. You know, like if they're all dressed the same, the kidnapper is going to be like, "What? I don't know what you want to take. They all look the same." I'm bamboozled. And he would just give up. Because again, you know men aren't smart until about 25, 30, according to them. Are you imagining it? Great.

It's your wedding day. Congratulations. Now to get to the altar, your dad has to walk you down the aisle and pass you off. It's a transaction of property after all. Sound familiar? Dad walking the bride down the aisle. A couple of other fun things we still do today that were invented by the Romans, the kiss. Back then Romans often couldn't read or write. So how they would seal the deal was with the kiss.

Great. They're like, do you know what that says? No. Do you know what that says? No, let's just make out. And so, you know outside the church when people throw confetti or whatever at the bride and groom? Romans. Romans did that. They would throw rice or sometimes like even nuts at the new bride and groom as they made their way to the after party. Could you imagine getting some like big old nuts thrown at your face? My God.

Ah, you know, just nuts flying out your face out of nowhere. So after all of that, the bride and groom and their families would have a big old dinner together. After that, dessert. Oh yeah. So the Romans would celebrate the marriage with cake. Yum, right? Can't be mad, love cake. But it's not the cake we know today. It was more like basic bread, cardboard kind of cake. So the newlyweds would go over to the cake. The groom would lift it up, the whole cake,

and then smash it over his new wife's head. Oh yeah. And not like in a nice way, like it was pretty hardcore. And this symbolized his dominance over her. Yeah. She's like, all right, you probably could have just done that another way. Well, hopefully the cake would break and crumble all over the floor. And that's when the whole wedding party would come up and pick the crumbs off of the floor and they would eat together. And it was seen as like a celebration of

him trying to knock out his wife with a big old crusty ass cake. I don't know. Yeah. After that, they were married and it was time for the honeymoon. Now this is where we think the name honeymoon comes from. During their honeymoon, they would drink honey wine, have sex and try to get pregnant. Hopefully get pregnant. You better get pregnant. Which again, kind of like what you do today. You get drunk and some of you have sex on your wedding night.

I say some because I know most of you are tired and you just go to bed. But when all this bliss of the wedding night fades, the realities of the arrangement starts to set in. And that's when the man develops an itch he just needs to scratch. In the Roman era, there were two types of women: sex worker, non-sex worker.

That's it. One or the other. Which one are you? So how could you tell who was a sex worker and who wasn't? Well, by the toga they were wearing. You know those sheet things that boys wear at frat parties?

that. Now the sex workers wore sheer tunics that were short, sometimes very colorful, and they would wear a lot of jewelry, a ton of makeup, and were a little bit more loose and relaxed with their hairstyles. They looked like they had more fun, honestly. So these men would see these girls with sex worker as the ones that they could fuck around with. Wives, they had to have sex with the husband because that was your job. And then the sex workers were like the ones that they could have fun with.

So again, kind of like having your mistress on the side, it's the same thing. The Romans, they also invented couples counseling, which is super interesting. In summary, it was always the woman's fault, okay? And the nice thing here, the little shift, was if you were a woman and your husband was abusive, you actually had an option to get out. You could get a divorce. This is the first time a woman could make that choice. Now, divorce was way more acceptable here, of course.

frowned upon. You'd be shamed. No one would want to look at you. Damaged goods. But I mean, it's something. At least they could get out, right? Still sucks, but it's a step. Traces of Roman traditions have gone on to inspire a bunch of wedding stuff that we carry on today. I mean, bridesmaids. Father walking the daughter down the aisle. Kissing at the altar because we can't read. Honeymoons.

And if a woman was ever feeling unsafe, she had the option to get a divorce. So yeah, thanks, Romans. You did something.

Oh, and couples counseling.

So just like your favorite podcast, Progressive will be with you 24, 7, 365 days a year. So you're protected no matter what. Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive.

Now let's get back to today's story.

So now we jump to Europe between the 1400s and 1600s. Now this would be considered the late middle ages and the Renaissance. This is the time when religion starts to dictate people's marriages and sex life. Unlike the previous eras, during this time, sex was seen as something very shameful, not to be celebrated or even like talked about or anything. Okay. No.

They even had rules about when you could have sex with your partner. For example, you were not allowed to have sex on Sundays because that's the Lord's day. Jesus is watching. And they would low-key use it as a shady insult. This was my favorite because I think we should continue this one on. Like rumors would spread around in town. Oh, Alexander over there?

He must've been conceived on a Sunday. So previously, daddy would pick out who you were going to marry to keep your status and money or whatever. And even though some cultures allowed you to marry freely, a lot of the times, oddly enough, it was the landlord or land owners who would decide who you got to marry. This is because the landlord, could you imagine, first of all, if your landlord decided who you got to marry? Let me think about that for a minute.

Yeah, that wouldn't be good. That would actually really suck. Anyways, so this is because the landlord held a lot of power and controlled the people that worked on his land. So when approaching the idea of marriage, the landlord is like, hmm, like, hey, I noticed that Ricky is really good at mowing the lawn and Sandra is really good at picking weeds. They should get married. You know, they could have some kids. They can like make my lawn look real good together.

So it's like, how is this going to benefit me? Which is really like what marriage is all about at the time. How is it going to benefit me, the landowner? So for commoners, a wedding didn't necessarily always happen within a church or a priest didn't have to be present. And it's funny because weddings would literally happen at the church doors, just not inside the church. They referred to it as getting married on the church's porch. Yeah.

which sounds so ugly and not romantic, right? But then I Googled it and it's actually really cute. It looks like a cute little like entryway, kind of like a gazebo for God. Like it has three walls with an arch doorway, windows and brick, exposed brick. We love that, don't we ladies? Exposed brick, we love that. And that's where they would get married in this little entryway.

Cute. Once married, their first meal together is a large feast for the witnesses and family.

And after that, the bridal procession led the wife to her new home. So once they got home, they had to have sex, right? And deflowering took place in the bedroom. One of the most important things to them was guaranteeing that you were marrying a woman who was a virgin, okay? Like that was very important. And they believed that if you were a virgin, that meant 100% you were going to get pregnant once you had sex, okay?

So they had to make sure that this man did indeed marry a virgin. Which you're probably thinking like, well, how the hell would they know? Well, I've got an answer. Look, this was like an actual job position available at this time, where after the deflowering happened, someone would go in into the room, like you just had sex, go in, pick up the sheets, hold them up, check for blood. Blood on the sheets, virgin. No blood, she's a liar.

Parents usually they wanted proof that the couple had sexual relations on their wedding night. And if the sheet wasn't enough proof, well, guests had the option to follow the couple into their bedroom to watch them do it. So it's just dinner and a show just to make sure that they're having sex.

They watch. This is really weird. This is really gross because the wedding guests, one of them would leave the bedroom after everybody was watching with like a little party favor.

One would take the bride's garter or like a different piece of underwear. And this would be evidence that the couple had sex. So, you know that awkward moment at a wedding when it's time for the garter toss and the groom like does that thing. First of all, in the middle of the dance floor in front of all of us, we're all just like watching and everyone's clapping. And then the groom disappears under the bride's dress. And you're like, yeah.

He's going down on her right there. Like, oh my God. And then he always pops out with like the gardener's teeth and everyone's like, yay. Everyone's all excited for some reason, right? Flicks it into the audience. The crowd goes wild. Anywho, this is literally where that tradition comes from because it's the man essentially proving he and his bride have done the deed, have done the nasty deed.

have had sexual relations. Us, the wedding party, we were the witnesses. Hey, you watched, you're a witness. Just like a tamed down version, obviously. But back then you would watch. I wonder if the room smelled. It was probably like really small. And let's be real here. Hygiene, not that important back then. How many, there's like a wedding party of like 10 to 12, right? Small bedroom, 10 to 12 people. You're having sex. No one has showered. Had to be a little stinky in there, you know? I'm just...

Let me know your thoughts. Was it stinky? Let me know. So in the 1600s, during the Renaissance, people got married for power. An example of this was the Medici family. Oh yeah. They had a net worth that in today's money amounts to over like $130 billion.

They were celebrities. I mean, people thought of them as the Kardashians of their time. Now these people, this family, they threw the most expensive, opulent, over the top, money on money on money on money on money type of wedding, okay? They took weddings to the next level. These people threw some epic affairs. They had parades, they had floats, fireworks, they had a 56 course meal.

Yeah, I don't know. What are they eating? I was thinking of as like when you go to medieval times, but if you add a wedding dress, kind of like that. Because this is the Renaissance era or whatever. Again, everyone's probably stinky. That's all I can think about. And what are you eating? 56 courses? What is that? What are they eating? Nah.

I had a lot of questions. I wish I could go back in time and attend one of these weddings. But anyways, people considered the family, the Medici family, their weddings were like a national holiday. I mean, everyone in town participated. So before we move forward, let's recap. The Babylonians and their Hammurabi code created the first ancient laws for marriage. They made the whole thing super official, essentially. The Greeks gave us the concept of soulmates and fun. The Romans gave us

pretty much everything else, right? They created what became weddings as we know today, the reception with tons of food, bridesmaids, the wedding cake, smashing the cake in the face, you know what I'm saying? The Middle Ages brought God into the picture and of course the garter belt, we love that. And then the Renaissance period showed us you don't have to have a boring ass wedding. You can go off. You can have an elephant, you know? Have a whole carnival. You're getting married.

And what did America do for marriage? We found a way to make money off of all of it. Woohoo! America, we're really good at that. We always find a way to make money off of something and found a way to turn the business of getting married into a billion dollar industry that just keeps making up weird traditions and...

For some reason. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

Now let's get back to the story. So here in America, I mean, hey, we have our own traditions we feel like we have to do in order to get married, like the diamond engagement ring. So rare, so valuable.

Diamonds are forever, you know, wrong. That's what they made us believe. You know, with every kiss begins with K, not sponsored. Diamonds are actually super common and not as rare as we've been led on to think. Okay, look, this is factual information I am sharing with you.

Diamonds are pretty cheap to make. They're cheap, they're not that great, and they're not that rare, and I'm about to shit all over it. So what happened? Well, there's a little company called DaBeers, has nothing to do with alcohol, but they control like 90% of the world's diamonds, which meant that they could sell those diamonds for however much they wanted.

They convinced the world that diamonds were the only stone fit for a proposal. Now, it was the perfect way to express your love, or at least that's what they wanted us to believe. Before De Beers was around, something like 5% of women were proposed to with a diamond ring. Now, by the late 1960s, it was over half. That's a big jump.

Right? We don't do math here, but 5% to half? Whoa. So what changed? Well, De Beers, that company, they launched an ad campaign convincing Americans that diamonds are forever. And not only that, they're a girl's best friend. But according to De Beers, the bigger the diamond, the more love you have for your future wife. That's what they were selling us. And we fell for it, damn it.

As much as I want to go a little bit further into De Beers, let's leave De Beers here because I think I'm going to dig into them for a future episode about advertising. But you can't have a marriage episode without at least mentioning De Beers and Diamonds. Double Ds, baby. So Diamonds, not that rare. Honestly, not that expensive. We're being ripped off. We've been sold a lie. Okay, great. I'm not judging. You could still love Diamonds. I'm just letting you know because we should know.

Great. Now, the second thing America tells Bryce that they need, a crisp white wedding dress. Now, I always thought it was because it represented a woman being pure and clean. And I think, I mean, that's true when it comes to like the religious side of things. But once again, for the most part, it doesn't even come from that.

The idea of a white wedding dress actually comes from Queen Victoria. Yeah. So during her reign in the 1800s, she was beloved by her people and was also known as like the biggest trendsetter. She wore a white dress at her wedding to Prince Albert in 1840. And you guys, it was the ultimate flex. Before this wedding, wedding dresses weren't any particular color or style. It was just like whatever nice item you had, put it on.

Now the white dress was actually a huge flex back then because it was not easy to clean clothes. I mean, to this day, white is a bitch. I never wear it because within five minutes of wearing it, I spill something on it. Hard to clean. I have a Clorox bleach pen. That thing doesn't work. You liars. Y'all say it work. It doesn't work.

Anyways, back in the olden days, if you messed up your white dress, your only option was to just throw it away. So by Queen Victoria wearing a white dress that was clearly thousands of dollars, she was kind of like telling to the people like, yeah, I'm only gonna wear it once. So what, I'm rich, you poor losers, get on my level.

As this trend evolved, America did its thing and was like, yeah, we wear white because it means you are a virgin, pure, like toilet paper, clouds, snow. It all makes sense. So once you had the diamond engagement ring and you got the white dress, you now got to plan the big day.

Now way back in the olden days, you could just decide one morning to get married or your dad would be like, "Hey, you're getting married today." You know? And that's it. It was done. Eat some bread, have some wine, shave your head, get chased around a dark room. You're married. Simple. But today, you've got seating arrangements, tablecloths, florals, catering DJs, and also you have to make those little gifts you feel required to give to people for coming to your wedding. It's just a lot.

And that is all by design. Oh, yes. Because in 1934, a magazine was created called So You're Going to be Married, a magazine for brides.

Now at this point in our dark history journey together, we shouldn't be surprised to find out that this bridal magazine was created by some old white man who went to Princeton. Because sure, that makes sense. And in that magazine, women start seeing for the first time

Things considered must-haves for your perfect dream wedding day. As in, you must have this or else everyone's going to judge you for having ugly centerpieces. And you don't want that. And just a little while later, after World War II, America introduces to us this thing called the American Dream.

which is essentially, you know, the wife, the kids, the dog. But in order to achieve this, step one, you gotta get married. So in 1950, marketing geared towards white women in America creates like this outline as to what weddings should look like, kind of essentially creating the golden age of marriage.

People are starting to realize how much money can be made from weddings. Hotels start building event spaces specifically for these types of parties, you know? Cakes are getting bigger and bigger and more expensive. Women are feeling pressured to have like that splashy

amazing wedding because fucking Susie next door, she had a chocolate fountain at her wedding. That dumb bitch, you know? But what all this was really doing was selling women the illusion that they too could be a rich princess for the day as she deserves. Even if she went into crippling debt to get it.

And going into debt for your wedding has only gotten worse. Things just keep adding up throughout the years. People thought they needed more and more to have that perfect American wedding. The average cost for a wedding today is around $28,000, which is a big number to begin with because according to the 2019 census, the average American income was $31,000.

Oh, and we can't forget to talk about Vegas weddings. You know, wake up at 9:00 AM, go to the pool party, seven Bloody Marys later, maybe you're at a chapel saying I do to some guy named Bryce while sweaty Elvis impersonator's like, "Kiss your bride," or whatever, and you're like, "Okay." I'm sure it happens to a lot of people out there. Or was it just me? Bryce, if you're watching, hey.

Anyways, what Vegas did was slap America's fast food model onto the institution of marriage and just cheapened, quotes, the whole thing. Which it's honestly like the purest thing we have.

It's the purest option, really. It comes down to you, the person you love, and a witness who may or may not be dressed as Elvis. You don't need to impress a damn soul, you know? It's nice, it's simple. And you'd think that's what a wedding's supposed to be, isn't it? I don't know. Well, of course nobody cares about that because this is America and, you know, they want you to spend money. Today, the wedding industry brings about $58 billion.

"So nobody wants your ass to get married in Vegas." Uh-uh, they're gonna keep pumping us with these dreams and visions. And this got me thinking, is this why we kind of look down on Vegas weddings? Like, "Hmm, that's so cheap." We used to, I feel like it's kind of turning, but you know, because we've been told to think

That it's cheap in order to keep us spending our money. It was just a thought. We've all been brainwashed. I mean, you best believe at my wedding day if that ever happens, I'm gonna go all out, baby, okay? So after my wedding, we should definitely look into making some changes. I'm just kidding, I'm not getting married. But if I did, I would wanna have a big old wedding. So I get it. I don't know why it's in us the way it is, but it just is, right? God damn it, we fall for everything.

Can't we have anything? Just something nice without being ripped off and going into debt? My God. Anyways. Well, everyone, thank you for learning with me today. I want to know what you learned. Let me know. Mm-hmm.

Remember, don't be afraid to ask questions to get the whole story because you deserve that. I'd love to hear your reactions to today's story, so make sure to use the hashtag Dark History so I can follow along. Also, join me over on my YouTube where you can watch these episodes on Thursday after the podcast airs. And while you're there, don't forget to catch Murder, Mystery, and Makeup. I hope you have a wonderful day today. You make good choices. I'll be talking to you next week. Goodbye! Goodbye!

Dark History is an Audioboom original. This podcast is executive produced by Bailey Sarian, Kimberly Jacobs, Junya McNeely from 3Arts, Kevin Grush, and Claire Turner from Maiden Network. Writers, Katie Burris, Alison Filobos, Joey Scaluzzo, and me, Bailey Sarian. Shot and edited by Tafadzwa Nemarundwe. Research provided by Regina Dolza and Xander Elmore.

Special thanks to our expert, Vicki Howard. And I'm your host, Bailey Sarian. Thank you. Thank you. I'm here all day. Goodbye.

54: Shave Your Head and Get In the Closet: Dark History of Marriage 49:27 Share

Dark History

Chapters

Shownotes Transcript

54: Shave Your Head and Get In the Closet: Dark History of Marriage