Talk:Bride price

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Bride price also known as bride wealth or a dower is an amount of money or property paid to the parents of a woman for the right to marry their daughter. (Compare dowry, which is paid to the parents of a man.) [edit]

History of the tradition

The Hebrew Bible and Talmud mention the practice of paying a bride price to the father of a minor girl.

The tradition of giving bride price is still practiced in many Asian countries although the amount changing hands is more a token amount to continue the traditional ritual then an actual price-tag attached to the bride-to-be for marriage.

In Chinese culture, an auspicious date is selected to 'Ti Qing' (literally meaning 'propose marriage'), where both families will meet to discuss the amount of the bride price demanded, among other things. A couple of weeks before the actual wedding, the ritual of 'Guo Da Li' (literally meaning 'performing the rites') takes place (on an auspicious date of course). The groom and a matchmaker will visit the bride's family bearing gifts like wedding cakes, sweetmeats and jewelry as well as the bride price. On the actual wedding day, the bride's family will return a portion of the bride price as a goodwill gesture.

The practice of bride price also existed in India, where it was considered as a social evil and the subject of a movement to eradicate it in the early 20th Century. Unlike what happened in the case of dowry, this movement was largely successful.

In parts of Africa the validity of a tradional marriage ceremony depends on the payment of a bride price which can vary from a token amount to really exorbitant figures. [edit]

The tradition in art

A famous Telugu play "Kanyasulkam" (Bride Price) satirised the practice and the brahminical notions that kept it alive. Though the practice no longer exists in India, the play, and the movie based on it, are still extremely popular in Andhra Pradesh.

[edit] Merge with Dowry

These two pages are both somewhat short and discuss similar traditions. Additionally, the Dowry page has a section on Mahr which isn't really a Dowry anyway. It would be more useful to just combine all three for easier comparison. 69.162.24.222 04:38, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

I would have to disagree, there is a vast and diverse array of methods and modes of bride price, some of which do and some of which do not relate so closely to dowry. If anything Dowry should be merged into bride price and bride price should stay the primary article name. Bride price is the dominant form of the practice, where as dowry may very be considered a specific case. Solidusspriggan 07:25, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

I disagree with the merging proposal. Both articles should be expanded, and there is no reason to merge opposite concepts. Also, the information in the dowry article about customs which are really more similar to bride price should be moved into this article instead, and I will do this tomorrow if there are no objections, but the section that actually describes dowry should remain its own article. Academic Challenger 03:43, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Dowry = Dower

Dower and Dowry are virtually synonymous in English. I don't know where editors got the (unattributed) idea that one is brideprice and one is paid by the bride's family... but OED, for example, considers both words to refer, primarily, to the payment by the bride's family, which is (AFAIK) the most common tradition in the West. In Egyptian English, I can attest, the word dowry is always used to refer to the money paid by the groom's family to the bride (brideprice would be considered a rather offensive term in this case). On the other hand, the Greek príka is also normally translated as dowry, although that is paid by the bride's family to the groom. For all intents and purrposes, the word dower is moribund. But the article really ought to be merged with dowry, as both refer (generally) to financial transactions accompanying marriage, without permitting further distinction.

The combined article should indicate that dowry traditionally refers to the typical Western standard of payment from the bride's family to the groom (or his family) but that it can refer equally to the payment by the groom's family in a non-Western context. Tkinias 19:31, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Check out the dower article.

"Dower" is, in fact, property given to the bride by the bridgroom. It therefore remains with the newly wed couple and normally split out of the marital property only when the woman was widowed or divorced.

I have revised the lede to reflect this. Goldfritha 03:46, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Humm. The "Similar traditions" section would be more properly shifted to the "dower" article rather than including redundant information here. Goldfritha 19:38, 28 October 2006 (UTC)