History of Marriage

As a man of science, I am forced to assess marriage as being forced by evolution. As all organisms are affected by the changing of environments, and this change in one way or another, leads to the change of behaviors. Humans are mammals, and as such have experienced the same lifestyles of other mammals. Early ancestral hominids most assuredly behaved in the most primitive forms of a sexual association - promiscuity. The most basal level of sexual relationships is the association in which the relationship is nonexistent. One would assume such animalist usage of sexuality between males and females would have only occurred in uncivilized societies of the ancient world, but much of the earliest writings tell a different story. Much of the earliest papyri of the earliest great civilization not only explain in detail the sharing of women, but even more taboo forms of marriage predate even this basal promiscuous attitude. Throughout this paper, the idea of marriage will not be shown as the traditional idea of marriage, but as the true forms of marriage that have existed since antiquity. The views of marriage transform throughout the ages arriving at a modern idea of marriage that is much different from the view modern societies' hold. Changes have occurred throughout history as civilizations grew and changes will be required for future cultural advancement.

Religion was tied to marriage even in the most ancient of civilizations. The Ancient Egyptians worshipped the deity Shu that married his sister Tefnut circa 3000 BCE. The two children begot from this union of gods were Geb and Nut, whom also married (Adamson 1982). This story of incest was not the taboo of modern societal views. Brother and sister marriage is viewed as illegal, but it occurred frequently during early Egyptian civilizations. It was common practice after the first dynasty of Egypt. The first union in Egypt was formed for political reasons, but the subsequent unions were reported to be between parent and child in pharaoh lineage, but brother - sister in the peasant classes. Census results have survived from AD19 - 258 that report as much as a third of all marriages were consanguineous during this time period (Hopkins 1980).

It would appear that Ancient Egypt influenced many of the marital practices of later civilizations. The conquest of the Egyptians by the Persians in 6th century BC seemed to play a role on their beliefs. The Persian kings celebrated consanguineous marriages