Going to Court

*I apologize ahead of time for not knowing how to use the "Read More" feature so you don't have to scroll through my entire post to get to the previous ones. (Does anyone know how to?) I also apologize for not providing many links to other material, hopefully I will get better with that. They're mostly links to Wikipedia pages, simply because Wikipedia lists other links for more specific and in-depth material, allowing one to not have to place links all over the place to the point that they become a pollutant. Hopefully the professors aren't anti-Wikipedia...*

Courtship (which, in context, I will use as meaning "the process by which two people come to be married" regardless of one's individual willingness and then the continuation of their courtship after marriage) is one example of domestic folk knowledge that has been around since essentially the beginning of time. It is also one that has changed greatly in recent years and that we are often counseled on in particularly from general authorities. It is for these reasons that I am selecting courtship traditions as my form of domestic folk knowledge to focus on from a historic perspective.

Most children form their understanding on how to treat members of the opposite sex from watching how their parents interact. In an ideal nineteenth-century home, this meant that respect and courtesy were to dominate. (Notice the similarity in "courtesy" and "courtship.") At an older age, however, youth learn courting practices by watching others who are themselves courting. The various styles of courting are specifically linked to the marriage relations of their respective cultures, but that's a whole different discussion in of itself.

Courting has been a part of nearly every society that has ever existed, even if it functions and is viewed differently in each. Typically, the male initiates the courtship process. (When was the last time that Shakespeare had a woman initiate courtship in all of his comedies?) This is most often done with some arranged consent of the parents, especially the father, who judge whether the young man is worthy enough for their daughter. Aside from these two features, courtship differs widely from civilization to civilization and even from class to class. While I will discuss many different cultures in my historical overview, I will focus mainly on the upper-class (nobility/aristocracy) because they influenced society more, especially with their marriages, which often functioned as means for political alliances. It is also important to note before going on that those born into the nobility and aristocracy knew very well what was expected of them in terms of courtship and marriage and that they fully recognized this as their duty even if an arranged marriage seems unglamorous to us.

In Western civilization, courting was widely left to the families of the couple. Non-Western society, however, often involved a matchmaker who took a role in the courting process. This is most notably the case in Ancient China. The matchmaker was trained to be able to predict whether the male and female in any given couple (who often did not know each other well) would be able to get along with one another and, in some instances, whether they would be able to conceive. This was based in a loose system that included physiognomy, birth dates, and, of course, the couple's individual personalities.


Once the couple was deemed fit for marriage, the matchmaker also helped to negotiate a suitable dowry, wedding arrangements, and other finer details.

Asiatic cultures were not the only ones in which courtship was paired, however, and they were not the only ones where dowries were a significant factor in determining whether an engagement would take place. In cultures where matchmakers were not prominent, dowry negotiations were typically made between the groom and the father of the bride. Some cultures involved the use of counselors, somewhere in between legal or business consultants and family friends, to provide a less prejudiced but still worthy price.

In more Western cultures, arranged marriages were more typical of the aristocracy and nobility than the commoners. In many cultures, princes (or other such nobility) would travel to far away lands in pursuit of the most suitable (and the most attractive or wealthiest) brides. Courting with the nobility was almost in every instance significantly more politically motivated than romantically or emotionally motivated. This was especially the case in areas where there were many weaker states or provinces (imagine the Middle East or Italy) than in areas where there were larger kingdoms that dominated political affairs (imagine Western Europe.)

We should NOT fool ourselves into thinking, however, that Europe is excluded from the tradition of arranging marriages among the aristocracy. Even simple fairy tales from Europe exhibit this. Remember Prince Philip, the prince from Sleeping Beauty that always seems to get left out because Prince Eric is apparently better-looking? (I like Disney movies if you hadn't noticed...) He's a German prince going off to marry a German princess that he has never met. (Remember that until 1871 Germany was a loose confederation of states, not a single political power, that depended on internal cooperation, which was often secured, like everywhere else, with arranged marriages.)

Courtship became increasingly important during the Renaissance. Castiglione (an Italian Renaissance diplomat and writer; his portrait to the left was painted by Raphael, if that gives any indication to his importance his time) published a book entitled The Book of the Courtier, which was one of (if not the) first written and mass-distributed instructions on how a proper young man should go about courting and what proper young men and young women were to behave like.

So I'm not part of the nobility going off to get hitched for the protection of my kingdom, and I'm not about to have some matchmaker tell me what price to pay for my wife (or, for women, what price you should be bought for). How does any of this apply to me? Well, that was basically the historical perspective. Now onto the personal perspective...

Just kidding. In the past few decades, we have seen a decline of actual "courtship." The general authorities talk about it all the time, and chances are that the last time you heard someone actually say the word "courtship" was during general conference. The general authorities frequently encourage us to engage in "courtship" (as opposed to "hanging out") when we are of the age to be thinking about marriage. As I began dating, I saw different couples- both inside my ward and outside the Church- and how they treated each other and how that affected their relationships. It was perhaps even more significant seeing how my parents treated each other. When they went on regular dates, they were kinder and more courteous to each other. When they were kind and courteous to each other, everyone in the family was happier. It is crucial that courtship is passed down from generation to generation so that proper (although this definition depends on a specific culture, I use "proper" in this instance to mean functional and effective in child-raising) marriages can be maintained. Regular courtship is important in modern society, even if it often gets overlooked. If Castiglione was alive today, his only solace would likely be that the general authorities still champion "old-fashioned" courtship with regards to the male being courteous and chivalrous towards the female.

Courtship will, of course, continue as long as marriage itself continues. In our present lives, courtship is even more important than ever before for us to hold onto as a cultural value because of its decline in prevalence in modern society. Therefore, we must watch those around us who are engaged in the process of courtship (both before and after marriage) and emulate their positive attributes.