Legally, marriage was a promise followed by a ritual, but Jacobeans often conflated the two by disregarding one or the other. What constituted a binding marriage often boiled down to semantics; a promise to marry someone in the future was not binding and a promise to marry someone in the present was a legal marriage. (That is, what we think of as a proposal today, would be legally binding as marriage.) It was preferred when a marriage was accepted by the families of the couple as well as their larger community, not only because marriage was a social institution, but also because it made the marriage easier to prove. Of course, private matters of the heart did not often follow the laws and secret marriages abounded in England. Clandestine nuptials created further drama in that they were legally binding but often impossible to verify.
From a seventeenth century book on marriage laws: “Naked consent is sufficient to make spousals”. This complicated the matter further, as the act of sexual intercourse could also bind two people in marriage. The ambiguity of marriage laws present many dilemmas in Measure for Measure; we have to wonder if Claudio is married to Juliette, if Angelo is married to Mariana, and if physical intimacy indicates marriage, then what about the libertine Lucio or Mistress Overdone? The “law” is subject to interpretation, no one is ever strictly wrong-- regardless of what The Duke Vincentio may think.
From a seventeenth century book on marriage laws: “Naked consent is sufficient to make spousals”. This complicated the matter further, as the act of sexual intercourse could also bind two people in marriage. The ambiguity of marriage laws present many dilemmas in Measure for Measure; we have to wonder if Claudio is married to Juliette, if Angelo is married to Mariana, and if physical intimacy indicates marriage, then what about the libertine Lucio or Mistress Overdone? The “law” is subject to interpretation, no one is ever strictly wrong-- regardless of what The Duke Vincentio may think.