Ritter, Frau und Priester

Time and again, the crisis of marriage is discussed, and the dissolution of the family is repeatedly announced. But how did the apparently equally threatened yet enduring institution of marriage actually come into being? This is precisely the subject of Georges Duby's new book: Knights, Women, and Priests.

Through chronicles, genealogies, and documents, as well as literary and theological sources, we learn how dynastic politics were conducted through marriage alliances; how family heads forced their younger sons into celibacy and sent them on crusades; how the abduction of women was sublimated into the game of courtly love; how women's control over their marriage dowries was restricted; how clergy resisted the demand for celibacy; how unmarried and married men adhered to different moral codes; how churchmen discredited concubinage and illegitimate births for their own interests; how ecclesiastical courts claimed and exercised jurisdiction over marriage matters; how theologians sought to free marriage from the stigma of sexuality and elevate it to a sacrament; and how, ultimately, a relatively stable form of marriage emerged that has remained influential in the subsequent history of the West.