List of child brides

This is a list of child brides, women of historical significance who married under 18 years of age.

Women have traditionally married at younger ages than men[1] although the average age of marriage has increased for both sexes with time. Historically girls were married at a young age more frequently in the past due to both law (increases in the minimum age required for marriage) and trends.[2]

List

Some of the child marriages recorded include:

Antiquity

7th century
  • Aisha (age 9; approximately), betrothed to Muhammad in 623 CE[3][4] although estimates vary from 9 to 15.

8th century

9th century

10th century

11th century
  • Constance of France (aged between about 15 and 17) was married to Hugh I, Count of Troyes (aged between about 19 and 21), between 1093 and 1095.

12th century
  • Agnes of Courtenay was no more than 15-years-old when she was married to Reynald of Marash, sometime before 29 June 1149.
  • Eleanor of England, daughter of Eleanor of Aquitane and Henry II of England, married 15-year-old Alfonso VIII of Castile in 1170, when she was about 9-years-old.
  • Berengaria of Castile married Conrad II, Duke of Swabia (aged 13/14), in 1187, when she was about 8-years-old. The marriage was never consummated due to her young age. After Conrad's death in 1196, Berengaria married her first cousin once removed Alfonso IX of León (aged 25/26) in 1197, when she was about 17- or 18-years-old. The marriage was eventually annulled by the Pope in 1204 on the grounds of consanguinity.

13th century

14th century
  • Joanna of Brabant (aged 11/12) was married to William IV, Count of Holland (aged 10/11), in 1334.
  • Joan of Kent (aged 12) secretly married Thomas Holland, 1st Earl of Kent (aged 26), in 1340. Holland went to war overseas, and her family arranged for the 13-year-old Joan to marry William Montagu (aged 12) in either late 1340 or early 1341. When Holland returned, the marriage was revealed, and Holland petitioned the Pope to have Holland's wife returned to him. Following the ruling in Holland's favor in 1349, Pope Clement VI annulled the marriage to Montagu and ordered Joan and Holland to be married in the Church.
  • Anna von Schweidnitz (aged 14) was married to Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor (aged 37), in 1353. She had originally been betrothed at age 11 to Charles's newborn son and heir, Wencelaus, but after the death of both Wenceslaus and his mother, Charles asked to marry Anna himself.
  • Anne Mauny (aged 13) was married to John Hastings, 2nd Earl of Pembroke (aged 20), in 1368, following the death of his first wife, Margaret, in 1361.
  • Joan of Navarre (aged about 17/18) was married to John IV, Duke of Brittany (aged 46/47), in 1386.

15th century
  • Margaret Beaufort, (age 7; approximately) was married to John de la Pole (age 7) in 1450 by the arrangement John's father.[5] The marriage was annulled in 1453.[6]
  • Caterina Sforza was betrothed at age 10 to Girolamo Riario (aged 29/30) in 1473. Some sources state that they married in that year, but that the marriage was not consummated until 1477, when Caterina turned 14, the legal age at the time.

16th century
  • Catherine of Aragon (aged 15), was married to Arthur, Prince of Wales (aged 15), in 1501. She was widowed a few months later and eventually married Arthur's younger brother, Henry VIII of England (aged 17), a couple of weeks before his 18th birthday.
  • Lady Mary Brandon was at most 17-years-old when she was married to Thomas Stanley, 2nd Baron Monteagle, sometime before 1527.
  • Christina of Denmark (aged 11) was married by proxy to Francis II, Duke of Milan (aged 38), in September 1533. They were married in person in May 1534, when she was 12 and he was 39. After her first husband's death in 1535, she was considered as a possible fourth wife for Henry VIII, who at the time was 46, while she was only 16. However, the match was opposed by both Christina and her aunt Mary of Hungary, and so it never materialized. Christina eventually married Francis, Duke of Bar (aged 23), in July 1541, when she was 19.
  • Catherine Howard was about 17-years-old when she was married to Henry VIII of England (aged 49) in 1540.
  • Lucrezia de' Medici (aged 12) was married to Alfonso II d'Este, Duke of Modena (aged 24), in 1558. As Alfonso was fighting in France at the time, she did not move to his home in Ferrara until two years later. She died at the age of 16, and is believed to have been poisoned by her husband.
  • Bianca Cappello (aged 15) fell in love with Pietro Bonaventuri and, in November 1563, eloped with him to Florence, where they were married.
  • Margherita Farnese (aged 13) was married to Vincenzo Gonzaga (aged 18), the future Duke of Mantua, in March 1581. The marriage was annulled in May 1583 on grounds of non-consummation, Vincenzo claiming Margherita had been unable to do so due to a deformity[9] and Margherita accusing Vincenzo of impotence.

17th century
  • Elizabeth Stuart (aged 16), eldest daughter of James VI and I and Anne of Denmark, married Frederick V, Elector Palatine (aged 16), in 1613.
  • Jane Needham (aged about 14/15) was married to Charles Myddelton (aged 24/25) in 1660.
  • Henrietta Howard (aged about 17) was married to Henry Horatio O'Brien, Lord Ibrackan, in June 1686.

18th century
  • Princess Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst (later known as Catherine the Great) was 16-years-old when she married her 17-year-old second cousin Peter of Holstein-Gottorp (later Peter III of Russia) in 1745.
  • Marie Joséphine of Savoy (aged 17) was married to Louis Stanilas, Count of Provence (aged 15; the future King Louis XVIII of France), in 1771.

19th century
  • Elizabeth Medora Leigh was, as a young teenager, seduced by her brother-in-law, Henry Trevanion, by whom she fell pregnant twice. After the second pregnancy ended in a miscarriage, she eloped with him to France in 1831, at age 16/17.
  • Isabella II of Spain (aged 16) was married to her double first cousin Francis, Duke of Cádiz (aged 24), in October 1846. The ceremony was held on Isabella's 16th birthday, and was a double wedding with Isabella's younger sister, Infanta Luisa Fernanda, marrying the Duke of Montpensier.
  • Rukhmabai (age 11) was married in India to her husband (age 19).[10] After a lengthy court battle, the marriage was dissolved by an order from Queen Victoria and the publicity helped influence the passage of the Age of Consent Act, 1891, which increased age of consent for girls in India, married or unmarried, from 10 to 12.[11]

20th century
  • Ushabati Ghosh (age 11) was married to the Indian physicist Satyendra Nath Bose (aged 20)[13] in 1914. Bose, not keen on marriage so early in life and while still attending college, only did so at his mother's insistence.[14] They had nine children, two of whom died in early childhood.

21st century
  • Nujood Ali (age 10), an arranged marriage by her father to a 30-year-old man[15] in 2008.[16] Coverage of her self-presented application for divorce later that year led to the legal age of marriage in Yemen to be raised to 18.[17]

See also

References
  1. Population Studies Vol. 32, No. 1 page 21: Average Age at First Marriage for Women in Mid-Nineteenth-Century England and Wales: A Cross-Sectional Study by N.F.R. Crafts, published March 1978
  2. Median age at first marriage by sex: 1890 to 2012 Archived 2017-01-19 at the Wayback Machine by the United States Census Bureau
  3. Campo, Juan Eduardo (2009-01-01). Encyclopedia of Islam. Infobase Publishing. pp. 25–. ISBN 9781438126968. Retrieved 28 October 2013.
  4. Reid, Donald Malcolm (2002-07-04). Cairo University and the Making of Modern Egypt. Cambridge University Press. pp. 66–. ISBN 9780521894333. Retrieved 25 November 2015.
  5. Jones, Michael K. (1993-04-22). The King's Mother: Lady Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond and Derby. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521447942. Retrieved 23 November 2013.
  6. Ralph A. Griffiths, King and Country: England and Wales in the Fifteenth Century, (Hambledon Press, 1991), 91.
  7. Butler, Alban; Burns, Paul (January 1998). Butler's Lives of the Saints. Continuum. pp. 48–. ISBN 9780860122517. Retrieved 28 October 2013.
  8. Tunis, David L. (2005-01-01). Fast Facts on the Kings and Queens of England. Author House. pp. 125–. ISBN 9781467065238. Retrieved 4 March 2014.
  9. Matthews-Grieco, SaraF (2017-07-05). "Cuckoldry, Impotence and Adultery in Europe (15th-17th century) ". Routledge. p. 38. ISBN 9781351570466.
  10. Lahiri, Shompa (2013-10-18). Indians in Britain: Anglo-Indian Encounters, Race and Identity, 1880-1930. Routledge. pp. 13–. ISBN 9781135264468. Retrieved 4 March 2014.
  11. Rappaport, Helen (2003). Queen Victoria: A Biographical Companion. ABC-CLIO. pp. 429–. ISBN 9781851093557. Retrieved 4 March 2014.
  12. Ramanujan’s wife: Janakiammal (Janaki). Profile at the Institute of Mathematical Sciences (IMSc)
  13. Chatterjee, Santimay; Chatterjee, Enakshi (2002). Satyendra Nath Bose (PDF). National Book Trust. ISBN 9788123704920.
  14. Wali, Kameshwar (2009). Satyendra Nath Bose, His Life and Times. World Scientific. pp. xviii–. ISBN 9789814518277.
  15. Farrell, Courtney (2010-01-01). Children's Rights. ABDO. pp. 58–. ISBN 9781616133405. Retrieved 28 October 2013.
  16. Borzou Daragahi (June 11, 2008). "Yemeni bride, 10, says I won't - Los Angeles Times". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 23 November 2013.
  17. Vivienne Walt (Feb 3, 2009). "A 10-Year-Old Divorcee Takes Paris - TIME". Time. Retrieved 23 November 2013.
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