cjh (01/07/83)
In response to your message of Wed Jan 5 17:25:04 1983:
In many Western cultures there is something of a tradition that a virgin
male be initiated by an older, experienced female (widow or spinster);
sometimes this position (sorry) was semi-formalized (THE WICKER MAN, for
all that it's a horror movie/stew of customs rather than organized
anthropology, shows an example of this). Of course such women were (at
best) questionable for marriage. I can offer several reasons for the
[prohibition]:
(1) Possible [incest]; a man whose mother died youngish (and probably
in childbirth) might find his father's second wife close to his own age.
(2) Dominance: A man might well find that a woman his own age or older
had enough of a practical education that he would feel himself unable to
control her.
(3) Assurance of progeny: a man would prefer a woman young enough that she
was likely to be a virgin as a guarantee that his heirs are of his own flesh;
hence a noble would scatter his seed among the peasantry then, at age 21 or
thereabouts, trade (literally) for the 14-year-old daughter of someone of his
own class. The later peaking of women simply makes this easier, although
their earlier maturation makes it more urgent.
(4) Social (although this is as much a consequence as a cause): women tending
to be held to stricter [schedules] ("If she isn't married by age X she's
hopeless", where X is small---this entangles with the above since such
strictures would apply only to the first of the male offspring and not much
even then).
Note that most of these guesses don't reflect very well on our male ancestors.
Well, much of history doesn't reflect well on our male ancestors either.
(Pardon my bitterness; I saw RICHARD III last night and after I ignored the
Tudor propaganda I saw some fascinating undertones of the women saying, like
the bowl of petunias, "Oh, no, not again!" as the men prepared for yet another
squabble over the crown. This was probably not intentional and not entirely
historical, but it's a continuing thread even in the Wars of the Roses.)