131 Lawyers as well as theologians of the Middle Ages were content to know that no impediment barred the union of a couple. They had surprisingly little interest in the formalities of entering marriage but later had to do so as doubts were more frequently expressed as to whether the vows had been exchanged voluntarily between a couple or not. Equally important, was it good law to accept marriage contracted with no publicity at all around the act? As soon as clandestine marriages had grown more popular, which had occurred by the mid-sixteenth century, a cluster of legal problems had surfaced in the law courts all over Europe, particularly related to the legal position of children begotten by clandestinely married parents. Could they be proven legitimate? Could they inherit their parents?34 The problems of judging what had actually been contracted and how it had been done developed into such dimensions that formalising marriage by rituals or ceremonies became almost inevitable. There was a growing assumption among theologians and jurists that only those marriages entered into in facie ecclesiae, in the presence of a priest, were properly started and institutionally acceptable. In the Council of Trent declared marriages established without a priest present as null and void. The Council elaborated a special wedding ceremony. The result was two-fold. On the one hand, children born by parents married without the assistance of a Catholic priest ran the risk of being judged illegitimate. On the other hand, the ceremony performed by a priest was the best means obtainable to prove legitimacy. Protestant countries tended to follow suit, at least in principle.35 Illegitimacy, poverty and social policy 34 H. E. Troje, “Das Matrimonium clandestinum in ‘Humanismus und Reformation’.” Miscellanea Domenico Maffei dicata: Historia, Jus, Studium, vol. IV, ed. A. García y García, P. Weidman, 389412. (Goldbach 1995: Keip.)
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