MARRiAGE

Marriage was an important ritual for the Aztecs and included the families of both the bride and groom. When a young man reached the age for marriage—late teens or early 20s—his family met with his schoolmasters. This was a formal meal—a kind of ritual graduation ceremony. The parents announced that their son would no longer attend classes. Instead, the young man’s parents looked for a wife for their son.

Several women who were in their late teens might be considered. It was up to the young man’s parents and other relatives to choose one. The bride might be a woman the groom already knew or a complete stranger. Once the bride was chosen, women from the young man’s family were sent to the bride’s home to ask for her hand in marriage. The decision was left to her family, not to the bride.

There were an endless number of tasks that needed to be done before the actual ceremony took place. The family consulted a fortuneteller to determine a good day for the marriage. The young couple needed to be married under a favorable sign if the marriage was to be successful. The bride’s family collected cocoa, flowers, tobacco and pipes, and corn to make tamales.

On the day before the wedding, a feast took place at the bride’s home. To get ready for the feast, the bride bathed and washed her hair. She dressed in a heavily embroidered blouse and skirts and wore red feathers on her body. She wore makeup, which might have been the only time she did so during her life. That night, both families went to the groom’s home, where the wedding would take place.

The wedding took place by the family hearth. There was singing, dancing, and feasting. In the same way that brides and grooms today share bits of wedding cake, the bride and groom fed each other tamales. Then the pair went to their room, where they prayed together for four days.

The newly married couple received gifts of food, household goods, pottery, and other items. Then they would usually move in with the husband’s family. However, the household structure was so flexible that they could end up in their own household, living with other relatives, or even living with the wife’s parents. Since women usually married within their calpulli, they rarely ended up far from their parents’ home.