Mahlschatz
The Mahlschatz (old German máhaljan , "married", Treuschatz; Middle High German mahelschaz ) referred to in older German law a down payment from the groom to the bride. Other terms are pledges or wedding goods .
definition
Old Germanic peoples, from whom women were bought, understood the term to be the price to be paid for them. Later the bridal gift was the pledge for keeping the promise of marriage , the acceptance of which was considered a sign of consent. This gift originally went to the muntwalt (e.g. the father) of the bride , later to the bride herself. It could also be a mutual engagement gift from the bride and groom, which was either sent or presented personally.
Examples
Lexicon entry from 1836:
“At the end of the sixth century, they consisted of a ring and a shoe, the acceptance of which was accompanied by the bride kiss. Later, coins were used in this place and coins minted specifically for this purpose, denars, were used for the grinding treasure, on the front of which there are two lilies with the inscription: Denier-Tournois (you can see the old French origin) and on the reverse a cross with the inscription : Pour épouser , found. Even now one notices in the lower classes, especially among the country folk of some provinces, the hanged ducats, or even silver coins, as meal donations, and even if the so-called, his world long ago renounced this old, simple custom, it adopted it In return, they are the arbitrary engagement gifts, among which only the ring still retained its earlier rights, as it did in the former Western Church, and the clasped hands on it still mean junctio dextrae , as it did in the early days of Christianity meant faithful clinging to one another in distress and death, the groom and bride mutually vowing. "
literature
- Erich Bayer, Frank Wende: Dictionary of history. Terms and technical terms (= Kröner's pocket edition , Volume 289). 5th, redesigned and expanded edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 1995, ISBN 3-520-28905-9 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Mahlschatz . In: Meyers Konversations-Lexikon . 4th edition. Volume 11, Verlag des Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig / Vienna 1885–1892, p. 98.
- ↑ Mahlschatz . In: Heidelberg Academy of Sciences (Hrsg.): German legal dictionary . tape 9 , issue 1/2 (edited by Heino Speer and others). Hermann Böhlaus successor, Weimar 1992, ISBN 3-7400-0167-4 ( adw.uni-heidelberg.de ).
- ↑ Ladies Conversations Lexicon