WORLD HISTORY

Detailed explanation-1: -In Renaissance Italy, arranged marriages were the norm. They were regarded as an alliance between two families who were usually of similar economic, social, and political standing. Wives were often younger than their husbands by a decade or more.

Detailed explanation-2: -During the Renaissance, Europeans saw love and marriage as two important, but very different, parts of life. Poets described love as an overpowering force, both spiritual and sexual. For most people, however, marriage was a more practical matter.

Detailed explanation-3: -An unknown source specializing in Renaissance weddings discusses this by stating, “The groom’s average age is at least fourteen years older than their brides… Noble women were generally married off before they were nineteen. For a woman not to be married over the age of twenty-four was rare” (5).

Detailed explanation-4: -1. Love is a feeling or an emotion, whereas marriage is more of a ceremonial event to formalize a change in one’s civil status from being single to being married. 2. Marriage is more equated to commitments, whereas love doesn’t necessarily have any, unless it is the romantic type of love.

Detailed explanation-5: -Family and Marriage-The family bond was a source of great security in the dangerous urban world of Renaissance Italy. To maintain the family, parents carefully arranged marriages, often to strengthen business or family ties.