School: Baile na Mín (roll number 14925)

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1. Marriage Customs (continued)

   

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   and would have to apologize before the altar, in presence of the congregation for the scandal he had given, and also the man of the house to which the run-away couple went would have to give an account to the priest before the congregation of how he discharged his duty towards them: which meant the sending home of the young man immediately and the keeping of the girl till her parents took her home.

   Almost every couple that were married from sixty to seventy years ago were all run-aways. Several of those couples had no means of living in view, but just those couples wished very much to get married. The last of those run-away marriages had not died out up to about thirty years ago. Almost all the marriages of those run-aways proved to be happy ones, and a kind of belief prevailed in those times that marriages arranged otherwise would not be lucky.

   Then there was the old and still prevailing custom of what is called and believed to be the sensible match-making.

   There were certain men and women in the country called "match-makers", and when a parent had an eligible daughter for marriage he or she acquainted this match-maker and he set about to make the match, first finding out from the parents what fortune they had for this girl, how much he would offer, sometimes she would get a cow or heifer, etc, in addition to the money. He would also find out how much land the boy was to get, how much houseroom, stock, fowl, farm implements,

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   Transcribed by a member of our volunteer transcription project.

   History Edit

   Topics

   1. activities
      1. social activities (~7)
         1. rites of passage (~573)
            1. marriage (~4,283)

   Language

   English

   Collector

   Kathleen Tansey

   Gender

   Female

   Address

   Sheeane, Co. Roscommon

   Informant

   Mrs M.A. Tansey

   Gender

   Female

   Address

   Sheeane, Co. Roscommon