Sororate marriage

Sororate (from the Latin soror "sister" ) or Schwägerinheirat referred to in the ethnosociology the preferred or sometimes prescribed marriage of a widower with the sister of his (often childless ) deceased wife, his sister in law - or the other way around: A woman has the privilege or is committed to the husband of her deceased sister to marry. It is a form of secondary marriage (second marriage).

A sororate serves either to maintain the existing family ties over the death of his wife and also to perpetuate consolidate (maintenance of the line), or with the intermarriage a marriage alliance between two family groups (maintenance of the Alliance). When allied lineages or clans the sororate is also associated with the bride price that the lineage of the husband has paid: the death of the wife, especially before she has borne children, the mutual exchange is not satisfied; of the lineage of the woman is then expected to provide another woman ( sister or close relatives ) as a replacement for the deceased. In some societies, the man is entitled, in addition to marry the sister of his wife, if they remain childless. The sororate can be found in many of the world's 1300 ethnic groups and indigenous peoples, such as the patriarchal Arapaho and other Plains Indians of North America.

The term sororate was introduced by the British anthropologist James George Frazer in 1910. As a junior sororate the American anthropologist George P. Murdock in 1949 described the preferred or prescribed marriage of a widower connection with the younger sister of his deceased wife. Sororale called polygyny, polygamy ( polygyny ) of a man with several sisters, often live while the wives together.

In the 19th century, as a widower were still more likely than widows, a sororate was not uncommon to get through especially infants of mothers who died in childbirth, but also other children while avoiding the potential problems of a foreign stepmother. In some parts of Brazil, this tradition is still relevant today.

Common and widespread is, conversely, the levirate ( brother in law marriage), in which a man follows his late brother as a husband and his widow married (he was earlier, her brother in law ).