Arranged marriages by exchanging sisters

themselves as brothers cf. Huber 1969:262; Huber 1973:434–435. By respecting the rule of exogamy, the danger of marrying someone who shares the same ancestor is diminished. Today, the rule of exogamy is no longer strictly followed and it is not unusual to find examples of endogamous marriages. Paul gave the example of his own parents, who are from the same community, but from two different lineages. Technically, his parents are classificatory siblings, his father being an older classificatory brother, and they can call each other n̄ tāa ‘my sibling, opposite sex’. The relationship, however, is distant enough that it does not count as incest and the danger of their sharing the same ancestor is low. If his parents had been from the same lineage, then their union would have been forbidden. As an older brother, Paul’s father is also in a different ī sāntūō ‘age set’ 18 from Paul’s mother. Paul went on to explain that his parents were the second endogamous marriage within his community. Paul shared that the first man from his community who set this precedence had claimed that marrying someone from one’s own community is less complicated and that the women are more obedient as they share the same history and traditions. Paul is not so sure about this and thinks that family relationships are actually more complicated when one’s maternal and paternal relations are from the same community. Paul went on to say that he is aware of other endogamous marriages amongst some of the other larger communities. At this point, I need to explain that, following the Bebelibe kinship system, siblings can be divided into two groups: those I refer to as full siblings and those I refer to as classificatory siblings. Full siblings are those that have the same father. This includes children that a father has had posthumously see 5.1. Classificatory siblings are parallel cousins: children of a paternal uncle classificatory father or a maternal aunt classificatory mother, whom I refer to as a uterine mother. This includes successive generations of cousins first, second, third, and so on. I explore these relationships in more detail below see 6.1 and C.2.3.1. Despite the examples of endogamous marriage, my interviewees maintain that exogamy rules are important and should be respected, though they themselves differed in their opinion about how. Christine, for example, shared that it is more common for families to favour a particular ethnic group when looking for wives. When a suitable wife has come from a particular ethnic group, the husband and other men of the family will return to that group when looking for other wives. Paul thinks it is better to look for wives from several ethnic groups or communities and that one should not always return to the same source. According to him, having two wives from the same ethnic group or community is the worst-case scenario, as the second wife will not have many children. As neighbouring ethnic groups are also exogamous and virilocal, there is a large movement of women around the region. Women who marry outside of their ethnic group usually learn their husband’s language, but this does not prevent them from also teaching their children their own language. This is even encouraged and expected given the importance of the maternal family. As previously mentioned, children are members of their father’s lineage and this is what determines their primary community identity. There are now laws against forced marriages. Arranged marriages, which I describe next, fall under the category of forced marriages if both parties concerned have not given their free and clear consent to the arrangement MFASSNHPTA 2012:9. None of the Bebelibe marriages I describe below are legally recognised by the Beninese state unless the marriage in question is formalised through a civil wedding.

4.1.1 Arranged marriages by exchanging sisters

An arranged marriage with the exchange of two sisters is called ū pōyiɛtu ‘exchange of women’, a compound noun formed from the words ū pūōhɔ̰ ‘woman’ and m̄ yɛ̄tīmɛ ‘exchange’. According to Koussey 1977:49 the Bebelibe adopted this form of marriage from their northern neighbours, the Berba. The sisters that are exchanged may be full or classificatory sisters of the brother seeking a wife. 18 See appendix C.1 for more details about age sets. The men of two families considering an exchange are responsible for making the arrangements. For example, Bill from Family Y wants to get married, so his family arranges for one of Bill’s sisters to be exchanged with a girl from Family Z. If possible, this should be Bill’s full sister. If he does not have a full sister, one of his classificatory sisters can be exchanged instead—one of Bill’s father’s brother’s daughters for example. If Bill does not have any sisters of marriageable age, the family will promise a younger sister or even a future baby. Thus, the exchange of the two girls does not necessarily happen at the same time. The two-way exchange can be simultaneous but it is possible to have a gap of several years between the transfer of the first woman and the second woman to their respective husbands. Once the exchange has been arranged, it is as if the full exchange has taken place. Should a suitor ask the parents of a girl promised in exchange if their daughter is free to marry, her parents would reply, “ tī u yɛtɔ” ‘we have exchanged her’, even though she is not yet united with her future husband. Once an exchange has been finalised and the girl is of age to be united with her fiancé, her paternal aunt will take her to his homestead for the marriage ceremony konná ū nītiyāa nnɛ ū nītipūōhɔ̰ ‘to unite a man with a woman’. 19 This ceremony is important as it allows the ancestors to accept the union, and according to Huber, it “assures a union without misfortune, as well as fertility” 1969:263, translation mine. If for some reason the ceremony has not been performed and the marriage encounters difficulties sickness, sterility, miscarriages or still births, for example, it is probable that the diviner ū pāāsɔ will recommend that the couple go through the ceremony in order for the ancestors to accept their marriage. If, several years after the ceremony, there is no child to consolidate the marriage and if the sister who was given in exchange for the apparently barren wife has now had her first child, the husband has the right to demand that his wife’s family provide him with a second wife. The family is obliged to do this as the sister they received during the exchange has already given them a child. The first wife usually stays with her husband, as it is not considered correct to send her back. 20 If, by misfortune, the second wife does not have children either, this strongly indicates that the problem is with the husband. Should someone seeking a wife not have a sister to exchange, then he can offer bride service in order to gain a wife.

4.1.2 Arranged marriages with bride service