"PAYING FOR: WIVES."

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 234, 3 October 1932, Page 8

"PAYING FOR: WIVES."

THE MARRIAGE : MARKET. A YUGOSLAVIAN TRAGEDY. A meeting of Mohammedans .was held at the Serb town of Kosovska Mitrovitsa in August to consider the question of the minimum amount to" be paid by a bridegroom to the family of the bride for her trousseau. It has hitherto been obligatory to pay a minimum of about £50, but in view of difficult economic conditions it lias now - been officially decided to reduce the amount- to one • quarter. The Belgrade Press : welcomes I this relaxation of the Mohammedan, custom of paying for wives,' which it considers primitive and degrading, but there is so far no indication of any tendency to reduce the amounts payable among Orthodox Yugoslavs by the families of brides for husbands. At the Yugoslav town of Pec, ■ njar. the Albanian frontier, the daughter of 1 Moslem family fell in love with the son of a well-to-do Moslem family. The son's father paid the daughter's father £50. Everything was ready for the celebration of . the nuptials, when the tragic news came that the bridegroom had been victimised by some Moliamniedian's blood revenge, still customary there. The girl's family, having used up the money, was unable to'Tepay it. The bridegroom's father did not insist on it, but demanded that according to an old rite the bride should join his liarem. The girl fled to her parents, but the bridegroom's father came after her, asking for either the money oi' the bride. There was no solution, and the poor gi.-l poisoned herself, dying a few days later at the hospital.