ABSTRACT
In pre-Reformation Europe the regulation of family matters was recognized to be the province of the Roman Church. Clerics taught the rules of spiritual survival in a sinful world; their prescriptions were to channel the newly baptized from the cradle to the grave and beyond. In this world, marriage allowed the human sexual needs and habits of ordinary people to be regulated behind the protection of a sacramental shield. The Church directed that marriage was monogamous and for life, within which the proper consequence of sexual intercourse was the bearing of children. Rome’s authority and teaching on such matters was generally acknowledged and upheld by the sovereigns and governors of Europe. It is against this broad canvas that a brief examination of the regulation of marriage and divorce in pre-Reformation England has to be set.
