ABSTRACT
IN NIGERIA, marriages may be contracted by customary law, in church, or by civil ceremony. A customary marriage is solemnized by the consent of the bride's family, and was traditionally arranged between the kinsfolk of the couple: the bridegroom usually presents the family of the bride with an agreed sum, and ritual gifts. 16 Church and civil marriages entail rights and penalties derived from English rather than Nigerian custom: polygamy becomes a crime, and the wife has personal rights in divorce and as a widow foreign to African traditions. Church weddings also tend to be more expensive, and become commoner with education and social standing. In Lagos, most Christians as well as Muslims contract marriages under customary law, and even those who are wed in church may observe many of the traditional customs. Nearly all the householders interviewed in central Lagos were, or had been married, and a third of them were Christian. But only a quarter of the Christians had married in church.
