What are the three legal ways to get married in Ancient Rome?

Answer 1

There were actually four legal types of marriages in ancient Rome. However three of them were the "in manum" type. In theses three, the wife was given over to the husband's "hand" in some way. The most sacred and solemn of the marriages was the Confarreatio.It had an elaborate religious ceremony with ten witnesses and both the flamen dialis and the pontifex maximus were in attendance. Only the children of parents who were married in Confarreatio were eligible. The next step downward in ceremony was the Coemptio. In this type of marriage the wife carried a dowry into the union and was ceremoniously bought by her husband in front of at least five witnesses. She and her possessions belonged to her husband. A third type of marriage was Usus. After a year of living together, the woman came under her husband's manus --- unless she stayed away for three nights. The fourth type of marriage which began in about the third century BC was "sine manu" or without/not in manum (not in her husband's hand. t was the most popular type of marriage by the first century A.D.