A wife is a female spouse, or participant in a marriage, or civil union or civil partnership.

Origin and etymology

The term originated from the Middle English wif, from Old English wīf, woman, wife, from Germanic * wībam, woman, related to Modern German Weib (woman, wife), from the Indo-European root ghwībh-; wīb, meaning veiled or clothed, referred to the wedding veils.. The original meaning of “wife” as simply “woman”, unconnected with marriage, is preserved in words like “midwife” and “fishwife”.

Related terminology

Although “wife” seems to be a close term to bride, the latter is a female participant in a wedding ceremony, while a wife is a married woman after the wedding, during her marriage. Her partner, if male, was known as the bridegroom during the wedding, and within the marriage is called her husband. Upon marriage, she or her family may have brought her husband a dowry, or the husband or his family may have needed to pay a bride price to the family of his bride, or both were exchanged between the families; the dowry not only supported the establishment of a household, but also served as a condition that if the husband committed grave offences upon his wife, the dowry had to be returned to the wife or her family; for the time of the marriage, they were made inalienable by the husband. A former wife whose spouse is deceased is a widow, and may be left with a dower (often a third or a half of his estate) to support her as dowager.

Wife refers especially to the institutionalized form in relation to the spouse and offspring, unlike mother, a term that puts a woman into the context of her children. Also compare the similar sounding midwife, a person assisting in childbirth (“Mother midnight” emphasizes to a midwife's power over life and death).

A wife may, in some cultures and times, share the title of her husband, without having gained that title by her own right.

Differences in cultures

The various divisions of the following chapters share the previous terminology in English language, notwithstanding religious and cultural, but also customary differences.

Antiquity

Many traditions like the wedding ring and a dower, dowry and bride price have long traditions in antiquity. The exchange of any item or value goes back unto the oldest sources, and the wedding ring likewise was always used as a symbol for keeping faith to a person.

Historical status

In the Middle Ages and Early Modern history, it was unusual to marry out of love, though it became an ideal in literature. Women were not expected to have any property: they only were given a dowry by their parents to give her husband and inherited only if there were no male offspring. Unable to procure for herself, a woman had to submit to the husband chosen to avoid problems (prostitution, or a criminal career,), which has been dealt with extensively in literature, where the most important reason for the lack of equal rights was the denial of equal education for women. The situation was assessed by the English conservative moralist Sir William Blackstone: “The husband and wife are one, and the husband is the one.” The situation changed only in the Married Women's Property Act 1882. Though the wife was generally expected to support the political faction favoured by the husband, satirists like Joseph Addison suggested ironically that the marriage contract might allow the wives to join the political faction independently in order to suit the expectations of their environment, or their peer group. Until late in the 20th century, women could in some cultures or times sue a man for wreath money when he took her virginity without taking her as his wife.