Widowhood

WIDOWHOOD. - It is the condition of a woman who has lost her husband.

Among the Hebrews, widowhood was a state of desolation and entailed particular prohibitions (cf. Gen. 38, 14, 19; Judg. 10, 2; 16, 9; II Sam. 20, 3; Lev. 21, 14). Thus the widow is a being who commends herself by her very condition to pity (cf. Ex. 22, 22; Deut. 24, 17; 19, 21; 14, 29; 26, 12-13; 16, 11, 14; 10, 18; 27, 19; 22, 24); very often, having no close relatives to defend her, she is at the mercy of the violent (cf. Job 22, 9; 34, 3, 21; Ps. 95, 6; Wis. 4, 10; Is. 1, 23; 10, 2; Jer. 7, 6; Ex. 22, 7, 25; Mal. 3, 5, etc.); she is consoled and helped only by the charitable man (cf. Job 29, 13; 31, 16; Jer. 22, 3; Zech. 7, 10; Is. 1, 17; etc.). A woman was always the property of a man: as a girl, she belonged to her father; as a wife, to her husband; as a widow, to her husband's heirs (cf. II Sam. 3, 7; 16, 22; I Kings 2, 13-18). The personal property of the widow was limited to what she had brought with her upon marrying and to what her husband had given her. If she remarried, she did not take with her the property of her deceased husband (cf. I Sam. 25, 42); if she did not remarry, she could return to her father's house (cf. Lev. 22, 13) or remain with one of the her sons (cf. II Kings 14, 6-7). The widow could not make vows without another's consent (cf. Num. 30, 10). Holy Scripture, however, speaks of many widows who were able to work effectively for the benefit of their own people (v. GIUDITTA) or who gave example of an austere and perfect life (v. ANNA).

From the earliest civilizations it was forbidden for a widow to pass to another marriage before a given term from the death of her husband. Roman law, by a constitution of the year 381 (cf. l. 2, C. de sec. nupt., 5, 9), raised to one year the term of ten months established by a law that tradition traces back to Numa. The reason for the prohibition was twofold: that of propriety and decency, and that of the danger of turbatio sanguinis and of uncertainty as to the paternity of the offspring (cf. l. 11, § 3, D, de his qui not. inf., 3, 2). This system continued to be applied also in the period of the Romano-barbarian laws and has passed into many modern legal systems, such as the Italian one.

According to art. 89 of the Italian Civil Code, the term of the prohibition is ten months, which ceases from the day on which the woman has given birth, and does not apply with respect to a marriage declared null on grounds of impotence. The aforesaid article and the law of 27 May 1929, no. 847, art. 2, provide for the possibility of dispensation.

The law of the Church "ad vitandum incontinentiae periculum, sustulit necessitatem anni luctus" (P. Gasparri, Tractatus canonicus de matrimonio, II, Rome 1932, p. 168 ff.). However, under the concordat regime, for Italy, art. 26 of the Instruction of the Sacred Congregation of the Sacraments of 8 July 1929, while decreeing that "the authorization for the marriage of a widow before the lapse of ten months from the v. is left to the prudent judgment of the Ordinary," nevertheless specifies that "the Ordinary must not grant permission to the widow before the lapse of ten months unless he has sufficient certainty that those inconveniences which the legislator intends to obviate are excluded." Therefore, according to the teaching of the Church, although a chaste v. is preferable (I Cor. 7, 8 ff., 39 ff.), second and further marriages are not forbidden to the widow (v. MATRIMONIO, IV. Diritto e teologia morale, Seconde nozze). The solemn blessing must not be imparted to a widow who remarries and who has already received it in her first marriage (can. 1143). The widow is obviously bound to the observance of imperfect chastity, called precisely widow's chastity. The poverty of the widow, burdened with numerous and needy offspring, constitutes grounds for matrimonial dispensation. The widow can acquire, besides a quasi-domicile, also a domicile of her own (can. 93; cf., for citizenship, arts. 10-11 of the law of 13 June 1912, no. 555). "The wife, during the state of widowhood, retains the surname of her husband" (art. 149 Italian Civil Code). Where a legitimate custom has been introduced, the widow, in the first days after the death of her husband, is excused from the precept of the festive Mass.

According to Roman law, the interest and fruits of the dowry, in the event of the death of the husband, did not accrue to the profit of the wife until a year had elapsed from the death of the husband (cf. Papinian, in D., in soluto matrim., 24, 3). The Code Napoléon in art. 1570, the Albertine Code in art. 1561 and the current Italian Civil Code in art. 1415 adopt a different system. According to them, in all cases the interest of the dowry is owed to the widow ipso iure, but she is granted the faculty of preferring to such interest a maintenance allowance during the year of mourning. If the widow had brought no dowry at the time of marriage, she has no right of reserve (cf. arts. 132, 133, 156 Italian Civil Code). For the patrimonial relations between spouses, see arts. 159-220 of the Italian Civil Code and the entry CONIUGI; for donations, art. 781; for legitimate and testamentary successions, cf. arts. 581-85, 542-54, 595, etc. and the entry SUCCESSIONE EREDITARIA.

The oppression of widows (as of wards and of the poor), insofar as they are placed in a state of inferiority, is one of the sins that cry out for vengeance in the sight of God: "You shall not wrong any widow or orphan. If you afflict them and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry" (Ex. 22, 2).

Angelo Criscito

ARCHAEOLOGY

Damasus recalls that his mother, who lived about a hundred years, "sexaginta Deo vixit post foedera prima" (Enc. Catt., IV, col. 1136).

Magnificent is the eulogy made by her son Obas to his mother Turtura, depicted in widow's attire in the famous painting of Commodilla, with the two patron saints Felix and Adauctus; the latter presents the widow to the B. Virgin seated on a throne with the Child. Obas attests that "post mortem patris servasti casta mariti / sextriginta annis sic vi-

widowhood kept the faith / you performed the office of father to your son and of mother to him..." (ibid., IV, col. 65). In the Christian Museum of the Lateran there is an "Octavia matrona vidua Dei" (O. Marucchi, Monumenti del Museo Crist. Pio Later., Milan 1910, pl. 54, no. 2); at Milan a Diogenia "quae viduata viro vixit amica Deo" (CIL, V, p. 618, no. 10); at Verona (CIL, V, 3419); at Trier (CIL, XII, 3916); at Tabarka "viduitatis et verecundiae preconium castitatis et pietatis exemplum" (Bull. archéol. du Comité, 1911, p. 172). Among the Greek sepulchral inscriptions are remembered those of a ΦΛΑΒΙΑ ΧΗΡΑ who lived 85 years, buried in Priscilla (G. B. De Rossi, Bull. arch. crist., 1886, p. 902, no. 130); of a ΒΙΚΤΩΡΙΑ ΧΗΡΑ in Callistus (G. Wilpert, La cripta dei Papi e la Cappella di S. Cecilia, Rome 1910, p. 70).

In some rare pagan inscriptions, but more in the Jewish and Christian ones, one sometimes finds the term univira or its Greek equivalent μονασθρος to praise a woman who had only one husband and, being a widow, had not passed to second nuptials. Sometimes in the Christian ones one finds a periphrasis such as "uni devota marito" (G. B. De Rossi, J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J. J.

Known is the inscription of Regina "matri viduae quae sedit annos LX et aeclsa [ecclesiam] nunqua(m) gravavit unibyraque vixit annos LXXX mesor. V dies XXII" now in the Lateran museum; examples are also found in Callistus both in the Greek μονασθρος (G. B. De Rossi, Roma sotterr., III, Rome 1877, p. 145) and in Latin (G. Wilpert, La cripta dei papi e la cappella di S. Cecilia nel cimitero di Callisto, Rome 1910, p. 79); and also outside Rome (O. Marucchi, Scoperta di un antico cimitero cristiano al miglio 36 della via Prenestina, in Nuovo Bull. di arch. crist., 1914, p. 133 no. 10). The expression "ecclesiam nunquam gravavit" of the inscription of Regina occurs likewise in that of "Dafnen vidua" who "cum vix(it) ecclesiam nihil gravavit" (Marucchi, Mon. del Museo Lat., pl. 54, 2). The expression "vidua sedit" is found again in inscriptions of Ferentino (CIL, X, 5902) and of Cagliari (CIL, X, 7787). The representation of the parable of the widow's mite (Mk. 12:41-44; Lk. 21:1-4) is in the mosaic cycle of S. Martino "in caelo aureo" in Ravenna, today S. Apollinare Nuovo; the scene was also represented in the basilica of S. Martino at Tours, finished by Bishop Perpetuus in 470; this representation was illustrated with verses of St. Paulinus of Périgueux (PL 61, 1071) "non quae multa dedit, sed quae sibi nulla reliquit / laudari maruit iudicis ore Dei". It is found again in one of the miniatures of the Paris codex (graecus 510) of the Homilies of St. Gregory of Nazianzus (ed. H. Omont, Miniatures des plus anciens mss. grecs de la Bibl. nat. du VIe au XIVe siècle, Paris 1929, pl. 46) and in the cycle of S. Angelo "in Formis".

Enrico Josi