MARRĀKESH (erroneously Morocco or Marocco City), one of the quasi-capitals of the sultanate of Morocco, Fez and Mequinez being the other two. It lies in a spacious plain—Blad el Hamra, “The Red”—about 15 m. from the northern underfalls of the Atlas, and 96 m. E.S.E. of Saffi, at a height variously estimated at 1639 ft. (Hooker and Ball) and 1410 ft. (Beaumier). Ranking during the early centuries of its existence as one of the greatest cities of Islām, Marrākesh has long been in a state of grievous decay, but it is rendered attractive by the exceptional beauty of its situation, the luxuriant groves and gardens by which it is encompassed and interspersed, and the magnificent outlook which it enjoys towards the mountains. The wall, 25 or 30 ft. high, and relieved at intervals of 360 ft. by square towers, is so dilapidated that foot-passengers, and in places even horsemen, can find their way through the breaches. Open spaces of great extent are numerous within the walls, but for the most part they are defaced by mounds of rubbish and putrid refuse. With the exception of the tower of the Kutubia Mosque and a certain archway which was brought in pieces from Spain, there is not, it is asserted, a single stone building in the city; and even bricks (although the local manufacture is of excellent quality) are sparingly employed. Tabiya or rammed concrete of red earth and stone is the almost universal building material, and the houses are consequently seldom more than two storeys in height. The palace of the sultan covers an extensive area, and beyond it lie the imperial parks of Agudal, the inner one reserved for the sultan’s exclusive use. The tower of the Kutubia is a memorial of the constructive genius of the early Moors; both it and the similar Hasan tower at Rabat are after the type of the contemporary Giralda at Seville, and if tradition may be trusted, all three were designed by the same architect, Jabir. The mosque to which the tower belongs is a large brick building erected by ʽAbd el Mumin; the interior is adorned with marble pillars, and the whole of the crypt is occupied by a vast cistern excavated by Yakūb el Mansur. Other mosques of some note are those of Ibn Yusef, El Mansur and El Moʽizz; the chapel of Sidi Bel Abbas, in the extreme north of the city, possesses property of great value, and serves as an almshouse and asylum. There is a special Jews’ quarter walled off from the rest. The general population is of a very mixed and turbulent kind; crimes of violence are common, and there are many professional thieves. The murder of a Frenchman, Dr Mauchamp, in March 1907, by the rabble of Marrākesh was the immediate cause of the occupation of Udja by France (see Morocco: History). Almost the only manufacture extensively prosecuted is that of Morocco leather, mainly red and yellow, about 1,500 men being employed as tanners and shoemakers. Scottish missionaries and a few European traders have become established here. The city was founded in 1062 by Yusef bin Tashfin. Before it was a hundred years old it is said to have had 700,000 inhabitants, but the population in 1906 probably did not exceed 50,000 to 60,000.
See Leo Africanus, and Paul Lambert’s detailed description in Notice sur la ville de Maroc (Paris, 1868). Lambert’s plan of Marrākesh is reproduced with some additions by Dr A. Leared, and another may be found in Gatell.
MARRI, a Baluch tribe on the Dera Ghazi Khan border of Baluchistan. In the census of 1901 they numbered 19,161 and their fighting strength is about 3000. Their relations with the British commenced in 1840 with attacks made on the communications of Sir John Keane’s army, after it had passed through the Bolan. An attempt was made to punish the tribe, which ended in disastrous failure. Major Clibborn was repulsed in an attempt to storm the Naffusak Pass, losing 179 killed and 92 wounded out of 650. Many of his force died of heat and thirst. The fort of Kahan, which he was trying to relieve at the time, was forced to capitulate with the honours of war. The Marris, however, joined the British against the Bugtis in 1845. After the annexation of Sind in 1843 the Marris gave much trouble, but were pacified by the policy of General John Jacob and Sir Robert Sandeman. In 1880 during the second Afghan War they made frequent raids on the British line of communications, ending with the plunder of a treasure convoy. A force of 3070 British troops under Brigadier-General Macgregor marched through the country, and the tribe submitted and paid 114 lakh (£12,500) out of a fine of 2 lakhs (£20,000); they also gave hostages for their future good behaviour. Since then they have given little trouble.
The Marri-Bugti country is classed as a tribal area in Baluchistan, politically controlled from Sibi, but enjoying a large measure of autonomy under its own chieftains. Total area, 7129 sq. m.; total pop. (1901), 38,919, almost equally divided between the two tribes of Marris and Bugtis.
MARRIAGE. Marriage (Fr. mariage, from marier, to marry; Lat. maritare, from mas, maris, a male), or “matrimony” (Lat. matrimonium, from mater, a mother), may be defined either (a) as the act, ceremony, or process by which the legal relationship of husband and wife is constituted; or (b) as a physical, legal and moral union between man and woman in complete community of life for the establishment of a family.[1] It is possible to discriminate between three stages, taking marriage in the latter sense as an institution—the animal or physical stage, the proprietary or legal stage, and the personal or moral stage. In the first or physical stage the relation of the sexes was unregulated, and in many cases of brief duration. In the second or legal stage greater permanence was secured in marriage by assigning the husband a property right in his wife or wives. In the last stage the proprietary relation falls more and more into the background, and the relation of husband and wife approximates that of two individuals entirely equal before the law. Although in the history of marriage these three stages have been roughly successive, the order of their entering the conscious experience of the individual is usually the reverse of their order in the development of the race; and in the solemnization of a marriage based upon affection and choice the growth of the relation begins with the moral, advances to the legal and culminates in the physical union, each one of these deriving its meaning and its worth from the preceding. In most legal systems marriage, in the sense of a ceremony, takes the form of a contract—the mutual assent of the parties being the prominent and indispensable feature. Whether it is really a contract or not, and if so to what class of contracts it belongs, are questions which have been much discussed, but into which it is not necessary to enter. While the consent of parties is universally deemed one of the conditions of a legal marriage, all the incidents of the relationship constituted by the act are absolutely fixed by law. The jurist has to deal with marriage in so far as it creates the legal status of husband and wife. It should be added that, while marriage is generally spoken of by lawyers as a contract, its complete isolation from all other contracts is invariably recognized. Its peculiar position may be seen at once by comparing it with other contracts giving rise to continuous relationships with more or less indefinite obligations, like those of landlord and tenant, master and servant, &c. In these the parties may in general make their rights and duties what they please, the law only intervening when they are silent. In marriage every resulting right and duty is fixed by the law.
Besides true marriage, inferior forms of union have from time to time been recognized, and may be briefly noticed here. These have all but disappeared from modern society, depending as they do on matrimonial restrictions now obsolete.
The institution of slavery is a fruitful source of this kind of debased matrimony. In Roman law no slave could contract marriage whether with another slave or a free person. The union of male and female slaves (contubernium) was recognized for various purposes; a free woman entering into a union with a slave incurred under the S.C. Claudianum the forfeiture of her own liberty; but the bondwoman might be the concubine of a freeman. In the United States, where slavery was said to be regulated by the principle of the civil law, the marriage of slaves was so far recognized that on emancipation complete matrimony took effect and the children became legitimate without any new ceremony.
- ↑ It is doubtless true, as anthropologists have pointed out, that in the history of the race “marriage is rooted in the family rather than the family in marriage” (Westermarck: History of Human Marriage, p. 22); but in that conscious experience of the individual with which law and ethics are especially concerned, this relationship is reversed, and the family originates in marriage (see Family, and allied headings).
