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Old 03-03-2003, 02:10 PM   #20
Kalimac
Candle of the Marshes
 
Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: Flyover Country
Posts: 780
Kalimac has just left Hobbiton.
1420!

Wow, I'd completely forgotten this thread. Spooky, now that we're not THAT far away from a one-year anniversary.

Child and Mark; for hobbits I'm guessing small ceremony, big reception - being such lovers of food it's really hard to see them passing up an opportunity for a feast. To reconcile this with Tolkien's "running away" comment (though I'm also inclined to think he was wimping out there a little bit) they might do the 19th century/Edwardian thing of being privately married in somebody's drawing-room while wearing the best clothes they happen to own. I have no idea who would officiate, since unlike Edwardian England there's no established Church, but possibly it would be the Mayor, or the patriarch of the family (or matriarch, if you prefer [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]).

What might tie in with "running away" would be if they did this and then went on a honeymoon afterwards, only having the major celebration after they got back as a welcome-home sort of thing. The trouble is that I have a really hard time imagining hobbits on any sort of wedding trip. Where would they *go*? If the residents of Brandy Hall are considered a bit, well, foreign, you get the feeling that honeymooning hobbits would pretty much be limited to Hobbiton itself and maybe a mile or two of fields beyond it. I believe that some Asian cultures, however, once had a tradition where the bride and groom were left by themselves for a week; they didn't go anywhere, but they had no social obligations and people did not call on them - it was to give them time to get used to each other without interruption. So maybe your hobbits could have a private wedding, go off to their new hole, and while they might still be seen around town their official entry into society as a married couple would come at the feast a week or two later.

As for Aragorn and Arwen - I'm still inclined to go with the Norse/Old English approach; no officiant, just lots of witnesses as they stand in some significant place or other (Pellenor Fields? Castle hall?) and make their vows to each other.
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Father, dear Father, if you see fit, We'll send my love to college for one year yet
Tie blue ribbons all about his head, To let the ladies know that he's married.
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