If I may step in here and comment on this most interesting discussion...
The honour and propriety bit in older times was dependant upon descreasing the worth of a family's goods and chattels, young girls being merely the property of the family, or, as
LMP points out, the future husband. The concern was for damage to property, not to the personal well being of the female. As well, medieval concepts of chivalry and the like of knights and damsels and lady loves don't really pertain to Anglo Saxon culture.
Reading Tolkien's letter to his son Michael might make for some interesting discussion here on 'canonical' depictions of young women. See Letter # 46, 6 -8 March 1941, pp. 48 - 54 in the HarperCollins paperback edition of 1990. What, indeed, would Tolkien do?
