Marriages among the Mi’kmaq were sometimes arranged, but not for political reasons (the main function of European arranged marriages). Instead, their parents or Elders would choose two whose personalities seemed compatible and put them together. But arranged marriages were not always the case. According to a European man named Hannay:“The lover, after advising with his relations as to the girl he should choose, went to the wigwam where she was, and if he liked her looks, tossed a chip into her lap, which she would take, and after looking at it with well-feigned wonder, if she liked her lover’s looks, would toss it back to him with a sweet smile. That was the signal that it was accepted. But if she desired to reject him, she threw the chip aside with a frown.”
It sounds strange and almost too simple, but all the business with flowers and chocolate and very ugly rings isn’t really any less strange.
Of course, that wasn’t all there was to it. Boys had to perform “bride service”- they traveled with their sweetheart’s family for at least a year, to prove his skill as a provider and a man. After that point there would be a service of sorts- the man and woman would go together into the woods to hunt, and come back with their game; a feast would then be held. Certain laws prohibited first and second cousins from marrying; however, there was no rule against marrying one’s in-laws.
Surprisingly- for in many ways the Mi’kmaq seem quite conservative- divorce was practiced. It seems that they took the same practical attitude towards this that they took to most things- if two people are miserable together, they reasoned, then why should they stay together? Polygamy was also fairly common amongst the Mi’kmaq, with one man having at two of more wives at one time. A few settlers noted, apparently in great surprise, that there seemed to be little of the rivalry often found between multiple wives among the polygamous Mi’kmaq women- perhaps because these polygamists had not been forced into the arrangement (the Mi’kmaq considered that to be barbaric) but came to it of their own accord.
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