£200 for an 1805 marriage obligation

[Mart 'n' Al]

I have a copy of an 1805 document, signed by the then Lord Bishop of Durham, authorising the marriage of my 4x GGF, at a cost of £200 "of good and lawful money of Great Britain".  The bride was under age at 19.  This seems extortionate.  Is it typical?  I think my ancestor should have waited two years, and passed the £200 on down the line to me, with compound interest.

Martin

[BumbleB]

Actually, £200.00 was the forfeit IF the marriage did NOT take place.  A marriage licence was obtained if the bride and groom did not wish to have Banns called prior to their marriage, for whatever reason.

[Mart 'n' Al]

BB, ah, that makes better sense.  I've read it again and it still isn't clear.  I hope my ancestor understood!

Martin

[stanmapstone]

I have a copy of an 1805 document, signed by the then Lord Bishop of Durham, authorising the marriage of my 4x GGF, at a cost of £200 "of good and lawful money of Great Britain". 
Martin

That would probably be a marriage bond. A visit to the clergyman issuing the licence resulted in three documents, an allegation or affidavit, a marriage bond and the licence. Bonds were a very common legal device. By entering into a bond a person would agree for instance that a statement was true, for a marriage  that there was no "lawful let or impediment" to the proposed marriage. If this was not the case  a penalty was due to the church official concerned, if the marriage did not take place the bond was irrelevant. A marriage bond would mention the two people who wanted to get married, not just one.  By the late 18th Century the penalty was £200. I would expect that they would not have to prove they had the money. After 1823 bonds ceased to be necessary.
See also https://familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/Marriage_Allegations,_Bonds_and_Licences_in_England_and_Wales
Stan

[Mart 'n' Al]

Thank you Stan. My ancestor was 30 and his bride-to-be was only 19.

Martin

[Girl Guide]

That £200 in 1805 would be worth £12070.23 in today's money.

[Bookbox]

That £200 in 1805 would be worth £12070.23 in today's money.

I wonder which currency converter you used? Present-day valuations can be controversial, because there's a vast difference in the calculation methods used by various websites.

The National Archives converter, for example, suggests that £200 in 1800 would have purchasing power equivalent to about £8,814 in today's terms, and in 1810 equivalent to about £9,305 in today's terms. Both very different from your figure?

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/currency-converter

[Mart 'n' Al]

A pint of beer is 20 times what it was 40 years ago.  I think you have to use various algorithms, such as a day's salary for a skilled labourer then and now, or the price of a used pony and trap against a Volvo, or a spinning top against a GameBoy, or the price of The Times.

I am here today to testify that the marriage lasted long enough to produce my 3x great grandfather and his 8 siblings.

Martin

[stanmapstone]

The British Association for Local History produce a booklet called "How Much is that Worth?" by Lionel Mumby. In the introduction it says "No single precise, numerical answer is possible to the question: what is the modern value of a given sum of money at a particular time in the past? We do know the monetary price of many distinct items at specific times, but we cannot easily generalise from these prices."

Stan