Contract of Separation

[carolineasb]

It was often an alternative to Divorce if the parties were members of certain religions and so were separated a mensa et thoro!

[Forfarian]

That looks like a right and proper linguistic muddle! A mensa et is clear enough, but where did thoro come from? There's no 'th' sound in Latin, so it must be Greek!

[carolineasb]

Have never really thought about it before but always known the phrase since my time working in Court, and haven't studied Latin for over 40 years otherwise lol!

[Forfarian]

I haven't studied it for more years than that, but it was one of the most useful things I did learn at school. Very handy for all the nonsense Latin in legal documents - you know, the ones where they invent Latin equivalents for given names and then decline them so you get messy phrases like 'Gulielmum Waddell pistorem in Airdrie' and 'Josephus Maclean filius Jacobi Maclean'.

[Rosinish]

Hmmm. Quite hard to compare, then, because what one has to look at is the purchasing power of £40 in 1822.

It may also be worth considering how old she was & how many yrs she was likely to live to need it (when it was drawn up) which turned out to be not too many really?

Just a thought.

Annie

[Rosinish]

It's a legal separation and the husband isn't responsible for his wife's debts.

We had a neighbour in the 1940s who had legally separated from his wife (probably couldn't afford the fees for a divorce)

I knew a couple who had a 'Legal Separation' 1970s (Scotland) on the grounds of faith, he being Catholic & didn't believe in divorce!

Annie