Concubines acceptable

With a POD of your choice make concubines in western society (that would be Europe and it's offshots) socially acceptable by majority. Such practice can be rejected and condemned by parts of society (could be religious groups, feminists....) but majority accepts it or at least not opposes it.

There has to clear knowledge that man is having that woman as a mistress, even though this is not neccesary spoken out loud or acknowledged by either man or woman in question.

Bonus points if concubines are seen as status symbol and there is competition about who has better one (looks, education....). Status of children born from such relations, both in they eyes of law and society, is of your choice.
 
Get status for bastards, and the rest will follow...

Agree. In the Muslim world, whose inheritance laws generally didn't make a distinction between bastards and "legitimate" children, it was socially acceptable for rich men to have concubines/mistresses almost up into the modern era. (Women, however, different story...)
 
Agree. In the Muslim world, whose inheritance laws generally didn't make a distinction between bastards and "legitimate" children, it was socially acceptable for rich men to have concubines/mistresses almost up into the modern era. (Women, however, different story...)

It probably doesn't hurt that a lot of Middle Eastern societies continued to practice polygamy after conversion to Islam. Bit of a first step, really, making it socially acceptable to having multiple wives. Then, maybe as society went from frowning on having a girlfriend (that you lived with and had premarital relations) rather than a wife -- to having the idea of, essentially, multiple girlfriends be acceptable.

It essentially is today, look at Hugh Hefner. Men with lots of girlfriends are considered cool.

I think a good PoD (at least for Western society) would be "liberalizing" Christian morality regarding sex before marriage and monogamy from the beginning of the church history.
 
There has to clear knowledge that man is having that woman as a mistress, even though this is not neccesary spoken out loud or acknowledged by either man or woman in question.

Bonus points if concubines are seen as status symbol and there is competition about who has better one (looks, education....)

Wait - it isn't that way already? Especially for the rich. ;)
 
Look getting back to the situation, the research I did for RoS and other general reading generally indicates that concubinage was acceptable in Europe during the first millennium. One example? Charlemagne's first wife, the mother of Peppin the Hunchback. So you need to weaken the power of the church which resolutely fought this from a very early time. Maybe try to mandate rules for the concubinage instead of attacking it directly as in Islam?
 
Perhaps keep the institution of marriage as a business deal rather than based on romantic love.
 
Perhaps keep the institution of marriage as a business deal rather than based on romantic love.
Interestingly early in the first millennium things tended to be about the betrothal (that's where you gave a ring, not the wedding) and that shifted over the centuries. This probably relates to the business/economic side of it. The problem is that marriage became about mutual acceptance between the parties very VERY early on in Christianity. Now there was an element to this earlier on in Roman marriages too, but Christianity took it to new levels in direct opposition to most of the germanic customs. In fact, a number of writers right on through the medieval period said that mutual consent to be married is actually the most important requirement, even above consummation. That said I have only read one medieval writer that actually said that mutual consent was ALL you needed.

Anyhow, the point is once it becomes about the two people consenting to be married the main blow toward seeing it as purely economic is struck.

From what I understand, modern Islam sees concubinage in ancient Islam as a necessarily evil done to protect the woman. Now obviously that wasn't the total sum of the issue but viewing concubinage in a similar light might help make it acceptable past ad 1000.
 
I believe concubinage/polygamy was permitted and regulated in the Old Testament (firstborns are firstborns regardless of which wife and favoritism with food, clothing, etc. is a no-no) and I don't think it's ever specifically condemned in the New Testament.

(The "husband of but one wife" command applies only to leaders, IIRC, although one might be able to make an argument based on Jesus' teaching against divorce. If a man who divorces his wife and marries another woman is an adulterer, what about a man who takes another wife or "official mistress" while being married to the first?)
 
Opposition to polygamy isn't biblical, it's a poiece of Roman heritage. And the church couldn't make it stick until the 11th century in big parts of Europe. Unfortunately, the focus on sexual and social mores at that time wasn't trivial, it was a big part of the reform movement. Kill off that, and you're likely to have a Europe in which marriage is still a legal matter between families and several levels of married-ness exist.
 
With a POD of your choice make concubines in western society (that would be Europe and it's offshots) socially acceptable by majority. Such practice can be rejected and condemned by parts of society (could be religious groups, feminists....) but majority accepts it or at least not opposes it.

There has to clear knowledge that man is having that woman as a mistress, even though this is not neccesary spoken out loud or acknowledged by either man or woman in question.

Bonus points if concubines are seen as status symbol and there is competition about who has better one (looks, education....). Status of children born from such relations, both in they eyes of law and society, is of your choice.
Something like this you mean, Maîtresse-en-titre :p
Not every society is as puritan as the USA or Victorian Britain:D Especially not the French!
 
Opposition to polygamy isn't biblical, it's a poiece of Roman heritage. And the church couldn't make it stick until the 11th century in big parts of Europe. Unfortunately, the focus on sexual and social mores at that time wasn't trivial, it was a big part of the reform movement. Kill off that, and you're likely to have a Europe in which marriage is still a legal matter between families and several levels of married-ness exist.

I'd love to see this developed by someone, especially the "several levels of married-ness" part. I think it would be interesting.

(Though as I said before, pre-modern Muslim societies came close to this, as it was acceptable for rulers to have four official "wives" plus numerous mistresses. It was even necessary, in a way-royal inheritence laws in he Islamic world never became as developed as European ones, so any situation where the ruler didn't have at least one surviving son could easily lead to chaos)
 
Isn't a concubine generally a sex-slave? That seems a little different than numerous wives/girlfriends (which is easy to achieve if you're a frequent traveller :p).

Women's rights basically wouldn't exist in a world where sexual slavery is common practise, unless you have lesbians that are generally accepted on a level similar to men.
 
Isn't a concubine generally a sex-slave? That seems a little different than numerous wives/girlfriends (which is easy to achieve if you're a frequent traveller :p).

Women's rights basically wouldn't exist in a world where sexual slavery is common practise, unless you have lesbians that are generally accepted on a level similar to men.
AFAIK, no, at least, not by definition. A concubine is more of an officialised mistress, often one of many. Actual status may depend from culture to culture or even relationship to relationship. Also, don't forget that in many cultures, including the West, wives were pretty much their husbands property anyway. See the relevant wiki as well.
 

Valdemar II

Banned
AFAIK, no, at least, not by definition. A concubine is more of an officialised mistress, often one of many. Actual status may depend from culture to culture or even relationship to relationship. Also, don't forget that in many cultures, including the West, wives were pretty much their husbands property anyway. See the relevant wiki as well.

I'm sorry but in the west a wife wasn't a mans property, neither was they in most of the Islamic world. They was subject to their husband, but they wasn't property.
 
Well, in some parts of some Spanish American countries, it used to be common (or at least, not extremely unusual), not so long ago, for some men to have their legitimate wives living with them, and to have also a concubine in the some town, in another house. This concubine would raise the kids she had with him, and would recieve money from her lover.

This was more or less accepted (this things can be hidden in small towns), but problems often arrised when men died and ilegitimate kids claimed a part of their inheritance. Those of you who have watched the film Evita might remember that Eva Duarte was the ilegitimate daughter of a wealthy man, and she wasn't allowed to go to the funeral of her father, which made her very angry (or maybe it was on another film about Eva?).

This practice might be a legacy of colonialism, when the conquistadors married Spanish women (if they could, as they were very few, at least at first), but would also have "ilegitimate" mestizo or Indian women.
 
Acceptance Today

Their is a leval of acceptance today. No one spoke up about Tiger Woods untill he came to the attention of police. Suberban men with favorite prostatutes. Secratarys who can't type. Strip clubs tell you " Our girls don't do that." Even when they do. The Playboy Lifestyle. It's a short step from here to concubines.
 
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