As discussed in Chapter 1, on a man's wedding day, he was said to “lead a wife” (ducere uxorem). In this chapter, we observe that the groom's participation in the rituals of the wedding, as the details have been handed down in fragments, was not a primary concern to antiquarians. The sources provide only hints at a man's participation in his wedding – what he wore, thought, or did – and leading a wife was certainly not always highlighted.

THE IDEAL GROOM

Where was the groom during the wedding, and what was he doing? What we know of the groom's attitude and experience comes largely from epithalamia, and from these we learn that the mien of the groom was as prescribed as that of the bride. As the ideal bride is at once blushing, frightened, perhaps crying decorously, and radiant with joy that she will be married, the ideal groom is said to be sexually experienced and in most cases cheerfully eager for the wedding night. The groom could perhaps afford to be cheerful, for he did not experience in the space of a few hours, as the bride did, the probable shock of a very public display that ended in the greater shock of separation from family and a familiar environment and, finally, the loss of virginity with a man who was (ideally) unknown to her sexually.