Consanguinity dispensations

pinkypinky

Just something that came up on the deciphering thread and I thought it would be useful for it have its own, since the DT is getting very long and may be hard to navigate in future.

Consanguinity dispensations were given by the church when the proposed couple were blood related in some way.

Affinity dispensations acted the same way but were for relations by marriage.

There's a number of explanations on the internet. I chose to link to one from the Clare Library website and I reproduce the relevant section of the text which pertains to marriages in the Carrigaholt registers:

For closer ‘cousin’ relationships, higher amounts of money had to be paid to the Church for dispensation / permission to marry, and permission from higher authority was sought. 3rd cousins could be allowed to marry by the parish priest, while 2nd cousins or multiple-related parties could be allowed to marry by the Bishop of Killaloe. For 1st cousins, or for a widower to marry his late wife’s sister, for instance, the Pope in the Vatican had to approve of it. There are two of these in this Register, from the ‘Papa’ in The Vatican in Rome.

Relationship by affinity came through re-marrying a member of one’s late spouse’s family. Consanguinity, or blood relationship, was to one’s own cousins, etc.
Example: Consanguinity Dispensation 3rd & 3rd degree for 2nd cousins to marry.
In Canon Law, the ‘degree of relationship’ is the number of generational steps to the common ancestor, from husband first, & then from his wife. So, from the groom to his father to his grandfather to his greatgrandfather = 3 and the equivalent from the bride, in this case.

P. Breathnach

The most disturbing case I came across (not in my own family) was the marriage of double first cousins (i.e. first cousins through each of their parents). It's the genetic equivalent of sibling marriage - the children have only four great-grandparents.

pinkypinky

I'm sure I mentioned this one I found before.

Man marries twice: wives are first cousins. Has child with each wife. Child of each of those children married each other.

Diagram attached.

P. Breathnach

Karen Cassidy wrote: »

Thank you all so much that makes sense! Slightly disappointed that it hasn't given me any genealogical info but cest la vie!

It hints at the possibility of genealogical info. They received a dispensation, which tells you there was an impediment to the marriage.

The most usual impediment was consanguinity, and if the dispensation was granted at the Parish Priest's level rather than at the Bishop's level (as in the one I incorrectly dealt with), it might have been that the couple were second cousins or thereabouts. Worth a little bit of digging, I would think.

Karen Cassidy

Yes but you can also I think have dispensation for not having done banns or being underage and possibly more that I don't know. Elsewhere on that page under dispensations it says Ter - I think that's what I remember which I read as 3rd degree relation so second cousin so figured that if they wrote that for one mine must be something different - if that makes sense?

wexflyer

Karen Cassidy wrote: »

Yes but you can also I think have dispensation for not having done banns or being underage and possibly more that I don't know. Elsewhere on that page under dispensations it says Ter - I think that's what I remember which I read as 3rd degree relation so second cousin so figured that if they wrote that for one mine must be something different - if that makes sense?

Dispensations could be required for time, place, affinity, consanguinity, banns, age, plus who knows what else.

VirginiaB

Re dispensations, a very valuable book for Irish genealogy is 'Bishop Loughlin's Dispensations, Diocese of Brooklyn, 1859-1866', compiled by Joseph Silinonte and pub 1996.

The vast majority of the thousands seeking dispensations and listed in this book were Irish-born, as were their priests so the info may reflect practice in Ireland as well. Parents' names, counties, parishes of origin are often included with other valuable info.

Silinonte, now deceased, says that "by far the greatest number of requests were for Dispensation from Banns." For privacy reasons, he did not publish individual reasons for requests tho that is available from the archives of the diocese. He also says over 95% of requests were granted.

Wherever you may live, you may find relatives in this book with useful info for your research. It's out of print but available thru inter-library loan in the US. Maybe the NLI has a copy--they should.

wexflyer

pinkypinky wrote: »

I chose to link to one from the Clare Library website .... higher amounts of money had to be paid to the Church for dispensation / permission to marry....

I think this is somewhat misleading. It was and is the position since a decree of the Council of Trent that no charges can be made for providing dispensations as such. What charges there are are for covering direct administrative costs associated with the process.