Editing Concubinage (section)

=== Early Christianity and Feudalism ===

The Christian morals developed by [[Patristics|Patristic writers]] largely promoted marriage as the only form of union between men and women. Both [[Augustine of Hippo|Saint Augustine]] and [[Jerome|Saint Jerome]] strongly condemned the institution of concubinage. [[Justinian I|Emperor Justinian]] in his great sixth-century code, the [[Corpus Juris Civilis|Corpus Iurus Civilis]], granted to concubines and their children the sorts of property and inheritance rights usually reserved for wives.{{sfn|The Oxford Encyclopedia of Women in World History|2008|p=471}} He brought the institution of concubinatus closer to marriage, but he also repeated the Christian injunction that concubinage must be permanent and monogamous.{{sfn|The Oxford Encyclopedia of Women in World History|2008|p=471}}

The two views, Christian condemnation and secular continuity with the Roman legal system, continued to be in conflict throughout the entire [[Middle Ages]], until in the 14th and 15th centuries the [[Catholic Church|Church]] outlawed concubinage in the territories under its control.{{sfn|The Oxford Encyclopedia of Women in World History|2008|p=471}}