How marriage has and hasn’t changed

Sometimes all it takes is a single quote to remind us how timeless the human condition really is.

“Consider the word ‘husband,’” University of North Carolina at Charlotte sociology professor Rosemary L. Hopcroft wrote for the Institute for Family Studies this week. “It derives from two words, ‘hús’ (from the Old Norse for house) and ‘bóndi’ (from the Old Norse for occupier and tiller of the soil), and its original meaning was a man who had a home and therefore could marry and support a family,” Hopcroft continued. “The word thus embodies a principle common in preindustrial England and Europe ‘that a man might not marry until his living was assured.’”