There’s a lot of discussion these days about big age gaps in relationships and whether they matter. Some studies indicate that there’s more social disapproval of an age difference than the sexuality or ethnicity of the couple. Social anxiety over this issue isn’t new and the debate has raged for a very long time, polarising opinion.
“Sugar daddy”, “gold digger”, “cougar” – all disparaging terms referring to people of one decade or more age difference who are in a relationship. In certain scenarios, pupil/teacher being the most obvious, there are obvious concerns and legal sanctions. So, let’s look at how this question has been tackled in the past.
Here’s a story from 1926 about a 43-year-old woman, Margaret Griggs, wanting to marry 17-year-old Jester Primmer, who worked on her farm. They applied for a marriage license and were turned down. She had five children from a previous marriage with the oldest child being just a year older than her intended husband. Despite being refused a license, Griggs announced they would wait a year until Primmer was of legal age and then tie the knot. Whether they got married or not is a mystery.
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An agony aunt column in the Wilmington Daily Press Journal in 1948 received a letter from a 48-year-old man worrying about marrying a 32-year-old woman. “She comes of fine stock but there is something unstable about her”, wrote the man, as if his wife was livestock at a county fair. He was earning a good salary but concerned she might be after his money. Plus she had been divorced twice already.
Dorothy Dix, the agony aunt, advised that marriage is a gamble in any situation. “And perhaps a divorcee is as good a risk as any”.
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Recently, social media has generated a great deal of outrage – much of it ‘faux’ – about age differences in celebrity relationships. Others express curiosity about how strong these relationships can be. The singer Cher, in characteristic fashion, has told people to mind their own business about her boyfriend, who is 40 years younger.
Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger is going out with Melanie Hamrick, 44 years his junior. Inés de Ramón is 26 years younger than Brad Pitt. While 84-year-old Al Pacino, the veteran actor, is seeing 29-year-old Noor Alfallah. Hollywood has a long list of actors in relationships with significant age gaps and yet these liaisons, in some cases, have endured.
The average gap in age between couples is 4.2 years worldwide today, though with some regional variations. The most extreme example is Yemen where child marriage – a form of modern slavery – is still prevalent. These are usually forced marriages, characterised by sexual abuse and extreme health risks. But this is clearly not the same thing as the relationships mentioned above. Though to listen to some ‘edgelords’ and trolls on social media you would think…
In history, marriages with large gaps often took place because of political alliances, dynastic politics, and the need to produce an heir that would live past infancy. High child mortality rates meant that a younger woman had more chance of producing a string of babies, at least one of whom would be a healthy son. This was the grim logic of the pre-modern age. So, older men marrying younger women – especially if it was a second or third marriage – was not uncommon, especially among the upper classes.
However, we do have instances of older women tying the knot with much younger men. In 1465, Catherine Neville, Dowager Duchess of Norfolk, processed up the church aisle with John Woodville, brother of the queen of England. Catherine was in her late 60s while John was 19. She outlived him as John got himself executed.
