A South African man who shot his pregnant fiancýe dead before killing himself will be posthumously married to her at the weekend:
http://channels.netscape.com/ns/news/story.jsp?floc=FF-RTO-PLS&idq=/ff/story/0002/20040827/1116494825.htm
Police Captain Mohale Ramatseba said David Masenta shot 25-year-old Mgwanini Molomo after a quarrel before turning the gun on himself. But Johannesburg’s Sowetan newspaper said family and friends wanted to remember them as a happy couple destined for a happy life together.
The groom’s corpse would be dressed in a cream suit and his bride’s in a gown for the ceremony, at which a priest in the rural village of Ceres in Limpopo will bless the union before the two are buried, the Sowetan said.
“In African culture, there is no death — there is merely the separation of body and soul,” said cultural expert Mathole Motshekga. “It is also important because the families are married together.”
“This does not mean the relationship has irretrievably broken down.”
Not so strange, really.In the many societies death is perceived as a transition of state from this world to a spiritual one. See Christianity, where the “soul” continues an existence after the physical death of a person and is, indeed, resurrected at the Last Judgement.
The concept in many, perhaps most, societies of marriage as a matter between “families” and not individuals, concerns property links and is obvious in lovelss marriages of today’ English aristocracy. Posthumous marriage is a logical extension of this and secures inheritance of property. The State seems to have taken this over in Europe and North Anmerica where there are no heirs.