Weddings in the WW (Was: Sharing names - Heritage)

[muscatel1988]

No: HPFGUIDX 98771

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Geoff Bannister" 
<gbannister10 at a...> wrote:> I quote below a part of my message 83700 
which was part of a 
> thread "No sex please, we're British."
> 
> "Geoff:
> 
> Perhaps I should point out that your argument is not upheld by
> evidence in canon:
> 
> "'You think I was going to use my filthy Muggle father's name for
> ever? I, in whose veins runs the blood of Salazar Slytherin 
himself,
> through my mother's side? I, keep the name of a foul, common, 
Muggle
> who abandoned me even before I was born, just because he found out
> his /wife/ was a witch? (my emphasis)'"
> 
> Tom Riddle to Harry (COS UK edition p.231)"

After reading all the interesting posts that flowed from this one, 
it occurs to me that we don't know anything at all about how wizards 
and witches get married, other than that they do.  

There must be, by assumption, some sort of ceremony, which would, in 
the WW, be legally binding.  But the point is that the Muggle 
authorities would have no record of such a union, so that if a 
Muggle and a witch/wizard were to be married only by the WW 
ceremony, a child born to them would, for Muggle legal purposes, be 
illegitimate.  

Warning: what follows is pure speculation!  We only have 
Tom/Voldemort's word for what went on between his parents, and even 
if he were completely trustworthy, the events he describes happened 
when he was a baby, or perhaps before.  He says that Riddle Snr left 
his mother "just because he found out his wife was a witch" - what 
we don't know is how soon he left.  Either it happened as soon as he 
found out ("Darling, why is that matinee jacket floating in mid air 
being knitted?"  "Why, sweetheart, I'm a witch."  "You're what?  I'm 
off!" (Door slams.)), or it happened some time after, when he 
realised on reflection that he couldn't take it.  If the latter, 
then it's possible that the couple had been married, in a WW 
ceremony, so Tom/Voldemort was telling the truth - in WW terms, they 
were man and wife.  If they hadn't also had a Muggle ceremony, the 
baby subsequently born would have been a candidate for an 
orphanage.  I'm not saying that this happened, of course - just that 
it's a situation that could arise given the two parallel worlds.

It might also be relevant that we're learning Tom/Voldemort's past 
from his own lips, and if he rewrites history to the extent that he 
tells the DEs that he's a pureblood, then my suspicion is that he 
would be just as likely to rewrite it by retrofitting a marriage to 
his parents.  It's exactly the sort of thing that a nasty little 
snob like him, brought up in mid 20th century Britain, with an 
intense belief in his own superiority, would do.