What, exactly, does it mean to be married? How are you supposed to treat your spouse? What are your expectations? And how do gender roles come into it? This week, we look at all this and more as we discuss historical married life. We are taking a deep dive into how spouses related to each other privately and publicly, how they divided labour, and how they fit into their wider community. We look at everything from medieval peasants to aristocrats to the enslaved peoples of the Americas, and what marriage meant to all these different groups.

TW: Discussions of historical domestic violence