putative marriage

noun

Law.

1. a marriage contracted in violation of an impediment, but in good faith on the part of one or both of the contracting persons.

Word History and Origins

Origin of putative marriage¹

First recorded in 1805–15

Example Sentences

McKinsey’s putative marriage to Trillian produced its first awkward moments when its chief executive, Bianca Goodson, showed up angry at the consultancy’s Sandton headquarters on a January evening in 2016.

Read more on New York Times

Even in the thirteenth century it began to be possible to attach a superior force to marriage verbally formed per verba de præsenti than to one constituted by sexual union, while so many impediments to marriage were set up that it became difficult to know what marriages were valid, an important point since a marriage even innocently contracted within the prohibited degrees was only a putative marriage.

Read more on Project Gutenberg