What was legal age to marry in olden times？
3 min readIn Chinese history the prescribed age of marriage varied.During the Zhou Dynasty，a man should be married by the age of 30，and a woman by 20.At that time，people thought that a man’s bones and muscles would be strong enough to withstand the burden of fatherhood at the age of 30；a woman would be full-grown and ready to be a mother when she reached the age of 20.
As the dynasties went by，the prescribed age for marriage gradually lowered. During the Spring and Autumn Period，Qi Huangong，king of the Qi State decreed a man should be married by the age of 30 and a woman by 15；towards the end of the Spring and Autumn Period，King Gou Jian of the Yue State said that parents would be penalized if their son did not get married by the age of 20 and their daughter by 17.
During the Han Dynasty，unmarried women of 15 years or older had to pay 5 times more taxes than required，thus forcing them to marry at an even earlier age.
In the Western Jin State，local officials would select a groom for the woman who had not been married off by the age of 17.In the Northern Zhou State，a man was required to marry by 15 and a woman by 13.
In the early Tang Dynasty，the Tang rulers adopted a rehabilitative policy in order to relieve people out of the severe social conflicts.Part of the policy stated that a man should get married by the age of 20 and a woman by 15.In the middle period of the Tang Dynasty，the latest age for marriage changed to 16 for man and 13 for a woman.The local government would interfere if any man or woman failed to get married by the prescribed age.
From the Song Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty，the latest age for a man was about 16 years old and for a woman about 14.
A new Marriage Law，which went into effect in 1950，stipulates that although later marriage should be encouraged，the minimum age for marriage is currently 22 for men and 20 for women.
What are the Eight Characters of a Horoscope？
The Eight Characters of a Horoscope is a Chinese conceptual term in Chinese astrology.It describes the four components creating a person’s destiny or fate.
These four components are the year，month，day，and time（hour）when he or she was born.In Chinese each of these components is expressed by two characters，which are a combination of the Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches，yielding a total of eight characters.The Eight Characters are also known as the 4 Pillars of Destiny or Pillars of Destiny because these 4 pillars make up a chart or a configuration of eight characters，which helps a fortuneteller determine a person’s qualities，relationships，potential for good career，and health risks.
In ancient China，when parents looked for a prospective wife or husband for their son or daughter，they had to consider a number of factors.One of the factors was to see if the prospective couple would be auspicious based on their four-pillar birth-chart in conjunction with the Chinese Almanac. If the prediction did not feel right，the marriage would be called off.
