Divorce is the process of terminating a marriage or marital union. Divorce usually entails the canceling or reorganising of the legal duties and responsibilities of marriage, thus dissolving the bonds of matrimony between a married couple under the rule of law of the particular country or state. It can be said to be a legal dissolution of a marriage by a court or other competent body. It is the legal process of ending a marriage.
"JUST DIVORCED!" hand-written on an automobile's rear window.
Cartoon parodying the circus-like divorce proceedings of Anna Gould (an American heiress and socialite) and Boni de Castellane (a French nobleman) in 1906 in Paris, France. Boni de Castellane then sought an annulment from the Vatican so that he could be free to remarry in the Church. The annulment case was not finally settled until 1924, when the highest Vatican tribunal upheld the validity of the marriage and denied the annulment.
Roman married couple.
Henry VIII of England broke with the Catholic Church in order to obtain an annulment.
Monogamy is a relationship of two individuals in which they form an exclusive intimate partnership. Having only one partner at any one time, whether that be for life or whether that be serial monogamy, contrasts with various forms of non-monogamy. More generally, the term is used to describe the behavioral ecology and sexual selection of animal mating systems, referring to the state of having only one mate at any one given time. In a human cultural context, monogamy typically refers to the custom of two individuals, regardless of orientation, committing to a sexually exclusive relationship.
Bronze sculpture of an elderly Kashubian married couple located in Kaszubski square, Gdynia, Poland, which commemorates their monogamous fidelity, through the time of their separation, while he temporarily worked in the United States
A pair of New Zealand kaka parrots at Auckland Zoo
Orangutan males are not monogamous and compete for access to females.
Plough agriculture. The castle in the background is Lusignan. Detail from the calendar Les très riches heures from the 15th century. This is a detail from the painting for March.