Note 726 — Chapter V · EARLY HISTORY OF DIVORCE
Reading edition
Post, Familienrecht, 250-58, enumerates six classes of peoples according to the freedom of divorce: (1) the marriage relation loose and dissoluble at the pleasure of either party; (2) marriage indissoluble; (3) divorce only by mutual consent; (4) divorce the right of the husband only; (5) divorce the right of the wife; (6) divorce only on definite grounds, these grounds either being the same for either spouse or different for the man and the woman respectively. In the text examples of the fifth group are given in connection with the cases of divorce at the pleasure of either party; for where the wife has the right to put away or leave the husband when she likes, the husband, unless in very exceptional cases (Post, Grundlagen, 271), appears to have the same privilege with respect to the wife; hence Post's first and fifth groups are practically the same.
In general on the first phase, see Post, Afrikanische Jurisprudenz, I, 433-38; idem, Grundlagen, 267 ff.; idem, Familienrecht, 249-51; Letourneau, L'évolution du mariage, 284 ff., 289, 290; Bernhöft, "Das Gesetz von Gortyn," ZVR., VI, 430 ff., 434; Westermarck, Human Marriage, 518 ff.