Note 789 — Chapter V · EARLY HISTORY OF DIVORCE

Westermarck, op. cit., 528, 529: ap. Amír' Alí, Personal Law of the Mahommedans (London, 1880), chaps. xii ff.

"According to the Talmudic Law, the wife is authorized to demand a divorce if the husband refuses to perform his conjugal duty, if he continues to lead a disorderly life after marriage, if he proves impotent during ten years, if he suffers from an insupportable disease, or if he leaves the country forever."—Westermarck, 528; Glasson, op. cit., 149 ff. Consult also Amram, The Jewish Law of Divorce, 63-77, who gives an interesting discussion of the woman's power of divorce; and, besides the causes just named, mentions also "refusal to support," "apostasy," "wife-beating," when the wife is not at fault, and "false charge of ante-nuptial incontinence." Cf. Letourneau, op. cit., 303.