In the Netherlands, there are no marriage licenses or marriage bonds like you may be familiar with in other countries. The only way to get married was to have banns read, typically for three consecutive weeks. That gave others the opportunity to raise objections, for example if one of the parties was promised to another, or if the couple was too closely related. In extraordinary circumstances, you may find dispensations to have the banns read all on the same day, but that is extremely rare. … [Read more...]