Bundling, or tarrying, is the traditional practice of wrapping a couple together in a bed, sometimes with a board between the two of them, usually as a part of courting behavior. The tradition is thought to have originated either in the Netherlands or in the British Isles and later became common in colonial United States, especially in Pennsylvania Dutch Country. Bundling is associated with the Amish as a form of courtship.

Courtship practice

Bundling, or "bed courting", is believed to have originated in the pre-Celtic populations of the British Isles and was introduced to the American colonies by European immigrants (primarily Dutch and Welsh) where it attained unprecedented popularity. Traditionally, the practice of courtship involved two young adults or adolescents, often betrothed, who spent the night in bed together under the parental roof to ensure compatibility and accountability. A bundling board or bundling sack may make an appearance, as it takes the form of a contraceptive for a bundling couple. The former definition refers to the practice used to accommodate the heavy traffic of travelers in the underdeveloped colonies, often with no implication of sexual activity. The latter, however, refers to the courtship practice which ensured legal accountability for an unwed father in the case of pre-marital pregnancy. The courtship ritual of bundling was primarily observed in rural communities. The measure of familial and community protection which bundling provided against the scandal of abandonment was not offered in urban settings where populations had a much higher degree of mobility and anonymity.

In Colonial United States, Jonathan Edwards and other preachers condemned bundling. American Puritanism condemned the practice of bundling as immoral, or un-Christian. In the modern United States, practices of "dating" and "necking" might be tied to the previous practice of bundling. Public widespread anxiety about the vulnerability of young women led to new writing which was published in newspapers and magazines during the eighteenth century.

Literature

The writer Washington Irving, in book 3, chapter 7 of A History of New York (1809) as well as other of his works, refers to bundling as a Yankee practice.<blockquote>This amazing increase may, indeed, be partly ascribed to a singular custom prevalent among them, commonly known by the name of bundling—a superstitious rite observed by the young people of both sexes, with which they usually terminated their festivities, and which was kept up with religious strictness by the more bigoted part of the community.</blockquote>Historian Edward Shorter wrote in his novel, The Making of the Modern Family, that the widespread increase of illegitimate births through courtship practices comprised a "sexual revolution" that was issued by the rise of industrial capitalism within the eighteenth century.

Jakob Huizinga, a Mennonite reverend who remained on the island of Texel (northwestern part of The Netherlands) from 1844 to 1881 wrote about unlawful premarital sexuality in his diary. Huizinga referred to the "Texel custom" or "night courting" practice that consisted of potential suitors entering an unmarried woman's bedroom at night. Night courting, bundling, or festerln was organized in areas bordering the North Sea as well as the Alps and Baltic region.

See also

  • Non-penetrative sex

References

Sources

  • Shachtman, Tom. Rumspringa: To Be or Not to Be Amish. New York: North Point Press (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), 2006.
  • Ekrich, Roger A. At Day's Close: Night in Times Past. Chapter 7, 2005.
  • Walsh, William S.: Handy Book of Curious Information. J. B. Lippincott Company, 1913
  • Little Known Facts about Bundling in the New World by Ammon Monroe Aurand Jr (1895–1956)
  • Folk Lore of the Pennsylvania Germans
  • "Bundling" in the Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online