What is "bridewealth"

Usage examples of "bridewealth".

Some of the Sun People tribes had sent in fairly bitter complaints about girls running off for this reason or that—being married to suitors they didn't like was the most common—and their fathers having to repay the bridewealth and swallow public shame.

And what young man his age had bridewealth, with the price of a wife going up all the time and no cattle raids to make a poor young warrior rich?

Some of the Sun People tribes had sent in fairly bitter complaints about girls running off for this reason or that being married to suitors they didn’t like was the most common and their fathers having to repay the bridewealth and swallow public shame.

Among her people, a woman could divorce her husband by running away from him and seeing that the bridewealth he had given for her was returned.