Marriage and related rules in pre-Islamic Central Asian steppe societies

The purpose of this research is to describe the manner of marriage and its related rules in the steppe societies of Central Asia in the pre-Islamic era. Therefore, after defining the steppe geography of Central Asia, it focused on the communities of this region and determined the main characteristics of the family institution among them. In the next step, marriage, traditions, and related conditions were taken into consideration and in-group, out-group, and political marriages were investigated as the most important types of marriages. Also, two of the most important marriage traditions of the steppe societies of Central Asia were investigated by focusing on the Leviratus tradition and the Qalin tradition, and it was found that the way of life of the people of those areas played an important role in the advent of such traditions. The final stage of this article was dedicated to examining the issue of polygamy and divorce. According to this research, polygamy was not common in all of the target communities, and it mainly depended on the man's economic status. Although divorce was not very common, it had different qualities depending on the type of issues between men and women; However, the norms of the steppe societies had caused the rights of both parties to be respected during divorce.