By pledges are meant gifts, which serve to confirm and bear witness to the engagement, and which are the first marks of good will and happiness. These gifts are confirmations because they are tokens of consent. That is why, when two people agree on something, we say, 'Give me a token.' Similarly we say of a couple, who have engaged to get married and given presents to confirm the promise, that they are pledged, and so confirmed in the engagement.

[2] These gifts bear witness, because the pledges are as it were permanent visible evidence of mutual love, and so also serve to call this to mind, especially if they are rings, pomanders and sashes which are worn so as to be seen. They form a kind of pictorial image of the intentions of the engaged couple. The pledges are the first marks of good will, because conjugial love promises itself everlasting good will, and these gifts are its first fruits. They are marks of the happiness of love, as is well known; for on seeing them the mind is cheered, and since there is love in them, these marks of good will are more dear and more precious than any other gifts whatsoever. It is as if their hearts were in them.

[3] Since these pledges serve to establish conjugial love, the giving of presents after giving consent was an accepted practice among the people of antiquity, and when they had been accepted, the couple were pronounced engaged. It should, however, be known that it is a matter of choice whether the presents are given before or after the ceremony of engagement. If given before, they confirm and bear witness to the agreement to become engaged; if afterwards, they confirm and bear witness to the agreement to marry.