Historians have examined the Reformations' numerous effects on sixteenth-century beliefs andpractices concerning marriage, the family, and sex. While some historians have extolled Protestant reformers for championing marriage as an idealized state and introducing divorce, more recent historical research has shown how these reforms either furthered patriarchal regimes or did little to change existing customary practices and beliefs. This dissertation explores how the Reformation reshaped European marriage practices apart from questions concerning the success and failures of reforms in specific states and cities. In analyzing cases from the Dutch-speaking Reformed diaspora, this dissertation asserts that the Reformation’s primary influence on sixteenth-century marriage practices lay not in the application of any new theology but in how churches and individuals adapted to the fracturing of the religious geography of Europe. Sixteenth-century individuals crossed into confessionally different jurisdictions to form marriages with individuals to whom their own religious community and family objected to the union.