The historian Barbara Hanawalt believes that it was certainly the case that amongst the peasantry men and women possessed a degree of freedom in choosing their spouses that was quite unlike members of the nobility.

Boys and girls would often grow up working together in the same settings and fields and develop lasting bonds of affection that could mature into sexual desire and/or consent for marriage.

One of her most interesting observations was that premarital sex, far from being a taboo, was often a pre-condiiton for marriage. It ensured that the bride-to-be was indeed fertile and would therefore be a good match in creating a family. Barbara Hanawalt, The Ties that Bound: Peasant Families in Medieval England (Oxford: OUP, 1986), 196.

However the capacity for some young men and women to successfully exercise their own agency over choosing a spouse should not distort the general picture. Family members and friends more often than not played significant roles in facilitating and governing the circumstances of courtship, and did so for obvious reasons such as the management of property and the furthering of family interests.

"In cases where the marriage was part of the family's economic and social strategy, careful planning by the whole unit was needed, for a good marriage that could bring considerable economic benefits." Ibid, 198.