Marriage certificate

Common card · No. 327314

A marriage certificate (colloquially marriage lines) is an official statement that two people are married to each other. In most jurisdictions, a marriage certificate is issued by a government official only after the civil registration of the marriage after application by one of the parties and the payment of a fee. In some jurisdictions, especially in the United States, a marriage certificate is the official record that two people have undertaken a marriage ceremony. This includes jurisdictions where marriage licenses do not exist. In other jurisdictions, a marriage license serves a dual purpose of granting permission for a marriage to take place and then endorsing the same document to record the fact that the marriage has been performed. A marriage certificate may be required for a number of purposes. It may be required as evidence of change of a party's name, on issues of legitimacy of a child, during divorce proceedings, or as part of a genealogical history, besides other purposes.

Read on Wikipedia