In the story “Pride and Prejudice” by Jane Austen the family had five girls Jane, Elizabeth, Mary, Kitty and Lydia who the family all wanted to get married to someone . Author Jane Austen explains the entire story of a middle-class family raising five daughters and forcing them to marry. Marriage played an important role in the life of the family. It's almost as if they were supposed to be married. The only thing the mother cared about was whether her daughters would get married. He would try to find men to marry his daughters. At the time, being single, women were looked down upon. Social restrictions on women played in marriage played a big role in history and marriages in the 1800s. In the story “Pride and Prejudice” women had many obligations and few choices. Women were completely controlled by men throughout their lives. The goal of women in the 1800s and throughout history is to find a husband, have children, and spend the rest of their lives in service to their husband. There were many rules that women had to follow that affected marriage. The unmarried woman looked forward to living with her relatives as a dependent, so marriage is basically the only way to escape parental control. “Women got married because they had no options; they were not previously educated and were instructed only in domestic tasks. They needed someone to support them and were encouraged to get married and have children” (Ziegenfuss). If a woman were to remain single she would be despised and pitied by the community in which she lives. The rules for women were so strict that it's as if she had to be a slave to her husband. “They had to obey the men, because in most cases the men held all the resources and the woman… middle of paper… an inquisitive mind would be able to further her education independently through reading” (Austen). In the 1800s unmarried women were school teachers because they were not married and had to be homemakers. Typically, women were not allowed to receive an education or gain knowledge outside the home because it was a man's world. The roles women played in the book "Pride and Prejudice" and in the early 1800s were important in a marriage because women did everything. They cooked, cleaned, taught their children everything. If there hadn't been women then then everything would have been a disaster because it was the women who did everything. Men took advantage of the good things they had then. A young woman who emerged into this life had difficulties. They didn't know they had it hard, but thinking back to the bad things men did, it was hard to be a woman in the 1800.