This quarter saw a rise in the number of civil weddings with respect to the same period the previous year, rising from 953 in 2002 to 1,014 in 2003, according to Eustat data. Traditionally, over the final months of the year there is a higher proportion of civil weddings (47.9%) than in the summer months (28.5%), when almost 4 out of 10 weddings are held. Conversely, there was a slight fall in the total number of weddings.

Of the 2,117 weddings held in the fourth quarter of 2003, 2,042 of the men and 2,092 of the women who married were residents in the A.C. of the Basque Country. For 1,877 grooms (91%) it was their first wedding, while 20 widowers and 145 divorcés remarried. The percentage of first weddings for women was slightly higher: there were 1,939 first-time brides (92,7%), 13 widows and 140 divorcées.

As regards the distribution of marriages according to the age of the bride and groom in the fourth quarter of 2003, 71% of grooms were over 30, while for brides this figure stood at 54.1%. These proportions are higher than those of the same quarter the previous year.

For 2003 as a whole, the total number of weddings involving people resident in the A.C. of the Basque Country was 9,946 and, in the absence of data on weddings held outside the A.C. of the Basque Country, there were 79 more weddings than the previous year. The proportion of civil weddings was higher than in 2002, accounting for 38.4% of the total.

In keeping with the trend to marry later, 66% of grooms and 47% of brides who got married during 2003 were aged 30 or over, a higher percentage than the previous year.