Concubinage in Canada
Largely unrecognised by modern courts, concubinage – the formal position of a mistress maintaining a religiously-sanctioned partnership with a man to whom she is not wed – has a varied history when it has appeared in Canada. The term "concubine" has many definitions, referring to any illicit lasting relationship with an unmarried woman, or an "unmarried wife", or an extra-marital partner to a married man.