In spite of the strict rules and defences, boys and girls are bound to see each other in the ordinary daily round of work. Some at least manage to exchange messages and arrange secret meetings. Occasionally such an affair ends in elopement.
The Turkish kïz kaçirma, to make a girl run away, is nearer in meaning to `kidnapping' than `elopement', and puts the responsibility firmly on the man. It is a recognised, although dangerous and disapproved, method of acquiring a wife. It not only provides for passion in a system in which it is formally ignored, it also provides a way of evading the heavy costs of normal marriage; and occasionally it can be a move in hostilities between lineages.
Five out of the 134 contemporary marriages in Sakaltutan were known to me to have begun with elopement and I am confident there were others about which I did not hear. Three cases were said to have taken place in a neighbouring village during our stay in Sakaltutan, and one actually occurred in Elbashï during our stay there. Roughly I would estimate that about one marriage in twenty begins by elopement - more towards the lower end of the village hierarchy than at the top.
An elopement involves three parties, the families of the two young people, and the couple as a new unit. Normally, the young man takes his bride to his.own household, who ought by rights to be ashamed, but in fact are usually not unduly distressed. The bride's family of the other household are expected to react strongly, to threaten violence, and to be difficult to reconcile. In practice, what happens depends on the situation. I was not able to gather full material on any one elopement, though I heard of a number both past and present.