Enforcement of consent laws based on the participants’ actual ages were not common until the 19th century, because proof of age and date of birth were not readily available.
The American colonists initially followed English tradition, which commonly recognized marriage at ages as young as 9 years, in the subject of marriage and sex. Christianity made it clear to its followers that sexual relations outside marriage was forbidden, and children were commonly held responsible, and punished, for submitting to sexual acts with an adult. The accepted age of marriage at the time was 12 years.
This Westminster 1 statute made it a crime to “ravish” a maiden younger than the age of marriage, with or without her consent. The first written age of consent law found by historians comes from England in 1275.