"Manus" marriage was an institutionally unequal relationship. By the time of Julius Caesar, it was largely abandoned in favour of "free" marriage; when a wife moved into her husband's home, she remained under her father's lawful authority; but she did not conduct her daily life under his direct scrutiny. and her husband had no legal power over her. This was one of the factors in the independence Roman women enjoyed, relative to those of many other ancient cultures and up to the modern period: Free marriage usually involved two citizens of equal or near-equal status, or a citizen and a person who held Latin rights. In the later Imperial period and with official permission, soldier-citizens and non-citizens could marry. So total was the law's separation of property that gifts between spouses were recognised as conditional loans; if a couple divorced or even lived apart, the giver could reclaim the gift.