Like much of the Middle East, a discourse about a “marriage crisis” –namely, the delay of marriage (or the forgoing of marriage all together) as a result of the high cost of marriage celebrations and establishing a separate household, as well as higher education and migration – has circulated throughout Jordan in recent years (with historical precursors as well). The crisis is framed as simultaneously economic, moral and national in nature. The delay or foregoing of marriage all together has been invariably linked to moral corruption, a crisis of delayed adulthood, excessive rates of spinsterhood, and even religious and political extremism among youth. Much of the economic analysis of the “marriage crisis” paints a picture of a stagnant institution of marriage clashing with new material realities. Paradoxically, the media, as well as charitable and community organizations concerned with this crisis, often tackle it by contrasting an idealized marriage “history” with what is viewed as corrupt and inauthentic contemporary marriage innovations. Their solution to the marriage crisis then is framed as a return to the past. Drawing on ethnographic research in Jordan, this paper analyzes memories, or memorializing of marriage traditions of old and the ways in which Jordanian institutions and actors draw on memories of marriage traditions and celebrations to address a contemporary “marriage crisis.” Drawing on this data, I highlight the image(s) of marriage in history that different Jordanians choose to highlight, “remember”, or romanticize and to what ends. Finally, I point to the ways in which marriage has indeed been transformed in a contemporary era, arguing that neither the image of unchanging marriage traditions clashing with contemporary economic realities, nor the ideal of marriages of old are sufficient for understanding how young adults conceive of marriage, marriage partners and marriageablity today.