This is a bit late - it refers to comments made about 2 pages ago. But nevertheless:
The custom of a woman taking a man' surname on marriage is NOT a very old one. From the sixteenth century, parish registers (religious records of baptisms, marriages and burials) recorded couples' names, but they reveal a mixed picture: very often they write of (eg) 'Mary Smith the wife of John Jones'. And even male surnames, changed, too, with change of residence, occupation or even on marriage.
What really fixed surnames was the introduction of compulsory state registration of births, marriages and deaths in the 19th century, plus ten-yearly censuses of population. They recorded all names in relation to the 'head' of the household. That was usually a man, though it could be a widowed or single woman.
Even today, a surname is not legally fixed in the same way as a first name. You can call yourself any surname you like, so long as you don't intend fraud. It makes it easier, when dealing with officialdom, to change a name officially. But legally, that's not essential.
The concept of a woman passing from her father's guardianship to her husband's on marriage is much older than the use of surnames. So is the concept of a woman's property usually passing to her husband on marriage (this was abolished/amended in the 19th cent). The ideas overlapped, but were not intrinsically connected.
None of this solves the OP's problem, which seems to be that her husband is too easily influenced by his family and is ignoring thier own earlier understanding.