A Saudi man married four women at the same time just to prove his ex-wife was wrong when she told him no other woman would marry him.

The Saudi woman had thought her 23-year-old ex-husband was bluffing when he told her he would marry four women at the same night to show she was mistaken, the Arabic language daily Alwatan reported on Wednesday.

“He fulfilled his promise and married four women at the same time and in one night just to vex his ex-wife,” the paper said.

It quoted the unidentified man from the southwestern province of Asir as saying he divorced his first wife because their marriage was a total failure.

“After I divorced her a few months later, she defied me and said that I will not be able to marry again as no other woman will accept me,” he said. “I replied by swearing to her that I will marry four at the same time and in one night.”

Alwatan said the man paid his four new wives around SR80,000 (Dh78,000) as dowry (money paid by bridegrooms to their brides under Islamic law).

The man also paid SR10,000 (Dh9,900) in expenses for his honey moon, the paper added, without making clear if the honey moon involved all the four.

Under Islamic law, Muslim men can have four wives at the same time and such an edict has given rise to polygamy in the oil-rich Gulf.