THE POSITION OF WOMAN
IN PRIMITIVE SOCIETY

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

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THE
POSITION OF WOMAN
IN PRIMITIVE SOCIETY

A
STUDY OF THE MATRIARCHY

BY
C. GASQUOINE HARTLEY
(MRS. WALTER M. GALLICHAN)
AUTHOR OF “THE TRUTH ABOUT WOMAN.”

LONDON
EVELEIGH NASH
1914

DEDICATION

TO ALL WOMEN

“Be not ashamed, women, your privilege includes the rest....
You are the gates of the body, you are the gates of the soul....
And I say it is as great to be a woman as to be a man.
And I say there is nothing greater than the mother of men.”
Walt Whitman.

7 Carlton Terrace,
Child’s Hill.
1914.

CONTENTS

PART I
THE PRIMITIVE FAMILY

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTORY

The twentieth century is the age of Woman; some day, it may be that it will be looked back upon as the golden age, the dawn, some say, of feminine civilisation. We cannot estimate as yet; and no man can tell what forces these new conditions may not release in the soul of woman. The modern change is that the will of woman is asserting itself. Women are looking for a satisfactory life, which is to be determined from within themselves, not from without by others. The result is a discontent that may well prove to be the seed or spring of further changes in a society which has yet to find its normal organisation. Yes, women are finding themselves, and men are discovering what women mean.

In the present time we are passing through a difficult period of transition. There are conditions of change that have to be met, the outcome of which it is very difficult to appreciate. A transformation in the thought and conduct of women, for which the term “revolution” is not too strong, is taking place around us; doubtless many experimental phases will be tried before we reach a new position of equilibrium.

This must be. There can be no life without movement.

The expression, “a transition period,” is, of course, only relative. We often say: This or that is a sign of the present era; and, nine times out of ten, the thing we believe to be new is in reality as old as the world itself. In one sense the whole of history is a vast transition. No period stands alone; the present is in every age merely the shifting point at which the past and the future meet. All things move onwards. But the movement sometimes takes the form of a cataract, at others of an even and almost imperceptible current. This is really another way of saying that the usually slow and gradual course of change is, at certain stages, interrupted by a more or less prolonged period of revolution. The process of growth, from being gradual and imperceptible, becomes violent and conscious.

There can be little doubt that what is called the “Woman’s Movement,” with its disintegrating influences on social opinion and practice, is bringing vast and momentous changes in women’s attitude towards the universe and towards themselves. A great motive and an enlarging ideal, a quickening of the woman’s spirit, a stirring dream of a new order—these are what we have gained. We are carried on, though as yet we know not whither, and there is, of necessity, a little stumbling of our feet as we seek for a way. Hence the fear, always tending to arise in periods of social reconstruction, which is felt by many to-day as women pass out far beyond the established boundaries prescribed for their sex.

Whoever reflects soberly on the past history of women will not be surprised at their present movement towards emancipation. Women are reclaiming a position that is theirs by natural right—a position which once they held. It may be all very well for those who accept the authority and headship of the man as the foundation of the family and of society, to be filled with bewildered fear at what seems to them to be a quite new assertion of rights on the part of the mothers of the race. But has the family at all stages of growth been founded on the authority of the father? Our decision on this question will affect our outlook on the whole question of Woman’s Rights and the relationships of the two sexes. There are civilisations, older and, as I believe, wiser than ours that have accepted the predominant position of the mother as the great central fact on which the family has been established.

The view that the family, much as it existed among the Hebrew patriarchs, and as it exists to-day, was primeval and universal is very deeply rooted. This is not surprising. To reverse the gaze of men from themselves is no easy task. The predominance of the male over the female, of the man over the woman and of the father over the mother, has been accepted, almost without question, in a civilisation built up on the recognition of male values and male standards of opinion. Thus the institutions, habits, prejudices, and superstitions of the patriarchal authority rest like an incubus upon us. The women of to-day carry the dead load upon their backs, and literally stagger beneath the accumulating burden of the ages.

The “Woman’s Movement” is pressing us forward towards a recasting of the patriarchal view of the relative position and duties of the two sexes. It must be regarded as an extremely great and comprehensive movement affecting the whole of life. From this wider standpoint, the fight for the parliamentary suffrage is but as the vestibule to progress; the possession of the vote being no more than a necessary condition for attaining far larger and more fundamental ends.

It is, however, very necessary to remark that the recognition of this imposes a great responsibility upon women. For one thing the practical difficulties of the present must be faced. It is far from easy to readjust existing conditions to meet the new demands. Present social and economic conditions are to a great extent chaotic. We cannot safely cast aside, in any haste for reform, those laws, customs and opinions which it has been the slow task of our civilisation to establish, not for men only, but for women. We women have to work out many questions far more thoroughly than hitherto we have done. We owe this to our movement and to the world of men. It will serve nothing to pull down, unless we are ready also to build up. Freedom can be granted only to the self-disciplined.

“Thou that does know the Self and the not-Self, expert in every work: endowed with self-restraint and perfect same-sightedness towards every creature free from the sense of I and my—thy power and energy are equal to my own, and thou hast practised the most severe discipline.”[1]

This little book is an attempt to establish the position of the mother in the family. It sets out to investigate those early states of society, when, through the widespread prevalence of descent through the mother, the survival of the family clan and, in some cases, the property rights were dependent on women and not on men. I start from the belief that the mother was at one period the dominant partner in the sexual relationships. This does not, however, at all necessarily involve “rule by women.” We must be very clear here. What I claim is this. The system by which the family was built up and grouped around the mother conferred special rights on women. The form of marriage favourable to this influence was that by which the husband entered the wife’s family and clan, and lived there as a “consort-guest.” The wife and mother was director in the home, the owner of the meagre property, the distributor of food, and the controller of the children.[2] Hence arises what is known as mother-right.

I am prompted to this inquiry by two reasons: in the first place, the origin of the maternal-system and the subsequent association of the mother and the father appear to me to afford evidence of the working of a natural law of the two sexes, which, both for social and other reasons, is of great interest in the present stage of women’s history. The establishing of the mother’s position is of great importance. If we can prove that women have exercised unquestioned and direct authority in the past history of human societies, we shall be in a position to answer those who to-day wish to set limits to women’s activities. Then, in the second place, I am compelled to doubt certain conclusions, both of those who accept mother-right, and also of the greater number who now deny its occurrence. If I am right, and the importance of the maternal family has been unduly neglected and the true explanation of its origin overlooked, I feel that, whatever errors I may fall into, I am justified in undertaking this task. My mistakes will be corrected by others with more knowledge than I can claim; and if my theory of mother-right has any merit, it will be established in more competent hands. The vast majority of investigators on these questions are men. I am driven to believe that sometimes they are mistaken in their interpretation of habits and customs which arose among primitive societies in which the influence of women was marked. In dealing with the family and its origin it has been usual to consider the male side and to pass over the female members. This has led, I am sure, to much error.

The custom of tracing descent through the mother, either practised consciously and completely, or only as a survival, occurs among many primitive peoples in all parts of the world. Whether, however, it existed universally and from all time, or whether only in certain races, among whose institutions it remains or may still be traced, is a much debated question. Not all barbarous tribes are in the stage of mother-right; on the contrary many reckon descent through the father. But even where the latter is the case, vestiges of the former system are frequently to be found. There seems to be a common tendency to discredit a system of relationship, which suggests even as a bare possibility the mother, and not the father, being the head of the family. Yet, I believe I can assign some, at least plausible, reasons for believing that descent through women has been a stage, though not, I think, the first stage, in social growth for all branches of the human family.

There can be little doubt of the importance of kinship and inheritance being reckoned through the mother. If the children belong to her, and if by marriage the husband enters her home, the greater influence, based on the present possession of property, and the future hope of the family rests on the female side. Such conditions must have exercised strong influence on the position of the women members of the primitive clan and the honour in which they were held. It cannot be ignored.

Of course, this does not prevent the hardships of savage life weighing more heavily in many ways upon women than on the stronger men. In primitive societies women have a position quite as full of anomalies as they hold among civilised races. Among some tribes their position is extremely good; among others it is undoubtedly bad, but, speaking generally, it is much better than usually it is held to be.[3] Obviously the causes must be sought in the environment and in social organisation. The differences in the status and power of women, often occurring in tribes at the same level of progress, would seem to be dependent largely on economic conditions. The subject is full of difficulties. Not only is the position of women thus variable, but our knowledge of the matter is very defective. It is seldom, indeed, that the question has been considered of sufficient importance to receive accurate attention.[4] Not infrequently conflicting accounts are given by different authorities, and even by the same writer.

I wish it to be understood that mother-right does not necessarily imply mother-rule. This system may even be combined with the patriarchal authority of the male. The unfortunate use of the term Matriarchate has led to much confusion. My own knowledge and study of primitive customs and ancient civilisations have made it plain to me that there has been a constant rise and fall of male and female dominance, but, I believe, that, on the whole, the superiority of women has been more frequent and more successful than that of men.

It is this that I shall attempt to prove.

The theory of mother-right has been subjected to so much criticism that a re-examination of the position is very necessary. To show its prevalence, to establish some leading points in its history, to make out its connection with the patriarchal family, and to trace the transition by which one system passed into the other, appear to me to be matters primarily important. The limited compass of this little book will prevent my substantiating my own views as I should wish, with a full and systematic survey of all authentic accounts of the peoples among whom mother-descent may be studied. I have considered, however, that I could summarise the position in a comprehensive picture, that will, I hope, suggest a point of view that seems to me to have been very generally neglected.

It is necessary to enter into such an inquiry with caution; the difficulties before me are very great. Nothing would be easier than from the mass of material available to pile up facts in furnishing a picture of the high status of women among many tribes under the favourable influence of mother-descent, that would unnerve any upholders of the patriarchal view of the subordination of women. It is just possible, on the other hand, to interpret these facts from a fixed point of thought of the father’s authority as the one support of the family, and then to argue that, in spite of the mother’s control over her children and over property, she still remained the inferior partner. I wish to do neither. It is my purpose to examine the evidence, and so to discover to what extent the system of tracing descent through the female side conferred any special claim for consideration upon women. I shall try to avoid mistakes. I put forward my own opinions with great diffidence. It is so easy, as I realise full well, to interpret facts by the bias of one’s own wishes. I know that the habits and customs of primitive peoples that I have studied closely are probably few in comparison with those I have missed; yet to me they appear of such importance in the light they throw on the whole question of the relationships of the two sexes, that it seems well to bring them forward.

Since my attention, now many years ago, was first directed to this question, I have felt that a clear and concise account of the mother-age was indispensable for women. Such an account, with a criticism of the patriarchal theory, is here offered. Throughout I have attempted to clear up and bring into uniformity the two opposing theories of the origin of the human family. I have tried to gather the facts, very numerous and falling into several classes, by which the theory of the mother-age could be supported. And first it was necessary to clear out of the way a body of opinion, the prevalence of which has opposed an obstacle to the acceptance of the rights of mothers in the family relationship. The whole question turns upon which you start with; the man—the woman, or the woman—the man.

Here it should be explained that this little book is an expansion of the historical section which treats of “the Mother-age civilisation” in my former book, The Truth About Woman. I wish to take this opportunity of expressing my gratitude for the generous interest and sympathy with which my work has been received. Such kindness is very imperfectly repaid by an author’s thanks; it is certainly the best incentive to further work.

This little volume was suggested to me by a review in one of the Suffrage papers. The writer, after speaking of the interest to women of the mother-age and the difficulty there was in gaining information on the subject, said that “a small and cheaper book on the matriarchate would be useful to women in all countries.” I was grateful for this suggestion. I at once felt that I wanted to write such a book. For one thing, this particular section on the mother-age in The Truth About Woman, and my belief in the favourable influence of mother-descent on the status of women, has been much questioned. I have been told that I “had quite deliberately gone back to our uncivilised ancestors to ‘fish up’ the precedent of the matriarchate;” that I “had allowed my prejudices to dictate my choice of material, and had thus brought forward examples explanatory of my own opinions;” that I “had fastened eagerly on these, without inquiring too carefully about other facts having a contrary tendency.” I was reminded of what I well knew, that the matriarchate and promiscuity with which it is usually connected were not universally accepted by anthropologists; the tendency to-day being to discredit both as being among the early phases of society. It was suggested that I “had unprofitably spent my time on the historical section of my book, and had built up my theory on a curiously uncertain foundation;” that I “had relied too much on the certain working of mother-right, and had been by no means clear in showing how, from such a position of power, women had sunk into subservience to patriarchal rule.” In fact, it has seemed to be the opinion of my critics that I had allowed what I “would have liked to have happened to affect my account of what did happen in the infancy of man’s social life.”

Now, I want to say quite frankly, that I feel much of this criticism is just. The inquiry on the mother-age civilisation was only one small section of my book on Woman. I realise that very much was hurried over. There is on this subject of the origin of the family a literature so extensive, and such a variety of opinions, that the work of the student is far from easy. The whole question is too extensive to allow anything like adequate treatment within the space of a brief, and necessarily insufficient, summary. My earlier investigation may well be objected to as not being in certain points supported by sufficient proofs. I know this. It is not easy to condense the marriage customs and social habits of many different peoples into a few dozen pages. Of course, I selected my examples. But this I may say; I chose those which had brought me to accept mother-right. I was driven to this belief by my own study and reading long before the time of writing my book. What I really tried to do was to present to others the facts that had convinced me. But my stacks of unused notes, collected for my own pleasure during many years of work, are witness to how much I had to leave out.

I know that many objections that have been raised to the theory of mother-right were left unanswered. I dismissed much too lightly the patriarchal theory of the origin of the family, which during late years has gained such advocacy. I failed to carry my inquiry far enough back. I accepted with too little caution an early period of promiscuous sexual relationships. I did not make clear the stages in the advance of the family to the clan and the tribe; nor examine with sufficient care the later transition period in which mother-right gave place to father-right.

I have been sent back to examine again my own position. And to do this, it was necessary first to take up the question from the position of those whose views are in opposition to my own. I have made a much more extensive study of those authorities who, rejecting mother-right, accept a modification of the patriarchal theory as the origin of the family. This has led to some considerable recasting of my views. Not at all, however, to a change in my belief in mother-right, which, indeed, has now been strengthened, and, as I trust, built up on surer foundations.

By a fortunate chance, I was advised to read Mr. Andrew Lang’s Social Origins,[5] which work includes Mr. Atkinson’s Primal Law. I am greatly indebted to the assistance I have gained from these writers. It is, perhaps, curious that a very careful study of the patriarchal family as it is presented by Mr. Atkinson and Mr. Lang, has brought me to a conclusion fundamentally at variance from what might have been expected. I have gained invaluable support for my own belief in mother-right, and have found fresh proofs from the method of difference. I have cleared up many points that previously puzzled me. I am able now to accept the patriarchal theory, without at all shaking my faith in a subsequent period of mother-descent and mother-power.

The discussion on this question is now half a century old. Yet in spite of the opposition of many investigators, and the support of others, the main problems are still unsettled. What form did the family take in its earliest stage? Did it start as a small group or with the clan or horde? What were the earliest conditions of the sexual relationships? Was promiscuity at one period the rule? Was the foundation of the family based on the authority of the father, or of the mother? If on that of the father, how is mother-kin and mother-right to be explained? These are among the questions that must be answered. Not till this is done, can we establish any theory of mother-descent, or estimate its effect on the status of women.

The whole subject is a very wide and complicated one. If I differ on several important points from learned authorities, whose knowledge and research far exceed my own, I do so only after great hesitation, and because I must. The facts they have collected from their personal knowledge of primitive peoples (facts which I have gratefully used) often suggest quite opposite conclusions to my thoughts than to theirs—the view-point is different, that is all. They were seeking for one thing; I for another: they were men; I am a woman. It would be foolishness for me to attempt any special pleadings for my own opinions. How far I shall succeed, or fail, to make clear to others a period of mother-right that is certain to me, I do not know. I offer my little book with all humility, and yet without any apology. We may read and learn and gather knowledge from many sources; but the opinions of others we cannot take on credit; we must re-think them out for ourselves, and make them our own.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The Mahābhārata. The Great God thus addresses Shakti, when he asks her to describe the duties of women. I quote from a pamphlet by Dr. Ananda Coomaraswamy: Sati: A Vindication of the Hindu Woman.

[2] McGee: “The Beginning of Marriage,” American Anthropologist, Vol. IV, p. 378.

[3] Westermarck, “The Position of Women in Early Civilisations,” Sociological Papers, 1904.

[4] For instance, Maine (Early Law and Custom), in speaking of tribes who still trace their descent from a single ancestress, says, “The outlines” (i. e. of the maternal family) “may still be marked out, if it be worth any one’s while to trace it.”

[5] This book was mentioned to me in a letter from Mr. H. G. Wells.

CHAPTER II

AN EXPOSITION OF BACHOFEN’S THEORY OF THE MATRIARCHATE

Fifty-three years ago in his great work, Das Mutterrecht,[6] the Swiss writer, Bachofen, drew the attention of the world to the fact that a system of kinship through mothers only prevailed among many primitive peoples, while survivals of the custom could be widely, if but faintly, traced among civilised races. Drawing his evidence from the actual statements of old writers, but more from legends and the mythologies of antiquity, he came to the conclusion that a system of descent through women had, in all cases, preceded the rise of kinship through males. Almost at the same time Dr. J. F. McLennan,[7] ignorant of the work of Bachofen, came to the same opinion. This led to a reconsideration of the patriarchal theory; and for a time it was widely held that in the early stages of society a matriarchate prevailed, in which women held the supreme power. Further support came from Morgan, with his knowledge of the maternal family among American aborigines, and he was followed by Professor Tylor, McGee, and many other investigators.

Obviously this gynæcocratic view, which placed woman in a new relation to man, was unlikely to be permanently accepted. Thus a reaction to the earlier theory of the patriarchal family has set in, especially in recent years. Many writers, while acknowledging the existence of mother descent, deny that such a system carries with it, except in a few exceptional cases, mother-rights of special advantage to women; even when these seem to be present they believe such rights to be more apparent than real.

In bringing forward any theory of mother-right, it thus becomes necessary to show the causes that have led to this reversal in opinion. To do this, the first step will be to examine, with considerable detail, the evidence for the matriarchal theory as it is given by its two great supporters. Now, an interesting point arises, if we compare the view of Bachofen with that held by McLennan. No two ways could well be further apart than those by which these two men arrived at the same conclusion. Both accept an early period of promiscuous sexual relationships. But Bachofen found the explanation of mother-descent in the supremacy of women, and believed a matriarchate to have been established by them in a moral revolt against such hetaïrism. Mr. McLennan, on the other hand, regarded the custom as due to uncertainty of paternity—the children were called after the mother because the father was unknown.

Let us concentrate our attention on the Das Mutterrecht of Bachofen, whose work as the great champion of matriarchy claims our most careful consideration. And it is necessary to say at once that there can be no doubt his view of women’s supremacy is greatly exaggerated. Such a rule of women, at the very early stage of society when mother-kin is supposed to have arisen, is not proved, and does not seem probable. Even if it existed, it could not have originated in the way and for the reasons that are credited by the Swiss writer. I wish to emphasise this point. Much of the discredit that has fallen on the matriarchate has arisen, I am certain, through the impossibility of accepting Bachofen’s mythical account of its origin. This great supporter of women was a dreamer, rather than a calm and impartial investigator. Founding his main theory on assumptions, he asks us to accept these as historical facts. Much of his work and his belief in women must be regarded as the rhapsodies of a poet. And yet, it is the poet who finds the truth. The poetic spirit is, in one sense, the most practical of all. Bachofen saw the fact of mother-power, though not why it was the fact, and he enfolded his arguments in a garment of pure fiction.

To disengage from his learned book, Das Mutterrecht,[8] his theory of the origin of the Matriarchate is no easy task. There is, for one thing, such bewildering contradiction and confusion in the material used. Then the interpretation of the mythical tales, so freely intermingled everywhere, is often strained—prompted by a poetic imagination which snatches at every kind of allegory. Often the views expressed are inconsistent with each other, the arguments and proofs are disconnected, while many of the details are hopelessly obscure and confused. Yet it seems to me possible to recognise the idea which brings into unity the mass of his work—the spirit, as it were, that breathes into it its life. It may be found in the clear appreciation of the superstitious and mystical element in primitive man, and their close interweaving with the sexual life. As I understand Herr Bachofen, the sex-act was the means which first opened up ways to great heights, but also to great depths.

Bachofen strongly insists on the religious element in all early human thought. He believes that the development of the primitive community only advanced by means of religious ideas.

“Religion,” he says, “is the only efficient lever of all civilisation. Each elevation and depression of human life has its origin in a movement which begins in this supreme department.”[9]

The authority for this belief is sought in religious myths.

“Mythical tradition appears to be the faithful interpretation of the progress of the law of life, at a time when the foundations of the historical development of the ancient world were laid; it reveals the original mode of thought, and we may accept this direct revelation as true from our complete confidence in this source of history.”[10]

This mystical religious element, which is the essential part of Das Mutterrecht, is closely connected by Bachofen with the power of women. As it is his belief that, even at this early period, the religious impulse was more developed among women than men, he bases on this unproved hypothesis his theory of women’s supremacy. “Wherever gynæcocracy meets us,” he says, “the mystery of religion is bound up with it, and lends to motherhood an incorporation in some divinity.”[11]

Doubtless this theory of a higher feminine spirituality is a pleasing one for women—but is it true? The insuperable difficulty to its acceptance arises, in the first place, from the fact that we can know nothing at all of the spiritual condition of the human beings among whom mother-kin was held first to have been practised. But we must go further than this in our doubt. Can we accept for any period a spiritual superiority in the character of woman over man? To me, at least, it is clear that a knowledge of the two sexes among all races both primitive and civilised—yes, and among ourselves, is sufficient to discredit such a supposition.

Bachofen would have us believe that[12] the mother-right of the ancient world, was due to a revolt of women against the degraded condition of promiscuity, which previously had been universal among mankind, a condition in which men had a community of wives, and openly lived together like gregarious animals.

“Women, by their nature nobler and more spiritual than men, became disgusted with this lawless hetaïrism, and, under the influence of a powerful religious impulse, combined in a revolt (the first Amazonian movement) to put an end to promiscuity and established marriage.”

Over and over again Bachofen affirms this spiritual quality in women.

“The woman’s religious attitude, in particular, the tendency of her mind towards the supernatural and the divine, influenced the man and robbed him of the position which nature disposed him to take in virtue of his physical superiority. In this way women’s position was transformed by religious considerations, until they became in civil life what religion had caused them to be.”[13] And again: “We cannot fail to see that of the two forms of gynæcocracy in question—religious and civil—the former was the basis of the latter. Ideas connected with worship came first, and the civil forms of life were then the result and expression.”[14]

We may note in passing, the greater affectability of woman’s nature, which would seem always to have had a tendency to expression in religio-erotic manifestations. But to build up a theory of matriarchy on this foundation is strangely wide of the facts. Bachofen adduces the spirituality of women as the cause of their power. But on what grounds can such a claim be supported?

It is on the evidence of licentious customs of all kinds and on polyandry, that he bases his belief in a period of promiscuity. He regards this early condition of hetaïrism as a law of nature, and believes that after its infraction by the introduction of individual marriage, expiation was required to be made to the Earth Goddess, Demeter, in temporary prostitution. Hence he explains the widespread custom of religious prostitution. This fanciful idea may be taken to represent Bachofen’s method of interpretation. There is an intermediate stage between hetaïrism and marriage, such as the group-marriage, held by him to have been practised among barbarous peoples. “Each man has a wife, but they are all permitted to have intercourse with the wives of others.”[15]

Great stress is laid on the acquisition by women of the benefits of a marriage law. In the families founded upon individual marriage, which grew up after the Amazonian revolt, the women, and not the men, held the first place. Bachofen does not tell us whether they assigned this place to themselves, or had it conceded to them. Women were the heads of the families, the children were named after the mother, and not the father, and all the relations to which rights of succession attached were traced through women only. All property was held by women. Moreover, from this headship, women assigned to themselves, or had conceded to them, the social and political power as well as the domestic supremacy.[16]

The authority for this remarkable theory is sought, with great ingenuity and patience, in the fragmentary accounts of barbarous people, and in an exhaustive study of heroic stories and religious myths. Bachofen argues powerfully for the acceptance of these myths.

“Every age unconsciously obeys, even in its poetry, the laws of its individual life. A patriarchal age could not, therefore, have invented the matriarchate, and the myths which describe the latter may be regarded as trustworthy witnesses of its historical existence. It may be taken for granted that the myths did not refer to special persons and occurrences, but only tell us of the social customs and ideas which prevailed, or were endeavouring to prevail, in several communities.”[17]

This is true. It is the interpretation given to many of these myths that one is compelled to question. Bachofen’s way of applying mythical tales has no scientific method; for one thing, abstract ideas are added to primitive legends which could only arise from the thought of civilised peoples. For instance, he accepts, without any doubt, the existence of the Amazons; and believes that the myths which refer to them record “a revolt for the elevation of the feminine sex, and through them of mankind.” It is on such insecure foundations he builds up his matriarchal theory.

There is, however, an aspect of truth in Bachofen’s position, which becomes plain on a closer examination. To prove this, I must quote a passage from Das Mutterrecht, as representing, or at least suggesting, the opinions of those who have argued most strongly against his theory. When recapitulating the facts and arguments in favour of accepting the supremacy of women, he makes this suggestive statement—

“The first state in all cases was that of hetaïrism. The rule is based upon the right of procreation: since there is no individual fatherhood, all have only one father—the tyrant whose sons and daughters they all are, and to whom all the property belongs. From this condition in which the man rules by means of his rude sexual needs, we rise to that of gynæcocracy, in which there is the dawn of marriage, of which the strict observance is at first observed by the woman, not by the man. Weary of always ministering to the lusts of man, the woman raises herself by the recognition of her motherhood. Just as a child is first disciplined by its mother, so are people by their women. It is only the wife who can control the man’s essentially unbridled desires, and lead him into the paths of well-doing.... While man went abroad on distant forays, the woman stayed at home, and was undisputed mistress of the household. She took arms against her foe, and was gradually transformed into an Amazon.”[18]

The italics in the passage are mine, for they bear directly on what I shall afterwards have to prove: (1) that mother-right was not the first stage in the history of the human family; (2) that its existence is not inconsistent with the patriarchal theory. Bachofen here suggests a pre-matriarchal period in which the elementary family-group was founded on and held together by a common subjection to the oldest and strongest male. This is the primordial patriarchal family.

Then come the questions: Can we accept mother-right? Are there any reasonable causes to explain the rise of female dominance? Westermarck, in criticising the matriarchal theory, has said: “The inference that ‘kinship through females only’ has everywhere preceded the rise of ‘kinship through males,’ would be warranted only on condition that the cause, or the causes, to which the maternal system is owing, could be proved to have operated universally in the past life of mankind.”[19] Now, this is what I believe I am able to do. Hence it has been necessary first to clear the way of the old errors. Bachofen’s interpretation is too fanciful to find acceptance. Will any one hold it as true that the change came because women willed it? Surely it is a pure dream of the imagination to credit women, at this supposed early stage of society, with rising up to establish marriage, in a revolt of purity against sexual licence, and moreover effecting the change by force of arms! Bachofen would seem to have been touched with the Puritan spirit. I am convinced also that he understood very little of the nature of woman. Conventional morality has always acted on the side of the man, not the woman. The clue is, indeed, given in the woman’s closer connection with the home, and in the idea that “she raises herself by the recognition of her motherhood.” But the facts are capable of an entirely different interpretation. It will be my aim to give a quite simple, and even commonplace, explanation of the rise of mother-descent and mother-right in place of the spiritual hypothesis of Bachofen.

It will be well, however, to examine further Bachofen’s own theory. It is his opinion that the first Amazonian revolt and period of women’s rule was followed by a second movement—

“Woman took arms against her foe [i. e. man], and was gradually transformed into an Amazon. As a rival to the man the Amazon became hostile to him, and began to withdraw from marriage and from motherhood. This set limits to the rule of women, and provoked the punishment of heaven and men.”[20]

There is a splendid imaginative appeal in this remarkable passage. Again the italics are mine. It is, of course, impossible to accept this statement, as Bachofen does, as an historical account of what happened through the agency of women at the time of which he is treating. Yet, we can find a suggestion of truth that is eternal. Is there not here a kind of prophetic foretelling of every struggle towards readjustment in the relationships of the two sexes, through all the periods of civilisation, from the beginning until now? You will see what I mean. The essential fact for woman—and also for man—is the sense of community with the race. Neither sex can keep a position apart from parenthood. Just in so far as the mother and the father attain to consciousness and responsibility in their relations to the race do they reach development and power. Bachofen, as a poet, understood this; to me, at least, it is the something real that underlies all the delusion of his work. But I diverge a little in making these comments.

Again the origin of the change from the first period of matriarchy is sought by Bachofen in religion.

“Each stage of development was marked by its peculiar religious ideas, produced by the dissatisfaction with which the dominating idea of the previous stage was regarded; a dissatisfaction which led to a disappearance of this condition.” “What was gained by religion, fostering the cause of women, by assigning a mystical and almost divine character to motherhood was now lost through the same cause. The loss came in the Greek era. Dionysus started the idea of the divinity of fatherhood; holding the father to be the child’s true parent, and the mother merely the nurse.” In this way, we are asked to believe, the rights of men arose, the father came to be the chief parent, the head of the mother and the owner of the children, and, therefore, the parent through whom kinship was traced. We learn that, at first, “women opposed this new gospel of fatherhood, and fresh Amazonian risings were the common feature of their opposition.” But the resistance was fruitless. “Jason put an end to the rule of the Amazons in Lemnos. Dionysus and Bellerophon strove together passionately, yet without gaining a decisive victory, until Apollo, with calm superiority, finally became the conqueror, and the father gained the power that before had belonged to the mother.”[21]

But before this took place, Bachofen relates yet another movement, which for a time restored the early matriarchate. The women, at first opposing, presently became converts to the Dionysusian gospel, and were afterwards its warmest supporters. Motherhood became degraded. Bacchanalian excesses followed, which led to a return to the ancient hetaïrism. Bachofen believes that this formed a fresh basis for a second gynæcocracy. He compares the Amazonian period of these later days with that in which marriage was first introduced, and finds that “the deep religious impulse being absent, it was destined to fail, and give place to the spiritual Apollonic conception of fatherhood.”[22]

In Bachofen’s opinion this triumph of fatherhood was the final salvation. This is what he says—

“It was the assertion of fatherhood which delivered the mind from natural appearances, and when this was successfully achieved, human existence was raised above the laws of natural life. The principal of motherhood is common to all the spheres of animal life, but man goes beyond this tie in gaining pre-eminence in the process of procreation, and thus becomes conscious of his higher vocation. In the paternal and spiritual principle he breaks through the bonds of tellurism, and looks upwards to the higher regions of the cosmos. Victorious fatherhood thus becomes as distinctly connected with the heavenly light as prolific motherhood is with the teeming earth.”[23]

Here, Bachofen, as is his custom, turns to point an analogy with the process of nature.

“All the stages of sexual life from Aphrodistic hetaïrism to the Apollonistic purity of fatherhood, have their corresponding type in the stages of natural life, from the wild vegetation of the morass, the prototype of conjugal motherhood, to the harmonic law of the Uranian world, to the heavenly light which, as the flamma non urens, corresponds to the eternal youth of fatherhood. The connection is so completely in accordance with law, that the form taken by the sexual relation in any period may be inferred from the predominance of one or other of these universal ideas in the worship of a people.”[24]

Such, in outline, is Bachofen’s famous matriarchal theory. The passages I have quoted, with the comments I have ventured to give, make plain the poetic exaggeration of his view, and sufficiently prove why his theory no longer gains any considerable support. To build up a dream-picture of mother-rule on such foundations was, of necessity, to let it perish in the dust of scepticism. But is the downthrow complete? I believe not. A new structure has to be built up on a new and surer foundation, and it may yet appear that the prophetic vision of the dreamer enabled Bachofen to see much that has escaped the sight of those who have criticised and rejected his assumption that power was once in the hands of women.

One great source of confusion has arisen through the acceptance by the supporters of the matriarchate of the view that men and women lived originally in a state of promiscuity. This is the opinion of Bachofen, of McLennan, of Morgan, and also of many other authorities, who have believed maternal descent to be dependent on the uncertainty of fatherhood. It will be remembered that Mr. McLennan brought forward his theory almost simultaneously with that of Bachofen. The basis of his view is a belief in an ancient communism in women. He holds that the earliest form of human societies was the group or horde, and not the family. He affirms that these groups can have had no idea of kinship, and that the men would hold their women, like their other goods, in common, which is, of course, equal to a general promiscuity. There he agrees with Bachofen’s belief in unbridled hetaïrism, but a very different explanation is given of the change which led to regulation, and the establishment of the maternal family.

According to Mr. McLennan, the primitive group or horde, though originally without explicit consciousness of relationships, were yet held together by a feeling of kin. Such feeling would become conscious first between the mother and her children, and, in this way, mother-kin must have been realised at a very early period. Mr. McLennan then shows the stages by which the savage would gradually, by reflection, reach a knowledge of the other relationships through the mother, sister and brother relationships, mother’s brother and mother’s sister, and all the degrees of mother-kin, at a time before the father’s relation to his children had been established. The children, though belonging at first to the group, would remain attached to the mothers, and the blood-tie established between them would, as promiscuity gave place to more regulated sexual relationships, become developed into a system. All inheritance would pass through women only, and, in this way, mother-right would tend to be more or less strongly developed. The mother would live alone with her children, the only permanent male members of the family being the sons, who would be subordinate to her. The husband would visit the wife, as is the custom under polyandry, which form of the sexual relationship Mr. McLennan believes was developed from promiscuity—a first step towards individual marriage. Even after the next step was taken, and the husband came to live with his wife, his position was that of a visitor in her home, where she would have the protection of her own kindred. She would still be the owner of her children, who would bear her name, and not the father’s; and the inheritance of all property would still be in the female line.[25]

We have here what appears to be a much more reasonable explanation of mother-kin and mother-right than that of Bachofen. Yet many have argued powerfully against it. Westermarck especially, has shown that belief in an early stage of promiscuous relationship is altogether untenable.[26] It is needless here to enter into proof of this.[27] What matters now is that with the giving up of promiscuity the whole structure of McLennan’s theory falls to pieces. He takes it for granted that at one period paternity was unrecognised; but this is very far from being true. The idea of the father’s relationship to the child is certainly known among the peoples who trace descent through the mother; the system is found frequently where strict monogamy is practised. Again, Mr. McLennan connects polyandry with mother-descent, regarding the custom of plurality of husbands as a development from promiscuity. Here, too, he has been proved to be in error. Whatever the causes of the origin of polyandry, it has no direct connection with mother-kin, although it is sometimes practised by peoples who observe that system.

For myself, I incline to the opinion that the system by which inheritance passes through the mother needs no explanation. It was necessarily (and, as I believe, is still) the natural method of tracing descent. Moreover, it was adopted as a matter of course by primitive peoples among whom property considerations had not arisen. Afterwards what had started as a habit was retained as a system. The reasons for naming children after the mother did not rest on relationship, the earliest question was not one of kinship, but of association. Those were counted as related to one another who dwelt together.[28] The children lived with the mother, and therefore, as a matter of course, were called after her, and not the father, who did not live in the same home.

All these questions will be understood better as we proceed with our inquiry. The important thing to fix in our minds is that mother-kin and mother-right (contrary to the opinion of McLennan and others) may very well have arisen quite independently of dubious fatherhood. It thus becomes evident that the maternal system offers no evidence for the hypothesis of promiscuity; we shall find, in point of fact, that it arose out of the regulation of the sexual relations, and had no connection with licence. It is necessary to understand this clearly.

Bachofen is much nearer to what is likely to have happened in the first stage of the family than Mr. McLennan, though he also mistakenly connects the maternal system with unregulated hetaïrism. Still he suggests (though it would seem quite unconsciously) the patriarchal hypothesis, which founds the family first on the brute-force of the male. Mother-right has been discredited chiefly, as far as I have been able to find, because it is impossible to accept, at this early period, sexual conditions of the friendly ownership of women, entirely opposed to what was the probable nature of brute man. At this stage the eldest male in the family would be the ruler, and he would claim sexual rights over all the women in the group. Bachofen postulates a revolt of women to establish marriage. We have seen that such a supposition, in the form in which he puts it, is without any credible foundation. Yet, it is part of my theory that there was a revolt of women, or rather a combination of the mothers of the group, which led to a change in the direction of sexual regulation and order. But the causes of such revolt, and the way in which it was accomplished, were, in my opinion, entirely different from those which Bachofen supposes. The arguments in support of my view will be given in the next two chapters.

FOOTNOTES:

[6] Das Mutterrecht was published in Stuttgart in 1861.

[7] Primitive Marriage, published 1865. Studies in Ancient History, which includes a reprint of Primitive Marriage; 1st ed. 1876, 2nd ed. 1886. The Patriarchal Theory, a criticism of this theory is based on the papers of Mr. McLennan and edited by his brother.

[8] Prof. Giraud-Teulon’s La Mère chez certains Peuples de l’Antiquité is founded on the introduction to Das Mutterrecht. This little book of fascinating reading is the best and easiest way of studying Bachofen’s theory.

[9] Das Mutterrecht, Intro., p. xiii.

[10] Das Mutterrecht, Intro., p. vii.

[11] Ibid., Intro., p. xv.

[12] Das Mutterrecht, Intro., p. xxiv. and p. 10.

[13] Ibid., Intro., p. xiv.

[14] Ibid., Intro., p. xv.

[15] Das Mutterrecht, p. 18.

[16] I have taken much of this passage from Mr. McLennan’s criticism of Bachofen’s theory, Studies in Ancient History, pp. 319-325.

[17] Das Mutterrecht, Intro., pp. vii.-viii.

[18] Das Mutterrecht, pp. 18-19.

[19] The History of Human Marriage, p. 105.

[20] Das Mutterrecht, p. 85.

[21] Das Mutterrecht, pp. 73, 85. Compare also McLennan, Studies, p. 322, and Starcke, The Primitive Family in its Origin and Development.

[22] Ibid., p. 85.

[23] Das Mutterrecht, Intro., p. xxvii.

[24] Ibid., Intro., p. xxix.

[25] Studies in Ancient History, pp. 83, et seq.

[26] History of Human Marriage, pp. 51-133. It is on this question that my own opinion has been changed, compare The Truth about Woman, p. 120.

[27] See next chapter on the [Patriarchal Theory].

[28] Starcke, The Primitive Family in its Origin and Development, pp. 36, 37.

CHAPTER III

DIFFICULTIES AND OBJECTIONS: AN ATTEMPT TO RECONCILE
MOTHER-RIGHT WITH THE PATRIARCHAL THEORY.

The foundation of the Patriarchal theory is the jealous sexual nature of the male. This is important; indeed profoundly significant. The strongest argument against promiscuity is to be gained from what we know of this factor of jealousy in the sexual relationships.

“The season of love is the season of battle,” says Darwin. Such was the law passed on to man from millions of his ancestral lovers. The action of this law[29] may be observed at its fiercest intensity among man’s pre-human ancestors. Courtship without combat is rare among all male quadrupeds, and special offensive and defensive weapons for use in these love-fights are found; for this is the sex-tragedy of the natural world, the love-tale red-written in blood.

This factor of sexual jealousy—the conflict of the male for possession of the female—has not been held in sufficient account by those who regard promiscuity as being the earliest stage in the sexual relationships. That jealousy is still a powerful agent even in the most civilised races is a fact on which it is unnecessary to dwell. This being so, and since the action of jealousy is so strong in the animal kingdom, it cannot be supposed to have been dormant among primitive men. Rather, in the infancy of his history this passion must have acted with very great intensity. Thus it becomes impossible to accept any theory of the community of women in the earliest stage of the family. For inevitably such peaceful association would be broken up by jealous battles among the males, in which the strongest member would kill or drive away his rivals.

Great stress is laid, by the supporters of promiscuity, on the danger that such conflicts must have been to the growing community. It is, therefore, held that in order to prevent this check on their development, it was necessary for the male members not to give way to jealousy, but to be content with promiscuous ownership of women. But this is surely to credit savage man with a control of the driving jealous instinct that he could not then have had? What we do not find in the sexual conduct of men, as they now are, cannot be credited as existing in the infancy of social life. We fall into many mistakes in judging these questions of sex; we under-estimate the strength of love-passion—the uncounted ancestral forces dating back to the remote beginnings of life. Doubtless conflicts over the possession of women were frequent from the beginning of man’s history. But these disputes would not lead to promiscuous intercourse, only to a change in the tyrant male, who ruled over the women in the group.

Another fact against a belief in promiscuity is that the lowest savages known to us are not promiscuous, in so far as there is no proved case of the sexual relations being absolutely unregulated. They all recognise sets of women with whom certain sets of men can have no marital relations. Again these savages are very far removed from the state of man’s first emergence from the brute, as is proved by their combination into large and friendly tribes. Such peaceful aggregation could only have arisen at a much later period, and after the males had learnt by some means to control their brute appetites and jealousy of rivals in that movement towards companionship, which, first resting in the sexual needs, broadens out into the social instincts.

For these reasons, then, we conclude that the theory of a friendly union having existed among males in the primitive group is the very reverse of the truth. This question has now been sufficiently proved. I am thus brought into agreement with Dr. Westermarck, Mr. Crawley, and Mr. Lang, in his examination of Mr. Atkinson’s Primal Law, as well as with other writers, all of whom have shown that promiscuity cannot be accepted as a stage in the early life of the human family.

I have now to show how far this rejection of promiscuity affects our position with regard to mother-descent and mother-right. It is clearly of vital importance to any theory that its foundations are secure. One foundation—that of promiscuity, on which Bachofen and McLennan, the two upholders of matriarchy, base their hypothesis—has been overthrown. It thus becomes necessary to approach the question from an altogether different position. Mother-right must be explained without any reference to unregulated sexual conduct. I am thus turned back to examine the opposing theory to matriarchy, which founds the family on the patriarchal authority of the father. Nor is this all. What we must expect a true theory to do is to show conditions that are applicable not only to special cases, but in their main features to mankind in general. I have to prove that such conditions arose in the primitive patriarchal family as it advanced towards social aggregation, that would not only make possible, but, as I believe, would necessitate the power of the mothers asserting its force in the group-family. Only when this is done can I hope that a new belief in mother-right may find acceptance.

The patriarchal theory stated in its simplest form is this: Primeval man lived in small family groups, composed of an adult male, and of his wife, or, if he were powerful, several wives, whom he jealously guarded from the sexual advances of all other males. In such a group the father is the chief or patriarch as long as he lives, and the family is held together by their common subjection to him. As for the children, the daughters as soon as they grow up are added to his wives, while the sons are driven out from the home at the time they reach an age to be dangerous as sexual rivals to their father. The important thing to note is that in each group there would be only one adult polygamous male, with many women of different ages and young children. I shall return to this later. Such is the marked difference in the position of the two sexes—the solitary jealously unsocial father and the united mothers. I can but wonder how its significance has escaped the attention of the many inquirers, who have sought the truth in this matter. Probably the explanation is to be found in this: they have been interested mainly in one side of the family—the male side; I am interested in the other side—in the women members of the group. The position of women has seemed of primary importance to very few. Bachofen is almost alone in placing this question first, and his mystical far-fetched hypothesis has failed to find acceptance.

Let me now, in order to make the position clearer, continue a rough grouping of the supposed conditions in this primordial family, with all its members in subjection to the common father. It may be argued that we can know nothing at all about the family and the position of the two sexes at this brute period. This is true. The conditions are, of course, conjectural, and any suggested conclusions to be drawn from them must be still more so. Yet some hypothesis must be risked as a starting-point for any theory that attempts to go so far back in the stream of time.

We may suppose, then, that mankind aboriginally lived in small families in much the same way as the great monkeys: we see the same conditions, for instance, among the families of gorillas, where the group never becomes large. The male leader will not endure the rivalry of the young males, and as soon as they grow up a contest takes place, and the strongest and eldest male, by killing or driving out the others, maintains his position as the tyrant head of the family.[30]

This may be taken as a picture of the human brute-family. It is clear that the relation of the father to the other group members was not one of kinship, but of power. “Every female in my crowd is my property,” says—or feels—Mr. Atkinson’s patriarchal anthropoid, “and the patriarch gives expression to his sentiment with teeth and claws, if he has not yet learned to double up his fist with a stone in it. These were early days.”[31]

We may conclude that there would be many of these groups, each with a male head, his wives and adult daughters, and children of both sexes. It is probable that they lived a nomadic life, finding a temporary home in a cave, rock, or tree-shelter, in some place where the supply of food was plentiful. The area of their wanderings would be fixed by the existence of other groups; for such groups would almost certainly be mutually hostile to each other, watchfully resenting any intrusion on their own feeding ground. A further, and more powerful, cause of hostility would arise from the sexual antagonism of the males. Around each group would be the band of exiled sons, haunting their former hearth-homes, and forming a constant element of danger to the solitary paternal tyrant. This I take to be important as we shall presently see. For, the most urgent necessity of these young men, after the need for food, must have been to obtain wives. This could be done only by capturing women from one or other of the groups. The difficulties attending such captures must have been great. It is, therefore, probable the young men at first kept together, sharing their wives in polyandrous union. But this condition would not continue, the group thus formed would inevitably break up at the adult stage under the influence of jealousy; the captured wives would be fought for and carried off by the strongest males to form fresh groups.

In this matter I have given the opinion of Mr. Atkinson and Mr. Lang. They hold that no permanent peaceful union could have been maintained among the groups of young men and their captive wives. Mr. Atkinson gives the reason—

“Their unity could only endure as long as the youthfulness of the members necessitated union for protection, and their immaturity prevented the full play of sexual passion.” And again: “The necessary Primal Law which alone could determine peace within a family circle by recognising a distinction between female and male (the indispensable antecedent to a definition of marital rights) could never have arisen in such a body. It follows if such a law was ever evoked, it must have been from within the only other assembly in existence, viz. that headed by the solitary polygamous patriarch.”[32]

Whether Mr. Atkinson is right I shall not attempt to say; the point is one on which I hesitate a decided opinion; but as this view affords support to my own theory I shall accept it.

Now, to consider the bearing of this on our present inquiry. So far I have followed very closely the family group gathered around the patriarchal tyrant, under the conditions given by Mr. Atkinson and Mr. Lang, in Social Origins and Primal Law. It will not, I think, have escaped the notice of the reader that very little has been said about the women and their children. There is no hint at all that the women must have lived a life of their own, different in its conditions from that of the men. The female members, it would seem, have been taken for granted and not considered, except in so far as their presence is necessary to excite the jealous sexual combats of the males. This seems to be very instructive. The idea of the subjection of all females to the solitary male has been accepted without question. But the group consisted of many women and only one adult man. Yet in spite of this, the man is held to be the essential member; all the family obey him. His wife (or wives) and his daughters, though necessary to his pleasure as also to continue the group, are regarded as otherwise unimportant, in fact, mere property possessions to him. Now, I am very sure the rights these group-women must have held have been greatly underrated, and the neglect to recognise this has led, I think, to many mistakes. I am willing to accept the authority of the polygamous patriarch—within limits. But it seems probable, as I shall shortly indicate, that a predominant influence in the domestic life is to be ascribed to the women, and, therefore, “the movement towards peace within the group circle” must be looked for as a result from the feminine side of the family, rather than from the male side. There is still another point: I maintain that precisely through the concentration of the male ruler on the sexual subjection of his females, conditions must have arisen, affecting the conduct and character of the women: conditions, moreover, that would bring them inevitably more and more into a position of power.

It remains for me to suggest what I believe these conditions to have been. Meanwhile let us keep one fact steadily before our minds. The fierce sexual jealousy of the males had by some means to be controlled. It is evident that the way towards social progress could be found only by the peaceful aggregation of these solitary hostile groups; and this could not be done without breaking down the rule that strength and seniority in the male conferred upon him marital right over all the females. In other words, the tyrant patriarch had in some way to learn to tolerate the presence of other adult males on friendly terms within his own group. We have to find how this first, but momentous, step in social progress was taken.

Let us concentrate now our attention on the domestic life of the women. And first we must examine more carefully the exact conditions that we may suppose to have existed in these hostile groups. The father is the tyrant of the band—an egoist. Any protection he affords the family is in his own interests, he is chief much more than father. His sons he drives away as soon as they are old enough to give him any trouble; his daughters he adds to his harem. We may conceive that the domination of his sexual jealousy must have chiefly occupied his time and his attention. It is probable that he was fed by his women; at least it seems certain that he cannot have provided food for them and for all the children of the group. Sex must have been uninterruptedly interesting to him. In the first place he had to capture his wife, or wives, then he had to fight for the right of sole possession. Afterwards he had to guard his women, especially his daughters, from being carried off, in their turn, by younger males, his deadly rivals, who, exiled by sexual jealousy from his own and the other similar hearth-homes, would come, with each returning year, more and more to be feared. An ever-recurring and growing terror would dog each step of the solitary paternal despot, and necessitate an unceasing watchfulness against danger, and even an anticipation of death. For when old age, or sickness decreased his power of holding his own, then the tables would be turned, and the younger men, so hardly oppressed, would raise their hands against him in parricidal strife.

You will see what all this strife suggests—the unstable and adventitious relation of the man to the social hearth-group. Such conditions of antagonism of each male against every other male must favour the assumption that no advance in peace—on which alone all future progress depended—could have come from the patriarchs. Jealousy forced them into unsocial conduct.

But advance by peace to progress was by some means to be made. I believe that the way was opened up by women.

I hasten to add, however, in case I am mistaken here, that I am very far from wishing to set up any claim of superiority for savage woman over savage man. The momentous change was not, indeed, the result of any higher spiritual quality in the female, nor was it a religious movement, as is the beautiful dream of Bachofen. I do not think we can credit “a movement” as having taken place at all, rather the change arose gradually, inevitably, and quite simply. To postulate a conscious movement towards progress organised by women is surely absurd. Human nature does not start on any new line of conduct voluntarily, rather it is forced into it in connection with the conditions of life. Just as savage man was driven into unsocial conduct, so, as I shall try to show, savage woman was led by the same conditions acting in an opposite direction, into social conduct.

My own thought was drawn first to this conclusion by noting the behaviour of a band of female turkeys with their young. It was a year ago. I was staying in a Sussex village, and near by my home was the meadow of a farm in which families of young turkeys were being reared. Here I often sat; and one day it chanced that I was reading Social Origins and Primal Law. I had reached the chapter on “Man in the Brutal Stage,” in which Mr. Atkinson gives the supposed facts of brute man, and the action of his jealousy in the family group. I was very much impressed; my reason told me that what the author stated so well was probably right. Such sexually jealous conduct on the part of savage man was likely to be true; it was much easier to accept this than the state of promiscuous intercourse, with its friendly communism in women, in which I had hitherto believed. I really was very much disturbed. For I was still unshaken in my belief in mother-right. How were the two theories to be reconciled?

Often it is a small thing that points to the way for which one is seeking. All at once my little boy, who had been playing in the field, called out, “Oh, look at the Gobble-gobble,”—the name by which he called the male-turkey. The cock, his great tail spread, his throat swelling, was swaggering across the field, making an immense amount of noisy disturbance. A group of females and young birds, many of them almost full grown, were near to where we were sitting; they had been rooting about in the ground getting their food. Their fear at the approach of the strutting male was manifest. All the band gathered together, with the young in the centre, led and flanked by the mothers. As the male continued to advance upon them they retreated further and further, and finally took harbour in a barn. Here the swaggerer tried to follow them, but the rear females turned and faced him and drove him off.

I had found the clue that I was seeking. All I had been reading now had a clear meaning for me. In my delight, I laughed aloud. I saw the egoism of the solitary male; I knew the meaning of the females’ retreat; they were guarding the young from the feared attacks of the father. I realised how the male’s unsocial conduct towards his offspring had forced the females to unite with one another. The cock’s strength, the gorgeous display of sex-charms, were powerless before this peaceful combination. He was alone, a tyrant—the destroyer of the family. But I saw, too, that his polygamous jealousy served as a means to the end of advance in progress. It was the male’s non-social conduct that had forced social conduct upon the females. And I understood that the patriarchal tyrant was just the one thing I had been looking for. My belief in mother-power had gained a new and, as I felt then in the first delight of that discovery, and as I still feel, a much surer, because a simpler and more natural foundation.

Having now defined my position, and having related how such conviction came to me, let me proceed to examine the causes that would lead to the assertion of women’s power, in the aboriginal family group. From what has been said, the following conditions acting on the women, may, it is submitted, be fairly deduced.

1. In the group, which comprised the mothers, the adult daughters, and the young of both sexes, the women would live on terms of association as friendly hearth-mates.

2. The strongest factor in this association would arise from the dependence of the children upon their mothers; a dependence that was of much longer duration than among the animals, on account of the pre-eminent helplessness of the human child, which entailed a more prolonged infancy.

3. The women and their children would form the group, to which the father was attached by his sexual needs, but remained always a member apart—a kind of jealous fighting specialisation.

4. The temporary hearth-home would be the shelter of the women; and it was under this shelter that children were born and the group accumulated its members. Whether cave, or hollow tree, or some frail shelter, the home must have belonged to the women.

5. And this state would necessarily attach the mothers to the home, much more closely than the father, whose desire lay in the opposite direction of disrupting the home. Moreover this attachment always would be present and acting on the female children, who, unless captured, would remain with the mothers, while it could never arise in the case of the sons, whose fate was to be driven from the home. Such conditions must, as time went on, have profoundly modified the women’s outlook, bending their desires to a steady, settled life, conditions under which alone the germ of social organisation could develop.

6. Again, the daily search for the daily food must have been undertaken chiefly by the women. For it is impossible that one man, however skilful a hunter, could have fed all the female members and children of the group. We may conceive that his attention and his time must have been occupied largely in fighting his rivals; while much of his strength, as sole progenitor, must have been expended in sex. It is therefore probable that frequently the patriarch was dependent on the food activities of his women.

7. The mothers, their inventive faculties quickened by the stress of child-bearing and child-rearing, would learn to convert to their own uses the most available portion of their environment. It would be under the attention of the women that plants were first utilised for food. Seeds would be beaten out, roots and tubers dug for, and nuts and fruits gathered in their season and stored for use. Birds would have to be snared, shell-fish and fish would be caught; while, at a later period, animals would be tamed for service. Primitive domestic vessels to hold and to carry water, baskets to store the food supplies would have to be made. Clothes for protection against the cold would come to be fashioned. All the faculties of the women, in exercises that would lead to the development of every part of their bodies, would be called into play by the work of satisfying the physical needs of the group.

8. This interest and providence for the family would certainly have its effect on the development of the women. The formation of character is largely a matter of attention, and the attention of the mothers being fixed on the supply of the necessary food, doubtless often difficult to obtain, their energies would be driven into productive activities, much more than in the case of the father, whose attention was fixed upon himself.

9. In all these numerous activities the women of each group would work together. And through this co-operation must have resulted the assertion of the women’s power, as the directors and organisers of industrial occupations. As the group slowly advanced in progress, such power increasing would raise the women’s position; the mothers would establish themselves permanently as of essential value in the family, not only as the givers of life, but as the chief providers of the food essential to the preservation of the life of its members.

10. And a further result would follow in the treatment by the male of this new order. The women by obtaining and preparing food would gain an economic value. Wives would become to the patriarch a source of riches, indispensable to him, not only on account of his sex needs, but on account of the more persistent need of food. Thus the more women he possessed the greater would be his own comfort, and the physical prosperity of the group. The women would become of ever greater importance, and the economic power that they thus acquired would more and more favourably influence their position.

11. There is one other matter in this connection. The greater number of women in the group the stronger would become their power of combination. I attach great importance to this. Working together for the welfare of all, the social motive would grow stronger in women, so that necessarily they would come to consider the collective interests of the group. Can it be credited that such conditions could have acted upon the patriarch, whose conduct would still be inspired by individual appetite and selfish inclinations? I maintain such a view to be impossible.

12. Another advantage, I think, would arise for women out of the male’s jealous tyranny in the sexual relationship. Such an idea may appear strange, if we think only of the subjection of the females to the brute-appetite of the patriarch. Yet there is another side. The women must have gained freedom by being less occupied with sex passions, and also from being less jealously interested in the man than he was in them. It may be urged that the women would be jealous of each other. I do not think this could have been. Jealousy has its roots in the consciousness of possession, and is only aroused through fear of loss. This could not have acted with any great power among the women in the patriarchal group. Their interest of possession in sex must have been less acute in consciousness than the interest of the male. Doubtless the woman would be attracted by the male’s courageous action in fighting his rivals for possession of her, but when the rival was the woman’s son such attraction would come into strong conflict with the deeper maternal instinct.

13. From the standpoint of physical strength, the patriarch was the master, the tyrant ruler of the group, who, doubtless, often was brutal enough. But the women, leading an independent life to some extent, and with their mental ingenuity developed by the conditions of their life, would learn, I believe, to outwit their master by passive united resistance. They would come to utilise their sex charms as an accessory of success. Thus the unceasing sexual preoccupation of the male, with the emotional dependence it entailed on the females, must, I would suggest, have given women an immense advantage. If I am right here, the patriarch would be in the power of his women, much more surely than they would be in his power.

14. Again, an antagonism must have arisen between the despot father and his women, in particular with his daughters, forced to submit to his brute-passions. I confess I find grave difficulty in reconciling the view that the group-daughters would willingly become the wives of their father. I cannot conceive them without some power to exercise that choice in love, which is the right of the female throughout nature. There is great insistence by Mr. Atkinson, and all who have written on the subject, on the sexual passions of the males, while the desires of the women are not considered at all. Apparently they are held to have had none! This affords yet another instance of the strange concentration on the male side of the family. It is taken for granted, for instance, that in every case the young men, when driven from their home, had to capture their wives from other groups. I would suggest that often the capture was aided by the woman herself; she may even have escaped from the hearth-home in her desire to find a partner, preferring the rule of a young tyrant to an old one, who moreover was her father. I believe, too, that the wives and mothers must frequently have asserted their will in rebellion. I picture, indeed, these savage women ever striving for more privileges, and step by step advancing through peaceful combination to power.

15. I desire also to maintain that all I have here suggested finds support from what is known of the position of women among primitive peoples; and I may add also, from the character of women to-day.

Now I have summarised briefly what seem to me the probable conditions of the women’s daily life in these earliest groups. I have attempted to show how the sexual jealousy, which acted for the destruction of the mutually hostile male members, would necessitate for the women conditions in many ways favourable; conditions of union in which lay the beginnings of peace and order. What we have to fix in our thoughts is the significant fact of the sociability of the women’s lives in contrast with the solitude of the jealous sire, watchfully resenting the intrusion of all other males. Such conditions cannot have failed to domesticate the women, and urged them forward to the work that was still to be done in domesticating man. During the development of the family, we may expect that the patriarch will seek to hold his rights, and that the women will exert their influence more and more in breaking these down; and this is precisely what we do find, as I presently shall show.

One point further. It may, of course, be urged that all I am affirming for women in this far back beginning is but a process of ingenious guessing. Such criticism is just. But I am speaking of conditions at a time when conjecture is necessary. I venture to say that my suggestions are in accord with what is likely to have happened. Moreover, many difficulties will be made clearer if these guesses are accepted. I believe that here in the earliest patriarchal stage we have already the germs of the maternal family. All the chances for success in power rested with the united mothers, rather than with the solitary father. Assuredly the jealous patriarchs paid a heavy price for their sexual domination.

FOOTNOTES:

[29] The reader is referred to The Truth about Woman, pp. 87-114. In the courtships and perfect love marriages of many birds we find jealous combats replaced by the peaceful charming of the female by the male.

[30] Darwin, Descent of Man. Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, and Brehm, Thierleben.

[31] Social Origins and Primal Law, pp. 4, 21. Westermarck, pp. 13, 42. Primal Law, pp. 209-212.

[32] Social Origins and Primal Law, p. 230. Mr. Atkinson writes this to show that there can be no connection between these groups of young males and the polyandrous marriages of Mr. McLennan’s theory. The first italics in the passage are his own; the second are mine. Why I wish to emphasise this point will soon be seen. I have already mentioned how I was recommended to read Social Origins to convince me of my mistake in accepting the mother-age. It has done just the opposite, and has given me the clue to many difficulties that I was before unable to clear up. This is why I am following this book rather than other authorities in my examination of the patriarchal theory. I take this opportunity of recording my debt to the authors, and of expressing my thanks to Mr. Wells, who recommended me to read the book.

CHAPTER IV

DEVELOPMENT IN THE PATRIARCHAL FAMILY
AND THE RISE OF MOTHER-POWER

The essential question, now, is how these small hostile groups were brought by association to expand into larger groups. In what way was the sexual monopoly of the male ruler first curbed, and afterwards broken down, for only by this being done could peace be gained? However advantageous the habits of the patriarch may have been for himself, they were directly opposed to progress. Jealousy depends on the failure to recognise the rights of others. This sexual egoism, by which one man through his strength and seniority held marital rights over all the females of his group, had to be struck at its roots. In other words, the solitary despot had to learn to tolerate the association of other adult males.

How was this happy change to be brought about? Social qualities are surely developed in the character by union with one’s fellow beings. From what has been stated, it seems certain that it was in the interests of the women to consolidate the family, and by means of association to establish their own power. Jealousy is an absolutely non-social quality. Regarding its influence, it is certainly absurd to believe any voluntary association to have been possible among the males of the hostile patriarchal groups; to credit this is to give the lie to the entire theory. We are driven, therefore, to seek for the beginnings of social conduct among the women. I have suggested the conditions forcing them into combination with one another against the tyranny of the patriarch. I have now to show how these causes, continually acting, brought the women step by step into a position of authority and power. There is, however, no suggestion of a spiritual revolt on the part of women. I do not wish to set up any claim for, because I do not believe in, the superiority of one sex over the other sex. Character is determined by the conditions of living. If, as I conceive, progress came through savage women, rather than through savage men, it was because the conditions were really more favourable to them, and drove them on in the right path. However strange it may appear, their sexual subjection to the fierce jealousy of the patriarch acted as a means to an end in advancing peace.

The strongest force of union between the women would grow out of the consciousness of an ever-threatening and common danger. Not only had the young to be fed and cared for during infancy and childhood, but, as they grew in years, they had to be guarded from the father, whose relation to his offspring was that of an enemy. It has been seen how the sons were banished at puberty from the family group to maintain the patriarch’s marital rights. Doubtless the strength of maternal love gained in intensity through the many failures in conflicts, that must have taken place with the tyrant fathers. Would not this community of suffering tend to force the women to unite with one another, at each renewed banishment of their sons? May they not, after the banishment, have assisted their sons in the capture of their wives? I think it must be allowed that this is possible. And there is another point to notice. The exiled sons and their captured wives would each have a mother in the groups they had left. May it not be conceived that, as time brought progress in intelligence, some friendly communication might have been established between group and group, in defiance of the jealous guardianship of the patriarchs? Thus, through the danger, ever to be feared in every family, there might open up a way by sympathy to a possible future union.

It is part of my supposition that every movement towards friendship must have arisen among the women. This is no fanciful idea of my own. Mr. Atkinson, one of the strongest supporters of the patriarchal theory, agrees with this view, though he does not seem to see its origin, and does not follow up its deep suggestion. By him the movement in advance is narrowed to a single issue of peace between the father and his sons, but this great step is credited to the influence of the mothers. I must quote the passages that refer to this—[33]

“At the renewed banishment of each of her male progeny by the jealous patriarch, the mother’s feelings and instincts would be increasingly lacerated and outraged. Her agonised efforts to retain at least her last and youngest would be even stronger than with her first born. It is exceedingly important to observe that her chances of success in this case would be much greater. When this last and dearest son approached adolescence, it is not difficult to perceive that the patriarch must have reached an age when the fire of desire may have become somewhat dull, whilst, again, his harem, from the presence of numerous adult daughters, would be increased to an extent that might have overtaxed his once more active powers. Given some such rather exceptional situation, where a happy opportunity in superlative mother love wrestled with a for once satiated paternal appetite in desire, we may here discern a possible key of the sociological problem which occupies us, and which consisted in a conjunction within one group of two adult males.”

In the next paragraph the author presents the situation which in this way might have arisen—

“We must conceive that, in the march of the centuries, on some fateful day, the bloody tragedy in the last act of the familiar drama was avoided, and the edict of exile or death left unpronounced. Pure maternal love triumphed over the demons of lust and jealousy. A mother succeeded in keeping by her side a male child, and thus, by a strange coincidence, that father and son, who, amongst all mammals, had been the most deadly enemies, were now the first to join hands. So portentous an alliance might well bring the world to their feet. The family would now present for the first time, the until then unknown spectacle of the inclusion within a domestic circle, and amidst its component females, of an adolescent male youth. It must, however, be admitted that such an event, at such an epoch, demanded imperatively very exceptional qualities, both physiological and psychological, in the primitive agents. The new happy ending to that old-world drama which had run so long through blood and tears, was an innovation requiring very unusually gifted actors. How many failures had doubtless taken place in its rehearsal during the centuries, with less able or happy interpreters!”

Mr. Atkinson supposes that success in the new experiment “was rendered possible by the rise of new powers in nascent man.” Here I do not follow him. “The germ of altruism,” which he sees as “already having risen to make its force felt” was, indeed, as he says “an important factor.” But is it credible that this altruism existed in the father? I can conceive him being won over through his own emotional dependence on some specially pleasing woman; he may well have had favourites among his wives. I cannot accept “altruism” as a reason for his conduct, under conditions acting in an exact opposite way in fostering and increasing egoism. Much more probable is the supposition that he “must have reached the age when the fire of desire had become somewhat dulled.”

I must also take exception to a further statement of Mr. Atkinson, “that with such prolonged infancy there had been opportunity for the development of paternal philoprogenitiveness.” And again: “It is evident that such long-continued presence of sons could but result in a certain mutual sympathy, however inevitable the eventual exile.” It is unnecessary for me to labour this question. I may, however, point out, that the identical conditions of the family among the anthropoid apes (on whom Mr. Atkinson bases his patriarchy) do not afford any proof of paternal altruism. The polygamous jealous father never enters into friendly union with the other males. He is strong and sexually beautiful, but he is never social in his domestic conduct. He is the tyrant in the family, and the young are guarded from his attacks by the mothers. With the mothers there is protection and safety, with the father ownership. The whole argument of the patriarchal theory is based on the fact of the jealous conduct of the male. Driven to live in solitary enmity, the patriarch could not voluntarily tolerate the presence of a rival, if he was to maintain his position as ruler. It is impossible to get away from this. Mr. Atkinson comes very near to this essential truth, when he suggests (though he does not fully acknowledge) that the first step in social development came through the mother’s love for her child; but at once he turns aside from this, drawn, I think unconsciously, to the common opinion of the complete subjection of the females to the male, an opinion always making it difficult to accept the initiative in reform as coming from the woman.

The exclusive and persisting idea of Mr. Atkinson’s theory is to establish the action of what he calls “the primal law.” Only by limiting and defining the marital rights of the males over the females could advancement be gained. Until this was done these small hostile groups could not become larger, and expand into the clan or tribe.

I must follow this question a little although it leads us aside from the immediate subject of my own inquiry. The first step in progress has been taken; by the triumph of maternal love, an adult male son is now included in the group. We must conceive that this victory, having once been gained by one mother, would be repeated by other mothers. Afterwards, as time went on, the advantage in strength gained to the group by this increase in their male members, would tend to encourage the custom. One may reasonably assume that it became established as a habit in each group that once had taken the first step. Father and sons, for so long enemies, now enter on a truce.

It must not, however, be concluded that sexual peace followed this new order. It is part of Mr. Atkinson’s theory that the patriarch’s sexual jealousy would not be broken down by his tolerance of the presence of his sons. Peace could be maintained only so long as the intruders respected his marital rights. Under this condition, all the group women, as they all belonged to the patriarch, would be taboo to the young men; otherwise there would be a fight, and the offending son would be driven into exile. Doubtless this frequently happened, but the advantages gained by union would tend to prevent the danger. Some means of preserving sexual peace within the group certainly would come to be established. “For the first time,” as Mr. Atkinson points out, “we encounter the factor which is to be the leading power in future metamorphosis, i. e. an explicit distinction between female and female as such.”

Through this bar placed on the female members within the family circle, the sons, who remained in peace, would be forced to continue the practice of capturing their wives, and would bring in women to live with them from other groups. It is assumed that these captures were in all cases hostile. I have given my reasons for disagreeing with this view. I hold that the young women may have been glad to have been taken by the young men, and most probably assisted them, in a surely not unnatural desire to escape from their tyrant fathers. I really cannot credit such continued sexual subjection on the part of the group-daughters, an opinion which arises, I am certain, from the curious misconception of the passivity of the human female in love.

I do not wish to conceal that my conjecture of an active part having been taken by the women, both in their captures and also in all the relationships of the family, is opposed to the great majority of learned opinion. The reason for this already has been suggested. Almost invariably the writers on these questions are men, and there is, I imagine, a certain blindness in their view. I am convinced that from the earliest beginnings of the human family women have exercised a much stronger and more direct influence than is usually believed. All the movements towards regulation and progress, so ingeniously worked out by Mr. Atkinson, are easier to credit if we accept the initiative as having come from the group-mothers. I have an inward conviction of an unchanging law between the two sexes, and though I cannot here attempt to give any proof, it seems to me, we can always trace the absorption by the male of female ideas. The man accepts what the woman brings forward, and then assumes the control, believing he is the originator of her ideas. Take this case of capture: If, as I suggest, the young women assisted or even took the initiative in their own captures, they would very plainly not be willing to allow sexual relationships with another hoary patriarch. I would urge that here again it was by the action of the young women, rather than the young men, that the new order was established. But this is a small matter. If I am right, the communal living and common danger among the women would powerfully bind them together in union, and sever them from the male rulers. Once this is granted, it follows that social consciousness in the women must have been stronger than in the solitary males. Then there can be no possible doubt of the part taken by women in the slow advancement of the group by regulation to social peace. Moreover, I believe, that confirmation of what is here claimed for women will be found (as will appear in the later part of my inquiry) in many social habits among existing primitive peoples, who still live under the favourable conditions of the maternal family; habits that suggest a long evolutionary process, and that can be explained only if they have arisen in a very remote beginning. But enough on this subject has now been said.

Many interesting questions arise from the action of Mr. Atkinson’s “primal law.” His theory offers a solution of the much-debated question of the origin of exogamy,[34] the term used first by Mr. McLennan, in Primitive Marriage, for the rule which prohibited sexual relationships within the group limit. Continence imposed by the patriarch on his sons within the group, as a condition of his tolerance of their presence, necessarily and logically entailed marriage without, with women from some other group. This explanation of exogamy is so simple that it seems likely to be true. It is much more reasonable than any of the numerous other theories that have been brought forward. Mr. McLennan, for instance, suggests that the custom arose through a scarcity of females, owing to the widespread practice of female infanticide. This can hardly be accepted, for such conditions, where they exist, would arise at a much later period. Even less likely is the theory of Dr. Westermarck, who explains exogamy as arising from “an instinct against marriage of near kin.” But we have no proof of the existence of any such instinct.[35] Mr. Crawley’s view is similar: he connects the custom with the idea of sexual taboo, which makes certain marriages a deadly sin. It is evident that these causes could not have operated with the brute patriarch. One great point in favour of Mr. Atkinson’s view is that it takes us so much further back. By it exogamy as a custom must have been much earlier than totemism, as at this stage the different group-families would not be distinguished by totem names; but its action as a law would become much stronger when reinforced by the totem superstitions, and would become fixed in rigid sexual taboos.[36] The strongest of these taboos is the avoidance between brothers and sisters; this is Mr. Atkinson’s primal law. It is a law that is still a working factor among barbarous races, and entails restrictions and avoidances of the most binding nature.

Unfortunately I have not space to write even briefly on this important and deeply interesting subject. A right understanding of the whole question of sexual taboos, with the complicated totem superstitions on which they are based, is very necessary to any inquiry into the position of women. But to do this I should have to write another book. All I can say is this: these avoidances had in their origin no connection with the relative power of the two sexes; nor do I believe it can be proved that they were established by men rather than by women. They arose quite naturally, out of the necessity for regulation as a condition of peace.

Let me give one example that will serve to show how easily mistakes may arise. One of these rules, common among primitive peoples, prevents the women from eating with the men. This is often considered as a proof of the inferior position of the women, whereas it proves nothing of the kind. It is just one instance out of many numerous laws of avoidance between wife and husband, sister and brother, mother and son, and, indeed, between all relations in the family, which are part of the general rule to restrict sexual familiarity between the two sexes, set up at a time when moral restraints upon desire could act but feebly. It was only much later that these sexual taboos came to be fixed as superstitions, that with unbreakable fetters bound the freedom of women.

Here, indeed, are facts causing us to think. We perceive how old and strongly rooted are many customs from which to-day we are fighting to escape; customs of separation between women and men, which, with appalling conservatism, have descended through the ages. Will they ever be broken down? I do not know. These questions are not considered in adequate fashion; often we are ignorant of the deep forces driving the sexes into situations of antagonism. Clearly these primitive avoidances shed strong light on the sexual problems of our day. The subject is one of profound interest. I wish that it were possible to follow it, but all this lies outside the limit set to my inquiry, and already I have been led far from the patriarchal family.

The group has advanced in progress, and now has many features in common with existing savage peoples. The friendly conjunction of the father and his sons has established peace. Exogamy has begun to be practised; and the family in this way has been increased not only by the presence of the group-sons, but by their captured wives. We have seen that this would necessitate certain rules of sexual avoidance; thus the patriarch still holds marital rights over his wives and the group-daughters, while the captured women are sacred to the group-sons.

There is now a further important change to consider. Again the rights of the patriarch have to be restricted; a bar has to be raised to prevent his adding his daughters to his wives. Only by overcoming this habit of paternal incest can further social evolution become possible.

On this question I shall give the explanation of Mr. Atkinson; and it is with real regret that the limit of my space makes it impossible to quote in full his own words.[37] The change came by the entrance of outside suitors as husbands for the daughters and their acceptance as group-members.

At this point a difficulty once again arises. By what means was the patriarch brought to accept the presence of these young intruders, thus usurping his sexual rights over his daughters? Mr. Atkinson believes this could not have taken place during the life of the patriarch. “The initiative in change must have arisen irrespective of him, or without his presence.” Here Mr. Atkinson appears to me to fall into error, as once more he neglects to consider the effect of the young women’s own desires. I hold that, by this time, the group-daughters, supported by their mothers, must have been strong enough to outwit their father (whose authority already had been weakened), if not openly, then by deceiving him. They would now see their brothers living with young wives. Is it credible, I ask, that they would remain content with the sexual embraces of their father?

In this connection it is of interest to note the opposition sometimes offered by young females to the advances of an old male among the families of monkeys. I have received quite recently an account of such a case in a letter from my friend, Max Henry Ferrass, formerly Inspector of Schools in India, and the author of a valuable work on Burmah. This is what he says—

“I once was able to observe a herd of common long-tailed monkeys of the Indian plains at play on a sandbank in a river. There were about fifty of all ages. There was one great bully among them who looked double the size of the average adult—and must have been double the weight, at any rate—whose sport was to chase the young females. They, knowing his game, fled before him, but he caught them readily. But before he could have his will of any, she would bound from his grasp as if stung, and always escape, as this sudden spurt of energy was more than he could control.”

Here we have a clear instance in which the young females escape from the thraldom of the male ruler of the horde. The power with which Mr. Atkinson endows his human patriarch seems to me quite incredible. I have asserted again and again that the consolidation of the group-circle was of much greater importance to the women than to the men. Now this surely points to the acceptance of the view that the regulation of the brute sexual appetite was initiated by the women. Thereby, it may be pointed out, their action merely resembles womankind in any stage from the lowest degree of savagery to the highest stage of civilisation.

Moreover, there is further proof that points strongly to the acceptance of this view, that, the new departure, by which young husbands came into the group, was brought about by the women, in opposition to the knowledge and will of the patriarch. There exists a common custom among primitive tribes, which affords evidence of these outside suitors having visited their brides in secret. I refer to the practice by which intercourse between the husband and wife is carried on clandestinely by night. This is one of the earliest forms of marriage, and, further, it is closely connected, as I shall presently show, with the maternal family system. There appears to be no real cause for this precaution. I do not think it can be explained by the superstitious dread of the sexes for each other, expressing itself in this form of sexual taboo; as Mr. Crawley and other writers suggest. Doubtless this is a factor, and a very powerful one, in the continuance of the custom, but it does not seem to me to be the true explanation of its origin. Such secrecy and clandestine meetings are, however, exactly what must have happened if the group-daughters received their lovers, as I would suggest, in defiance of the will of the patriarch. May not the custom as it still exists be a survival, retained and strengthened by superstition, from a time when these fugitive visits were necessary for safety?[38]

Mr. Atkinson’s view is different from mine. He does not allow any power at all to the women. He holds that after the death of the patriarch, his daughters, still young, would be left without husbands. To meet this difficulty suitors are brought from other groups by the brothers, i. e. the sons settled in the group and who now rule. We are asked to believe that they do this to relieve themselves of the maintenance of their widowed sisters, and to prevent their being captured and carried off to other groups. According to Mr. Atkinson the presence of these outside lovers would not be dangerous to the family peace. They would come from neighbouring groups, from which the young men had already captured their wives. In this way the strangers would be the brothers of their women; and thus the brother-and-sister avoidance—the primal law already established—would prevent any fear of interference with the established marital rights on the part of the new-comers. I strongly differ from the suggestion that the brothers had to feed and maintain their widowed sisters; such an opinion is but another example of a failure to appreciate the women’s side of the question. I allow willingly that the sisters may have had the assistance of their brothers; I incline, indeed, to the opinion that they would be strong enough to compel their help, though probably this was not necessary. The group-sisters and the group-brothers may well have united against the father, who was the enemy of both. To me the common-sense view is that these visits from outside suitors were first paid clandestinely at night. In the light of human nature it is at least probable that the tyrant father was deceived by his daughters and his sons. If already he was dead, what reason was there for any fear—why were the visits secret? This seems to show that I am right; that once more the initiative in the changes that led to regulation must be traced back to women. Afterwards, the custom thus established, would come to be recognised, and the practice of the husband visiting his wife by night would persist long after the danger making such secrecy necessary had ceased.

It will be readily seen that the introduction of young husbands from outside, by whatever means this was done, would be an immense gain in strength. Again a new regulation in the sexual relationships would follow, and the group-daughters would now have husbands of their own generation, sacred to them. Furthermore it was the first direct step in friendly union between group and group; a step that would open up ways to further progress. The husband, living in his own group, and visiting his wife in hers, would at once form a connecting link between two hitherto separate family circles, which friendly connection would not be broken, when, later, the custom arose of the husband leaving his group to take up his residence with his wife.

Such an arrangement must have been of immense advantage to the women. Under the new order, a wife married to one of these young strangers would hold a position of considerable power, that hitherto had been impossible. We have seen that the home was made by the group-women, and must have belonged to them; but so far, the continuance of a daughter in the home had entailed the acceptance of her father as a husband; the only way of escape being by capture, which—whether forced or, as I hold, aided by the girl’s desire—sent her out from her own family as a stranger into a hostile group. Now this was reversed, and the husband entered as the alien into her home and family.

The following observation of Mr. Atkinson in this connection must be quoted, as it is in strong agreement with my own view—

“As a wife who had not been captured, who, in fact, as an actual member of the group itself, was, so to speak, the capturer, her position in regard to her dependent husband would be profoundly modified, in comparison with that of the ordinary captive female, whereas such a captive, seized by the usual process of hostile capture, had been a mere chattel utterly without power; she, as a free agent in her own home, with her will backed by that of her brothers” [why not, I would ask, her sisters and her mother?] “could impose law on her subject spouse.”[39]

In the foregoing sentences Mr. Atkinson affirms the fateful significance to women of this new form of marriage. I am in whole-hearted agreement with this opinion. I glean here and there from the wealth of Mr. Atkinson’s suggestions, statements which indicate how nearly he came to seeing all that I am trying to establish. Yet, I am compelled to disagree with his main argument; for always when he touches the woman’s side, he falls back at once to consider the question in its relation to the males as the only important members in the group. I do not, for instance, accept his view that the captive wives were “mere chattels.” They could not, under the conditions, have been without some considerable power, even if it arose only from the sexual dependence of their owners upon them. Much more significant, however, is Mr. Atkinson’s view regarding the authority of the wife in these new peaceable marriages. He sees one point only as arising from such a position, and finds “a psychological factor of enormous power, now for the first time able to make itself felt, in the play of sexual jealousy on the part of the wife.” She would now “impose law on her subject spouse, and such law dictated by jealousy would ordain a bar to intercourse between him and her more youthful and hence more attractive daughters.” Now, I do not deny that such a factor may have acted, for the incentive to jealousy arises always from individual as opposed to collective possession. Still I do not think jealousy can have been strong in this case, and, even if it were not, any reversion on the part of an alien father to the habits of the patriarch must have been impossible; such conduct would not have been tolerated by the other males in the group, nor by the daughters, now able to get young husbands for themselves. To limit the wife’s power to this single issue can hardly be consistent with the conditions of the case. Mr. Atkinson, in common with many other anthropologists, seems disposed to underrate the evidence regarding the far-reaching importance of this form of marriage. Among existing examples of the maternal family, the mother-rights and influences of women are dependent largely on the position of the husband as a stranger in her family home. This matter will become clear in the later part of my inquiry.

With the establishment of this new peaceful marriage the way was cleared for future progress; it is but a few further steps for the group to grow into the clan and the tribe. The family-group has increased greatly in size and in social organisation, from the time when it consisted of the patriarch, and his community of women and young children. The group-sons have brought in wives from other groups and have founded families; the group-daughters now have husbands who live with them. Primitive regulations over the marital rights have arisen, enabling peace to be maintained. Each family to some extent would be complete in itself. As the groups advanced in progress, totem names would come to be used as family marks of distinction, taken usually from some plant or animal. Peaceable marriages between the sons and daughters of the different groups would more and more become the habit, and would gradually take the place of capture marriages. The regulation of the sexual relationships, by which certain women and certain men became sacred to each other, would become more strongly fixed by custom; and afterwards the law would follow that a group of kindred, distinguished by its totem mark, might not marry within the hereditary name. The religious superstitions that came to be connected with these totem names would make binding the new order in the marriage law. When this stage was reached exogamy would be strictly practised; and in all cases under the complete maternal system, the woman on marriage would remain in her family home, where the husband would come to live with her as a kind of privileged guest.

There is one other matter that must be noted. The totem name was inherited from the mother, and not the father. This was the natural arrangement. When the group was small, there may have been a communal ownership of the group-children by the mothers, under the authority of the father. But this would not continue for long; when the group increased in numbers, the mother and her children would keep together as a little sub-family in the larger circle. This would be especially the case with captured wives, who would bring with them the totem marks of their groups, and this would be the name of the children. The naming of the children after the mother would also be the simplest way of distinguishing between the offspring of different wives, a distinction that would often be necessary, during the earlier conditions, among the polygamous fathers.

It is, however, an entirely mistaken view that the father’s relation to the child was ever unrecognised. The taking of the name of the mother arose as a matter of course, and was adopted simply as being the most convenient custom. It is manifest that mother-descent has no connection with a period of promiscuity. Quite the reverse. All the conditions of mother-right arose out of the earliest movements towards order and regulation in the relationships of the sexes, and were not the result of licence. Nor was the naming of the child after the mother so much a question of relationship as of what may be called “social kinship.” The causes which led to the maternal system are closely connected with the collective motive, which, if I am right, was in its origin, at least, the result of the union of the women against the selfish inclinations of the patriarch. When property rights came to be recognised, consisting at first of stores of food and the household goods, it would be perfectly natural that they should belong to the women, and descend through them. The inheritance would be to those most closely bound together, and who lived together in the same home. Thus it appears that descent through the mother was founded on social rights, by which the organisation of the family, such as membership in the group or clan, succession and inheritance were dependent on the mothers. In this sense it is clear that the term mother-power is fully justified; it is nearer to the facts than the term mother-kin.

Further than this I must not go; the first part of my inquiry now has come to an end. It may seem to the reader that the patriarchal theory, in a book written to establish mother-right, has received more attention than was called for. I have discussed it so fully, not only because of the interest of the subject in proving the errors in the earlier theories of matriarchy, but because of the insight the conditions of the primordial group give us into the origin of the maternal family.

Many of the suggestions made are more or less hypothetical, but not a few, I think, are necessary deductions, based on what is most probable to have happened. I am fully aware of numerous omissions, and the inadequacy of this summary; but if the suggestions brought forward shall prove in themselves to have merit, it has seemed to me that a fruitful field of investigation has been opened. Much new ground had to be covered in this attempt to picture the position of women at a period so remote that the difficulties are very great. I hope at least to have cleared away the old errors, which connected mother-descent with uncertainty of paternity and an early period of promiscuity.

Recognising sexual jealousy as the moving force in brute man, I have accepted that the primeval family was of the patriarchal type. I have traced the probable development of the group-family, expanding by successive steps into larger groups living in peaceful association. In the earlier stage, whilst the men lived as solitary despots, the women enjoyed a communal life. It is thus probable that the leading power in the upward movement of the group developing into the clan and tribe arose among the united mothers, and not with the father. The women were forced into social conduct. On this belief is based the theory of mother-power.

The most important result we have gained is the proof that the maternal system was framed for order, and has no connection with sexual disorder. It is enough if I have suggested reasons to show that this widespread custom, which is practised still among many peoples, has nothing about it that is exceptional, nothing fantastic, nothing improbable. I hold it to be a perfectly natural arrangement—the practical outgrowth of the practical needs of primitive peoples. The strongest and the one certain claim for a belief in mother-right and mother-power must rest on this foundation. It is left for the second part of my book to prove how far I am right in what I claim.

FOOTNOTES:

[33] Primal Law, pp. 231-232.

[34] Studies. Chap. VII. “Exogamy: Its Origin.”

[35] History of Human Marriage. Chap. XIV. “Prohibition of Marriage between Kindred.”

[36] Mystic Rose.

[37] Primal Law. The chapter “From the Group to the Tribe,” pp. 250-263.

[38] Mr. Atkinson refers to these clandestine marriages. He does not, however, connect the custom, as I suggest, with any action on the part of the young women.

[39] Primal Law, p. 256.

PART II
THE MOTHER-AGE CIVILISATION

“It’s not too late to seek a newer world:

Tho’ much is taken, much abides: and tho’
We are not now the strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts;
Made weak by time and rule, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.”
Tennyson.

CHAPTER V

THE MATRIARCHAL FAMILY AMONG THE AMERICAN INDIANS

It is time now to turn to the actual subject of this investigation, in order to see how far the theory of mother-right has been helped by the lengthy examination of the patriarchal group.

Since the publication of Das Mutterrecht much has been written that has tended to raise doubts as to the soundness of the matriarchal theory, at least in the form held by its early supporters. A reaction in the opposite direction has set in, before which the former belief in mother-power has been transformed, and now seems likely to disappear altogether. In recent years, Westermarck, Starcke, Andrew Lang, N. W. Thomas, and Crawley among others have given utterance to this view. The prevalence of a system tracing descent through the mother is accepted by the majority of learned opinion, though it would seem somewhat grudgingly. Mr. Crawley is the only writer, as far as I know, who denies that such a practice was ever common; the cases in which it still exists, as these cannot be denied, he regards as exceptions. He affirms: “There is no evidence that the maternal system was ever general or always preceded the paternal system.” And again: “Though frequent, maternal descent cannot have been either universally or generally a stage through which man has passed.”[40]

Mr. Crawley considers this assumption may be taken for granted; so that he does not trouble himself about proofs. The subject of mother-right is dismissed as unworthy of serious attention. Such an attitude is surely instructive, and illustrates the failure, to which I have already pointed, in considering the woman’s side in these questions. There would seem to be a tendency to doubt as being possible any family arrangement favourable to the authority of women. Even when descent through the mother is accepted as a phase in social development, it is denied that such descent confers any special rights to women.

One reason of this prejudice must be sought in the persistence of the puritan spirit: the objection to mother-kin rests mainly on the objection to loose sexual relationships. Thus it became necessary to attempt a new explanation of the origin of the custom, and hence my examination of the primordial patriarchal group. It may be thought that I should have done better to confine my inquiry to existing primitive peoples. But, if I am right, mother-power is rooted much further back than history, and arose first in the dawn of the human family. This had to be established.

It is clearly of vital importance to an inquiry that claims to set up a new belief in a discredited theory to protect it from those objections which hitherto have prevented its acceptance. This I have attempted to do. I have shown that the customs connected with mother-right had no connection at all with a state of promiscuity; that they were the result of order in the sexual relationships, and not of disorder. I have traced the causes which appear to have given rise to such a system, showing that the maternal order was not the first phase of the family, but was a natural forward movement—one which developed slowly and quite simply from the conditions of the patriarchal group. Moreover, I have maintained, and tried to prove, that the initiative in progress was taken by the women, they being inspired by their collective interest to overcome the individual interests of the male members of the group. If this is not assented to, then indeed, my view of mother-power can find no acceptance.

It is necessary, however, once more to guard against any mistake. I do not wish to prove a theory of gynæcocracy, or rule of woman. The title chosen for this chapter at once opens the way to misinterpretation. It might appear as if I supported Bachofen’s supposition that, under a system of maternal descent women possessed supreme rule in the family and in the clan: this is a dream only of visionaries. I declare here that I consider the theory of the so-called matriarchate at once false and injurious: false, because it can lead to nothing; and injurious, because, while it cannot be supported by facts, it overthrows what can be proved by the evidence that is open to all investigators. Nothing will be gained by exaggeration and by claiming over much for women. The term “matriarchal” takes too much for granted that women at one period ruled. Such a view is far from the truth. All I claim, then, is this: the system by which the descent of the name and the inheritance of property passes through the female side of the family placed women in a favourable position, with definite rights in the family and clan, rights which, in some cases, resulted in their having great and even extraordinary power. This, I think, may be granted. If descent through the father stands, as it is held to do, for the predominance of man over woman—the husband over the wife, then it is at least surely possible that descent through the mother may in some cases have stood for the predominance of the wife over the husband. The reader will judge how far the examples of the maternal family I am able to bring forward support this claim.

The evidence for mother-right has never yet been fully brought into notice; but much of the evidence is now available. Our knowledge of the customs of primitive peoples has increased greatly of late years, and these afford a wide field for inquiry. And although the examples of the complete maternal family existing to-day are few in number—probably not more than twenty tribes,[41] yet the important fact is that they occur among widely separated peoples in all the great regions of the uncivilised world. Moreover, side by side with these, are found a much larger number of imperfect systems, which give unmistakable evidence of an earlier maternal stage. Such examples are specially instructive; they belong to a transitional period, and show the maternal family in its decline as it passes into a new patriarchal stage; often, indeed, we see the one system competing in conflict with the other.

In this connection I may note that Westermarck does not accept an early period when descent was traced exclusively through the mother; he gives a long list of peoples among whom the system is not practised. These passages occur in his well-known Criticism of the Hypothesis of Promiscuity,[42] and his whole argument is based on the assumption that mother-right arose through the tie between the father and the child being unrecognised. But mother-descent has no connection at all with uncertainty of paternity. I venture to think Dr. Westermarck has not sufficiently considered this aspect of the question, and, if I mistake not, it is this confusion of mother-descent with promiscuity which explains his attitude towards the maternal system, and his failure to recognise its favourable influence on the status of women. In his opinion this system of tracing descent does not materially affect the relative power of the two sexes.[43] In such a view I cannot help thinking he is mistaken; and I am supported in this by the fact that he makes the important qualification that the husband’s power is impaired when he lives among his wife’s kinsfolk. Now, it is this form of marriage, or the more primitive custom when the husband only visits his wife, that is practised among the peoples who have preserved the complete maternal family. Under such a domestic arrangement, which really reverses the position of the wife and the husband, mother-right is found; this maternal marriage is, indeed, the true foundation of the woman’s power. Where the marriage system has been changed from the maternal to the paternal form, and the wife is taken from the protection of her own kindred to live in the home of her husband, even when descent is still traced through the mother, the chief authority is almost always in the hands of the father. Thus it need not cause surprise to find mother-descent combined with a fully established patriarchal rule. But among such peoples practices may often be met with that can be explained only as survivals from an earlier maternal system. Moreover, in other cases, we meet with tribes that have not yet advanced to the maternal stage. A study of existing tribes, and of the records of ancient civilisations, will yield any number of examples.

Unmistakable traces of mother-right may, indeed, be found by those, whose eyes are opened to see, in all races. In peasant festivals and dances, and in many religious beliefs and ceremonies, we may meet with such survivals. They may be traced in our common language, especially in the words used for sex and for kin relationships. We can also find them shadowed in certain of our marriage rites, and sex habits to-day. Another source of evidence is furnished by the widespread early occurrence of mother-goddesses, who must be connected with a system which places the mother in the forefront of religious thought. Further proof may be gathered from folk stories and heroic legends, whose interest offers rich rewards in suggestions of a time when honour rested with the sex to whom the inheritance belonged. Thus, the difficulty of establishing a claim for mother-right and mother-power does not rest in any paucity of proof—but rather in its superabundance.

It would be superfluous for me to dwell on the difficulties of such an inquiry. The subject is immensely complicated and wide-reaching, so that I must keep strictly to the path set before me. It is my purpose to outline the domestic relations in the maternal family clan, and to examine the sex-customs and forms of marriage. I shall limit myself to those matters which throw some light on the position of women, and shall touch on the features of social life only in so far as they illustrate this. These questions will be discussed in the three succeeding chapters. Some portion of the matter given has appeared already in the section on the “Mother-Age Civilisation” in The Truth about Woman, which gives examples of the maternal family in America, Australia, India and other countries. Such examples formed a necessary part of the historical section of that work; they are even more necessary to this inquiry. Many new examples will be given, and the examination of the whole subject will be more exhaustive. These chapters will be followed by a discussion of certain difficulties, and an examination of the transition period in which the maternal family gave way to the second patriarchal stage with the family founded on the authority of the father. A short chapter will be devoted to the work done by women in primitive tribes and its importance in relation to their position. Then will come as full an account as is possible of the traces of the mother-age to be found in the records of ancient and existing civilised races; while a brief chapter will be added on certain myths and legends which help to elucidate the theory of women’s early power. The final chapter will treat of general conclusions, with an attempt to suggest certain facts which seem to bear on present-day problems. Throughout I shall support my investigation (as far as can be done in a work primarily designed for a text-book) by examples, which, in each case, have been carefully chosen from trustworthy evidence of those who are personally acquainted with the habits of the peoples of whom they write. I shall try to avoid falling into the error of a one-sided view. Facts will be more important than reflections, and as far as possible, I shall let these speak for themselves.

Let us now concentrate our attention on the complete maternal family, where the clan is grouped around the mothers.

The examples in this chapter will be taken from the aboriginal tribes of North and South America among whom traces of the maternal system are common, while in some cases mother-right is still in force. At the period of European discovery the American Indians were already well advanced in the primitive arts, and were very far removed from savagery. Their domestic and social habits showed an organisation of a very remarkable character; among certain tribes there was a communal maternal family, interesting and complicated in its arrangements. Such customs had prevailed from an antiquity so remote that their origin seems to have been lost in the obscurity of the ages. It is possible, however, to see how this communism in living may have arisen and developed out of the conditions we have studied in the far distant patriarchal groups. For this reason they afford a very special interest to our inquiry.

Morgan, who was commissioned by the American Government to report on the customs of the aboriginal inhabitants, gives a description of the system as it existed among the Iroquois—

“Each household was made up on the principle of kin. The married women, usually sisters, own or collateral, were of the same gens or clan, the symbol or totem of which was often painted upon the house, while their husbands and the wives of their sons belonged to several other gentes. The children were of the gens of their mother. As a rule the sons brought home their wives, and in some cases the husbands of the daughters were admitted to the maternal household. Thus each household was composed of persons of different gentes, but the predominating number in each household would be of the same gens, namely, that of the mother.”[44]

We see here, at once, the persistence and development of the conditions and later customs of the patriarchal family-group, now evolved into the clan. In the far-distant days the jealous spirit was still strong; now it has been curbed and regulated, and the female yoke binds the clan together. We have the mothers as the centre of the communal home; the sons bringing their wives to live in the circle, while the daughters’ husbands are received as permanent guests. Under such a system the mothers are related to each other, and belong to the same clan, and their children after them; the fathers are not bound together by the same ties and are of different clans. The limits within which marriage can take place are fixed, and we can trace the action of the ancient primal law in the bar that prohibits the husband from being of the same clan as his wife. Though the husband takes up his abode in the wife’s family, dwelling there during her life and his good behaviour,[45] he still belongs to his own family. The children of the marriage are of the kindred of the mother, and never of his kindred: they are lost to his family. Thus there can be no extension of the clan through the males, it is the wife’s clan that is extended by marriage.[46]

The important point to note is that the conditions of the clan are still favourable to the social conduct of the women, who are attached much more closely to the home and to each other than can be the case with the men. The wife never leaves the home, because she is considered the mistress, or, at least, the heiress. In the house all the duties and the honour as the head of the household fall upon her. This position may be illustrated by the wife’s obligation to her husband and his family, which are curiously in contrast with what is usually expected from a woman. Thus a wife is not only bound to give food to her husband, to cook his provisions when he sets out on expeditions, but she has likewise to assist members of his family when they cultivate their fields, and to provide wood for an allotted period for the use of his family. In this work she is assisted by women of her clan. The women are also required in case of need to look after their parents.

There are many interesting customs in the domestic life of the Iroquois. I can notice a few only. The system of living, at the time Morgan visited the tribes, consisted of a plan at once novel and distinctive. Each gens or clan lived in a long tenement house, large enough to accommodate the separate families. These houses were erected on frames of poles, covered with bark, and were from fifty to a hundred feet in length. A passage way led down the centre, and rooms were portioned off on either side: the doors were at each end of the passage. An apartment was allotted to each family. There were several fireplaces, usually one for every four families, which were placed in the central passage: there were no chimneys. The Iroquois lived in these long houses, Ho-de-no-sau-nee, up to A.D. 1700, and in occasional instances for a hundred years later. They were not peculiar to the Iroquois, but were used by many tribes. Unfortunately this wise plan of living has now almost entirely passed away.

I wish that I had space to give a fuller account of these families.[47] Each household practised communism in living, and made a common stock of the provisions acquired by fishing and hunting, and by the cultivation of maize and plants. The curse of individual accumulation would seem not to have existed. Ownership of land and all property was held in common. Each household was directed by the matron who supervised its domestic economy. After the daily meal was cooked at the several fires, the matron was summoned, and it was her duty to apportion the food from the kettle to the different families according to their respective needs. What food remained was placed in the charge of another woman until it was required by the matron. In this connection Mr. Morgan says: “This plan of life shows that their domestic economy was not without method, and it displays the care and management of women, low down in barbarism, for husbanding their resources and for improving their conditions.”

In this statement, made by one who was intimately acquainted with the customs of this people there is surely confirmation of what I have claimed for women? The further we go in our inquiry the more we are driven to the conclusion that the favourable conditions uniting the women with one another exerted a powerful influence on their character. I think this is a view of the maternal family system that has never received its proper meed of attention.

It must be noted that the women did not eat with the men; but the fact that the apportioning of the food was in the women’s hands is sufficient proof that this separation of women and men, common among most primitive peoples, has no connection with the superiority of one sex over the other. It is interesting to find that only one prepared meal was served in each day. But the pots were always kept boiling over the fires, and any one who was hungry, either from the household or from any other part of the village, had a right to order it to be taken off and to eat as he or she pleased.

We may notice the influence of their communistic living in all the Indian customs. At all times the law of hospitality was strictly observed. Food was dispensed in every case to those who needed it; no excuse was ever made to avoid giving. If through misfortune one household fell into want, the needs were freely supplied from the stock laid by for future use in another household. Hunger and destitution could not exist in any part of an Indian village or encampment while plenty prevailed elsewhere. Such generosity at a time when food was often difficult to obtain, and its supply was the first concern of life, is a remarkable fact. Nor does this generosity seem, as might be thought, to have led to idleness and improvidence. He who begged, when he could work, was stigmatised with the disgraceful name of “poltroon” or “beggar”; but the miser who refused to assist his neighbour was branded as “a bad character.” Mr. Morgan, commenting on this phase of the Indian life says: “I much doubt if the civilised world would have in their institutions any system which can properly be called more humane and charitable.”

These reflections induce one to ask: What were the causes of this humane system of living among a people considered as uncivilised? Now, I do not wish to claim overmuch for women. We have seen, however, that the control and distribution of the supply of food was placed in the hands of the matrons, thus their association with the giving of food must be accepted. Is not this fact sufficient to indicate the reason that made possible this communism? To me it is plain that these remarkable institutions were connected with the maternal family, in which the collective interests were more considered than is possible in a patriarchal society, based upon individual inclination and proprietary interests.

A brief notice must now be given to the system of government. An Indian tribe was composed of several gentes or clans, united in what is known as a phratry or brotherhood. The tribe was an assemblage of the gentes. The phratry among the Iroquois was organised partly for social and partly for religious objects. Each gens was ruled by chiefs of two grades, distinguished by Morgan as the sachem and common chiefs. The sachem was the official head of the gens, and was elected by its adult members, male and female. The sachems and chiefs claimed no superiority and were never more than the exponents of the popular will of the people. Unanimity among the sachems was required on all public questions. This was the fundamental law of the brotherhood; if all efforts failed to gain agreement the matter in question was dropped. Under such a system individual rule or the power of one gens over the other became impossible. All the members of the different gentes were personally free; equal in privileges, and in position, and in rights. “Liberty, equality, and fraternity,” though never formulated, were the cardinal principles of the gens.[48] Mr. Morgan holds the opinion that “this serves to explain that sense of independence and personal dignity universally attributed to the Indian character.”

Regarding the part taken by the women in the government, we have very remarkable testimony. Schoolcraft,[49] in his elaborate study of the customs of the Indian tribes, states that the women had “a conservative power in the political deliberations. The matrons had their representatives in the public councils, and they exercised a negative, or what we call a veto, power, in the important question of the declaration of war.” They had also the right to interpose in bringing about a peace. Heriot also affirms: “In the women is vested the foundation of all real authority. They give efficiency to the councils and are the arbiters of war and peace.... It is also to their disposal that the captured slaves are committed.” And again: “Although by custom the leaders are chosen from among the men, and the affairs which concern the tribe are settled by a council of ancients, it would yet seem that they only represented the women, and assisted in the discussion of subjects which principally related to that sex.”[50]

These remarkable social and domestic conditions were common to the American Indians under the maternal system. The direct influence of women, as directors through the men, is a circumstance of much interest. Among the Senecas, an Iroquoian tribe with the complete maternal family, the authority was very certainly in the hands of the women. Morgan quotes an account of their family system, given by the Rev. Ashur Wright for many years a resident among the Senecas, and familiar with their language and customs.

“As to their family system, it is probable that one clan predominated (in the houses), the women taking in husbands, however, from other clans, and sometimes for novelty, some of their sons bringing in their young wives, until they felt brave enough to leave their mothers. Usually the female portion ruled the house, and were doubtless clannish enough about it. The stores were in common, but woe to the luckless husband or lover who was too shiftless to do his share of the providing. No matter how many children or whatever goods he might have in the house, he might at any time be ordered to pack up his blanket and budge, and after such orders it would not be healthful for him to attempt to disobey; the house would be too hot for him, and unless saved by the intercession of some aunt or grandmother, he must retreat to his own clan, or, as was often done, go and start a new matrimonial alliance in some other. The women were the great power among the clans as everywhere else. They did not hesitate, when occasion required, to ‘knock off the horns,’ as it was technically called, from the head of a chief and send him back to the ranks of the warrior. The original nomination of the chief also always rested with them.”

Mr. Morgan affirms his acceptance of the Indian women’s authority, and says, after quoting this passage: “The mother-right and gynæcocracy among the Iroquois here plainly indicated is not over-drawn. The mothers and their children, as we have seen, were of the same gens, and to them the household belonged. The position of the mother was eminently favourable to her influence in the household, and tended to strengthen the maternal bond.”[51]

It is important to note that among the Iroquois polygamy is not permitted, nor does it appear ever to be practised. Many instances are reported in the Seneca tribe of a woman having more than one husband, but an Iroquoian man is never allowed more than one wife.[52] This is the more remarkable when we consider the fact that the mothers nurse their children for a very long period, during which time they do not cohabit with their husbands. Such entire absence of polygamy is to be explained, in part, by the maternal marriage, a system which in its origin was closely connected with sexual regulation; nor would plurality of wives be possible in a society in which all the members of both sexes enjoyed equal privileges, and were in a position of absolute equality. Marriages usually take place at an early age. Under the maternal form, the husband living with the wife worked for her family, and commonly gained his footing only through his service. As suitor he was required to make presents to the bride’s family. During the first year of marriage all the produce of his hunting expeditions belonged to the wife, and afterwards he shared his goods equally with her. The marriages were negotiated by the mothers: sometimes the father was consulted, but this was little more than a compliment, as his approbation or opposition was usually disregarded. Often it was customary for the bridegroom to seek private interviews at night with his betrothed; clearly a survival from a time when such secrecy in love was necessary. In some instances it was enough if the suitor went and sat by the girl’s side in her apartment; if she permitted this, and remained where she was, it was taken for consent, and the act would suffice for marriage. Girls were allowed the right of choice in the selection of their partners. There is abundant testimony as to the happiness of the marriage state. Divorce was, however, allowed by mutual consent, and was carried out without dispute, quarrel or contradiction.[53] If a husband and a wife could not agree, they parted amicably, or two unhappy pairs would exchange husbands and wives. An early French missionary remonstrated with a couple on such a transaction, and was told: “My wife and I could not agree; my neighbour was in the same case, so we exchanged wives and all four were content. What can be more reasonable than to render one another mutually happy, when it costs so little, and does nobody any harm.”[54] It would seem that these maternal peoples have solved many difficulties of domestic and social life better than we ourselves have done.

The Wyandots, another Iroquoian tribe, maintained the maternal household, though they seem to have reached a later stage of development than the Senecas. They camped in the form of a horse-shoe, every clan together in regular order. Marriage between members of the same clan was forbidden; the children belonged to the clan of the mother. The husbands retained all their rights and privileges in their own gentes, though they lived in the gentes of their wives. After marriage the pair resided, for a time, at least, with the wife’s mother, but afterwards they set up housekeeping for themselves.[55]

We may note in this change of residence the creeping in of changes which inevitably led in time to the decay of the maternal family and the reassertion of the patriarchal authority of the father. This is illustrated further by the Musquakies, also belonging to the Algonquian stock. Though still organised in clans, descent is no longer reckoned through the mother; the bridegroom, however, serves his wife’s family, and he lives in her home. This does not make him of her clan, but she belongs to his, till his death or divorce separates her from him. As for the children, the minors at the termination of the marriage belong to the mother’s clan, but those who had had the puberty feast are counted to the father’s clan.[56]

The male authority was felt chiefly in periods of war. This may be illustrated by the Wyandots, who have an elaborate system of government. In each gens there is a small council composed of four women, called yu-waí-yu-wá-na; chosen by the heads of the household. These women select a chief of the gens from its male members, that is, from their brothers and sons. He is the head of the gentile council. The council of the tribe is composed of the aggregated gentile councils; and is thus made up of four-fifths of women and one-fifth of men. The sachem of the tribes, or tribal-chief, is chosen by the chiefs of the gentes. All the civil government of the gens and of the tribe is carried on by these councils; and as the women so largely outnumbered the men, who are also—with the one exception of the tribal-chief—chosen by them, it is evident that the social government of the gens and tribe is largely controlled by them. On military affairs, however, the men have the direct authority, though, as has been stated, the women have a veto power and are “allowed to exercise a decision in favour of peace.” There is a military council of all the able-bodied men of the tribe, with a military chief chosen by the council.[57] This seems a very wise adjustment of civic duties; the constructive social work and the maintaining of peace directed by the women; the destructive work of war in the hands of men.

Powell gives an interesting account of their communal life. Each clan owns its own lands which it cultivates; but within these lands each household has its own patch. It is the women councillors who partition the clan lands among the households. The partition takes place every two years. But while each household has its own patch of ground, the cultivation is communal; that is, all the able-bodied women of the clan take a share in cultivating every patch. Each clan has a right to the service of all its women in the cultivation of the soil. It would be difficult to find a more striking example than this of communism in labour. I claim it as proof of what I have stated in an earlier chapter of the conditions driving women into combination and social conduct.

If we turn now to the South American continent we shall find many interesting survivals of the complete maternal family, in particular among the Pueblo peoples of New Mexico and Arizona, so called from the Spanish word pueblo, a town. The customs of the people have been carefully studied and recorded by Bancroft, Schoolcraft, Morgan, Tylor, McGee, the Spanish historian, Herrera, and other travellers. When first visited by European anthropologists the country was divided into provinces, and in many provinces the people lived in communities or little republics. The communal life was here more developed even than among the Northern Indians. The people lived together in joint tenement houses, much larger, and of more advanced architecture, than the long houses of the Iroquois. These houses are constructed of adobe, brick and stone, imbedded in mortar; one house will contain as many as 50, 100, 200, and in some cases, 500 apartments. Speaking of these houses, Bancroft states: “The houses are common property, and both women and men assist in building them; the men erect the wooden frames, and the women make the mortar and build the walls. In place of lime for mortar they mix ashes with earth and charcoal. They make adobes, or sun-dried bricks, by mixing ashes and earth with water.”[58] Cushing, who visited and lived with the Zuñi Indians, records that among them the houses are entirely built by the women, the men supplying the material. These houses are erected in terrace form; within they are provided with windows, fireplaces and chimneys, and the entrance to the different apartments is gained by rude pole ladders. The pueblo, or village, consists of one or two, or sometimes a greater number of these houses, each containing a hundred or more families, according to the number of apartments.

Among the Creek Indians of Georgia, Morgan recounts a somewhat different mode of communal dwelling as formerly being practised. In 1790 they were living in small houses, placed in clusters of from four to eight together; and each cluster forming a gens or clan, who ate and lived in common. The food was prepared in one hut, and each family sent for its portion. The smallest of these “garden cities” contained 10 to 40 groups of houses, the largest from 50 to 200.[59] These communistic dwelling-houses are so interesting and so important that I would add a few words. Here, we have among these maternal peoples a system of living which appears to be identical with the improved conditions of associated dwelling now beginning to be tried. How often we consider new things that really are very old! In the light of these examples, our co-operative dwelling-houses and garden cities can no longer be regarded as experiments. They were in use in the mother-age, when many of our new (!) ideas seem to have been common. Can this be because of the extended power held by women, who are more practical and careful of detail than men are? I believe that it is possible. This would explain, too, the revival of the same ideas to-day, when women are taking up their part again in social life. To those who are questioning the waste and discomfort of our solitary homes I would recommend a careful study of this primitive communism. I would point out the connection of the social ideal with the maternal family, while the home that is solitary and unsocial must be regarded as having arisen from the patriarchal customs. I have had occasion again and again to note that collective interests are more considered by women; and individual interests by men. This, at least, is how I see it; and a study of the Indian maternal families seems to give confirmation to such a conclusion.

But to return to the Pueblo peoples. The tribes are divided into exogamous totem clans. Kinship is reckoned through the women, and in several tribes we find the complete maternal family. Among such peoples the husband goes to live with the wife and becomes an inmate of her family. If the house is not large enough, additional rooms are built on to the communal home and connected with those already occupied. Hence a family with many daughters increases, while one consisting of sons dies out.

The marriage customs and relationships between the young men and the girls are instructive; they vary in the different tribes, but have some points in common. The Pueblos are monogamists, and polygamy is not allowed amongst them. Bancroft records a very curious custom. The morals of the young people are carefully guarded by a kind of secret police, whose duty it is to report all irregularities; and in the event of such taking place the young man and the girl are compelled to marry.[60] Now, whatever opinion may be held of such interference with the love-making of the young people, it affords strong proof of the error which has hitherto connected the maternal system with unregulated sexual relationships. This is a fact I am again and again compelled to point out, risking the fear of wearying the reader.

Among some tribes freedom is permitted to the women before marriage. Heriot states that the natives who allow this justify the custom, and say “that a young woman is mistress of her own person, and a free agent.”[61] The tie of marriage is, however, observed more strictly than among many civilised monogamous races. And this is so, although divorce is always easy and by mutual consent; a couple being able to separate at once if they are dissatisfied with each other. Here are facts that may well cause us to think. As for the courtship, the usual custom is reversed; when a girl is disposed to marry she does not wait for a young man to propose to her, but selects one to her liking, and then consults her family as to his suitability as a husband. The suitor has to serve the bride’s family before he can be accepted, and in some cases the conditions are binding and exceedingly curious.

How simple and really beautiful are the conditions of life among these people may be seen from the idyllic record of the Zuñi Indians given by Mr. Cushing.[62] He describes how the Zuñi girl, when taking a fancy to a young man, conveys a present of thin hewe-bread to him as a token, and becomes his affianced, or as they say “his-to-be.” He then sews clothes and moccasins for her, makes her a necklace of gay beads, and combs her hair out on the terrace in the sun. After his term of service is over, and all is settled, he takes up his residence with her; then the married life begins. “With the woman rests the security of the marriage tie, and, it must be said, in her high honour, that she rarely abuses the privilege; that is, never sends her husband ‘to the home of his fathers’ unless he richly deserves it.” Divorce is by mutual consent, and a husband and wife would “rather separate than live together unharmoniously.” This testimony is confirmed by Mrs. Stevenson, who visited the Zuñis, and writes with enthusiasm of the people. “Their domestic life might well serve as an example for the civilised world. They do not have large families. The husband and wife are deeply attached to one another and to their children.” “The keynote of this harmony is the supremacy of the wife in the home. The house with all that is in it is hers, descending to her through her mother from a long line of ancestresses; and the husband is merely her permanent guest. The children—at least the female children—have their share in the common home; the father has none.” “Outside the house the husband has some property in the fields, although in earlier times he had no possessory rights and the land was held in common. Modern influences have reached the Zuñi, and mother-right seems to have begun its inevitable decay.”[63]

The Hopis, another Pueblo tribe, are more conservative, and with them the women own all the property except the horses and donkeys, which belong to the men. Among the Pueblos the women commonly have control over the granary, and they are very provident about the future. Ordinarily they try to have one year’s provisions on hand. It is only when two years of scarcity succeed each other that the community suffers hunger. Like the Zuñis, the Hopis are monogamists. Sexual freedom is, however, permitted to a girl before marriage. This in no way detracts from her good repute; even if she has given birth to a child “she will be sure to marry later on, unless she happens to be shockingly ugly.” Nor does the child suffer, for among these maternal peoples, the bastard takes an equal place with the child born in wedlock. The bride lives for the first few weeks with her husband’s family, during which time the marriage takes place, the ceremony being performed by the bridegroom’s mother, whose family also provides the bride with her wedding outfit. The couple then return to the home of the wife’s parents, where they remain, either permanently, or for some years, until they can obtain a separate dwelling. The husband is always a stranger, and is so treated by his wife’s kin. The dwelling of his mother remains his true home, in sickness he returns to her to be nursed, and stays with her until he is well again. Often his position in his wife’s home is so irksome that he severs his connection with her and her family, and returns to his old home. On the other hand, it is not uncommon for the wife, should her husband be absent, to place his goods outside the door: an intimation which he well understands, and does not intrude upon her again.[64]

Again, among the Pueblo peoples, we may consider the Sai. Like the other tribes they are divided into exogamous totem clans; descent is traced only through the mother. The tribe through various reasons has been greatly reduced in numbers, and whole clans have died out, and under these circumstances exogamy has ceased to be strictly enforced. This has led to other changes. The Sai are still normally monogamous. When a young man wishes to marry a girl he speaks first to her parents; if they are willing he addresses himself to her. On the day of the marriage he goes alone to her home, carrying his presents wrapped in a blanket, his mother and father having preceded him thither. When the young people are seated together the parents address them in turn, enjoining unity and forbearance. This constitutes the ceremony. Tribal custom requires the bridegroom to reside with the wife’s family.[65]

All the Pueblo peoples are more advanced than the greater number of the neighbouring tribes; their matrimonial customs are more refined, their domestic life much happier, and they have an appreciation of love, a rare thing in primitive peoples.[66] Among other tribes purchase of a wife is common, always a sure sign of the enslavement of women. Thus in Columbia what is most prized in a woman is her aptitude for labour, and the price paid for her (usually in horses) depends on her capacity as a beast of burden. Sometimes, as in California, a suitor obtains a wife on credit, but then the man is called “half married;” and until her price is paid he has to labour as a slave for her parents. Here, as elsewhere, morality is simply a custom of habit; Bancroft says that purchase of a wife has become accepted as honourable, so that among the Californian Redskins “the children of a wife who has cost nothing to her husband are looked down upon.”[67] Such customs are in sharp contrast to the liberty granted to the woman among the Pueblos. As an example of women’s power carried to the limit of tyranny, we may note the Nicaraguans, of whom Bancroft states that “the husbands are said to have been so much under the control of their wives that they were obliged to do the housework, while the women attended to the trading.” Under these circumstances it is perhaps not surprising to find the women described as “great shrews, who would on the slightest provocation drive their offending husbands out of the house.”[68] This is a curious case of the despotic rule of women. Westermarck accounts for their position by the strict monogamy that is enforced, but I do not think this can be the true explanation.[69]

Among the Guanas the women make their own stipulations with their lovers before marriage, arranging what they are to do in the household. They are also said to decide the conditions of the marriage, whether it is to be monogamous, or if polygamy or polyandry is to be allowed.[70] The Zapotecs and other tribes inhabiting the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, are remarkable for “the gentleness, affection, and frugality that characterises the marital relations. Polygamy is not permitted, which is very remarkable as the women greatly outnumber the men.”[71]

Lastly, I wish to bring forward a very striking example of the complete maternal family among the Seri Indians, on the south-west coast of North America, now reduced to a single tribe. Their curious and interesting marriage customs have been described by McGee, who visited the people to report on their customs for the American Government. The Seri are probably the most primitive tribe in the American continent. At the time of Mr. McGee’s visit they preserved the maternal system in its early form, and are therefore an instructive example by which to estimate the position of the women.[72]

“The tribe is divided into exogamous totem clans. Marriage is arranged exclusively by the women. The elder woman of the suitor’s family carries the proposal to the girl’s clan mother. If this is entertained, the question of marriage is discussed at length by the matrons of the two clans. The girl herself is consulted; a jacal is erected for her, and after many deliberations, the bridegroom is provisionally received into the wife’s clan for a year under conditions of the most exacting character. He is expected to prove his worthiness of a permanent relationship by demonstrating his ability as a provider, and by showing himself an implacable foe to aliens. He is compelled to support all the female relatives of his bride’s family by the products of his skill and industry in hunting and fishing for one year. There is also another provision of a very curious nature. The lover is permitted to share the jacal, or sleeping-robe, provided for the prospective matron by her kinswomen, not as a privileged spouse, but merely as a protective companion; and throughout this probationary time he is compelled to maintain continence—he must display the most indubitable proof of his moral force.”

This test of the Seri lover must not mistakenly be thought to be connected, as might appear, with the modern idea of continence. As is pointed out by McGee, it arose out of the primitive sexual taboos, and is imposed on the young man as a test of his strength to abstain from any sexual relationships outside the proscribed limits. Such a moral test may once have been common, but seems to have been lost except among the Seri; though a curious vestige appears in the anti-nuptial treatment of the bridegroom, in the Salish tribe. The material test is common among many peoples, and must not be confused with the later custom of payment for the wife by presents given to her family. Still this Seri marriage is one of the most curious I know among any primitive peoples. And the continence demanded from the bridegroom appears more extraordinary if we compare it with the freedom granted to the bride. “During this period the always dignified position occupied by the daughters of the house culminates.” Among other privileges she is allowed to receive the “most intimate attentions from the clan-fellows of the group.” “She is the receiver of the supplies furnished by her lover, measuring his competence as would-be husband. Through his energy she is enabled to dispense largess with a lavish hand, and thus to dignify her clan and honour her spouse in the most effective way known to primitive life; and at the same time she enjoys the immeasurable moral stimulus of realising she is the arbiter of the fate of a man who becomes a warrior or an outcast at her bidding, and through him of the future of two clans—she is raised to a responsibility in both personal and tribal affairs which, albeit temporary, is hardly lower than that of the warrior chief.” At the close of the year, if all goes well, the probation ends in a feast provided by the lover, who now becomes the husband, and finally enters his wife’s jacal as “consort-guest.” His position is wholly subordinate, and without any authority whatever, either over his children or over the property. In his mother’s hut he has rights, which seem to continue after his marriage, but in his wife’s hut he has none.

I have now collected together, with as much exactitude as I could, what is known of the maternal family in the American continents. There are many tribes in which descent is reckoned through the father, and it would be bold to assert that these have all passed through the maternal stage. An examination of their customs shows, in some cases, survivals, which point to such conclusion; among other tribes it seems probable that the maternal clan has not developed. As illustrations of mother-power, I claim the examples given speak for themselves. It may, of course, be urged that these complete maternal families are exceptions, and thus to dismiss them as unimportant. But this is surely an unscientific way of settling the question. One has to accept these cases, or to prove that they are untrue. Moreover, I have by no means exhausted the evidence; and to these complete maternal families might be added examples from other tribes which would furnish similar proofs, but there is such consistency of custom among them all that further accounts may be dispensed with.

There is one other matter for which I would claim attention before closing this chapter on the American Indians, and that is the remarkable similarity to be noticed in many tribes between the faces of the men and the women. To me this is a point of deep interest, though I do not claim to understand it. My attention was first drawn to notice this likeness between the two sexes when I came to know some Iroquois natives who live in England. I was at once struck with the appearance of the men: though strong and powerfully built, they were strikingly like women. Since then I have examined many portraits of the North Indian tribes; I have found that the great majority of men approach much more nearly to the feminine than the male type. I might, however, hesitate to bring the matter forward, were it founded only on my own observation. But in my reading I have found an important reference to the question in a recent work, “The Indians of North America in Recent Times,” by Mr. Cyrus Thomas, Ph.D., Archæologist, in the Bureau of American Ethnology. He writes as follows (p. 41)—

“Another curious fact, which has not hitherto received special notice, though apparently of considerable interest, is the prevailing feminine physiognomy of the males, at least of those of the northern section. If any one will take the trouble to study carefully a hundred or more good photographs of males of pure blood he will find that two thirds, if not a greater proportion, show feminine faces. The full significance of this fact is not apparent, but it seems to bear to some extent upon the question of the evolution of the race.”

What this fact suggests is a problem to which it is very difficult even to guess at an answer. Does this lack of differentiation in the physiognomy of the Indians point to something much deeper? Are the men really like the women? Such a conception opens up considerations of very great significance. So far as I understand the matter, it appears that, as well as the deep inherent differences between the two sexes, there are other differences due to divergence in function. It seems probable that changes in environment or in function (as when one sex, for some reason or other, performs the duties usually undertaken by the other sex), may alter or modify the differences which tend to thrust the sexes apart. I feel very sure that there can be changes in the secondary sexual characters of the male and female. This is sufficiently proved by many examples. Can we, then, accept the theory that an environment, which favours women’s forceful function, may modify the infinitely complicated characters of sex, which, as yet, we so imperfectly understand? I do not know with any certainty. Yet I can see no other interpretation; and, if I mistake not, it may be possible in this way to cast a light on one of the most difficult problems with which we are faced to-day.

FOOTNOTES:

[40] The Mystic Rose, pp. 460-461.

[41] This is the number given by Prof. Tylor. “The Matriarchal Family System,” Nineteenth Century, July 1896.

[42] History of Human Marriage, pp. 97-104.

[43] “The Position of Woman in Early Civilisations,” Sociological Papers, 1904.

[44] Morgan, Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines, p. 64.

[45] Tylor, “The Matriarchal Family System,” Nineteenth Century, July 1896.

[46] McLennan, The Patriarchal Theory, p. 208. Heriot, Travels through the Canadas, p. 323.

[47] The reader is referred to Morgan’s interesting Houses and House-Life of the Aborigines. It is from this work that many of the facts I give have been taken.

[48] Morgan, Ancient Society, p. 62. Also Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines.

[49] Historical and Statistical Information Respecting the History, Condition, and Prospects of the Indian Tribes of the United States, 6 vols., Vol. III, p. 195. See also Notes on the Iroquois and The Indian in his Wigwam.

[50] Heriot, op. cit., pp. 321-322.

[51] Houses and House-Life of American Aborigines, pp. 65-66.

[52] Morgan, League of the Iroquois, p. 324. Heriot, op. cit., pp. 323, 329. Schoolcraft, op. cit., Vol. III, p. 191.

[53] Heriot, pp. 231-237. See also Report of an Official of Indian Affairs on two of the Iroquoian tribes, cited by Hartland. Primitive Paternity, Vol. I, p. 298.

[54] Charleroix, Vol. V, p. 48, quoted by Hartland, op. cit., Vol. II, p. 66.

[55] Powell, Rep. Bur. Ethn., I, 63.

[56] Owen: Musquakie Indians, p. 72.

[57] I have summarised the account of the Wyandot government as given by Hartland, who quotes from Powell’s “Wyandot Government,” First Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, 1879-1880, pp. 61 ff.

[58] The Native Races of the Pacific States of South America, 5 vols., Vol. I, p. 555. See also Morgan.

[59] Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes, p. 262, gives an account of these houses. A similar plan of living is reported of the Maya Indians.

[60] Bancroft, op. cit., pp. 546, 547.

[61] Heriot, op. cit., p. 340.