Chapter 12

cleave unto his wife," refers without any doubt to the early marriage under mother-right, when the husband left his own kindred and went to live with his wife and among her people. We find Samson visiting his Philistine wife, who remained with her kindred.[110] Even the obligation to blood vengeance rested apparently on the maternal kinsmen (Judges viii. 19). The Hebrew father did not inherit from his son, nor the grandfather from the grandson,[111] which points back to an ancient epoch when the children did not belong to the clan of the father.[112] Among the Hebrews individual property was instituted in very early times (Gen. xxiii. 13); but various customs show clearly the ancient existence of communal clans. Thus the inheritance, especially the paternal inheritance, must remain in the clan. Marriage in the tribe is obligatory for daughters. "Let them marry to whom they think best; only to the family of the tribe of their father shall they marry. So shall not the inheritance of the children of Israel remove from tribe to tribe."[113] We have here an indication of the close relation between father-right and property.

Under mother-descent there is naturally no prohibition against marriage with a half-sister upon the father's side. This explains the marriage of Abraham with Sara, his half-sister by the same father. When reproached for having passed his wife off as his sister to the King of Egypt and to Abimelech, the patriarch replies: "For indeed she is my sister; she is the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother, and she became my wife."[114] In the same way Tamar could have married her half-brother Amnon, though they were both the children of David.[115] The father of Moses and Aaron married his father's sister, who was not legally his relation.[116] Nabor, the brother of Abraham, took to wife his fraternal niece, the daughter of his brother.[117] It was only later that paternal kinship became recognised among the Hebrews by the same title as the natural kinship through the mother.[118]

Other examples might be added. All these survivals of mother-descent (and they may be discovered in the early history of every people) have their value; they are, however, only survivals, and their interest rests mainly in comparing them with similar facts among other peoples among whom the presence of mother-right customs is undisputed. To these existing examples of the primitive family clan grouped around the mother we will now turn our attention.

II.--_The Matriarchal Family in America_

Traces of mother-descent are common everywhere in the American continent; and in some districts mother-rule is still in force. 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."[119]

There are many interesting customs belonging to the Iroquois; I can notice a few only. The _gens_ was ruled by chiefs of two grades, distinguished by Morgan as _sachem_ and common chiefs. The sachem was the official head of the _gens_. The actual occupant of the office was elected by the adult members of the _gens_, male and female, the own brother or son of a sister being most likely to be preferred.[120] The wife never left the parental home, because she was considered the mistress, or, at least, the heiress; her husband lived with her. In the house all the duties and the honour as the head of the household fell on her. She was required in case of need to look after her parents. The Iroquois recognised no right in the father to the custody of his children; such power was in the hands of the maternal uncle.[121] Marriages were negotiated by the uncles or the mothers; sometimes the father was consulted, but this was little more than a compliment, as his approbation or opposition was usually disregarded.[122] The suitor was required to make presents to the bride's family. It was the custom for him to seek private interviews at night with his betrothed. In some instances, it was enough if he went and sat by her side in her cabin; if she permitted this, and remained where she was, it was taken for consent, and the act would suffice for marriage. If a husband and wife could not agree, they parted, or two 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 are content. What can be more reasonable than to render one another mutually happy, when it costs so little and does nobody any harm?"[123] It would seem that these primitive people have solved some difficulties better than we ourselves have!

Among the Senecas,[124] an Iroquoian tribe with a less organised social life, the authority remained in the hands of the women. These people led a communal life, dwelling in long houses, which accommodated as many as twenty families, each in its own apartments.[125]

"As to their family system, it is probable that some one clan predominated (in the houses), the women taking in husbands, however, from the 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 chiefs also always rested with them."

This last detail is very interesting; we find the woman's authority extending even over warfare, the special province of men.

The Wyandots, another Iroquoian tribe, camp in the form of a horse-shoe, every clan together in regular order. Marriage between members of the same clan is forbidden; the children belong to the clan of the mother. The husbands retain all their rights and privileges in their own _gentes_, though they live in the _gentes_ of their wives. After marriage the pair live for a time, at least, with the wife's mother, but afterwards they set up housekeeping for themselves.[126]

We may note here the creeping in of changes which led to father-right. 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 mother, and he lives with her people. This does not make him of her clan; 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 have had the puberty feast are counted to the father's clan.[127]

The male authority is chiefly felt 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 women heads of the household. These women councillors 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 composed of four-fifths of women and one-fifth of men. The _sachem_ of tribes, or tribal-chief is chosen by chiefs of the _gentes_. All civil government of the _gens_ and of the tribe is carried on by these councils, and as the women so largely outnumber the men, who are also--with the exception of the tribal chief chosen by them--it is surely fair to assume that the social government of the _gens_ and _tribe_ is largely directed by them. In military affairs, however, the men have sole authority; there is a military council of all the able-bodied men of the tribe, with a military chief chosen by the council.[128] This seems a very wise adjustment of civic duties; the constructive civil work directed by the women; the destructive work of war in the hands of men.

Some interesting marriage customs of the Seri, on the south-west coast, now reduced to a single tribe, are described by McGee.[129] The matriarchal system exists here in its early form, it is, therefore, an instructive example by which to estimate the position held by the women--

"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 the 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 his wife's clan for a year, under conditions of the most exacting character. He is expected to prove his worthiness of a permanent relation 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 and 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 term he is compelled to maintain continence--he must display the most indubitable proof of moral force."

This is the more extraordinary if we compare 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."[130] "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 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 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.

The customs of the Pueblo peoples of the south-west of the United States are almost equally interesting. They live in communal dwellings, and are divided into exogamous _totem_ clans. Kinship is reckoned through the women, and the husband on marriage goes to live with the wife's kin and becomes an inmate of her family. If the house is not large enough, additional rooms are built adjoining and connected with those already occupied. Hence a family with many daughters increases, while one consisting of sons dies out. The women are the builders of the houses, the men supplying the material. The marriage customs are instructive. As is the case among the Seri, the lover has to serve his wife's family, but the conditions are much less exacting. Unlike most maternal peoples, these, the Zuñi Indians, are monogamists. Divorce is, however, frequent, and a husband and wife would "rather separate than live together unharmoniously."[131] 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 her 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, though probably in earlier times he had no possessory rights. "Modern influences have reached the Zuñi, and mother-right seems to have begun its inevitable decay."

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. Like the Zuñis, the Hopis are monogamists. Sexual licence is, however, often permitted to a woman 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 matriarchal people 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 relation 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 himself upon her again.[132]

Lastly, 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 women. 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 at least 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 father and mother 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.[133]

Now I submit to the judgment of my readers--what do these examples of mother-right among the aboriginal tribes of America show, if not that, speaking broadly, women were the dominant force in this early stage of civilisation? In some instances, it is true, their power was shared, or even taken from them, by their brothers or other male relatives. This I believe to have been a later development--a first step in the assertion of male-force. In all cases the alien position of the father, without tribal rights in his wife's clan and with no recognised authority over her children, is evident. If this is denied, the only conclusion that suggests itself to me is, that those who seek to diminish the importance of mother-rule have done so in reinforcement of their preconceived idea of male superiority as the natural and unchanging order in the relationship between the sexes. I have no hesitation as the result of very considerable study, in believing that it is the exact opposite of this that is true. The mother, and not the father, was the important partner in the early stages of civilisation; father-right, the form we find in our sexual relationships, is a later reversal of this natural arrangement, based, not upon kinship, but upon property. This we shall see more clearly later.

Thomas[134] suggests another reason for the general tendency among many investigators to lessen the importance of the mother-age civilisations. He thinks it due to dislike in acknowledging the theory of promiscuity (notably Westermark in his _History of Human Marriage_). This view would seem to be connected with the mistaken opinion that womb-kinship arose through the uncertainty of paternity. But this was not the sole reason, or indeed the chief one, of descent being traced through the mother. We have found mother-rule in very active existence among the Pueblo peoples, who are monogamists, and where the paternity of the child must be known. The modern civilised man cannot easily accustom himself to the idea that in the old matriarchal family the dominion of the mother was accepted as the natural, and, therefore, the right order of society. It is very difficult for us to accept a relationship of the sexes that is so exactly opposite to that to which we are accustomed.

After I had written the foregoing account of mother-rule as it exists in the continent of America, I had the exceeding good fortune to attend a lecture given by a native Iroquois. I wish it were possible for me to write here those things that I heard; but I could not do this, I know, without spoiling it all. This would destroy for me what is a very beautiful and happy memory. For to hear of a people who live gladly and without any of those problems that are rotting away our civilisation brings a new courage to those of us who sometimes grow hopeless at this needless wastage of life.

The lecturer told us much of the high status and power of women among the Iroquoian tribes. What he said, not only corroborated all I have written, but gave a picture of mother-rule and mother-rights far more complete than anything I had found in the records of investigators and travellers. The lecturer was a cultured gentleman, and I learnt how false had been my view that the race to which he belonged was uncivilised. I learnt, too, that the Iroquoian tribes were now increasing in numbers, and must not be looked upon as a diminishing people. They have kept, against terrible difficulties, and are determined to keep, their own civilisation and customs, knowing these to be better for them than those of other races. The lecturer astonished me by his familiarity with, and understanding of, our social problems. He spoke, in particular, of the present revolution among women. This, in his opinion, was due wholly to the unnatural arrangement of our family relationship, with the father at the head instead of the mother. There seem to be no sex-problems, no difficulties in marriage, no celibacy, no prostitution among the Iroquoians. All the power in the domestic relationship is in the hands of women. I questioned the lecturer on this point. I asked him if the women did not at times misuse their rights of authority, and if men did not rebel? He seemed surprised. His answer was: "Of course the men follow the wishes of the women; they are our mothers." To him there seemed no more to be said.

III.--_Further Examples of the Matriarchal Family in Australia, India, and other countries_

It is only fair to state that the question of the position of women during the mother-age is a disputed one. Bachofen[135] was the first to build up in his classical works of Matriarchy, the gynæcocratic theory which places the chief social power under the system of mother-descent in the hands of women. This view has been disputed, especially in recent years, and many writers who acknowledge the widespread existence of maternal descent deny that it carries with it, except in 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.[136]

One suspects prejudice here. To approach this question with any fairness it is absolutely essential to clear the mind from our current theories regarding the family. The order is not sacred in the sense that it has always had the same form. It is this belief in the immutability of our form of the sexual relationship which accounts for the prejudice with which this question is so often approached. I fully admit the dark side of the mother-age among many peoples; its sexual licence, often brutal in practice, its cruelties and sacrifice of life. But these are evils common to barbarism, and are found existing under father-right quite as frequently as under mother-right. I concede, too, that mother-descent was not necessarily or universally a period of mother-rule. It was not. But that it did in many cases--and these no exceptional ones--carry with it power for women, as the transmitters of inheritance and property I am certain that the known facts prove.[137] Nor do I forget that cruel treatment of women was not uncommon in matriarchal societies. I have shown how in many tribes the power rested in the woman's brother or male relations, and in all such cases mother-descent was really combined with a patriarchal system, the earlier authority of the mother persisting only as a habit. But to argue from the cases of male cruelty that mother-descent did not confer special advantages upon women is, I think, as absurd as it would be to state that under the fully developed patriarchal rule (as also in our society to-day) the authority was not in the hands of men, because cases are not infrequent in which women ill-treat their husbands. And, indeed, when we consider the position of the husband and father under this early system, without rights of property and with no authority over his children, and subject to the rule either of his wife or of her relatives, no surprise can be felt if sometimes he resorted to cruelties, asserting his power in whatever direction opportunity permitted. I may admit that for a long time I found it difficult to believe in this mother-power. The finding of such authority held by primitive woman is strange, indeed, to women to-day. Reverse the sexes, and in broad statement the conditions of the mother-age would be true of our present domestic and social relationship. Little wonder, then, that primitive men rebelled, disliking the inconveniences arising from their insecure and dependent position as perpetual guests in their wives' homes. It is strange how history repeats itself.

Women, from their association with the home, were the first organisers of all industrial labour. A glance back at the mother-age civilisation should teach men modesty. They will see that woman was the equal, if not superior, to man in productive activity. It was not until a much later period that men supplanted women and monopolised the work they had started. Through their identification with the early industrial processes women were the first property owners; they were almost the sole creators of ownership in land, and held in respect of this a position of great advantage. In the transactions of North American tribes with the colonial government many deeds of assignment bear female signatures.[138] A form of divorce used by a husband in ancient Arabia was: "Begone, for I will no longer drive thy flocks to pasture."[139] In almost all cases the household goods belonged to the woman. The stores of roots and berries laid up for a time of scarcity were the property of the wife, and the husband would not touch them without her permission. In many cases such property was very extensive. Among the Menomini Indians, for instance, a woman of good circumstances would own as many as from 1200 to 1500 birch-bark vessels.[140] In the New Mexican _pueblo_ what comes from outside the house, as soon as it is inside is put under the immediate control of the women. Bandelier, in his report of his tour in Mexico, tells us that "his host at Cochiti, New Mexico, could not sell an ear of corn or a string of chilli without the consent of his fourteen-year-old daughter Ignacia, who kept house for her widowed father."[141]

The point we have now reached is this: while mother-descent did not constitute or make necessary rule by women, under this system they enjoyed considerable power as the result (1) of their position as property-holders, (2) of their freedom in marriage and the social habits arising from it. This conclusion will be strengthened if we return to our examination of mother-right customs, as we shall find them in all parts of the world. I must select a few examples from as various countries as is possible, and describe them very briefly; not because these cases offer less interest than the matrilineal tribes of America, but because of the length to which this part of my inquiry is rapidly growing.

Let us begin with Australia, where the aboriginal population is in a more primitive condition than any other race whose institutions have been investigated. In certain tribes the family has hardly begun to be distinguished from kin in general. The group is divided into male and female classes, in addition to the division into clans.[142] This is so among the tribes of Mount Gambier, of Darling River, and of Queensland. Marriage within the clan is strictly forbidden, and the male and female classes of each clan are regarded as brothers and sisters. But as every man is brother to all the sisters of his clan, he is husband to all the women of the other clans of his tribe. Marriage is not an individual act, it is a social condition. The custom is not always carried out in practice, but any man of one clan has the right, if he wishes to exercise it, to call any woman belonging to another clan of his tribe his wife, and to treat her as such.[143] The children of each group belong naturally to the clan of the mother, and there is no legal parenthood between them and their father. In the case of war the son must join the maternal tribe. But this is not the universal rule, and in many tribes the children now belong to the paternal clan. The paternal family is beginning to be established in Australia, and varied artifices are used to escape from the tribal marriage and to form unions on an individual basis.

Mother-right is still in force in parts of India, though owing to the influence of Brahmanism on the aboriginal tribes the examples are fewer than might be expected. This change has brought descent through the fathers, and has involved, besides, the more or less complete subjugation of women, with insistence on female chastity, abolition of divorce, infant marriage, and perpetuation of widowhood.[144] Not every tribe is yet thus revolutionised. Among the Kasias of south-east India the husband lives with the wife or visits her occasionally.

"Laws of rank and property follow the strictest maternal rule; when a couple separate the children remain with the mother, the son does not succeed his father, but a raja's neglected offspring may become a common peasant or a labourer; the sister's son succeeds to rank and is heir to the property."[145]

This may be taken as an extreme example of the conditions among the unchanged tribes. The Garos tribe have an interesting marriage custom.[146] The girl chooses her lover and invites him to follow her; any advance made on his side is regarded as an insult to the woman's clan, and has to be expiated by presents. This marriage is very similar to the ceremony of capture, only the actors change parts; it is here the bridegroom who runs away, and is conducted by force to his future wife amidst the lamentations of his relations.

Even tribes that have adopted paternal descent preserve numerous customs of the earlier system. The husband still remains in the wife's home for a probationary period, working for her family.[147] Women retain rights which are inconsistent with father-rule. The choice of her lover often remains with the girl. If a girl fancies a young man, all she has to do is to give him a kick on the leg at the tribal dance of the _Karama_, and then the parents think it well to hasten on a wedding. Among Ghasiyas in United Provinces a wife is permitted to leave her husband if he intrigues with another woman, or if he become insane, impotent, blind or leprous, while these bodily evils do not allow him to put her away.[148] We find relics of the early freedom enjoyed by women in the licence frequently permitted to girls before marriage. Even after marriage adultery within the tribal rules is not regarded as a serious offence. Divorce is often easy, at the wish of either the woman or the man.[149] This is the case among the Santál tribes, which are found in Western Bengal, Northern Orissa, Bhágulpur and the Santál Párganas.[150] It seems probable that fraternal polyandry must formerly have been practised.

Polyandry must have been common at one time in southern India. It will be sufficient to give a few examples. The interesting Todas tribe of the Nil'giri Hills practise fraternal polyandry. The husbands of the women are usually real brothers, but sometimes they are clan brothers. The children belong to the eldest brother, who performs the ceremony of giving the mother a miniature bow and arrow; all offspring, even if born after his death, are counted as his until one of the other brothers performs this ceremony. It is also allowed sometimes for the wife to be mistress to another man besides her husbands, and any children born of such unions are counted as the children of the regular marriage. There is little restriction in love of any kind. In the Toda language there is no word for adultery. It would even seem that "immorality attaches rather to him who grudges his wife to another man."[151]

Similarly among a fine tribe of Hindu mountaineers at the source of the Djemmah fraternal polyandry has been proved to have existed. A woman of this tribe, when asked how many husbands she had, answered, "Only four!" "And all living?" "Why not?" This tribe had a high standard of social conduct; they held lying in horror, and to deviate from the truth even quite innocently was almost a sacrilege.[152] To-day the Kammalaus (artisans) of Malabar practise fraternal polyandry. The wives are said to greatly appreciate the custom; the more husbands they have the greater will be their happiness.[153]

At another extremity of India, in Ceylon, the polyandric rule is still common,[154] but it is particularly in lamaic Thibet that fraternal polyandry is in full vigour, for in this country religion sanctions the custom, and it is practised by the ruling classes.[155] Its customs are too well known to need description. "The tyranny of man is hardly known among the happy women of Thibet; the boot is perhaps upon the other leg," writes Hartland.[156]

Polyandry is a survival of the group-marriage of the mother-age.[157] It is not really dependent on, though in many cases it occurs in connection with, the economic causes of poverty and a scarcity of women, due to the practice of female infanticide. This form of sexual association has evident advantages for women when compared with polygamy. That freedom in love carried with it domestic and social rights and privileges to women I have no longer to prove.[158]

The case of the Nâyars of Malabar, where polyandry exists with the early system of maternal filiation, is specially instructive. It is impossible to give the details of their curious customs. The young girls are married when children by a rite known as tying the _tali_; but this marriage serves only the purpose of initiation, and is often performed by a stranger. On the fourth day the fictitious husband is required to divorce the girl. Afterwards any number of marriages may be entered upon[159] without any other restrictions than the prohibitions relative to cast and tribe. These later unions, unlike the solemn initial rite, have no ceremony connected with them, and are entered into freely at the will of the women and their families. As a husband the man of the Nâyars cannot be said to exist; he does not as a rule live with his wife.[160] It is said that he has not the right to sit down by her side or that of her children, he is merely a passing guest, almost a stranger. He is, in fact, reduced to the primitive rôle of the male, and is simply progenitor. "No Nâyar knows his father, and every man looks upon his sister's children as his heirs. A man's mother manages his family; and after her death his eldest sister assumes the direction." The property belongs to the family and is enjoyed by all in common (though personal division is coming into practice under modern influences). It is directed and administered by the maternal uncle or the eldest brother.[161]

The Malays of the Pedang Highlands of Sumatra have institutions bearing many points of similarity with the Nâyars. On marriage neither husband nor wife changes abode, the husband merely visits the wife, coming at first by day to help her work in the rice-fields. Later the visits are paid by night to the wife's house. The husband has no rights over his children, who belong wholly to the wife's _suku_, or clan. Her eldest brother is the head of the family and exercises the rights and duties of a father to her children.[162] The marriage, based on the _ambel-anak_, in which the husband lives with the wife, paying nothing, and occupying a subordinate position, may be taken as typical of the former conditions.[163]

But among other tribes who have come in contact with outside influences this custom of the husband visiting the wife, or residing in her house, is modified.

From a private correspondent, a resident in the Malay States, I have received some interesting notes about the present condition of the native tribes and the position of the women. In most of the Malay States exogamous matriarchy has in comparatively modern times been superseded by feudalism (_i.e._ father-right). But where the old custom survives the women are still to a large extent in control. The husband goes to live in the wife's village; thus the women in each group are a compact unity, while the men are strangers to each other and enter as unorganised individuals. This is the real basis of the woman's power. In other tribes where the old custom has changed women occupy a distinctly inferior position, and under the influence of Islam the idea of secluding adult women has been for centuries spreading and increasing in force.

Male kinship prevails among the Arabs, but the late Professor Robertson Smith discovered abundant evidence that mother-right was practised in ancient Arabia.[164] We find a decisive example of its favourable influence on the position of women in the custom of _beena_[165] marriage. Under such a system the wife was not only freed from any subjection involved by the payment of a bride-price (which always places her more or less under the authority of her husband), but she was the owner of the tent and household property, and thus enjoyed the liberty which ownership always entails. This explains how she was able to free herself at pleasure from her husband, who was really nothing but a temporary lover.[166] Ibn Batua in the fourteenth century found that the women of Zebid were perfectly ready to marry strangers. The husband might depart when he pleased, but his wife in that case could never be induced to follow him. She bade him a friendly adieu and took upon herself the whole charge of any child of the marriage. The women in the Jâhilîya[167] had the right to dismiss their husbands, and the form of dismissal was this: "If they lived in a tent they turned it round, so that if the door faced east it now faced west, and when the man saw this he knew that he was dismissed and did not enter." The tent belonged to the woman; the husband was received there and at her good pleasure.[168]

A further striking example of mother-right is furnished by the Mariana Islands, where the position of women was distinctly superior.

"Even when the man had contributed an equal share of property on marriage, the wife dictated everything and the man could undertake nothing without her approval; but if the woman committed an offence, the man was held responsible and suffered the punishment. The women could speak in the assembly, they held property, and if a woman asked anything of a man, he gave it up without a murmur. If a wife was unfaithful, the husband could send her home, keep her property and kill the adulterer; but if the man was guilty, or even suspected of the same offence, the women of the neighbourhood destroyed his house and all his visible property, and the owner was fortunate if he escaped with a whole skin; and if the wife was not pleased with her husband, she withdrew and a similar attack followed. On this account many men were not married, preferring to live with paid women."[169]

A similar case of the rebellion of men against their position is recorded in Guinea, where religious symbolism was used by the husband as a way of escape. The maternal system held with respect to the chief wife.

"It was customary, however, for a man to buy and take to wife a slave, a friendless person with whom he could deal at pleasure, who had no kindred that could interfere for her, and to consecrate her to his Bossum or god. The Bossum wife, slave as she had been, ranked next to the chief wife, and was exceptionally treated. She alone was very jealously guarded, she alone was sacrificed at her husband's death. She was, in fact, wife in a peculiar sense. And having, by consecration, been made of the kindred and worship of her husband, her children could be born of his kindred and worship."[170]

This practice of having a slave-wife who was the property of the husband became more and more common; and was one of the causes that led to the establishment of father-right. How this came we have now to see.

IV.--_The Transition to Father-right_

In the preceding sections of this chapter I have collected together, with as much exactitude as I could, many examples of the maternal family. I want now to refer briefly to a few further cases, which will make clearer the causes which led to the adoption of father-right.

Many countries where the patriarchal system is firmly established retain practices which can only be explained as survivals of the earlier custom of mother-descent.[171] It must suffice to mention one or two examples. In Burma, which offers in this respect a curious contrast to India, the women have preserved under father-right most of the privileges of mother-right. This is the more remarkable as the law of marriage and the relationship of the sexes is founded on the code of Manu, which proclaims aloud the inferiority of woman. It is interesting, however, to note that the code recognises only three kinds of men: the good man, the indifferent man, and the bad man. Women, though recognised solely in their relation as wives, are placed in seven classes: the mother-wife, the sister-wife, the daughter-wife, the friend-wife, the master-wife, the servant-wife, and the slave-wife. Manu holds that the last of these, the slave-wife, is the best wife. It is, however, certain that the interpretation of the code in Burma was entirely opposed to any subjection of the wife. That mother-right must have been once practised and was very firmly established is proved by the occurrence of brother-sister marriages. The queens of the last rulers of the country, Minden-Min and Thebaw, were either their own or their half-sisters, and the power of government seems to have been almost wholly in the hands of these queens. The patriarchal custom, so far as the position of women was concerned, is but a thread, binding them in their marriage, but leaving them entirely free in other respects. The Burmese wife is much more the master than the slave of her husband, though she is clever enough as a rule not to let him feel any inconvenience from her power, which, therefore, he accepts. The exceptional position of the women is clearly indicated by the fact that they enter freely into trade, and, indeed, carry out most of the business of the country. Nearly all the shops are kept by women. In the markets, where everything that any one could possibly want is sold, almost all the dealers are women. All classes of the Burmese girls receive their training in these markets; the daughters of the rich sell the costly and beautiful stuffs, the poorer girls sell the cheaper wares. It is this training which accounts for the business capacity shown by the women. The boys are trained by the priests, as every boy is required, "in order to purify his soul, to acquire a knowledge of sacred things." This explains a great deal. It would seem that religion enforces the same penalties on men that in most countries fall upon women. The Burmese women are very attractive, as is testified by all who know them. The streets of the towns are thronged with women at all hours of the day, and they show the greatest delight in everything that is lively and gay.

Given such complete freedom of women, it is self-evident that the sexual relationships will also be free. Very striking are the conditions of divorce. The marriage contract can be dissolved freely at the wish of both, or even of one, of the partners. In the first case the family property is divided equally between the wife and the husband, while if only one partner desires to be freed the property goes to the partner who is left. The children of the marriage remain with the mother while they are young; but the boys belong to the father. I wish it were possible for me to give a fuller account of the Burmese family. The freedom and active work of the women offer many points of special interest. One thing further must be noted. The Burmese women would seem not to be wholly satisfied with their power, disliking the work and responsibility which their freedom entails. For this reason many of them prefer to marry a Chinese husband; he works for them, while with a husband of their own country they have to work for him. This is very instructive. It points to what I believe to be the truth. The loss of her freedom by woman is often the result of her own desire for protection and her dislike of work, and is not caused by man's tyranny. Woman's own action in this matter is not sufficiently recognised. I must not enter upon this here, as I shall return to the subject later in this chapter. We must now consider the traces left by mother-descent in Japan and China.

In Japan, as among the Basques, filiation is subordinated to the transmission of property. It is to the first-born, whether a boy or a girl, that the inheritance is transmitted, and he or she is forbidden to abandon it. At the time of marriage the husband or wife must take the name of the heir or heiress who marries and personifies the property. Filiation is thus sometimes paternal and sometimes maternal. The maternal uncle still bears the name of "second little father."[172] The children of the same father, but not of the same mother, were formerly allowed to marry, a decisive proof of mother-descent. The wife remained with her own relatives, and the husband had the right of visiting her by night. The word commonly used for marriage signified _to slip by night into the house_. It was not until the fourteenth century that the husband's residence was the home of the wife, and marriage became a continued living together by the married pair. Even now when a man marries an only daughter he frequently lives with her family, and the children take her name. There is also a custom by which a man with daughters, but no son, adopts a stranger, giving him one of his daughters in marriage; the children are counted as the heirs of the maternal grandfather.[173] Similar survivals are frequent in China. The patriarchate is rigidly established, but there is evidence to show that the family in this ancient civilisation has passed through the usual stages of development, having for its starting-point the familial clan, and passing from this through the stage of mother-right.[174] The Chinese language itself attests the ancient existence of the earliest form of marriage, contracted by a group of brothers having their wives in common, but not marrying their sisters. Thus a Chinaman calls the sons of his brothers "his sons," but he considers those of his sisters as his nephews.[175] Certain of the aboriginal tribes still require the husband to live with his wife's family for a period of seven or ten years before he is allowed to take her to his home. The eldest child is given to the husband, the second belongs to the family of the wife.[176] The authority which the Chinese mother exercises over her son's marriage and over his wife can only be explained by mother-right customs. There are many other examples which I must pass over.

In the Island of Madagascar, with whose interesting civilisation, as it existed before the unfortunate conquest of the country by the French, I am personally acquainted, mother-right has left much more than traces.[177] Great freedom in sexual relations was permitted to the men, and in certain cases to women also. There was no word in the native language for virgin; the word _mpitòvo_, commonly used, means only an unmarried woman. On certain festive ceremonies the licence was very great. The hindrances to marriage were much more stringent with the mother's relations than with the father's. Divorce was frequent and easy; the power to exercise it rested with the husband; but the wife could, and often did, run away, and thus compel a divorce. A Malagasy proverb compared marriage to a knot so lightly tied that it could be undone by a touch. Such freedom was due to the great desire for children; every child was welcome in the family, whatever its origin.[178] The children belonged to the husband, and so complete was this possession, that in the case of a divorce not only the children previously born, but any the wife might afterwards bear, were counted as his.

Among the ruling classes mother-right remained in its early force. The royal family and nobility traced their descent, contrary to the general practice, through the mother, and not through the father. The rights of an unmarried queen were great. She was permitted to have a family by whomsoever she wished, and her children were recognised as legitimately royal through her. Among the Hovas not only wealth, but political dignities, and even sacerdotal functions, were transmitted to the nephew, in preference to the son.

In the adjacent continent of Africa we find similar privileges enjoyed by royal women. A delightful example is given by Frazer[179] in Central Africa, where a small state, near to the Chambezi river, is governed by a queen, who belongs to the reigning family of Ubemba. She bears the title _Mamfumer_, "Mother of Kings." The privileges attached to this dignity are numerous; the husbands may be chosen at will and from among the common people.

"The chosen man becomes prince consort, without sharing in the government of affairs. He is bound to leave everything to follow his royal and often little accommodating spouse. To show that in these households the rights are inverted and that a man may be changed into a woman, the queen takes the title of _Monsieur_ and the husband that of _Madame_." A visitor to this state,[180] who had an interview with the queen, reports that, "she was a woman of gigantic stature, wearing many amulets."

Battle reported that "Loango was ruled by four princes, the sons of a former king's sister, since the sons of a king never succeed.[181] Frazer gives an account of the tyrannical authority of the princesses in this state.[182]

"The princesses are free to choose and divorce their husbands at pleasure, and to cohabit at the same time with other men. The husbands are nearly always plebeians. The lot of a prince consort is not a happy one, for he is rather the slave and prisoner than the mate of his imperious princess. In marrying her he engages never more to look at a woman; when he goes out he is preceded by guards whose duty it is to drive all females from the road where he is to pass. If, in spite of these precautions, he should by ill-luck cast his eyes on a woman, the princess may have his head chopped off, and commonly exercised, or used to exercise, the right. This sort of libertinism, sustained by power, often carries the princesses to the greatest excesses, and nothing is so much dreaded as their anger."

In Africa descent through women is the rule,[183] though there are exceptions, and these are increasing. The amusing account given by Miss Kingsley[184] of Joseph, a member of the Batu tribe in French Congo, strikingly illustrates the prevalence of the custom. When asked by a French official to furnish his own name and the name of his father, Joseph was wholly nonplussed. "My fader?" he said. "Who my fader?" Then he gave the name of his mother.

The case is the same among the Negroes. The Fanti of the Gold Coast may be taken as an example. Among them an intensity of affection (accounted for partly by the fact that the mothers have exclusive care of the children) is felt for the mother, while the father is hardly known, or disregarded, notwithstanding that he may be a wealthy and powerful man and the legal husband of the mother.[185] The practice of the Wamoima, where the son of a sister is preferred in legacies, "because a man's own son is only the son of his wife," is typical.[186] The Bush husband does not live with his wife, and often has wives in different places. The maternal uncle supplies his place in the family.

Wherever mother-right has progressed towards father-right, as is the condition, broadly speaking, in the African continent, the supreme authority is vested in the maternal uncle. The tribal duty of blood-revenge falls to him, even against the father. Thus, in some cases, if a woman is murdered, the duty of revenge is undertaken by her kinsman.[187] In the state of Loango among the common people the uncle is addressed as _tate_ (father). He has even the power to sell his sister's children.[188] The child is so entirely the property of the kin that he may be given in pledge for their debts. Among the Bavili the mother has the right to pawn the child, but she must first consult the father, so that he may have a chance of giving her goods to save the pledging.[189] This is very plainly a step towards father-right. There is no distinction between legitimate and illegitimate children. Similar conditions prevail among the Alladians of the Ivory Coast, but here the mother cannot pledge her children without the consent of her brother or other male head of the family. The father has the right to ransom the child.[190] An even stronger example of the property value of children is furnished by the custom found among many tribes, by which the father has to make a present to the wife's kin when a child dies: this is called "buying the child."[191]

These cases, with the inferences they suggest, show that though mother-descent may be strongly established in Africa, this does not confer (except to the royal princesses) any special distinction upon women. This is explained if we recognise that a transitional period has been reached, when, under the pressure of social, and particularly of military activities, the government of the tribe has passed to the male kindred of the women. It wants but a step further for the establishment of father-right.

There are many cases pointing to this new father-force asserting itself and pushing aside the earlier order. Again I can give one or two examples only. Among Wayao and Mang'anja of the Shire highlands, south of Lake Nyassa, a man on marrying leaves his own village and goes to live in that of his wife; but, as an alternative, he is allowed to pay a bride-price, in which case he takes his wife away to his home.[192] Whenever we find the payment of a bride-price, there is sure indication of the decay of mother-right: woman has become property. Among the Bassa Komo of Nigeria marriage is usually effected by an exchange of sisters or other female relatives. The women are supposed to be faithful to their husbands. If, however, as frequently happens, there is a preliminary courtship period, during which the marriage is considered as provisional, considerable licence is granted to the woman. Chastity is only regarded as a virtue when the woman has become the property of the husband. The men may marry as many wives as they have sisters or female relatives to give in exchange. In this tribe the women look after the children, but the boys, when four years old, go to work and live with their fathers.[193] The husbands of the Bambala tribe (inhabiting the Congo states between the rivers Inzia and Kwilu) have to abstain from visiting their wives for a year after the birth of each child, but they are allowed to return to her on the payment to her father of two goats.[194] Among the Basanga on the south-west of Lake Moeru the children of the wife belong to the mother's kin, but the children of slaves are the property of the father.[195]

It is rendered clear by such cases as these, that the rise of father-right was dependent on property and had nothing to do with blood relationship. The payment of a bride-price, the giving of a sister in exchange, as also marriage with a slave, gained for the husband the control over his wife and ownership of her children. I could bring forward much more evidence in proof of this fact did the limits of my space allow me to do this; such cases are common in all parts of the world where the transitional stage from mother-right to father-right has been reached. But I believe that the causes by which the father gained his position as the dominant partner in marriage must be clear to every one from the examples I have given. I will, therefore, quote only one final and most instructive case. It illustrates in a curious way the conflict between the old rights of the woman and the rising power of the male force in connection with marriage. It occurs among the Hassanyeh Arabs of the White Nile, where the wife passes by contract for only a portion of her time under the authority of her husband.

"When the parents of the man and the woman meet to settle the price of the woman, the price depends on how many days in the week the marriage tie is to be strictly observed. The woman's mother first of all proposes that, taking everything into consideration, with due regard to the feelings of the family, she could not think of binding her daughter to a due observance of that chastity which matrimony is expected to command for more than two days in the week. After a great deal of apparently angry discussion, and the promise on the part of the relations of the man to pay more, it is arranged that the marriage shall hold good as is customary among the first families of the tribe, for four days in the week, viz. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, and in compliance with old established custom, the marriage rites during the three remaining days shall not be insisted on, during which days the bride shall be perfectly free to act as she may think proper, either by adhering to her husband and home, or by enjoying her freedom and independence from all observance of matrimonial obligation."[196]

We have at length concluded our investigation of this first period of organised society, and have ascertained many facts that we can use as a touchstone to try the truth of the various theories that are put forward with regard to woman and her position in the family and in the State. The importance of the mother-age to women is evident. Thus I offer no apology for the length at which I have treated the subject. It has seemed to me after careful revision that no one of the examples given can be omitted. Facts are of so much more importance than opinions if we are to come to the truth.

Without attempting to trace exhaustively the history or even to enumerate the peoples living, or who have lived, under mother-right customs, we have examined many and varied cases of the actual working of this system, with special reference to the position held by women. The examples have been chosen from all parts of the world, so as to prove (what is sometimes denied) that mother-right has not been confined to any one race, that it is not a local custom under special conditions, but that it has been a necessary stage of growth of human societies. My aim has been to illustrate the stages through which society passed from mother-right to father-right. It has not been possible to arrange the evidence in any exact progressive sequence, but I hope the cases given will make clear what I believe to have been the general trend of growth: at first the power in the hands of the women, but this giving way to the slow but steady usurping of the mother's authority by the ever-assertive male.

I shall now conclude this study of the mother-age by attempting to formulate the general truths, which, it seems to me, may be drawn from the examples we have examined.

I. The first effort of primitive society was to establish some form of order, and in that order the women of the group were the more stable and predominant partners in the family relationship.

II. Impelled by the conditions of motherhood to a more settled life than the men of the tribe, women were the first agriculturists, weavers, dyers and dressers of skins, potters, the domesticators of animals, the first architects, and sometimes the primitive doctors--in a word, the inventors and organisers of the peaceful art of life.[197] Primitive women were strong in body[198] and capable in work. The power they enjoyed as well as their manifold activities were a result of their position as mothers, this function being to them a source of strength and not a plea of weakness.

III. Moral ideas, as we understand them, hardly existed. The oldest form of marriage was what is known as "group marriage," which was the union of two tribal groups or clans, the men of one _totem_ group marrying the women of another, and _vice versa_, but no man or woman having one particular wife or husband.

IV. The individual relationship between the sexes began with the reception of temporary lovers by the woman in her own home. But as society progressed, a relationship thus formed would tend under favourable circumstances to be continued, and, in some cases, perpetuated. The lover thus became the husband, but he was still without property right, with no--or very little--control over the woman, and none over her children, occupying, indeed, the position of a more or less permanent guest in her hut or tent.

V. The social organisation which followed this custom was in most cases--and always, I believe, in their primitive form--favourable to women. Kinship was recognised through the mother, and the continuity of the family thus depending solely on the woman, it followed she was the holder of all property. Her position and that of her children was, by this means, assured, and in the case of a separation it was the man who departed, leaving her in possession. The woman was the head of the household, and in some instances held the position of tribal chief.

VI. This early power of women, arising from the recognition alone of womb-kinship, with the resulting freedom in sexual relationships permitted to women, could not continue. It was no more possible for society to be built up on mother-right alone than it is possible for it to remain permanently based on father-right.

VII. It is important to note that the causes which led to the change in the position of the sexes had no direct connection with moral development; it was not due, as many have held, to the recognition of fatherhood. The cause was quite different and was founded on property. It arose, in the first instance, through a property value being connected with women themselves. As soon as the women's kin began to see in their women a means by exchange of obtaining wives for themselves, and also the possibility of gaining worldly goods, both in the property held by women, and by means of the service and presents that could be claimed from their lovers, we find them exercising more or less strict supervision over the alliances of their female relatives.

VIII. At first, and for a long time, the early freedom of women persisted in the widely spread custom of a preliminary period before marriage of unrestricted sexual relationships. But permanent unions became subject to the consent of the woman's kindred.

It was in this way, I am certain, and for no moral considerations that the stringency of the sexual code was first tightened for women.

IX. At a much later date virginity came to have a special market-value, from which time a jealous watch began to be kept upon maidenhood.

It seems to me of very great importance that women should grasp firmly this truth: the virtue of chastity owes its origin to property. Our minds fall so readily under the spell of such ideas as chastity and purity. There is a mass of real superstition on this question--a belief in a kind of magic in purity. But, indeed, chastity had at first no connection with morals. The sense of ownership has been the seed-plot of our moral code. To it we are indebted for the first germs of the sexual inhibitions which, sanctified by religion and supported by custom, have, under the unreasoned idealism of the common mind, filled life with cruelties and jealous exclusions, with suicides and murders and secret shames.

X. This intrusion of economics into the sexual relationships brought about the revolution in the status of women. As soon as women became sexually marketable, their early power was doomed. First came what I hold to have been the transitional stage of the mother-age. This will explain how it is that, even where matrilineal descent is in full force, we may find the patriarchal subjection of women. The mother's authority has been usurped by her male kindred, usually her brother.

XI. We have noted the alien position of the father even among peoples at a stage of development where paternity was fully established. This subjection, which, perhaps, would not be felt in the earlier stage of mother-right, must have been increased by the intrusion of the authority of the wife's male kindred. The impulse to dominate by virtue of strength or of property possessions has manifested itself in every age. As society advanced property would increase in value, and the social and political significance of its possession would also increase. It is clear that such a position of insecurity for the husband and father would tend to become impossible.

XII. One way of escape--which doubtless took place at a very early stage--was by the capture of women. Side by side with the customary marriages in which the husband resided in the home of the wife, without rights and subject to her clan-kindred, we find the practice of a man keeping one or more captive wives in his own home for his use and service. It will be readily seen that the special rights in the home over these owned wives (rights, moreover, that were recognised by the tribe) would come to be desired by other men. But the capture of wives was always difficult as it frequently led to a quarrel and even warfare with the woman's tribe, and for this reason was never widely practised. It would, therefore, be necessary for another way of escape to be found. This was done by changing the conditions of the customary marriage. Nor do I think it unlikely that such change may have been received favourably by women. The captive wives may even have been envied by the regular wife. An arrangement that would give a more individual relationship to marriage and the protection of a husband for herself and the children of their union may well have been preferred by woman to her position of subjection that had now arisen to the authority of her brother or other male relative. The alteration from the old custom may thus be said to have been due, in part, to the interests of the husband, but also, in part, to the inclination of the wife.

XIII. The change was gained by elopement, by simulated capture, by the gift or exchange of women, and by the payment of a bride-price. The bride-price came to be the most usual custom, gradually displacing the others. As we have seen, it was often regarded as a condition, not of the marriage itself, but of the transfer of the wife to the home of the husband and of the children to his kin.

XIV. It was in this way, for economic reasons, and the personal needs of both the woman and the man, and not, I believe, specially through the fighting propensities of the males, and certainly not by any unfair domination or tyranny on the part of the husband that the position of the sexes was reversed.

XV. But be this as it may, to woman the result was no less far-reaching and disastrous. She had become the property of one master, residing in her husband's tribe, which had no rights or duties in regard to her, where she was a stranger, perhaps speaking a different language. And her children kept her bound to this alien home in a much closer way than the husband could ever have been bound to her home under the earlier custom. Woman's early power rested in her organised position among her own kin: this was now lost.

XVI. The change was not brought about quickly. For long the mother's influence persisted as a matter of habit. We have its rather empty shadow with us to-day.

XVII. But, under the pressure of the new conditions, the old custom of tracing descent and the inheritance of property in the female line (so favourable to women) died. Mother-right passed away, remaining only as a tradition, or practised in isolated cases among primitive peoples. The patriarchal age, which still endures, succeeded. Women became slaves, who of old had been dominant.

One final word more.

The opinion that the subjection of women arose from male mastery, or was due to any special cruelty, must be set aside. To me the history of the mother-age does not teach this. I believe this charge could not have arisen, at all events it would not have persisted, if women, with the power they then enjoyed, had not desired the gaining of a closer relationship with the father of their children. With all the evils that father-right has brought to woman, we have got to remember that woman owes the individual relation of the man to herself and her children to the patriarchal system. The father's right in his children (which, unlike the right of the mother, was not founded on kinship, but rested on the quite different and insecure basis of property) had to be established. Without this being done, the family in its full and perfect development was impossible. We women need to remember this, lest bitterness stains our sense of justice. It may be that progress social and moral could not have been accomplished otherwise; that the cost of love's development has been the enslavement of woman. If so, then women will not, in the long account of Nature, have lost in the payment of the price. They may be (when they come at last to understand the truth) better fitted for their refound freedom.

Neither mother-right alone, nor father-right alone, can satisfy the new ideals of the true relationship of the sexes. The spiritual force, slowly unfolding, that has uplifted, and is still uplifting, womanhood, is the foundation of woman's claim that the further progress of humanity is bound up with her restoration to a position of freedom and human equality. But this position she must not take from man--that, indeed, would be a step backwards. No, she is to share it with him, and this for her own sake and for his, and, more than all, for the sake of their children and all the children of the race.

This replacement of the mother side by side with the father in the home and in the larger home of the State is the true work of the Woman's Movement.

FOOTNOTES:

[97] It is abundantly evident to any one who looks carefully into the past that sex occupied a large share of the consciousness of primitive races. The elaborate courtship rites and sex festivals alone give proof of this. It is, unfortunately, impossible for me to follow this question and give examples. I must refer the reader to H. Ellis's _Psychology of Sex_, Vol. III. pp. 34-44, where a number of typical cases are given of the courtship customs of the primitive peoples. See also Thomas, _Sex and Society_, chapter on "The Psychology of Exogamy," pp. 175-179.

[98] This is the mistake that Westermark--in his valuable _History of Human Marriage_--as well as many writers have fallen into; assuming that because monogamy is found among man's nearest ancestors, the anthropoid apes, primitive human groups must have had a tendency towards monogamy. Whereas the exact opposite of this is true. There is, it would seem, a deeply rooted dislike in studying sex matters to face truth. This habit of fear explains the many elaborate efforts undertaken to establish the theory that primitive races practised a stricter sexual code than the facts prove. Letourneau, in _The Evolution of Marriage_, appears to adopt this view, and forces evidence in trying to prove the non-existence of a widespread early period of promiscuity (pp. 37-44). Mention may be made, on the other side, of Iwan Bloch, who, writing from a different standpoint and much deeper psychology, has no doubt at all of the early existence of, and even the continued tendency towards, promiscuity.--_The Sexual Life of Our Times_, pp. 188-195.

[99] Our knowledge of the habits of primitive races has increased greatly of late years. The classical works of Bachofen, Waitz, Kulischer, Giraud-Teulon, von Hellwald, Krauss, Ploss-Bartels and other ethnologists, and the investigation of Morgan, McLennan, Müller, and many others, have opened up wide sources of information.

[100] Thomas, _Sex and Society_, p. 68, and Letourneau, _Evolution of Marriage_, pp. 269-270, 320.

[101] Lubbock, _Origin of Civilisation_, p. 9.

[102] This opinion is founded on the anthropological investigations during the past half century. See Hartland, _Primitive Paternity_, Vol. I. pp. 256-257; H. Ellis, _Psychology of Sex_, Vol. VI. pp. 390-382, and "The Changing Status of Women," _Westminster Review_, October 1886; Thomas, _Sex and Society_, p. 58, and Bloch, _Sexual History of our Times_, pp. 190-196.

[103] For a full and illuminative treatment of this subject I would refer my readers to the essays of Professor Karl Pearson, _The Chances of Death_, Vol. II.--"Woman as Witch: Evidences of Mother-Right in the Customs of Mediæval Witchcraft"; "Ashiepattle, or Hans Seeks his Luck"; "Kindred Group Marriage," Part I.; "The Mother-Age Civilisation," Part II.; "General Words for Sex and Kinship," Part III.; "Special Words for Sex and Relationship." In these suggestive essays Professor Pearson has brought together a great number of facts which give a new and charming significance to the early position of women. Perhaps the most interesting essay is that of "Woman as Witch," in which he shows that the beliefs and practices connected with mediæval witchcraft were really perverted rites, survivals of mother-age customs.

[104] Bede, II. 1-7.

[105] F. Frazer, _Golden Bough_, Pt. I. _The Magic Art_, Vol. II. pp. 282-283. Canute's marriage was clearly one of policy: Emma was much older than he was, she was then living in Normandy, and it is doubtful if the Danish king had ever seen her. Such marriages with the widow of a king were common. The familiar example of Hamlet's uncle is one, who, after murdering his brother, married his wife, and became king. His acceptance by the people, in spite of his crime, is explained if it was the old Danish custom for marriage with the king's widow to carry the kingdom with it. In Hamlet's position as avenger, and his curious hesitancy, we have really an indication of the conflict between the old and new ways of reckoning descent.

[106] Strabo, IV. 5, 4. Hartland, _Primitive Paternity_, Vol. II. p. 132. It must not be thought that mother-descent was always accompanied by promiscuity, or even with what we should call laxity of morals. We shall find that it was not. But the early custom of group marriages was frequent, in which women often changed their mates at will, and perhaps retained none of them long. We shall see that this freedom, whatever were its evils, carried with it many privileges for women.

[107] H. Ellis, citing Rhys and Brynmor-Jones, _The Welsh People_, p. 214.

[108] Gen. xxiv. 5-53.

[109] Gen. xxxi. 41, 43.

[110] Judges xv. 1.

[111] Num. xxxii. 8-11.

[112] Letourneau, _Evolution of Marriage_, p. 326.

[113] Num. xxxvi. 4-8.

[114] Gen. xii.

[115] 2 Sam. xiii. 16.

[116] Exod. vi. 20.

[117] Gen. xi. 26-29.

[118] See Thomas, _Sex and Society_, pp. 63-64.

[119] Morgan, _House and House-life of the American Aborigines_, p. 64. This example of mother-descent may be taken as typical of Indian life in all parts of America at the epoch of European discovery.

[120] Morgan, _Anc. Soc._, 62, 71, 76; Hartland, _Primitive Paternity_, Vol. I. p. 298, Vol. II. p. 65.

[121] McLennan, _Studies_, I. p. 271. Thus among the Choctas, if a boy is to be placed at school, his uncle, instead of his father, takes him to the mission and makes arrangements.

[122] Report of an Official for Indian Affairs on two of the Iroquoian tribes, cited by Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. I. p. 298. McLennan attributes the arrangement of the marriages to the mothers (_Studies_, ii. p. 339). This would be the earlier custom and is still practised among several tribes.

[123] Charlevoix, V. p. 418, quoted by Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. II. p. 66.

[124] The customs of the Senecas have been noted by the Rev. A. Wright, who was a missionary for many years amongst them, and was familiar with their language and habits. His account is quoted by Morgan, _House and House-life of the American Aborigines_.

[125] We seem here to have a suggestion of the modern plan of co-operative dwelling-houses. It is extraordinary how many of our new (!) ideas seem to have been common in the mother-age. Was it because women, who are certainly more practical and careful of detail than men are, had part in the social arrangements? This would explain the revival of the same ideas to-day, when women are again taking up their part in the ordering of domestic and social life.

[126] Powell, _Rep. Bur. Ethn._, I, p. 63.

[127] Owen, _Musquakies_, p. 72, quoted by Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. II. pp. 68-69.

[128] 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.

[129] "The Beginning of Marriage," _American Anthropologist_, Vol. IX. p. 376. _Rep. Bur. Ethn._, XVII. p. 275.

[130] This is supposed by McGee to suggest a survival of a vestigial polyandry.

[131] Mrs. Stevenson, _Rep. Bur. Ethn._, XXIII. pp. 290, 293. Cushing, _Zuñi Folk Tales_, p. 368, cited by Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. II. pp. 73, 74.

[132] _Rep. Bur. Ethn._, XIII. p. 340. Solberg, _Zeits. f. Ethnol._, XXXVII. p. 269. Voth, _Traditions of the Hopi_, pp. 67, 96, 133. Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. II. pp. 74-76.

[133] _Rep. Bur. Ethn._, IX. p. 19. Hartland, _Ibid._, pp. 76-77. It would seem in some cases, the husband, after a period of residence with his wife's family, provides a separate house.

[134] _Sex and Society_, pp. 65-66.

[135] Bachofen's work was foreshadowed by an earlier writer, Father Lafiteau, who published his _Moeurs des sauvages américains_ in 1721. _Das Mutterrecht_ was published in 1861. McLennan, ignorant of Bachofen's work, followed immediately after with his account of the Indian Hill Tribes. He was followed by Morgan, with his knowledge of Iroquois, and many other investigators.

[136] Lord Avebury, for example, says: "I believe that communities in which women have exercised supreme power were quite exceptional," _Marriage, Totemism and Religion_, p. 51. See also Letourneau, _Evolution of Marriage_, pp. 281-282.

[137] In this opinion I am glad to have the support of so high an authority as Mr. Havelock Ellis. See his admirable summary of this question, _Psychology of Sex_, Vol. VI. pp. 390-393; also the essay already referred to, "Changing Status of Women," _Westminster Review_, Oct. 1886.

[138] Ratzel, _History of Mankind_, Vol. II. p. 130; see Thomas, _op. cit._, chapter on "Sex and Primitive Industry."

[139] Robertson Smith, _Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia_, p. 65.

[140] Hoffman, "The Menomini Indians," _Fourteenth Rep. of the Bur. of Am. Ethno._, p. 288.

[141] Papers of the _Arch. Inst. of Am._, Vol. II. p. 138.

[142] Fison and Howitt, _Native Tribes of Australia_; also _Kamilaroi_ and _Kurnai_, pp. 33, 65, 66. See also Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. I. p. 294.

[143] Letourneau, _op. cit._, pp. 44, 271-274. Thomas, _op. cit._, p. 61.

[144] Hartland, _Primitive Paternity_, Vol. II. pp. 155-156, 39-41.

[145] Dalton, _Ethnology of Bengal_, p. 54; also Tylor, "The Matriarchal System," _Nineteenth Century_, July 1896, p. 89.

[146] Dalton, _op. cit._, p. 63, cited by Hartland. I would suggest that Mr. Bernard Shaw may have had this marriage custom in his mind when he created Ann. See p. 66.

[147] This custom prevails, for instance, among the Kharwârs and Parahiya tribes, and is common among the Ghasiyas, and is also practised among the Tipperah of Bengal. Among the Santâls this service-marriage is used when a girl is ugly or deformed and cannot be married otherwise, while the Badagas of the Nil'giri Hills offer their daughters when in want of labourers.

[148] Crooke, _Tribes and Castes_, iii. p. 242.

[149] Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. II. pp. 156, 157.

[150] Risley, _The Tribes and Castes of Bengal_, Vol. I. pp. 228, 231.

[151] Rivers, _The Todas_; Schrott, _Tras. Ethno. Soc._ (New Series), Vol. VIII. p. 261.

[152] Letourneau, quoting Skinner, _Evolution of Marriage_, p. 78.

[153] Thurston, _Ethnographic Notes in Southern India_, p. 114. Polyandry has flourished not only among the primitive races of India. The Hindoo populations also adopted it, and traces of the custom may be found in their sacred literature. Thus in the _Mahäbhärata_ the five Pándava brothers marry all together the beautiful Drûaupadi, with eyes of lotus blue (_Mahäbhärata_, trad. Fauche, t. II. p. 148). For an account of polyandry in ancient India the reader should consult Jolly, _Gundriss der Indo-Arischen Philologie und Altertumskunde_.

[154] Davy, _Ceylon_, p. 286; Sachot, _L'Île de Ceylon_, p. 25.

[155] Turner, _Thibet_, p. 348, and _Hist. Univ. des, Voy._, Vol. XXXI. p. 434; Dalton, _Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal_, p. 36.

[156] Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. II. p. 164.

[157] This is the opinion of Bernhöft, quoted by Iwan Bloch. Marshall points out that among the Todas group-marriages occur side by side with polyandry. Bloch also notes that in the common cases where the husband has a claim on his wife's sister, and even her cousins and aunts, we find polygamy developed out of group-marriage. The practice of wife lending and wife exchange is also connected with the early communal marriage (_Sexual History of Our Times_, pp. 193-194). It is possible that prostitution may be a relic of this early sexual freedom. What is moral in one stage of civilisation often becomes immoral in another, when the reasons for its existing have changed.

[158] Havelock Ellis writing on this subject ("Changing Status of Women," _Nineteenth Century_, Oct. 1886) says: "It seems that in the dawn of the race an elaborate social organisation permitted a more or less restricted communal marriage, every man in the tribe being at the outset the husband of every woman, first practically, then theoretically, and that the social organisation which had this point of departure was particularly favourable to women."

[159] It is a matter of dispute whether a woman may have more than one husband at a time. The older accounts state this, while later it has been denied. The probability is that this was the custom, but that it is dying out under modern influences. Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. I. p. 267.

[160] In north Malabar a custom has arisen by which after a special ceremony the bridegroom is allowed to take the bride to live in his house, but in the case of his death she must at once return to her own family.

[161] _J.A.I._, XII. p. 292; Hartland, _op. cit._, p. 288. Letourneau, apparently quoting Bachofen, says that the women control property. This was probably an earlier custom, when the power was more truly in the hands of women, and had not passed to their male relatives.

[162] Wilken, _Verwantschap_, p. 678; _Bijdragen_, XXXI. p. 40.

[163] Havelock Ellis, _Psychology of Sex_, Vol. VI. p. 291. A second form of marriage, known as Jujur, was also practised. It was much more elaborate, and shows very instructively the rise of father-right. By it the authority of the husband over his wife is asserted by a very complicated system of payments; his right to take her to his home, and his absolute property in her depending wholly on these payments. If the final sum is paid (but this is not commonly claimed except in the case of a quarrel between the families) the woman becomes to all intents the slave of the man; but if on the other hand, as is not at all uncommon, the husband fails or has difficulty in making the main payment, he becomes the debtor of his wife's family and is practically a slave, all his labour being due to his creditor without any reduction in the debt, which must be paid in full, before he regains liberty. (See Marsden, _History of Sumatra_, pp. 225, 235, 257, 262, for an account of both marriages.)

[164] _Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia._

[165] Havelock Ellis, _op. cit._, pp. 391-392, quoting Robertson Smith.

[166] Barlow, _Semitic Origins_, p. 45.

[167] Robertson Smith, _op. cit._, p. 65.

[168] This kind of union for a term is said to have been recognised by Mahommed, though it is irregular by Moslem law. The cases of _beena_ marriage are very frequent among widely different peoples. (See Hartland, _Primitive Paternity_, Vol. II. pp. 11, 13, 14, 19, 20, 24, 27, 30-36, 38, 41-43, 51, 53, 55, 60-63, 67-72, 76, 77.) Frazer (_Academy_, March 27, 1886) cites an interesting example among the tribes on the north frontier of Abyssinia, partially Semitic peoples, not yet under the influence of Islam, who preserve a system of marriage closely resembling the _beena_ marriage, but have as well a purchase marriage, by which a wife is acquired by payment of a bride-price and becomes the property of her husband. (Quoted by Ellis, _op. cit._, p. 392 _note_.)

[169] Thomas, _Sex and Society_, pp. 73-74. Quoting Waitz-Gerland, _Anthropologie der Naturvölker_, Vol. V. p. 107.

[170] McLennan, _The Patriarchal Theory_, p. 235.

[171] Thomas, _op. cit._, p. 75, points out that this survival of woman's power after the rise of father-right is similar to the assertion of male-power under mother-right in the person of the woman's brother or male relative.

[172] Letourneau, _op. cit._, p. 323, who quotes Lubbock, _Orig. Civil._, p. 177.

[173] Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. II, p. 14, citing Morgan, _Systems of Consanguinity_.

[174] Letourneau, _op. cit._, p. 323.

[175] Morgan, _Systems of Consanguinity_ ("Smithsonian Contributions"), Vol. XVII. pp. 416-417.

[176] Hartland, Vol. II. p. 45, quoting Gray, _China_, Vol. II. p. 304.

[177] This is the opinion of Hartland. He quotes Ellis, _History of Madagascar_, and Sibree, _The Great African Island_. I am able to speak as to the truths of the facts given in their books from my knowledge of the Malagasy before the French occupation of the island. Madagascar is my birth-place, and my father was a missionary in the country at the same time as Mr. Ellis and Mr. Sibree.

[178] As an instance of the importance attached to children, I may mention the fact that, after my birth my father was not announced to preach under his own name, but as "the father of Kéteka," the Malagasy equivalent of my name.

[179] Frazer, _Golden Bough_, Pt. I. _The Magical Art_, Vol. II. p. 277.

[180] Father Guillemé, Missiones Catholiques, XXXIV. (1902), p. 16.

[181] Lubbock, _Origin of Civilisation_, p. 151.

[182] Frazer, _Ibid._, p. 276.

[183] "Birth," we are told by a keen observer, who has lived for many years in intimate converse with the natives, "sanctifies the child; birth alone gives him status as a member of his mother's family" (Dennett, _Jour. Afr. Soc._, I. p. 265).

[184] _Travels_, p. 109.

[185] Hartland, quoting Mr. Sarbah, a native barrister, _op. cit._, Vol. I. p. 286.

[186] Lippert, _Kulturgeschichte_, Vol. II. p. 57.

[187] This is done among the Beni Amer on the shores of the Red Sea and in the Barka valley, which is the more remarkable as mother-descent has fallen into desuetude under the influence of Islamism. (Hartland, Vol. I. p. 274, quoting Munzinger, _Ostafrikanische studien_.)

[188] Bastian, _Loango-Küste_, I. p. 166.

[189] Dennett, _Jour. Afr. Soc._, I. p. 266.

[190] _Jour. Afr. Soc._, I. p. 412. See Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. I, pp. 275-288.

[191] A similar custom prevails among Maori people of New Zealand. When a child dies, or even meets with an accident, the mother's relations, headed by her brother, turn out in force against the father. He must defend himself until wounded. Blood once drawn the combat ceases; but the attacking party plunders his house and appropriates the husband's property, and finally sits down to a feast provided by him (_Old New Zealand_, p. 110). This case is the more extraordinary as the Maori reckon descent through the father; it is doubtless a custom persisting from an earlier time.

[192] Macdonald, _Africana_, Vol. I. p. 136.

[193] _Jour. Afr. Soc._, VIII. pp. 15-17. This tribe now traces descent through the father.

[194] Torday and Joyce, _J.A.I._, XXXV. p. 410.

[195] Arnot, _Garenganze_, p. 242.

[196] Spencer, _Descriptive Sociology_, Vol. V. p. 8, citing Petherick, _Egypt, the Soudan, and Central Africa_, pp. 140-144. This case is quoted by Thomas, _op, cit._, pp. 85, 86.

[197] For fuller information on this important subject the reader is referred to Professor Otis Mason, who gives a picturesque summary of the work done by women among the primitive tribes of America (_American Antiquarian_, January 1889, "The Ulu, or Woman's Knife of the Eskimo," _Report of the United States National Museum_, 1890). H. Ellis, _Man and Woman_, pp. 1-17, and Thomas, _Sex and Society_, pp. 123-146, give interesting accounts of the division of labour among primitive people, showing the important part women took in the start of industrialism. For direct examples from primitive peoples, the works of Fison and Howit, James Macdonald, Professor Haddow, Hearn, Morgan, Bancroft, Lubbock, Ratzel, Schoolcroft and other anthropologists should be consulted.

[198] It is an entirely mistaken view, founded on insufficient knowledge, that in early civilisations women were a source of weakness to the men of the tribe or group, and, thus, liable to oppression. The very reverse is the truth. Fison and Howit, who discuss the question, say of the Australian women, "In time of peace they are the hardest workers and the most useful members of the community." In time of war, "they are perfectly capable of taking care of themselves at all times, and so far from being an encumbrance on the warriors, they will fight, if need be, as bravely as the men, and with even greater ferocity" (_Kamilaroi and Kurnai_, pp. 133-147, 358). This is no exceptional case, and is confirmed by the reports of investigators of widely different peoples. I may mention the ancient Iberian women of Northern Spain, whose bravery in battle is testified to by Strabo: the descendants of these women still carry on the greater part of the active labour connected with agriculture (_Spain Revisited_, pp. 191-292). In our own day we have the witness to the same truth in the heroic part taken by women in the Balkan army.

CONTENTS OF CHAPTER VII

WOMAN'S POSITION IN THE GREAT CIVILISATIONS OF ANTIQUITY

I.--_In Egypt_

The importance of estimating woman's position in the great civilisations of the ancient world--The Egyptian civilisation--Women more free and more honoured than in any country to-day--The account given by Herodotus--The Egyptian woman never confined to the home--No restraint upon her actions--She entered into commerce in her own right and made contracts for her own benefit--Abundant material in proof of the high status of Egyptian women--Marriage contracts--Their importance and interest--Numerous examples--The proprietary rights of the wife--An early period of mother-rule--Property originally in the hands of women--The marriage contracts a development of the early system--The Egyptians solved the difficult problem of the fusion of mother-right with father-right--The statement of Dioderus that among the Egyptians the woman rules over the man--The conditions of marriage dependent on the birth of children--M. Paturet's view the Egyptian woman the equal of man--The high status of woman proved by the fact that her child was never illegitimate--The position of the mother secure in every relationship between the sexes--This made possible by the free conditions of the marriage contracts--Polygamy allowed--This practice in Egypt very different from polygamy in a patriarchal society--The husband a privileged guest in the home of the wife--The high ideal of the domestic relationship--Illustrations from the inscriptions of the monuments--Reasons which explain this civilised and human organisation--The Egyptians an agricultural and a conservative people--They were also a pacific race--The significance of the Maxims of the Moralists--Honour to the wife and the mother strongly insisted on--The health and character of the Egyptian mother--Some reflections in the Egyptian Galleries of the British Museum.

II.--_In Babylon_

Traces of mother-right in primitive Babylon--The honour paid to women--The position of women in later Babylonian history, though still at an early period--Their rights more circumscribed--The marriage code of Hammurabi--Polygamy permitted, though restricted, by the code--The exacting conditions of divorce--The position of the wife as subject to her husband--The later Neo-Babylonian periods--The position of women continuously improving--They obtain a position equal in law with their husbands--Their freedom in all social relations--They conduct business transactions in their own right--Illustrations from the contract tablets--Remarks and conclusion.

III.--_In Greece_

Traces of mother-right traditions in Greek literature and history--The women of the Homeric period--Dangers arising from the patriarchal subjection of women--Illustrations and various reflections--Historic Greece--The social organisation of Sparta--Their marriage system--The laws of Lycurgus--The freedom of the Spartan girls--The wise care for the health of the race--Plato's criticism of the Spartan system--He accuses the women of ruling their husbands--The Athenian women--Their subjection under the strict patriarchal rule--The insistence on chastity--Reasons for this--The degraded position of the wife--The _hetairæ_--They the only educated women in Athens--Aspasia--She leads the movement to raise the position of the Athenian women--Plato's estimate of women--Remarks on the sexual penalties for women that are always found under a strict patriarchal regime--The ideal relationship between the wife and the husband--Euripides voices the sorrows of women--He foreshadows their coming triumph.

IV.--_In Rome_

Little known of the position of women in Rome in prehistoric times--Indications of an early period of mother-rule--The patriarchal system formerly established when Roman history opens--The Roman marriage law--The woman regarded as the property first of her father and afterwards of her husband--The patrician marriage of _confarreatio_--The form known as _coemptio_--Marriage by _usus_--The inequality of divorce--The subjection of the woman--The terrible right of the husband's _manus_--The way of escape--The development of the early marriage by _usus_--The new free marriage by consent--Free divorce--A revolution in the position of women--The patriarchal rule of women dwindled to a mere thread--They gained increasingly greater liberty until at last they gained complete freedom--The public entry of women into the affairs of State--Illustrations to show the fine use made by the Roman matrons of their freedom--An examination into the supposed licentiousness of Roman women--This opinion cannot be accepted--The effect of Christianity--The view of Sir Henry Maine--Some concluding remarks on the position of women in the four great civilisations examined in this chapter.