Chapter II: Theory of the Horde and Mother-Right (2)

[147] The first series of relationships is seen in the Arunta
tribe, where "no man will lend his wife to anyone who does not
belong to the particular group with which it is lawful for her to
have marital relations--she is, in fact, only lent to a man whom
she calls _Unwana_, just as she calls her own husband, and though
this may undoubtedly be spoken of as an act of hospitality, it
may with equal justice be regarded as evidence of the very clear
recognition of group relationship, and as evidence also in favor
of the former existence of group marriage." A native, it is true,
will sometimes lend his wife "as an act of hospitality to a white
man; but this has nothing to do with the lending of wives which
has just been dealt with." It "does not imply the infringement
of any custom." The second relationship in the series named is
of a public nature, and it is strictly regulated by custom. It
consists in the defloration of a girl just before her marriage by
certain men who have access to her in a definite order. These men
belong to forbidden groups; that is, groups into which the woman
may not marry. "The ceremonies in question are of the nature
of those which Sir John Lubbock has described as indicative of
expiation for marriage;" and they may be regarded as "rudimentary
customs" pointing back to a stage of wider marital rights than
those which now exist in these tribes. The third relationship is
the license allowed on "occasions when a large number of men and
women are gathered together to perform certain corrobborees,"
the more important gatherings lasting perhaps "ten days or a
fortnight." Every day "two or three women are told off to attend
at the corrobboree ground, and, with the exception of men who
stand in the relation to them of actual father, brother, or son,
they are, for the time being, common property to all the men
present." The explanations of similar usages advanced by McLennan
and Westermarck, such as phallicism, are deemed inapplicable
to these cases: SPENCER AND GILLEN, _Native Tribes of
Central Australia_, 92-111. Compare especially KOHLER,
_Zur Urgeschichte der Ehe_, 64 ff., _passim_, who finds in
the totem groups and classificatory systems of relationship,
existing in Australia, America, and elsewhere, evidence of former
group-marriage.

But these usages are capable of a very different explanation. That they imply a primitive state of promiscuity is emphatically denied by Crawley. Like sacred prostitution, the customs of avoidance, the couvade, and marriage rites in general, according to his theory, they take their rise in the religious or superstitious ideas upon which sexual taboo rests.[148]

[148] _Mystic Rose_, 236-66, 294-317, 347 ff., 468-85, _passim_.
_Cf._ LANG, _Social Origins_, 87-111, _passim_.

Adherents of the communistic theory are not entirely at one as to the phases in the development of marriage and the family. Very generally the family, regarded from the standpoint of authority and kinship, is said to pass from the unregulated horde through the maternal and the paternal to the parental or two-sided stage.[149] Thus Dargun declares that there is a tendency for the uterine system of kinship to give place to the paternal, but never the reverse.[150] Kohler takes the same position.[151] Lippert regards the history of social culture as beginning with the natural relation of mother and child, producing in course of evolution, long before "marriage" arose, the "primitive family" whose principle is mother-right, and which, in turn, under various influences, generally yields to the "old family" (_Altfamilie_) in its origin based, not on relationship, but on patriarchal power and possession.[152] Bernhöft denies the invariable sequence of mother-right and father-right;[153] and Kautsky maintains that the two systems are parallel, not successive, developments from the hetairism of the primitive horde.[154]

[149] According to FRIEDRICHS, "Familienstufen und
Eheformen," _ZVR._, X, 190 ff., the forms of the family are the
following: (1) "die lose Familie;" (2) "die matriarchale, uterine
Familie;" (3) "die patriarchale, agnatische Familie;" (4) "die
moderne, zweiseitige Familie."

[150] DARGUN, _Mutterrecht und Raubehe_, 12, 13. For
exceptions, however, see his _Mutterrecht und Vaterrecht_, 29
ff., 35, 41, 46.

[151] KOHLER, in _ZVR._, III, 393; IV, 266 ff.

[152] LIPPERT, _Geschichte der Familie_, 4 ff., 218 ff.;
_idem_, _Kulturgeschichte_, I, 76 ff., 90.

[153] BERNHÖFT, "Zur Geschichte des eur.
Familienrechts," _ZVR._, VIII, 401, 402.

[154] KAUTSKY, "Die Entstehung der Ehe und Familie,"
_Kosmos_, XII, 338-48, especially 347; _cf._ MUCKE,
_Horde und Familie_, 172 ff.

Marriage also, like the family, is said to pass through several distinct phases of development. Thus, with respect to the number of persons joining in a household, Friedrichs distinguishes four "forms" of marriage which, with equal propriety, may be called forms of the family. These are group-marriage, polyandry, polygyny, and monogamy, the first three forms having several varieties.[155] But, as will hereafter appear,[156] it would be rash to infer that these forms necessarily arise in the order named. Again, with regard to the way in which it originates, marriage presents a number of successive stages. According to Kohler,[157] these are marriage by capture, marriage by purchase, religious marriage, and civil marriage. That wife-capture generally gives place to wife-purchase, and this in turn to marriage by gift, and then to the modern contract between the parents, or later between the parties themselves, is especially insisted upon. Hildebrand,[158] however, reverses this order. A measure of progress he finds in what he regards as the three great industrial stages of human culture: those of the chase, pastoral life, and agriculture. In the first stage, not communism, but a tendency toward monogamy prevails. There is little notion of private property; hence covetousness is not a motive of social action. Marriages are freely formed through presents given to the parents, or even without them by simple agreement of the parties. Later, with the rise of private property, marriage by purchase and marriage by capture come into existence; though capture is always exceptional and of comparatively little importance in the history of marriage.

[155] FRIEDRICHS, "Familienstufen und Eheformen,"
_ZVR._, X, 256-58.

[156] See below, chaps. iii, iv.

[157] "Wie die Ehe aus der Ueberwältigung der Frau durch den
Mann hervorging, und wie sie sich von da aus zum Frauenkaufe
gestaltete; wie sie zur religiösen Heilanstalt wurde und wie
sie von da aus zum geläuterten Rechtsinstitute umbildete, indem
die religiöse Feier nicht mehr obligat blieb, ... lehrt uns das
indische Recht klarer, als jedes andere."--"Indisches Ehe- und
Familienrecht," _ZVR._, III, 342, 343.

[158] HILDEBRAND, _Ueber das Problem einer algemeinen
Entwicklungsgeschichte_, 14 ff., 17 ff.; _idem_, _Recht und Sitte
auf den versch_. _Kulturstufen_, 9 ff.

Similar to the view of Hildebrand, in respect to the initial stage, is the theory of Kautsky.[159] The starting-point is the horde. In this absolute equality of the sexes prevails; and the only divisions are the different generations. Neither the maternal nor the paternal line is recognized, for the children belong to the group. Not promiscuity, but "hetairism,"[160] or rather "hetairistic monogamy," exists. Incessant feuds, however, lead to wife-capture; and wife-capture tends directly to communism, for the captured woman belongs as a slave to the band. But the rights of the band may pass to the individual. The free native woman is "wooed;" the war-captive is "fought-for;" and so she becomes the slave-wife of the strongest, who may win other wives in the same way. Marriage by capture thus conquers the original monogamy, in whose place polygyny appears, either at once, or after a transition-period of community in women. Moreover, in this process may be discerned the genesis of modern individual marriage under the sanction of the law. But the consequences of wife-capture are not yet exhausted. The presence in the horde of women taken from several neighboring bands leads at once to the formation of clans and to the matriarchate; for the connection of children with the clan is naturally determined by the mother. The development of private property produces still further results. The individual may buy his wife. She becomes his chattel; and the offspring also belong to him. Thus marriage by purchase gains the victory over wife-capture; and the patriarchate triumphs over mother-right. This is the order of development in the more war-like hordes. But wife-capture does not always precede wife-purchase as a general phase. In the more peaceful and industrious groups wife-capture does not appear at all. Here hetairistic monogamy runs its natural course. Partly under the external influence of tribes where mother-right existed as the result of wife-capture, but mainly under the powerful influence of private property, the matriarchate arose. In the earlier stage kinship with the father was disregarded or unknown. Naturally, therefore, under the new condition, name and also property were transmitted to the children through the mother, with whom their physical connection was always manifest. So it appears that the conception of private property is the basis of "hetairistic mother-right" as it is of father-right; and hetairistic mother-right, as distinguished from the mother-right which owes its origin to wife-capture, implies the precedence of woman in the family.[161] "Gynocracy and patriarchalism are therefore parallel branches of the same stem," the original hetairism of the horde: the one cannot be a further development of the other. Gynocracy, and with it polyandry, which is its result,[162] is the highest stage in the evolution of hetairistic mother-right; just as polygyny and the patriarchal family are the highest stage in the evolution of father-right or the agnatic system of kinship.[163]

[159] KAUTSKY, "Entstehung der Ehe und Familie,"
_Kosmos_, XII, 190-207, 256-72, 329-48.

[160] KAUTSKY's use of "hetairism" for "defective"
monogamy is apt to become misleading.

[161] KAUTSKY, 339.

[162] According to KAUTSKY, just as polygyny arises
in a _Herrschaftsverhältniss_--the lordship of the man over
the captured or purchased woman--so polyandry originates in an
analogous relation of the woman to the man. Under gynocracy the
woman chooses her husband, hence polyandry; 344-46.

[163] KAUTSKY, 347.

To the theory of Kautsky that of Dargun, already explained, bears some resemblance in important details. But Dargun rejects Kautsky's idea of original monogamy; and he does not regard wife-purchase as the necessary source of the patriarchate, though the rise of the latter was greatly favored by it; while mother-right is especially due to the uncertainty of fatherhood.[164]

[164] DARGUN, _Mutterrecht und Vaterrecht_, 60, 61, 127,
43-52.

Hellwald--who in the general development of his subject and in many essential particulars agrees closely with Lippert[165]--seeks the elements of human sexual relations in those of the lower animals. Absolute promiscuity has never existed among men. The hetairism which prevailed was restricted to the immediate band or horde of kindred, which was probably never large. Thus in the horde there was "unregulated polygyny." To the earliest sexual relations[166] of men neither "marriage" nor "family" may properly be applied; and for them no suitable name is forthcoming. In the horde the first social institution evolved was the "mother-group" or rudimentary primitive family (_Urfamilie_). "Mother and child," as Lippert suggests, "these were the simplest elements of the oldest organization." For the "relation of mother and child alone is given by nature."[167] In the form of the mother-group the family, however imperfectly constituted, precedes the state in the order of growth; although it is not until society, the state, has gained permanent form that from it the historical "family" is developed.[168] Indeed, the mother-group is "lacking in everything" which distinguishes the family according to our modern conceptions.[169] The history of the "primitive family," so far as mother-right is concerned, shows two stages of evolution. The first stage is that of the mother-group strictly so called, through which, as Bachofen and Dargun declare, every race passes and in which all relationship is traced through the mother's blood.[170] Absolute unity or identity of blood is the basis of the earliest human conception of relationship. Generations or stages of seniority alone (_Altersstufen_), not degrees of kinship, are recognized. Members of the group are of equal blood, "consanguine."[171] Relationship with the father is as yet unknown; and there is in the outset no conception of property. Gradually, however, in the endogamous mother-group a horror of incest, of inbreeding, arises, thus leading to exogamy, which is often facilitated by the stealing of women from surrounding groups. The obtaining of foreign women next produces the clan system. Private property in land and movables arises, especially among those peoples which have attained to settled life and a knowledge of agriculture. In this way the "primitive family" enters upon its second stage--that of the matriarchate. Here we find for the first time forms of marriage and the family properly so called, although rudimentary as compared with the modern institutions. The mother ceases to be merely the center of the common life; she is now the social axis around which everything revolves. Mother-right, implying kinship as well as succession to name and property exclusively in the maternal line, becomes fully established. The matriarchate, unlike the simple mother-group, is not a universal phase through which all mankind has run. In some cases the agnatic system or father-right may have followed immediately upon the earlier stage of mother-right. Incident to the matriarchate are the polygynous and polyandrous forms of the family. With these the institution of property grew apace; and so we reach the paternal system, whose triumph is powerfully aided by wife-capture. In this stage, whatever be the form of social union--whether it be called _gens_, _sippe_, or joint-family--it rests upon the authority of the father or patriarchal lord. Following Lippert,[172] the author prefers for this patriarchal group the name "old family" (_Altfamilie_); and he finds its most famous examples in Hellas and Rome. Here monogamy gained the victory; and so, under the influence mainly of Stoicism and Christianity, the foundations of modern marriage and the individual family were laid.[173]

[165] For LIPPERT's development of the family see
his _Geschichte der Familie_, and especially his excellent
_Kulturgeschichte_, I, 71-90; II, 1-165, 505-54.

[166] HELLWALD, _Die mensch. Familie_, 121, 122, 126.
"Was Platz griff, war wohl ungeregelte Polygamie, welche aber
ziemlich naturgemäss Polyandrie nach sich zieht, und aus dieser
Vermischung jenen ehelosen Geschlechtsverkehr schuf, für welchen
noch die richtige Benennung fehlt."--_Ibid._, 129.

[167] _Ibid._, 146, 150; LIPPERT, _Kulturgeschichte_, I,
76; _idem_, _Geschichte der Familie_, 20.

[168] HELLWALD, _op. cit._, 150; FRERICHS, _Zur
Naturgeschichte des Menschen_, 103, 104; _cf._ LIPPERT,
_op. cit._, I, 76.

[169] HELLWALD, _op. cit._, 151.

[170] _Ibid._, 151; DARGUN, _Mutterrecht und Raubehe_,
3; BACHOFEN, _Mutterrecht_, as above quoted.

[171] HELLWALD, _op. cit._, 158 ff., accepting
MORGAN'S main conclusions in his _Systems of
Consanguinity_; and opposing SCHNEIDER, _Die
Naturvölker_, II, 474-77.

[172] LIPPERT, _Geschichte der Familie_, 218, 219, who
distinguishes between the "Alt- und Gesamtfamilie" and the modern
"Sonderfamilie."

[173] Of course, only a bare outline of the author's
able treatise is here given. See especially _Die mensch.
Familie_, 176 ff. ("Exogamie und Clanbildung"), 197 ff.
("Entwicklungsbedingungen und Wesen des Matriarchats"), 227 ff.
("Die Bündnissformen im Matriarchat"), 274 ff. ("Der Frauenraub
und seine Folgen"), 347 ff. ("Ausbildung des Patriarchats"), 529
ff. ("Die Altfamilie").

The influence of economic forces on the evolution of matrimonial and family institutions is especially emphasized by Grosse. Restricting his examination to the conditions which lie within actual "historical or ethnological experience," he seeks to demonstrate that the "various forms of the family correspond to the various forms of economy (_Wirthschaft_);" that "in its essential features the character of each particular form of the family may be explained by the form of economy in which it is rooted." For the sake of clearer analysis the peoples known to history or ethnology are arranged, not in three, but in five groups according to the leading types of industrial life. These are the lower and upper hunters, the pastoral peoples, and the lower and upper cultivators of the soil.[174] But, like Kohler, Lippert, and Hellwald,[175] the author rejects the popular theory adhered to by Hildebrand, that the chase, herding, and agriculture are three successive stages of progress through which all the races of mankind have necessarily passed. For, as a matter of fact, some pastoral peoples, and even some hunters, like the Eskimo, are more advanced in culture than various peoples who are chiefly dependent upon agriculture; and some tillers of the soil, as Hildebrand concedes, may never have passed through the pastoral stage.[176] On the other hand, Grosse distinguishes two forms of the family: the individual family (_Sonderfamilie_), or the community of parents and children living in a lasting and exclusive marriage relation, and the great-family (_Grossfamilie_), which comprises, not merely parents and children, but all descendants with their families, so far as they are not separated from it by marriage or otherwise. Examples of the "great-family" are afforded by the Romans and the Chinese; while the "individual family" is practically the only form known wherever western European culture prevails. In each form of the family either the maternal or the paternal succession (_Mutterfolge_ or _Vaterfolge_) may exist; but succession must not be confused with the matriarchate or with the patriarchate, each involving the idea of authority; although paternal succession usually implies paternal power, while succession in the female line does not necessarily carry with it the supremacy of the mother.

[174] "Niedere und Höhere Jäger, Viehzüchter, Niedere und Höhere
Ackerbauer."--GROSSE, _Die Formen der Familie_, 25, 26.

[175] LIPPERT, _op. cit._, 30 ff.; KOHLER, _Zur
Urgeschichte der Ehe_, 4, 5, where Hildebrand is criticised;
HELLWALD, _op. cit._, 197 ff., who declares that in
the history of civilization it is "undoubtedly more correct to
regard, not pastoral life and agriculture, but nomadic life and
settled life as the marks of two diverse culture-phases."

[176] GROSSE, _op. cit._, 29 ff.

Among the peoples classed as "lower hunters," even the most backward, exists the individual family; and in the majority of cases it is founded on monogamic marriage, for promiscuity nowhere appears. The authority of the husband is patriarchal. "He procures his wife by exchange or service; and in consequence he is her owner and lord." The "great-family" and the _gens_ (_sippe_) are also found among these peoples; but they are relatively little developed. _Gentes_ which have become unions for protection and control of territory are father-_gentes_; while those in which the kinship is traced through the mother are not unions for the purposes of the common life, but for maintenance of the common name.[177] The case is practically the same for the "upper hunters." Wife-purchase, however, is more pronounced. The individual monogamic family still predominates. Kinship through the mother is not so much a "motive for union as it is for separation of those related by blood."[178] Here as among the lower hunters it is the paternal _gens_ which forms an actual union for the common life; and there is "not the least ground for assuming" that a patriarchal gentile constitution has replaced an earlier matriarchal form. Among peoples leading a pastoral life, even more than with those devoted to the chase, the chief economic production lies in the hands of the man. Accordingly he has the place of power and honor. Through him descent and kinship are usually traced. Nowhere is the paternal system so one-sided and so stringently carried out as among pastoral tribes. Woman is oppressed and degraded. She is bought or stolen by her lord. Polygyny, with all its attendant evils, flourishes. The individual family has a thoroughly patriarchal stamp; but it is still the most conspicuous social fact, surpassing in practical significance for the needs of the pastoral life the great-family, and far more the _gens_. On the contrary, among the lower cultivators woman holds an economic position at least equal in social importance to that of man. As a rule, therefore, she is no longer his slave, but his companion, sometimes even his superior. She gains a corresponding share in the control of the children. The great-family is in like manner affected by the new economic conditions. Communal agriculture gives a mighty impulse to the growth of the gentile constitution; and now among many peoples, under influence of the new and higher position of woman, the maternal _gens_, perhaps existing side by side with the paternal _gens_, is developed into a firm social, economic, and political union. In the life of the lower cultivators, if the _gens_ thus becomes the mightiest social organization, the fact is due essentially to its economic function. With the change from communal to individual agriculture the gentile constitution is dissolved; and so among the higher cultivators the individual monogamic family has more than regained its former sway. "Thus it appears," the author summarizes, "that under every form of culture that form of family organization prevails which is best suited to economic needs and conditions;" although, he wisely warns us, a perfect explanation of the various types of the human family can never be given until every part and function of culture which has had an influence upon the functions or the organisms of the family has been separately examined for each case.[179]

[177] "Im Uebrigen aber bildet die Muttersippe auf
dieser Culturstufe noch keine Lebens- sondern nur eine
Namensgemeinschaft."--GROSSE, _op. cit._, 64.

[178] _Ibid._, 84.

[179] _Ibid._, 244, 245.

The views of Dargun, Hildebrand, and Grosse may be compared with the remarkable, but scarcely well-grounded, speculation of Mucke.[180] According to his ingenious theory, men originally lived in the horde, which, so far from being a fortuitous unorganized band, in which "animal promiscuity" prevailed, was so strictly ordered as to be worthy the name of the "society of the primeval age."[181] In the horde all are free and equal. There is no subordination of the wife, monogamy prevails; for, since every male or female has his predestined mate, there is no room for communism. The author's treatise rests upon the fundamental assumption that primitive relationships are merely "space-relationships."[182] They do not arise in notions of descent. They are determined by the fixed spaces occupied by each sex, generation, and individual in the _Hordenlager_ or camping-place.[183] Every male finds his predestined wife in the corresponding room or division on the opposite side of the sleeping-space; each brother thus marrying the sister nearest to himself in the order of birth. This ideal life of the horde is brought to an end through the rise of the family. The family (from _famel_, a "servant") is the very opposite of the horde of free and equal members, originating as it does in subjection and servitude. Almost simultaneously the family develops two forms, the androcratic and the gynocratic. Each originates in capture[184] which, under the influence of the conception of private property, yields to purchase. In the androcratic family, the woman becomes a slave-wife; in the gynocratic, the man becomes a slave-husband.[185] Polyandry is the natural product of the gynocratic, as is polygyny of the androcratic family. Originally each of these forms of the family is part "maternal" and part "paternal," in the ordinary sense. But gradually, under the influence of adoption, aided by purchase, the horde is broken up and modern forms of the family arise.[186]

[180] MUCKE, _Horde und Familie in ihrer
urgeschichtlichen Entwickelung_. _Eine neue Theorie auf
statistischer Grundlage_ (Stuttgart, 1895). Mucke is harshly
reviewed by KOHLER, _Urgeschichte der Ehe_, 17-27.

[181] "Genossenschaft der Urzeit." He derives horde from _orta_,
_orda_ = "local community," "Ortsgemeinschaft," hence "order":
MUCKE, viii, 40, 41, 43 ff., _passim_.

[182] "Raumverwandtschaften," MUCKE, 1 ff., 20-43,
_passim_.

[183] The details of the author's argument cannot here be given.
First (_erster Abschnitt_) he appeals to the mental processes
of the child. The spaces, and consequently the relationship,
arise in the child's sense-perception, the impression obtained
by the infant soul of the relative distance or remoteness of
persons belonging to the different ages and generations. The very
inadequate evidence adduced for the former universality of such
_Lager_ arrangement (_sechster Abschnitt_) consists (1) of the
alleged customs of modern Asiatic hordes; and (2) the remains
of ship-shaped graves and dwelling-places discovered in various
parts of the world. With wonderful ingenuity the author is able
to explain by his theory nearly every problem connected with
marriage and the family. Aside from the constructive part of his
work, his criticism of other writers, though often unjust and
intolerant, is sometimes acute and instructive.

[184] The brothers capture men for their sisters by way of
reprisal and retaliation for stealing the latter: MUCKE,
_Horde und Familie_, 125, 126, 111, 113 ff.

[185] But at first the man and the woman are merely slaves--there
is no sexual or marriage relation whatever: _ibid._, 117.

[186] _Ibid._, 178-82. In the fourth and fifth _Abschnitte_
(155-247) the author discusses the dissolution of the horde
through the influence of the two forms of the family. The
argument is involved and almost entirely _a priori_. It is nearly
impossible to discover his conclusion as to whether a purely
patriarchal or matriarchal family is differentiated in the
process.

II. MORGAN'S CONSTRUCTIVE THEORY

The doctrine of the primitive horde as the starting-point of social evolution has a special interest in connection with the researches of Lewis H. Morgan and J. F. McLennan. Though their principal works appeared subsequently to that of Bachofen,[187] each has reached his conclusions independently; and each, rejecting the patriarchal family as the primordial unit, has set forth what may be called a "constructive" theory of uniform social progress. In the hands of each marriage and the family are made to pass through an ascending series of phases for all mankind. Unquestionably valuable as are their contributions to the material of sociological science, seldom have there been seen more striking examples of hasty generalization than appear in the theoretical parts of their work.

[187] MCLENNAN'S _Studies in Ancient History_ appeared
in 1876, being mainly a reprint of his _Primitive Marriage_,
published January, 1865, four years later than Bachofen's book;
but "it was in the spring of 1866," he says, "that I first heard
of _Das Mutterrecht_."--_Studies_, I, 319.

MORGAN'S _League of the Iroquois_ was published in 1851,
and in this he describes some of the essential facts connected
with his theory. In 1857, he re-examined the subject and
enlarged his views (_Proceedings of the Am. Association for the
Advancement of Science_, Part II). But it was not until 1871 that
his great work on _Systems of Consanguinity_ appeared, though
accepted for publication, January, 1868. This was followed by the
_Ancient Society_, 1877, in which his theory is fully elaborated.
The _Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines_, 1881, was
originally intended as Part V of the _Ancient Society_.

This is particularly true of the theories of Morgan;[188] although in his _Systems of Consanguinity_ he has with prodigious labor erected a monument of scientific research whose vast importance for the early history of human social relations is by no means yet definitively settled; and whose _Ancient Society_, aside from its speculative features, has the distinction of first clearly identifying the gentile organization of the Greeks and Romans with that of the red race of the western continents. Starting with the organization of society "on the basis of sex," as illustrated by the so-called class or group-marriages of the Australian Kamilaroi, he proceeds to discuss at length the gentile systems of the American Indians and the classic nations.[189] Originally relationship is traced in the female line, and intermarriage is prohibited within the _gens_. The _gens_ is older than the monogamic family. It cannot have the family as its constituent unit, because it is composed, not of entire families, but of parts of families.[190]

[188] Referring to Lubbock's favorable view of Morgan's
contributions to ethnological science, DR. STARCKE
declares: "With all respect for Morgan's diligence as a collector
of facts, I am more disposed to agree with McLennan that his
work is altogether unscientific, and that his hypotheses are
a wild dream, if not the delirium of fever."--_Primitive
Family_, 207, 208. _Cf._ MCLENNAN, _Studies_, I,
269; LUBBOCK, _Origin of Civilization_, 162; and
GROSSE, _Die Formen der Familie_, 3 ff. This criticism
is far too severe; see KOHLER, _Zur Urgeschichte der
Ehe_, 1 ff.; CUNOW, _Australneger_, chaps. v-vii, 11
ff.; HELLWALD, _Die mensch. Familie_, 158 ff.

[189] _Ancient Society_, 49-379; _Houses and House-Life_, 1 ff.

[190] _Ancient Society_, 227, 433 ff., 469. It is easy to see
that this argument is fallacious, even when the rule of exogamy
prevails. _Cf._ the criticism of STARCKE, _op. cit._,
275-77; BOTSFORD, _Athenian Constitution_, 4-7.

The earliest phase of sexual relations among primitive men is promiscuity. Following this are five successive stages or forms of marriage and the family, shading into each other, and each running a "long course in the tribes of mankind, with a period of infancy, of maturity, and of decadence."[191] Of these forms the first, second, and fifth are "radical," that is, each developing a distinct system of consanguinity. These systems of consanguinity "resolve themselves into two ultimate forms, fundamentally distinct." One is the _classificatory_ and the other the _descriptive_. "Under the first, consanguinei are never described, but are classified into categories, irrespective of their nearness or remoteness in degree to _Ego_; and the same term of relationship is applied to all the persons in the same category." Under the second, which came in with monogamy and prevails among the Aryan, Semitic, and Uralian peoples, "consanguinei are described either by the primary terms of relationship or a combination of these terms, thus making the relationship of each person specific."[192] The classificatory systems of consanguinity, it should be carefully noted, are more tenacious than the forms of marriage, their nomenclatures often surviving long after the actual relationships they denote have ceased to exist.

[191] _Ancient Society_, 389, and on the whole subject, 382-508.
In his earlier work, _Systems of Consanguinity_, 480 ff., MR.
MORGAN gives fifteen normal stages or institutions in the
evolution of marriage and the family. See also the summary in
MCLENNAN, _Studies_, I, 251, 252; and LUBBOCK'S
elaborate discussion of Morgan, _Origin of Civilization_, 162 ff.

[192] _Ancient Society_, 394; _Systems of Consanguinity_, 10-15;
LUBBOCK, _op. cit._, 165.

The first form of the family in Morgan's series is the consanguine,[193] based on the intermarriage of brothers and sisters, own and collateral, in a group. Though now extinct, this form is thought once to have been universal, rude survivals being found even in the present century among the Hawaiians. But the evidence of its former existence upon which Mr. Morgan relies as conclusive is the Malayan system of consanguinity, which he assumes could only have been produced by it. This system is found among the Maoris, the Hawaiians, and other Polynesians. Anciently it may have prevailed generally in Asia; and it lies at the basis of the Chinese relationships. The Malayan system is classificatory. "The only blood-relationships are the primary," being comprised in five categories. These are parent, child, grandparent, grandchild, brother and sister. Thus consanguine marriage "found mankind at the bottom of the scale" of social progress.

[193] _Ancient Society_, 383 ff., 401-23; _Systems of
Consanguinity_, 480 ff., 488 ff., where the term "communal
family" is used.

In course of time, however, its evils were perceived and the second form of the family arose. This is the Punaluan,[194] resting on the intermarriage of several sisters in a group with each other's husbands; or on that of several brothers in a group with each other's wives; marriage between brothers and sisters not being permitted. "The Punaluan family has existed in Europe, Asia, and America[195] within the historical period, and in Polynesia within the present century," the most interesting example being afforded by the Hawaiians. It is an outgrowth of the consanguine family "through the gradual exclusion of own brothers and sisters from the marriage relation."[196] With it arose the organization into _gentes_, whose "fundamental rules" in the archaic form are exogamy and relationship in the female line. The Punaluan family co-operating with the gentile organization,[197] produced the Turanian or Ganowánian system of consanguinity, which is also classificatory.[198] This is described by Morgan as "simply stupendous," recognizing "all the relationships known under the Aryan system, besides an additional number unnoticed by the latter."[199]

[194] _Systems of Consanguinity_, 131 ff., 489, 490; _Ancient
Society_, 424-52. The Hawaiian word _Pŭnalŭa_ means "dear
friend," "intimate companion": _ibid._, 427.

[195] In forty North American tribes the former existence of the
Punaluan family is thought to be proved by the Turanian system
of consanguinity and by the right of the husband of the eldest
sister to the younger sisters also: _Ancient Society_, 432, 436.

[196] _Ibid._, 424.

[197] Since the rule of exogamy as respecting the _gens_ would
permit the intermarriage of brothers and sisters. For convenience
McLennan's term "exogamy" is here used to indicate prohibition of
marriage within the _gens_.

[198] _Systems of Consanguinity_, 131-382. But, curiously enough,
among the peoples with the Punaluan family the Malayan system of
consanguinity survived: _Ancient Society_, 426, 427, _passim_.
_Ganowánians_ are the American Indians, the word meaning
"bow-and-arrow people": _Systems of Consanguinity_, 131. _Cf._
MCLENNAN, _Studies_, I, 253, n. 1.

[199] _Ancient Society_, 387, 435 ff. In all more than two
hundred relationships of the same person are recognized: _ibid._,
436.

But forces were now operating within the Punaluan family which were destined to transform it. "From the necessities of the social state," there was more or less pairing from the first, "each man having a principal wife among a number of wives, and each woman a principal husband among a number of husbands." Moreover, the fuller development of the gentile organism, with its rule of exogamy, tended to foster a sentiment hostile to the intermarriage of near kindred and, in other ways, to produce a scarcity of women available for marriage within the Punaluan groups, thus leading to wife-capture and wife-purchase. Under these influences arose the Syndiasmian, or third general type of the family, based upon the marriage of single pairs, often temporary and without exclusive cohabitation. It is found among the Senaca-Iroquois and many other American tribes, among the Tamils of South India, and some other races of Asia.[200] This family did not produce a distinct system of consanguinity, the peoples having it still retaining the Turanian system.[201] The next, or Patriarchal, family, like the Syndiasmian, is "intermediate," not being "sufficiently influential upon human affairs to create a new, or modify essentially the then existing system of consanguinity."[202] It is found particularly among the Semites and Romans, and is characterized by the "organization of a number of persons, bond and free, into a family under paternal power, for the purpose of holding lands, and for the care of flocks and herds." The Syndiasmian, and in a less degree the Patriarchal, constitute the transitional stage in the development of the Monogamic family. Its rise was especially fostered by the influence of property and the increase of the paternal power, leading to the change from the female to the male line of descent. It produced the system of consanguinity prevailing among the Uralian, Semitic, and Aryan peoples.[203]

[200] _Ibid._, 384 ff., 453-65. Called the "barbarian" family in
_Systems of Consanguinity_, 490, 491.

[201] _Ancient Society_, 461.

[202] _Ibid._, 384, 465, 466; _Systems of Consanguinity_, 480,
491.

[203] _Ancient Society_, 468-97; _Systems of Consanguinity_, 492,
493, 3-127.

Such, sketched in hasty outline, is the symmetrical structure which the author of the _Ancient Society_ has erected. But it has not been able wholly to withstand the shock of adverse criticism. The argument rests on too narrow a basis of investigation, and it is sometimes contradictory in its details. Its real foundation is the assumption that the nomenclatures of the classificatory systems of relationship must necessarily denote actual relationships. The truth of this assumption, however, is not self-evident. Other explanations of their meaning, some of them simpler and far more probable, have been offered. In the first place, it is evident that Morgan was misled by Fison's account of the Kamilaroi class-marriages.[204] Only in Australia was he able to find in existence, as he believed, a social organization upon the basis of sex. Yet it is by no means established that communal or even group-marriage has ever prevailed among the Australian aborigines. The criticism of Mr. Curr has raised doubt as to the trustworthiness of Fison's theory, although it may not have entirely shattered it.[205] According to Curr, the class-system is an ingenious arrangement to prevent close intermarriages. Even first cousins may not marry.[206] The Australian is very jealous of his wife, who may be betrothed to him in childhood. Wife-lending occurs, but it is not sanctioned by custom. The use of a single word for different relationships, as for father and father's brother, is not an evidence of former group-marriage, but of "poverty of language."[207] Nevertheless the Australian nomenclature is richer in terms of relationship than has been assumed by Mr. Fison. "There is hardly an Australian vocabulary in print" in which distinct translation of terms for "uncle, aunt, nephew, niece, sister-in-law, and son-in-law" do not occur.[208]

[204] Published by MORGAN in _Proceedings of the
Am. Academy of Arts and Science_, for 1872; and subsequently
presented in full by FISON in _Kamilaroi and Kurnai_,
50 ff., 99 ff., 159 ff., _passim_; MORGAN, _Ancient
Society_, 49-61. Compare MCLENNAN'S account of
Australian kinship in _Studies_, II, 278-310, especially 304 ff.

[205] CURR, _The Australian Race_, I, 106-42. _Cf._
also KEANE, _Man: Past and Present_, 154, 155; and
CRAWLEY, _Mystic Rose_, 348, 476 ff.

[206] CURR, _op. cit._, I, 111, 112.

[207] _Ibid._, 116.

[208] _Ibid._, 140. Compare the criticism of
WESTERMARCK, _Human Marriage_, 56, 57.

Mucke, as we have already seen, explains the classificatory system as being a survival of the primitive "space-relationships" of the primitive horde.[209] By Kautsky also its origin is traced to the horde in which "hetairistic monogamy" prevailed, and in which blood-relationship with the parents was not regarded. The classes, therefore, have nothing to do with descent, but each embraces all the individuals of a single generation under a common name.[210]

[209] MUCKE, _Horde und Familie_, 31 ff., _passim_.

[210] KAUTSKY, "Entstehung der Ehe und Familie,"
_Kosmos_, XII, 194-98, 256.

On the other hand, McLennan, in his well-known controversy with Morgan,[211] insists that the system of nomenclature is merely a "system of mutual salutations," urging the fact that most of the peoples having it possess also "some well-defined system of blood-ties."[212] Yet he believes that the Malayan nomenclature, which lies at the basis of Morgan's classificatory system, "had its origin in some early marriage-law."[213] Starcke criticises this inconsistency,[214] and comes to the conclusion, after examination of the whole question, that the "nomenclature was in every respect the faithful reflection of the juridical relations which arose between the nearest kinsfolk of each tribe. Individuals who were, according to the legal point of view, on the same level with the speaker, received the same designation."[215] In substantial harmony with this opinion are the results of Westermarck's researches.[216] According to his view the classificatory nomenclatures are merely terms of address, used to denote the sex, relative age, or the "external, or social relationship in which the speaker stands to the person whom he addresses."[217]

[211] See _Studies_, I, 249-315; II, 304 ff.; and the reply of
MORGAN, _Ancient Society_, 509 ff.

[212] _Studies_, I, 270, 271, 273.

[213] _Studies_, I, 277. The form of marriage referred to is
Nair polyandry. So the Turanian system is referable to Thibetan
polyandry. _Cf._ MORGAN, _op. cit._, 517 ff.

[214] _Primitive Family_, 181.

[215] _Ibid._, 207, 171-208. STARCKE is criticised by
CUNOW, _Australneger_, 165, for lack of thoroughness and
consistency in his examination of the classificatory systems.

[216] _History of Human Marriage_, chap. v, 82 ff.

[217] _Ibid._, 90. LUBBOCK, _Origin of Civilization_,
162-203, criticises Morgan's views as to the classificatory
systems and concludes that the "terms for what we shall call
relationships are, among the lower races of men, mere expressions
for the results of marriage customs, and do not comprise the
idea of relationship as we understand it; that, in fact, the
connection of individuals _inter se_, their duties to one
another, their rights, and the descent of their property, are
all regulated more by the relation to the tribe than by that to
the family; that, when the two conflict, the latter must give
way" (202). TYLOR, _On a Method of Investigating the
Development of Institutions_, 261-65, discovers a close relation
between exogamy and the classificatory system. Thus out of
fifty-three tribes with that system thirty-three observe the rule
of exogamy (264).

These criticisms have not gone unchallenged. More recent and more detailed examination of the classificatory nomenclatures has thrown new light on their meaning; although their origin in promiscuity or "group-marriage" has not been conclusively established. Thus Cunow, who in general accepts the former existence of group-marriage among various peoples, and even finds traces of it in Australia,[218] denies that the Australian class-nomenclatures are derived from original group-relations;[219] nor are they, as Westermarck believes, ever employed as mere empty terms of polite or respectful address.[220] The class-systems arose in a very early recognition of three generations or stages of seniority, in order to hinder sexual relations between relatives in the ascending and descending line.[221] For this reason, and because of the existence among some backward tribes of significant terms of kinship, individual marriage must as a general rule have existed among the Australian natives from the "earliest times."[222] Thus, "in its original form," the author concludes, "the division into classes is a striking confirmation of Morgan's theory, that the first step in the development of systems of relationship consists in the prevention of sexual union between parents and children in the wide sense."[223] For the same reason it follows that intermarriage between the nearest collateral relatives may not have been excluded.

[218] The so-called "Pirauru marriage" of the Dieri tribe
(HOWITT, in _Trans. R. S. Victoria_, I, Part II, 1899,
96) and the "Dilpamali marriage" of the Kunandaburi tribe
(CUNOW, _Australneger_, 163). Practically the same is
the Piraungaru custom of the Urabunna tribe which SPENCER AND
GILLEN, _Native Tribes of Central Australia_, 61 ff., regard
as a "modified form of group-marriage."

[219] CUNOW, _op. cit._, 161, 163-65.

[220] _Idem_, _Australneger_, 176.

[221] On the three _Altersclassen_ or _Altersschichtungen_,
see _ibid._, 25 ff. The present class-system of the Kamilaroi,
the author believes, is not older than the rise of the gentile
organization. "Originally the division into classes by no
means served, as Morgan and Fison assume, to exclude sexual
intercourse between near collateral kindred, but to prevent
cohabitation between relatives in the ascending and descending
line, between parents and children, uncles and nieces, aunts
and nephews, etc." _Cf._ as to the main point the somewhat
similar views of HELLWALD, _Die mensch. Familie_,
158 ff.; LIPPERT, _Kulturgeschichte_, I, 81-83; and
KAUTSKY, _Kosmos_, XII, 196-98.

[222] CUNOW, _op. cit._, 161, 162: Among backward tribes
parents are distinguished from parents' brothers and sisters; and
own children from the children of own brothers and sisters.

[223] _Ibid._, 25. See the somewhat similar conclusion of
ATKINSON, _The Primal Law_, 280-94; and compare the
criticism of CUNOW by LANG, _Social Origins_,
37, 112-18.

Much more radical are the conclusions reached by Kohler in the monograph in which, by a minute examination of Morgan's tables and other materials, he seeks to establish the genetic relations subsisting between "totemism, group-marriage, and mother-right," as they appear among the Dravidians, the Australians, and the American aborigines. The researches of Curr and Westermarck are criticised as being too general and as lacking in rigid scientific method.[224] Abundant "survivals," such as the levirate, wife-lending, and, above all, the class-system, seem to demonstrate the former existence of group-marriage in Australia; and in the same way the same result is reached for the other peoples considered. The "key" to the problem is found in totemism, one of the most "formative and vitalizing impulses of mankind. In totemism lies the germ of the future family and state."[225] It is the characteristic feature of the social and religious life of the American Indians. From its very nature totemism favors the rise of mother-right and group-marriage. No person can belong to more than one totem, which is therefore of necessity exogamous. Choice must be made between the maternal and the paternal line--for totemism implies the blood-bond. This choice naturally leads directly to mother-right; since the relation of mother and child is the central fact in the genesis of social experience. The maternal system precedes the paternal, and no trustworthy examples of the opposite evolution have been discovered.[226] Furthermore, totemism leads straight to group-marriage. For if two totem-groups may intermarry, it follows that the "men of one totem may marry women of the other and _vice versa_." With kinship counted in the maternal line, this fact implies that a man may mate with his own daughter; while the union of mother and son or brother and sister would be excluded because of the identity of their totem.[227] Totemism is thus a means of differentiating matrimonial classes. "The whole history of group-marriage," the author concludes, "is a history of the restriction of marriage from totem to totem by the separation of under-totems through which marriage is subjected to definite conditions." Totemistic group-marriage appears to be the "starting-point" of social culture for all the races of mankind. Whether a more primitive stage of promiscuity may have preceded it, the author in this paper does not undertake to establish.[228]

[224] KOHLER, _Zur Urgeschichte der Ehe_, 3, 14 ff.,
151 ff. This paper supplements the author's earlier _Recht der
Australneger_, _ZVR._, VII, 321 ff., 329 ff., 337 ff., where
Fison's general conclusions are accepted and the literature cited.

[225] "Der Totemglaube gehört zu den bildensten,
lebensvollsten, religiösen Trieben der Menschheit. In dem
Totemismus liegt die künftige Familien- und Staatenbildung im
Keime."--KOHLER, _op. cit._, 27.

[226] _Ibid._, 62.

[227] _Ibid._, 39 ff., 41, 53 ff., 64, 65.

[228] _Ibid._, 65, 163, 164.

Similar results are reached by Spencer and Gillen, who have given a remarkably clear and minute account of matrimonial, tribal, and totemistic institutions in central Australia. So far as the Australians are concerned, the theory that the classificatory nomenclatures are merely terms of address is positively rejected.[229] "When, in various tribes, we find series of terms of relationship all dependent upon classificatory systems such as those now to be described, and referring entirely to a mutual relationship such as would be brought about by their existence, we cannot do otherwise than come to the conclusion that the terms do actually indicate various degrees of relationship based primarily upon the existence of inter-marrying groups.... Whatever else they may be, the relationship terms are certainly not terms of address, the object of which is to prevent the native having to employ a personal name. In the Arunta tribe, for example, every man and woman has a personal name by which he or she is freely addressed by others--that is, by any, except a member of the opposite sex who stands in the relationship of '_Mura_' to them, for such may only on very rare occasions speak to one another."[230] The fundamental idea of the Australian classes is "that the women of certain groups may marry the men of others." It is a device for limiting and defining the inter-marriage of persons supposed to be of common blood.[231]

[229] SPENCER AND GILLEN, _Native Tribes of Central
Australia_, 56.

[230] _Ibid._, 56, 57. "A man can only marry women 'who stand in
the relationship of _nupa_, that is, are children of his mother's
elder brother's blood or tribal, or, what is the same thing, of
his father's elder sister.'" The mother of a man's _nupa_ is
"_mura_ to him and he to her, and they must not speak to one
another." This applies to a possible mother, _i. e._, the sister
of the father: _ibid._, 61, 62.

[231] _Op. cit._, 58.

Crawley likewise holds that the terms of the classificatory systems "are terms of kinship and not terms of address;" although being "in origin terms of _relation_," so far they are "terms of address also." For "all of the terms can be used as terms of address, just as our terms of relationship can be so used." The classificatory system, in some cases, appears clearly as a device to assist nature in confining marriage within the same generation.[232]

[232] _Mystic Rose_, 473, 474.

The results of the most recent research, therefore, seem to have advanced our knowledge of the early social condition of mankind; but not to have definitively settled the problem of the former existence of communistic marriage. One rises from an examination of the literature relating to totemism and to the classificatory systems of relationship with a feeling that much more material must be gathered and exploited before we shall escape entirely from the domain of speculation as to their full meaning.[233]

[233] In general on the Australian class-systems see further,
TYLOR, _Early History of Mankind_, 288; WAKE,
_Marriage and Kinship_, chap. iv; KOVALEVSKY, _Tableau_,
13 ff.; LUBBOCK, _Origin of Civilization_, 104 ff.,
BERNHÖFT, in _ZVR._, IX, 6 ff.; MCLENNAN,
_Studies_, II, 304 ff., where the reports of Grey, Ridley, and
other observers are summarized; GROSSE, _Die Formen
der Familie_, 49 ff., 58 ff., who, in the main, accepts Curr's
conclusions; DAWSON, _Australian Aborigines_, 1, 2,
26-40; FOREST, "Marriage Laws of N. W. Australia,"
_Report 2d Meeting of Aust. Association Adv. Sci._ (1890), 653,
654; FISON, "Group-Marriage and Relationships," _ibid._,
_4th Meeting_ (Tasmania, 1893), 688-97, criticising Westermarck,
717-20, criticising McLennan; MATHEW, "Australian
Aborigines," _Jour. R. S. N. S. Wales_, XXIII, 335-49,
criticising Morgan and McLennan. Consult also the references in
the Bibliographical Note at the head of the chapter.

For further discussion of Morgan's researches see
BERNHÖFT, _Verwandtschaftsnamen und Eheformen_;
POSADA, _Théories modernes_, 52-57; SCHROEDER,
_Das Recht in der geschlechtl. Ordnung_, 18 ff.; CUNOW,
_Australneger_, v-vii, 11 ff.; GROSSE, _op. cit._,
3 ff.; HELLWALD, _Die mensch. Familie_, 158 ff.;
BEAUCHAMP, "Aboriginal Communal Life in America," _Am.
Antiquarian_, IX, 343-50, attacking Morgan's views, holding
that proper communism is not found among the red Indians;
GIRAUD-TEULON, _Les origines du mariage_, 92-101, 169
ff.; FISON AND HOWITT, _Kamilaroi and Kurnai_, 99,
101, 149, 316 ff., who, for the Australian groups, sustain
Morgan as opposed to McLennan; WAKE, _op. cit._, 15,
19, 112, 266 ff., 297 ff.; LETOURNEAU, _L'évolution
du mariage_, 432, 433, who accepts Morgan's five forms of the
family; KOVALEVSKY, _op. cit._, 9, 10; MAINE,
_Early Law and Custom_, 195 ff., _passim_; PESCHEL,
_Races of Man_, 224, 228 ff., who rejects Morgan's conclusions;
LUBBOCK, "Development of Relationships," _Jour. Anth.
Inst._, Feb., 1871.

III. McLENNAN'S CONSTRUCTIVE THEORY

McLennan's theory[234] starts also with man in a condition, as he conceives it, resembling that of other gregarious animals. The unions of the sexes are "probably, in the earliest times, loose, transitory, and in some degree promiscuous."[235] There is no idea of consanguinity, though men may always have been held together by that "feeling of kindred" which arises in "filial and fraternal affection."[236] Everywhere when society emerges from this condition kinship is traced in the female line. Originally paternity is uncertain,[237] hence the recognition of relationship through the mother must of necessity have preceded the parental and the agnatic systems;[238] and this order of development is never reversed.

[234] _Studies in Ancient History_, I, viii, 83-146. McLennan's
views are somewhat modified and further developed in his
_Patriarchal Theory_, notably in chaps. xii and xiii, 181-242;
and a mass of new material is presented in his _Studies_, 2d ser.
(1896).

[235] In his two earlier works McLennan is vague as to the exact
meaning of "promiscuity" and "polyandry;" but in his letter to
Darwin (1874), _Studies_, II, 50-56, he defines these terms, so
that, in effect, he makes important concessions to the adherents
of early monogamy and polygyny and to those critics who have
questioned his theory of universal phases of progress. He says,
referring to the first series of _Studies_: "The import of my
reasoning is that more or less of it [promiscuity] and of
_indifference_ must appear in the hordes or their sections or
some of them." It is used to "denote the general conduct as to
sexual matters of men without wives.... Now I agree with you
that from what we know of human nature we may be sure that each
man would aim at having one or more women to himself, and cases
would occur wherein for a longer or shorter time the aim would
be realized, and there would be instances of what we may call
polygyny and monogamy--your first stage.... I take it, polygyny,
monogamy, and polyandry (or its equivalents) must have occurred
in every district from the first;" but the cases of polyandry
would be much more numerous. "Polyandry, in my view, is an
advance _from_, and _contraction_ of, promiscuity. It gives men
wives. Till men have wives they may have tastes, but they have
no obligations in matters of sex. You may be sure polygyny in
the early stage never had the sanction of _group opinion_." This
late explanation does not, however, relieve the author from
responsibility for the misleading statements or obscurities of
his earlier works. _Cf._ the rather too appreciative review of
the second series of _Studies_ by PROFESSOR GIDDINGS, in
_Annals of the Am. Academy_, IV, 97-100.

[236] _Studies_, I, 83, 88-90.

[237] _Ibid._, chap. viii.

[238] On the three systems of kinship see POST,
_Familienrecht_, 6 ff.