Chapter I: Front Matter

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ANCIENT SOCIETY

Or

Researches in the Lines of Human Progress from Savagery, through Barbarism to Civilization

by

LEWIS H. MORGAN, LL.D.

Member of the National Academy of Sciences. Author of “The League of the Iroquois,” “The American Beaver and his Works,” “Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family,” etc.

_Nescit vox missa reverti._

HORACE.

New York Henry Holt and Company 1877

Copyright, 1877, By Henry Holt.

TO THE REVEREND
J. H. McILVAINE, D.D.,
LATE PROFESSOR OF BELLES-LETTRES IN PRINCETON COLLEGE,
THIS VOLUME IS DEDICATED,
IN RECOGNITION OF HIS GENIUS AND LEARNING,
AND IN APPRECIATION OF HIS FRIENDSHIP.

Cum prorepserunt primis animalia terris,
Mutum et turpe pecus, glandem atque cubilia propter
Unguibus et pugnis, dein fustibus, atque ita porro
Pugnabant armis, quæ post fabricaverat usus:
Donec verba, quibus voces sensusque notarent,
Nominaque invenere: dehinc absistere bello,
Oppida coeperunt munire, et ponere leges,
Ne quis fur esset, neu latro, neu quis adulter.

—Horace, _Sat._, I, iii, 99.

“Modern science claims to be proving, by the most careful and
exhaustive study of man and his works, that our race began
its existence on earth at the bottom of the scale, instead
of at the top, and has been gradually working upward; that
human powers have had a history of development; that all
the elements of culture—as the arts of life, art, science,
language, religion, philosophy—have been wrought out by slow
and painful efforts, in the conflict between the soul and
the mind of man on the one hand, and external nature on the
other.”—Whitney’s _Oriental and Linguistic Studies_, p. 341.

“These communities reflect the spiritual conduct of our
ancestors thousands of times removed. We have passed through
the same stages of development, physical and moral, and are
what we are to-day because they lived, toiled, and endeavored.
Our wondrous civilization is the result of the silent efforts
of millions of unknown men, as the chalk cliffs of England are
formed by contributions of myriads of foraminifera.”—Dr. J.
Kaines, _Anthropologia_, vol. i, No. 2, p. 233.