CHAPTER VI

THE MOTHER-AGE CIVILISATION

I.--_Progress from Lower to Higher Forms of the Family Relationship_

"The reader who grasps that a thousand years is but a small period in the evolution of man, and yet realises how diverse were morality and customs in matters of sex in the period which this essay treats of" (_i.e._ _Mother-Age Civilisation_), "will hardly approach modern social problems with the notion that there is a rigid and unchangeable code of right and wrong. He will mark, in the first place, a continuous flux in all social institutions and moral standards; but in the next place, if he be a real historical student, he will appreciate the slowness of this steady secular change; he will perceive how almost insensible it is in the lifetime of individuals, and although he may work for social reforms, he will refrain from constructing social Utopias."--Professor KARL PEARSON.

Our study of the sexual associations among animals has brought us to understand how large a part the gratification of the sex-instincts plays in animal life, equalling and, indeed, overmastering and directing the hunger instinct for food. If we now turn to man we find the same domination of sex-needs, but under different conditions of expression.[97] Man not only loves, but he knows that he loves; a new factor is added, and sex itself is lifted to a plane of clear self-consciousness. Pathways are opened up to great heights, but also to great depths.

We must not, therefore, expect to take up our study of primitive human sexual and familial associations at the point where those of the mammals and birds leave off.[98] We have with man to some extent to begin again, so that it may appear, on a superficial view, that the first steps now taken in love's evolution were in a backward direction. But the fact is that the increased powers of recollection and heightened complexity of nervous organisation among men, led to different habits and social customs, separating man radically in his love from the animals. Man's instincts are very vague when compared, for instance, with the beautiful love-habits of birds; he is necessarily guided by conflicting forces, inborn and acquired. Thus precisely by means of his added qualities he took a new and personal, rather than an instinctive, interest in sex; and this after a time, even if not at first, aroused a state of consciousness in love which made sex uninterruptedly interesting in contrast with the fixed pairing season among animals. Hence arose also a human and different need for sexual variety, much stronger than can ever have been experienced by the animals, which resulted in a constant tendency towards sexual licence, of a more or less pronounced promiscuity, in group marriage and other forms of sexual association which developed from it.

This is so essential to our understanding of human love, that I wish I could follow it further. All the elaborate phenomena of sex in the animal kingdom have for their end the reproduction of the species. But in the case of man there is another purpose, often transcending this end--the independent significance of sex emotion, both on the physical and psychical side, to the individual. It seems to me that women have special need to-day to remember this personal end of human passion. This is not, however, the place to enter upon this question.

I have now to attempt to trace as clearly as I can the history of primitive human love. To do this it will be necessary to refer to comparative ethnography.[99] We must investigate the sex customs, forms of marriage and the family, still to be found among primitive peoples, scattered about the world. These early forms of the sexual relationship were once of much wider occurrence, and they have left unmistakable traces in the history of many races. Further evidence is furnished by folk stories and legends. In peasant festivals and dances and in many religious ceremonies we may find survivals of primitive sex customs. They may be traced in our common language, especially in the words used for sex and kin relationships. We can also find them shadowed in certain of our marriage rites and sex habits to-day. The difficulty does not rest in paucity of material, but rather in its superabundance--far too extensive to allow anything like adequate treatment within the space of a brief and necessarily insufficient chapter. For this reason I shall limit my inquiry almost wholly to those cases which have some facts to tell us of the position occupied by women in the primitive family. I shall try to avoid falling into the error of a one-sided view. Facts are more important here than reflections, and, as far as possible, I shall let these speak for themselves.

In order to group these facts it may be well to give first a rough outline of the periods to be considered--

1. A very early period, during which man developed from his ape-like ancestors. This may be called the pre-matriarchal stage. With this absolutely primitive period we are concerned only in so far as to suggest how a second more social period developed from it. The idea of descent was so feeble that no permanent family groups existed, and the family remains in the primitive biological relation of male, female and offspring. The Botocudos, Fuegians, West Australians and Veddahs of Ceylon represent this primitive stage, more or less completely. They have apparently not reached the stage where the fact of kinship expresses itself in maternal social organisation.[100] A yet lower level may be seen among certain low tribes in the interior of Borneo--absolutely primitive savages, who are probably the remains of the negroid peoples, believed to be the first inhabitants of Malaya. These people roam the forests in hordes, like monkeys; the males carry off the females and couple with them in the thickets. The families pass the night under the trees, and the children are suspended from the branches in a sort of net. As soon as the young are capable of caring for themselves, the parents turn them adrift as the animals do.[101]

It was doubtless thus, in a way similar to the great monkeys, that man first lived. With the chimpanzee these hordes never become large, for the male leader of the tribe will not endure the rivalry of the young males, and drives them away. But man, more gregarious in his habits, would tend to form larger groups, his consciousness developing slowly, as he learnt to control his brute appetites and jealousy of rivals by that impulse towards companionship, which, rooted in the sexual needs, broadens out into the social instincts.

It is evident that the change from these scattered hordes to the organised tribal groups was dependent upon the mothers and their children. The women would be more closely bound to the family than the men. The bond between mother and child, with its long dependence on her care, made woman the centre of the family. The mother and her children, and her children's children, and so on indefinitely in the female line, constituted the group. Relationship was counted alone through them, and, at a later stage, inheritance of property passed through them. And in this way, through the woman, the low tribes passed into socially organised societies. The men, on the other hand, not yet individualised as husbands and fathers, held no rights or position in the group of the women and their children.

2. This leads us to the second period of mother-descent and mother-rights. It is this phase of primitive society that we have to investigate. Its interest to women is evident. Just as we found in our first inquiry that, in the beginnings of sexuality the female was of more importance than the male, so now we shall find society growing up around woman. It is a period whose history may well give pride to all women. Her inventive faculties, quickened by the stress of child-bearing and child-rearing, primitive woman built up, by her own

## activities and her own skill, a civilisation which owed its

institutions and mother-right customs to her constructive genius, rather than to the destructive qualities which belonged to the fighting male.

3. But again we find, as in the animal kingdom, that step by step the forceful male asserts himself. We come to a third transitional period in which the male relatives of the woman--usually the brother, the maternal uncle--have usurped the chief power in the group. Inheritance still passes through the mother, but her influence is growing less. The right to dispose of women and the property which goes with them is now used by the male rulers of the group. The sex habits have changed; endogamous unions, or kin marriages within the clan, have given place to exogamy, where marriage only takes place between members of different groups. But at first the position of the husband and father is little changed; he marries into the wife's group and lives with her family, where he has no property rights or control over his wife's children, who are now under the rule of the uncle.

4. It is plain that this condition would not be permanent. The male power had yet to advance further; the child had to gain a father. We reach the patriarchal period, in which descent through the male line has replaced the earlier custom. Woman's power, first passing to her brother or other male relative, has been transferred to the husband and father. This change of power did not, of course, take place at once, and even under fully developed father-right systems many traces of the old mother-rights persist.

What it is necessary to fasten deeply in our minds is this: the father as the head of the woman and her children, the ruler of the house, was not the natural order of the primitive human family. Civilisation started with the woman being dominant--the home-maker, the owner of her children, the transmitter of property. It was--as will be made abundantly clear from the cases we shall examine--a much later economic question which led to a reversal of this plan, and brought the rise of father-right, with the father as the dominant partner; while the woman sank back into an unnatural and secondary position of economic dependence upon the man who was her owner--a position from which she has not even yet succeeded in freeing herself.

The maternal system of descent is found in all parts of the world where social advance stands at a certain level. This fact, added to the widespread traces the custom has left in every civilisation, warrants the assumption that mother-right in all cases preceded father-right, and has been, indeed, a stage of social growth for all branches of the human race.[102]

I shall not attempt to give the numerous traces of mother-descent that are to be found in the early histories of existing civilised nations, for to do this would entail the writing of the whole chapter on this subject. For the same reason I must reluctantly pass over the abundant evidence of mother-right that is furnished in folk-lore, in heroic legends, and in the fairy stories of our children. These stories date back to a time long before written history; they are known to all of us, and belong to all countries in slightly different forms. We have regarded them as fables; they are really survivals of customs and practices once common to all society. Wherever we find a king ruling as the son of a queen, because he is the queen's husband, or because he marries a princess, we have proof of mother-descent. The influence of the mother over her son's marriage, the winning of a bride by a task done by the wooer, the brother-sister marriage so frequent in ancient mythologies, the interference of a wise woman, and the many stories of virgin-births--all are survivals of mother-right customs. Similar evidence is furnished by mother-goddesses, so often converted into Christian local saints. I wish it were possible to follow this subject,[103] whose interest offers rich rewards. Perhaps nowhere else can we gain so clear and vivid a picture as in these ancient stories and legends of the early powerful position of woman as the transmitter of inheritance and guardian of property.

It may interest my readers to know that mother-descent must once have prevailed in Britain. Among the Picts of Scotland kingship was transmitted through women. Bede tells us that down to his own time--the early part of the eighth century--whenever a doubt arose as to the succession, the Picts chose their king from the female rather than from the male line.[104] Similar traces are found in England: Canute, the Dane, when acknowledged King of England, married Emma, the widow of his predecessor Ethelred. Ethelbald, King of Kent, married his stepmother, after the death of his father Ethelbert; and, as late as the ninth century, Ethelbald, King of the West Saxons, wedded Judith, the widow of his father. Such marriages are intelligible only if we suppose that the queen had the power of conferring the kingdom upon her consort, which could only happen where matrilineal descent was, or had been, recognised.[105] In Ireland (where mother-right must have been firmly established, if Strabo's account of the free sexual relations of the people[106] is accepted) women retained a very high position and much freedom, both before and after marriage, to a late period. "Every woman," it was said, "is to go the way she willeth freely," and after marriage "she enjoyed a better position and greater freedom of divorce than was afforded either by the Christian Church or English common law."[107]

Similar survivals of mother-right customs among the ancient Hebrews are made familiar to us in Bible history. To mention a few examples only: when Abraham sought a wife for Isaac, presents were taken by the messenger to induce the bride to leave her home; and these presents were given to her mother and brothers. Jacob had to serve Laban for fourteen years before he was permitted to marry Leah and Rachel,[108] and six further years of service were given for his cattle. Afterwards when he wished to depart with his children and his wives, Laban made the objection, "these daughters are my daughters, and these children are my children."[109] Such acts point to the subordinate position held by Jacob, which is clearly a survival of the servitude required from the bridegroom by the relatives of the woman, who retain control over her and her children, and even over the property of the man, as was usual under the later matriarchal custom. The injunction in Gen. ii. 24, "Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall 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