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PRIMITIVE MARRIAGE.

see

PRIMITIVE MARRIAGE

AN INQUIRY INTO THE ORIGIN OF THE FORM OF CAPTURE

IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES.

BY JOHN F. M‘LENNAN, MA,

ADVOCATE.

EDINBURGH: ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK. 1865.

[The right of Translation and Reproduction is Reserved.)

PRE FACE

—_~+ o

In the course of some inquiries which I had been making into the early history of civil society, the meaning and origin of the Form of Capture in Marriage Ceremonies fell to be investigated. The Subject being in itself curious, as well as obscure, and one which has never hither- to, so far as I am aware, been handled; I venture to lay the result of my investi- gation before the public, hoping that it May to some extent interest by its novelty. To the philosophic reader, I humbly sub-

mit my little book as an exercise in scien-

tific history. If I am right in my con-

vi : PREFACE.

clusions as to the origin of the symbol of capture, my essay must be accepted as throwing new light on the primitive state. For it will be seen that the symbol is not peculiar to any of the families of mankind. It is at once Indo-European, Turanian, and Semitic; and the frequency of its oc” cutrence is such as strongly to suggest— what I incline to believe—that the phase of society in which it originated existed, at some time or other, almost every- where. Indeed, so far as my inquiries into early social phenomena have. ex- tended, I have found such similarity, so many correspondences, so much sameness in the forms of life prevailing among the races usually considered distinct, that I have come to regard the ethnological differences of the several families of man-

PRERACE. vii

kind as of little or no weight compared with what they have in common: The most that can be attributed to those diffe- rences is, that they have affected the rate of development of the families, and the character of the development itself, in some of its secondary aspects. | Apart from the interest attaching to the Form of Capture as pointing out what most probably was the primitive form of human association, it will be found to have an important bearing on several social problems which have

hitherto remained unsolved. “I think

that the most important portions of my work are Chapters VIII. and IX. in Which the solution of some of these pro- blems is attempted. These chapters, it

will be seen, are. strictly pertinent to the

viii PREPACE.

main subject of inquiry. In order to explain the appearance of the Form of Capture among endogamous peoples, it was necessary that I should examine the systems of kinship which anciently

prevailed, and their influence on the

structure of the primitive groups, so as

to obtain a true view of the rise of caste and of endogamy.

I ought to mention that, in some cases, I have had much difficulty in ascertaining the proper names of places. For instance, Munniepore is sometimes written Munipur, and sometimes Manni- poor. In every such case I have followed the authority which I have had most fre- quent occasion to cite in regard to the place. I have farther to notice, that I have discarded the use of the signs

PREFACE.

A = Pe

ee “, and so on, commonly em- ployed to indicate the orthoepy of foreign — words. Such signs are of no use to the unlearned ; and, in the run of cases, the

learned may be presumed not to require

their assistance. Besides, I have not found much agreement, among writers, in the use of such signs. The word Ra- mayana, for example, is written Rámáy- ana by Professor Monier Williams, Rā- mayana by Dr. Muir, and Ramayana by Professor Max Müller. In writing it Simply Ramayana, I follow Mr. Tagore, in his recent translation of the ‘ Vivada Chintamani,’ in which work, as in the

Present, the signs referred to are wholly - discarded.

EDINBURGH, Fan. 6, 1865.

CONTENTS.

0

CHAPTER I. Legal Symbolism and Primitive Life -

CHAPTER II.

The Form of Capture in Marriage Ceremonies

CHAPTER III. The Origin of the Form of Capture

CHAPTER IV.

On the Prevalence of the Practice of Capturing Wives, de facto - - - -

CHAPTER V.

Of the Rule against Marriage between mem- bers of the same Tribe—Of the coincidence of this rule with the Practice of Capturing Wives, de Sacto, and with the Form of Cap- ture in Marriage Ceremonies - " x

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER VI. On the State of Hostility -

CHAPTER VII.

Exogamy : its Origin—Comparative Archaism of Exogamy and Endogamy 4 è

GHAPTER VIII. Ancient Systems of Kinship, and their Influence

on the Structure of the Primitive Groups- -

CHAPTER IX.

The Decay of Exogamy - a

CHAPTER X.

Conclusion - > g

— —0——

APPENDIX. NoTE A.—Additional Examples of the Form of Capture í 2 2 g 7

NOTE B.—On the Practice of Capturing Women

for Wives z % = te ta

CRAPPER I

INTRODUCTORY.

Legal Symbolism and Primitive Life.

TuE chief sources of information regard- ing the early history of civil society are, first, the study of races in their primitive condition ; and, second, the study of the symbols employed by advanced nations in the constitution or exercise of civil rights. From these studies pursued to- gether, we obtain, to a large extent, the Power of classifying social phenomena as more or less archaic, and thus of connect- ing and arranging in their order the Stages of human advancement.

None of the usual methods of his-

torical inquiry conduct us back to forms B

LEGAL SYMBOLISM

of life so nearly primitive as many that have come down into our own times. The geological record, of course, exhibits races as rude as any now living, some per- haps even more so, but then it goes no farther than to inform us what food they ate, what weapons they used, and what was the character of their ornaments. More than this was not to be expected from that record, for it was not in its nature to preserve any memorials of those aspects of human life in which the

philosopher is chiefly interested—of the

family or tribal groupings, the domestic and political organisation. Again, the facts disclosed by philology as to the civil condition of the Indo-European race be- fore its dispersion from its original head- quarters,—the earliest, chronologically — considered, which we possess respecting the social state of mankind,—cannot be

AND PRIMITIVE LIFE. 7

—

Said to tell us anything of the origin or early progress of civilization. Assuming the correctness of the generalization by Which philologers have attempted to re- construct the social economy of the Aryans, we find that people, at an un- known date before the dawn of. tra- dition, occupying nearly the same point of advancement as that now occupied by the pastoral hordes of Kirghiz Tar- tary, and leading much the same sort of life. They had marriage laws re- Sulating the rights and obligations of husbands and wives, of parents and chil- dren; they recognised the ties of blood through both parents; they had great flocks and herds, in defence of which they often did battle, and they lived under à patriarchal government with monarchi- cal features. It is interesting—a short time ago we should have said surprising

LEGAL SYMBOLISM

—to find that such progress had been so early made. But in all other respects this so-called revelation of philology is void of instruction. Those Aryan institutions are ato use the language of geology—post- pliocene, separated by a long interval from the foundations of civil society, and throw- ing back upon them no light. Marriage laws, agnatic relationship, and kingly go- vernment, belong, in the order of develop- ment, to recent times.

For the features of primitive life, we must look, not to tribes of the Kirghiz type, but to those of Central Africa, the wilds of America, the hills of India, and the islands of the Pacific ; with some of whom we find marriage laws unknown, the family system undeveloped, and even the only acknow- ledged blood-relationship that through . mothers. These facts of to-day are, in a sense, the most ancient history. In the

Seen ee, E AND PRIMITIVE LIFE. 9

—

Sciences of law and society, old means not old in chronology, but in structure: that is most archaic which lies nearest to the beginning of human progress considered as a development, and that is most modern which is farthest removed from that be- ginning.

And since the historical nations were so far advanced at the earliest dates to which even philology can lead us back, the Scientific investigation of the progress of mankind must not deal with them, in the first instance, but with the very rude forms of life still existing, and the rudest of which we have accounts. The preface of `- general history must be compiled from the Materials presented by barbarism. Hap-

pily, if we may say so, these materials are abundant. So unequally has the species been developed, that almost every con- ceivable phase of progress may be studied,

IO LEGAL SYMBOLISM

as somewhere observed and recorded. And thus the philosopher, fenced from mistake, as to the order of development, by the in- terconnection of the stages and their shad- ing into one another by gentle gradations, may draw a clear and decided outline of the course of human progress in times long antecedent to those to which even philology can make reference. All honour to philology; but in the task of recon-

structing the past, to which its professors declare themselves to be devoted, they must be contented to act as assistants

rather than as principals.

We have said that the preface of gene- ral history must be compiled from mate- rials presented by barbarism. Some may account it illogical to prefix a scheme of early progress formed on view of socie- ties that have not yet advanced far, if at all, from savagery, to a scheme of further

AND PRIMITIVE LIFE.

Progress deduced from the written histories of nations whose origin and early training we are unacquainted with. But, in point of fact, it is not so. It is the best proof of the propriety of such a course—as well as of the continuity and uniform charac- ter of human progress—that we can trace everywhere, disguised under a -variety of symbolical forms in the higher layers of civilization, the rude modes of life and forms of law with which the examination of the lower makes us familiar. Indeed, were these remarks not merely general and introductory to the investigation of the origin of one particular symbol, many in- Stances of this correspondence between

the higher and lower levels might be cited, to show that the symbolism of law in the light of a knowledge of primi- tive life, is the best key to unwritten history. ;

LEGAL SYMBOLISM

Of the value of that symbolism—of that reverence for the past to which it owes its origin—there will be occasion to say something hereafter. Meantime, we ob- serve that, wherever we discover sym- bolical forms, we are justified in inferring that in the past life of the people em- ploying them, there were corresponding realities ; and if, among the primitive races which we examine, we find such realities as might naturally pass into such forms on - an advance taking place in civility, then we may safely conclude (keeping within the conditions of a sound inference) that what these now are, those employing the symbols once were. History is thus made to ratify conclusions derived from the observation of rude tribes ; while such observation, again, is made to fur- nish the key to many of the enigmas of history.

AND PRIMITIVE LIFE. « Le

e

For it is not as regards unwritten history merely that the two sources of information specified at the outset are of importance. Apart from the tests of truth afforded by the minute knowledge .of Primitive modes of life and their classi- fication as more or less archaic, nothing could be more delusive than written his- tory itself. In Roman law, to take a con- venient example, Confarreatio has the foremost place among the modes of con- Stituting marriage. Usus is just men- tioned in the twelve tables, which contain a provision against the wife coming into the Manus of her husband through Usus. Coemptio does not appear in the old law of Rome at all, nor is there any mention of it earlier than that by Gaius. But it can easily be shown that Usus and Co- emptio come first in order of age, and Confarreatio later; that is to say, the two

14. LEGAL SYMBOLISM

former are more archaic than the latter. Yet have recent learned writers, overlook- ing this fact and the meaning of legal symbolism, represented Usus and Co- emptio as forms invented and introduced by the legislators of Rome, whereby the plebeians might have their wives in Manu, and enjoy the other advantages of Juste Nuptiz; Usus as an invention; and the fictitious sale in Coemptio as merely a device of legislative ingenuity. The true explanation of the late appearance of both Usus and the fictitious sale in the Roman law, is this—that the law at first was not that of the whole people but of a limited aristocracy, who, with a Sabine king and priesthood, adopted the Sabine religious ceremony of marriage; that the law long totally ignored the life and

usages of the mass, and that ¢#ezv modes

of marrying and giving in marriage be-

T ee

AND PRIMITIVE LIFE. 15

gan to appear, and to make their mark in the law, only on the popular element in the city becoming of importance. In- Stead of marriage per coemptionem being the invention of legislators, it was of spontaneous popular growth, and must have been as old as the establishment of peaceful relations between tribes and fami- lies. All fictions, or nearly all, have had their germs in facts; became fictions or merely symbolical forms afterwards. And that the fictitious sale was originally an actual sale and purchase, cannot be doubted by any one who knows that marriage by the form of actual sale has prevailed

almost universally among rude popula- tions.

We see in the case of the Roman law how incomplete must necessarily be the history of the law of a country, as written on the face of it. The law is at first that of

16 LEGAL SYMBOLISM

the dominant and presumably the most ad- vanced classes—the literates, warriors, and statesmen ; the rest of the community are beyond its pale, a law unto themselves. When the levelling processes, by which the lower classes succeed in the long run in acquiring rights more or less equal, have gone on for some time, then the ruder cus- toms followed by them before and since the commencement of the State appear in a modified form in what is now for the first time really becoming the law of the people. Civility seems suddenly to as- sume the garb and the air, and to use the gutturals of barbarism ; legal pro- cesses are gone through with the frantic howls and gesticulations of armed Ojibe- ways; and while all this, to those who are ignorant of primitive times, seems mere idle pantomime, sometimes silly, some- times odd, sometimes: puzzling by its in-

AND PRIMITIVE LIFE. 17

tricacy, to those who are prepared to receive their suggestions, the forms em- ployed are pregnant with meaning and in- Struction. Fortunately all the nations in the world have not advanced in civility Pari passu; and what is pantomime with One people, we discern to be grimmest reality with another. Were it not for this inequality of development, in what mys- teries would the history of the race be enveloped! What Michelet calls the poetry of law would have to be received as such simply ; as so many grotesqueries Or graces introduced into the ways of life to satisfy the popular fancy. As it is, however, the so-called poetry of law, the Symbolic forms that appear in a code or in Popular customs, tell us as certainly of the carly usages of a people, as the rings in the transverse section of a tree tell of its age.

The Libripens, with his scales, offi-

18 Fee ete A SYMBOLISM.

ciating at a will or act of adoption, seems out of place; but his presence illustrates the source whence all ideas of formal dis- positions were derived—the sale of fun- gibles. So does an old form of process preserved by Gaius—the Legis Actio Sacramenti of the Romans—prove that cultivated people to have been at one time zv pari casu as regards the adminis- tration of justice with many races which

we find ignorant of legal proceedings, and dependent for the settlement of their dis-

putes on force of arms or the good offices of neutral parties interfering as arbiters.

So far, briefly, of the importance of the symbolism of law and of the study of races in their primitive condition. What follows is an attempt at a practical exem- plification in a new direction of the aid derivable from these sources in the task of unveiling the past.

FORM OF CAPTURE.

CHAPTER II.

The Form of Capture in Marriage Ceremonies.

IN the whole range of legal symbolism _ there is no symbol more remarkable than that of capture in marriage ceremonies

—the origin of which it is our purpose to investigate—nor is there any the Meaning of which has been less studied. So far as we know, neither has the extent to which it prevails been made the subject of inquiry; nor its signifi- Cance the subject of thought. In two Cases, indeed, the occurrence of the Symbol could not fail to receive some attention. But, naturally, it did not lie in the way of the historians of either Greece or Rome to examine the matter

20 THE FORM OF CAPTURE

very minutely, or to follow up the sugges- tions which, upon examination, it might have yielded, as to the early condition of the Dorians or Latins. Accordingly, the custom has been accepted as meaning

no more than Festus said it did among the

Romans, than Muller says it did among the Spartans ; as indicating nothing at Rome but the popular appreciation of the good fortune of Romulus in the rape of the Sabines;* as indicating, at Sparta, the feel- ing that a young woman “could not sur- render her freedom and virgin purity unless compelled by the violence of the stronger sex.”t It is surprising that writers so acute should have rested con- tent with such explanations, and that their views should have been so gene-

* Festus, De Verborum Significatione—Rapi. T Mullers “ Dorians,” Book iv. c. iv., sec. 2; and see “Rawlinson’s Notes,” Herod., Book vi. 65.

IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES. 21

i ge Panetta

rally adopted. The theory of Festus we Shall have occasion to notice hereafter : of that of Muller we observe that before we can entertain it, we must suppose

that in the exceedingly lax community of

the Spartans, or at least within certain of the tribes composing that community, there had been an early period of austere Virtue, the tradition of which was still so influential as to compel the Spartans to Observe in their marriages this custom as the shadow of their former delicacy. Now, of the existence of such a period bt prudery among the ancient Dorians, or among the Pelasgi, or the Achzans, there is not a tittle of evidence. On the contrary, such evidence as we have, points to the Lacedzemonian customs as having been an improvement on ancient prac- tice, Savages are not remarkable for

delicacy of feeling in matters of sex, and l >

22 THE FORM OF CAPTURE

the wandering hordes, who in succession overran the Peloponessus, were no better than savages when they first come under our observation.* Again, no case can be cited of a primitive people among whom the seizure of brides is rendered neces- sary by maidenly coyness. On the con- trary, it might be shown, were it worth while to deal seriously with this view, that women among rude tribes are usu- ally depraved, and inured to scenes of depravity from their earliest infancy. In this state of the facts, it is remarkable that any one should have been satisfied with so improbable an explanation. Rejecting, then, the primitive prudery hypothesis, which requires for its basis a declension from ancient standards of

* They were certainly as savage as the Khonds, . with whom they agreed in cultivating a religion requiring human sacrifices,

IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES. 23

Snes

Purity—of the existence of which we have no evidence—we proceed to examine the Various phases in which the symbol of capture is presented. We shall find it in Places far from classic ground, and point- ing, in all its varieties, so steadily to the true theory of its origin, that the mere exhibition of its phases will lead the reader to anticipate much of what we have to say on the subject. In order to see what is the precise state of the facts with which we have to deal, it is Necessary to say something of the nature Of the symbol, and to adduce at some length such accounts of it as we find in Our authorities. |

The symbol of capture occurs when- “ver, after a contract of marriage, it is necessary for the constitution of the rela- tion of husband and wife that the bride- stoom or his friends should go through

24 THE FORM OF CAPTURE

the form of feigning to steal the bride, or carry her off from her friends by superior force. The marriage is agreed

upon by bargain, and the theft or abduc-

tion follows as a concerted matter of form, to make valid the marriage. The test, then, of the presence of the symbol in any case is, that the capture is concerted, and is preceded by a contract of marriage. If there is no preceding contract, the case is one of actual abduction.

So far of the nature of the symbol. We proceed to examine the instances of its occurrence. That the form was ob- served in the marriages of the Dorians, and was, equally with betrothal, requi- site as a preliminary of marriage, rests chiefly on the authority of Herodotus and Plutarch.* The evidence of Hero-

dotus is indirect, and is contained in

* Muller’s “ Dorians,” ut supra.

IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES. 25

the well-known passage in which he ex- plains how Demaratus robbed Lestychides of his bride Percalus, to whom he had been betrothed—/orestalling him in carry- ing her off and marrying her.* The case Was one of actual abduction : but the language of Herodotus implies that it remained for Lestychides, in order to make Percalus his wife, that he should 80 through the form of carrying her off. With this must be conjoined the express Statement of Plutarch,t+ that the Spartan bridegroom always carried off the bride by feigned violence. He says, indeed, dy violence; but at the same time he shews that the seizure was made by friendly concert between the parties. These pas- Sages must be held sufficiently to prove that the custom existed at Som ft

is equally certain that it was observed

“ Herodotus,” B. vi, 65. -f “Life of Lycurgus.”

26 IHL LORM OF CAP LIORE

at Rome,* in the plebeian marriages which were not constituted by Confar- reatio or Coemptio. The bridegroom and his friends—the time agreed upon having arrived—invaded the house of the bride, and carried off the lady with feigned force from the lap of her mother, or of her nearest female relation if the mother were dead. or absent. The seizure is vividly described by Apuleius} in. the story of the Captive Damsel, in which he is understood to have had the ple- beian form of marriage in view. The

lady, narrating how she had been carried off, says that her mother having dressed her becomingly in nuptial apparel, was loading her with kisses, and looking for- ward to a future line of descendants, when

* Festus, #¢ supra—Rapi: Pothier, Pandecta, etc., - App,, Title I. book xxiii, t+ Apuleius, de Asino Aureo, Book iv.

IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES. 27

On a sudden a band of robbers, armed like gladiators, rushed in with glittering Swords, made straight for her chamber in a compact column, and, without any Struggle or resistance whatever on the part of the servants, tore her away half dead with fear from the bosom of her trembling mother. The custom is said Still to prevail to a great extent among the Hindus.* It may well do so, for we find what must, as we shall show, be held to be the form of capture, prescribed as a Marriage ceremony to the Hindus in the Sutras.t It prevails among the Khonds in the hill tracts of Orissa. The marriage being agreed upon, a feast, to which the families of the parties equally contribute,

* M‘Pherson’s “Report upon the Khonds of the dis- tricts of Ganjam and Cullack,” p. 55. Calcutta, 1842.

t “Indische Studien,” p. 325. Edited by Dr. Weber. Berlin, 1862.

28 bits FORM. OF GAPLORE

is prepared at the dwelling of the bride. “To the feast,” says Major M‘Pherson,* “succeed dancing and song. When the night is far spent, the principals in the scene are raised by an uncle of each upon his shoulders, and borne through the dance. The burdens are suddenly ex- changed, and the uncle of the youth dis- appears with the bride. The assembly divides into two parties; the friends of the bride endeavour to arrest, those of the bridegroom to cover her flight, and men, women, and children, mingle in mock conflict, which is often carried to great lengths.” “ On one occasion,” says Major- General Campbell, “ I heard loud cries proceeding from a village close at hand.

* M‘Pherson’s “ Report,” ut supra. t “ Personal Narrative of Service, etc, in Khond- istan,” 1864, p. 44.

IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES. 29

and there I saw a man bearing away upon his back something enveloped in an ample Covering of scarlet cloth; he was sur- rounded by twenty or thirty young fel- lows, and by them protected from the desperate attacks made upon him by a Party of young women. On seeking an explanation of this novel scene, I was told that the man had just been married, and his precious burden was his bloom- ing bride, whom he was conveying to his own village. Her youthful friends— as, it appears, is the custom—were seek-

ing to regain possession of her, and hurled Stones and bamboos at the head of the devoted bridegroom, until he reached the confines of his own village.* Then the

* The hurling of old shoes, etc. after the bride- groom among ourselves, may be a relic of a similar Custom. It is a sham assault on the person carrying off the lady; and in default of any more plausible

30 THE FORM OF CAPTURE

tables were turned, and the bride was fairly won; and off her young friends scampered, screaming and laughing, but not relaxing their speed till they reached their own village.” The custom may be presumed to prevail among the Koles, the Ghonds, and the other congeners of the Khonds ; but we are without authority on the subject.

According to De Hell,* the form of capture is observed in the marriages of the noble or princely class among the Kalmucks. The price to be paid for the _ bride to her father having been fixed, the bridegroom sets out on horseback, accom- panied by the chief nobles of the horde

explanation, and we know of none such, it may fairly be considered as probable that it is the form of capture in its last stage of disintegration.

* Xavier Hommaire de Hell, “ Travels in the Steppes of the Caspian Sea.” Lond. 1847, p. 259.

IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES. 31

to which he belongs, to carry her off. “A sham resistance is always made by the people of her camp, in spite of Which she fails not to be borne away on a richly caparisoned horse, with loud Shouts and feux de joie.” Dr. Clarke describes the ceremony differently, and it is possible that it assumes different forms in the different nations of the Kal- Mucks. “The ceremony of marriage among the Kalmucks,” he says,” “is per-

formed on horseback. A girl is first Mounted, who rides off in full speed. Her lover pursues; if he overtakes her,

She becomes his wife, and the marriage is consummated on the spot; after this she

returns with him to his tent. But it

Sometimes happens that the woman does not wish to marry the person by whom

TARTANE, étc., vol. i, p. 433.

32 LHEIPORM OF CAPTURE

suffer him to overtake her. We were assured that no instance occurs of a Kal- muck girl being thus caught, unless she have a partiality to the pursuer. If she dislikes him, she rides, to use the language of English sportsmen, ‘ neck or nought,’ until she has completely effected her escape, or until her pursuer’s horse þe- comes exhausted, leaving her at liberty to return, and to be afterwards chased by some more favoured admirer.” This ride for a wife is never undertaken till after the price for her has been fixed between the friends of the parties, the lover hav- ing to pay for as well as to catch her. The custom is not mentioned in the ac- count of the Kalmucks by Pallas, who knew of their marriage customs only by hearsay. But it favours the sup- position that there are varieties of the form in use among this people, that

IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES. 33

Bergman * describes the ceremony some-

what differently from both Clarke and De Hell. The necessity for the appear- ance of using force is satisfied, according to Bergman, by the act of putting the bride by force upon horseback when she is about to be conducted to the hut pre- pared for her by the bridegroom. And, indeed, we find the form reduced to this minimum of pretence in not a few cases. Thus in North Friesland,t a young fellow, called the bride-lifter, lifts the bride and her two bridesmaids upon the waggon

in which the married couple are to travel to their home.

Among the Tunguzes and Kamcha-

* Bergman’s “Streifereien.” Riga 1804, vol. 3, p. 145, et seg.

t Weinhold, pp. 250, 251; and see the other au- thorities for like cases noted by Dr. Weber, “Indische Studien,” uż supra.

34 THE FORM OF CAPTURE

dales, a matrimonial engagement is not considered to be definitely concluded until the suitor has overcome his beloved by force, and torn her clothes—the maiden being bound by custom to defend her liberty to the utmost.* Also among the Bedouin Arabs it is necessary for the bridegroom to force the bride to en- ter his tent.t A similar custom existed among the French, at least in some pro- vinces, in the 17th century.{ In all the

cases just mentioned the form assumed by the custom was analogous to the rule prescribed in the Sutras, where it was provided that at a certain vital Stage of

* «Travels in Siberia,” Erman, vol. ii, p. 442— 1848 (Cowley’s trans.)

t Burckhardt’s “Notes on the Bedouins and Wahabys.” Lond. 1830, vol. i, p. 108. ;

: “Marriage Ceremonies,” etc., Gaya, 2ded. Lond. . 1698, p. 30.

IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES. 35

Sheree:

the marriage ceremony, & strong man and the bridegroom should forcibly draw the bride and make her sit down on a red Ox-skin.*

There is good ground for believing that the form of capture is observed in the Marriage ceremonies of the Nogay Tartars. The rule which prohibits a Kal- Muck bride from entering the yurt of

her parents for a year or more after her Marriage, and which is undoubtedly con-

nected with the form of capture, pre- Vails among the Nogais, as it does also “Mong the Kirghiz. At any rate, we find the custom in the Caucasus in the immediate neighbourhood of the Nogais. The form which it assumes among the Circassians, indeed, closely resembles that Observed in ancient Rome. The wedding is. celebrated with noisy feasting and

* “Tndische Studien,” uz supra.

36 THE FORM OF CAPTURE

revelry, “in the midst of which the bride- groom has to rush in, and with the help of a few daring young men, to carry off the lady by force; and by this process she becomes his lawful wife.’* The cus- tom also prevailed till a recent date in Wales. Lord Kamest says that the following marriage ceremony was in his day, or at least had till shortly before been customary among the Welsh. “On the morning of the wedding day, the bridegroom, accompanied with his friends on horseback, demands the bride. Her friends, who are likewise on horseback, give a positive refusal, upon which a mock scuffle ensues. The bride, mounted be-

* Louis Moser, “The Caucasus and its People.” Lond. 1856, p. 31; and see Spencer's “Travels in Circassia.” Lond. 1837, vol. ii. p 375; and “Bell’s Journal,” vol. ii. p. 221. Lond. 1840.

+ “Sketches of the History of Man,” Book 1. sec. 6, p. 449. Edin. 1807.

IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES. 37

hind her nearest kinsman, is carried off and is pursued by the bridegroom and his friends, with loud shouts. It is hot uncommon on such an occasion to see two or three hundred sturdy Cambro- Britons riding at full speed, crossing

and jostling to the no small amuse- Ment of the spectators. When they have fatigued themselves and their horses, the bridegroom is suffered to overtake his bride. He leads her away in triumph, and the scene is concluded with feasting and festivity.” Some such picture we Should have had from De Hell had he expanded his account of the mock scuffle among the Kalmucks of the hordes of the bride and bridegroom.

We have now found the custom in various parts of Europe and Asia; it Occurs also in Africa and in America.

Lord Kames vouches for the custom D

os RT Tat ae ee, a E EE E a po

38 THE FORM OF CAPTURE

among the Inland Negroes.* “When the preliminaries of the marriage are adjusted, the bridegroom with a number of his companions set out at night and surround the house of the bride as if in- tending to carry her off by force; she and her female attendants pretending to make all possible resistance, cry aloud for help, but no person appears.” Speket men- tions an incident which he observed in Karague, and which may have been the sequel to a capture. “ At night,” he

says, “ I was struck by surprise to see a long noisy procession pass by where I sat, led by some men who carried on their shoulders a woman covered up ina blackened skin. On inquiry, however, I heard she was being taken to the hut of

* “Sketches,” etc., uz supra. ; t “Journal of the Discovery of the Source of the Nile,” 1863, p. 198.

PR ci ago

IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES. 39

m

her espoused, where bundling fashion She would be put to bed; but it is only with virgins they take so much trouble.” Traces of the custom are indeed frequently Met with in Africa, but in so distinct and Marked a form as that mentioned by Lord Kames, we have not found it. His lord- Ship has not given his authority. He Mentions the custom, however, merely for its singularity, and apparently in ig- Norance of its connecting itself with any Wide-spread practice of mankind, which demanded investigation. Among the pri- Mitive races throughout the whole con- tinent of America traces of the form of capture (that is, customs seemingly of no Significance, except in the light of this form) are of frequent occurrence. Among the people of Tierra del Fuego, however, the form itself appears almost in perfec-

tion. “Ac soon, says Captain Fitzroy,

40 THE FORM OF CAPTURE

speaking of the Fuegians,* “as a youth is able to maintain a wife by his exertions in fishing or bird-catching, he obtains the consent of her relations, and does some

piece of work, such as helping to make a canoe, or prepare seal-skins, etc., for her parents. Having built or stolen a canoe for himself, he watches for an opportunity, and carries off his bride. If she is unwilling she hides herself in the woods, until her admirer is heartily tired of looking for her, and gives up the pursuit, but this seldom happens.”

-= These are among the best marked in- stances of the Form with which we are ac- quainted.+ The instances fix our attention

* “Voyages of the Adventure and Beagle.” Vol. ii., p. 182; 1839.

t The reader will find in the Appendix A, a- marked example of the Form, occurring in Ireland, and several other examples occurring elsewhere,

IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES. 41

“specially upon a few geographical points. But nothing in nature stands by itself. Each example of the Form leads us to contemplate a great area over which the custom once prevailed, just as a fossil fish in rock on a hill-side forces us to con- ceive of the whole surrounding country 4S at one time under water. Were we to enumerate and examine all the customs Which Seem to us connected with the Form, we should be led into discussions

foreign to our purpose, and there would

be few primitive races with which we Should not have to deal. Suffice it, that the Form which of old appeared so well defined in the peninsulas of Italy and Greece, may be traced thence, on the one hand, northwards through France and Britain, south-westwards through

Which the author has not thought it necessary. to in- corporate in the text.

42 LEAT ORME. OF CAPT ORE: ETC.

Spain, and north - eastwards through Prussia; on the other hand, northwards through ancient Thessaly and Macedonia, into the mountainous regions on the Black Sea and the Caspian; again, that the form which is perfect among the Kal- mucks shades away into faint and fainter traces throughout almost all the races of the Mongolidz ; that we may assume it of frequent occurrence in Africa, as it unquestionably was among the red men of America; that it occurs among the Hindus, and may be assumed to have

been common among the aboriginal in- habitants of the plains of India, of whom

we have a well-preserved specimen in the Khonds of Orissa.

THE ORIGIN OF FORM OF CAPTURE. 43

CHAP FER sed: THE ORIGIN OF THE FORM OF CAPTURE.

Tur question now arises, what is the Meaning and what the origin of a cere- mony so widely spread, that already on the threshold of our inquiry, the reader Must be prepared to find it connected with some universal tendency of man- kind ?

Those who approach the subject with minds undisturbed by the views of Festus and Muller will most naturally think, in the first instance, of an early period of lawlessness, in which it was with women aS with other kinds of property, that he Should take who had the power, and he should keep who could. And it is a trite

fact, that women captured in war have

44 THE ORIGIN OF

universally, in barbarous times and coun- tries, been appropriated as wives, or as worse. But little consideration is needed to see that the symbol implies much more than this; for it is impossible to believe that the mere lawlessness of savages should be consecrated into a legal symbol, or to assign a reason—could this be believed— why a similar symbol should not appear in transferences of other kinds of pro- perty. To a certain extent, indeed, the first impression must be held to be a cor- rect one. We cannot escape the conclu- sion that there was a stage in the history

of tribes observing this custom when wives were usually obtained by theft or force. And unless the practice of get-

ting wives by theft or force was so general where it prevailed that we may Say it was. almost invariable, it is incredible that such an association should be established in the

THE FORM OF CAPTURE. 45

Popular mind between marriage and the. . act of rapine, as would afterwards require the pretence of rapine to give validity to the ceremony of marriage. It must have been the system of certain tribes to cap-

ture women—necessarily the women of ,

Other tribes—for wives. But we may be Sure that such a system could not have Sprung out of the mere instinctive desire of Savages to possess objects cherished by a foreign tribe; it must have had a deeper source—to be sought for in their Circumstances, their ideas of kinship, their tribal arrangements.

The fact that among savage tribes— Whose normal relations with each other are those of war—a man could get a woman of a foreign tribe for his wife only by Carrying her off, cannot, by itself, €x- Plain a symbolism which is so well estab- lished, so invariable, where it occurs at

40 THE ORIGIN OF

all. Where savages had women of their own whom they might marry, captive women would naturally become slaves or concubines rather than wives; the men would find their wives, or their chief wives, within the tribe; and the capture of women could never become so impor-

tant in connection with marriage as to furnish a symbolism for all marriages to a later time. It may be doubted whether,

in the circumstances supposed, the form of capture would, in a great number of cases, be bequeathed to more peaceful and friendly generations, even in the case of intertribal marriages—in which only the form could be expected to appear; and at any rate these, when first made subjects of friendly compact, would be too infre- quent for their ceremonies to override. those which were indigenous, and to be transferred into the general marriage law.

THE FORM OF CAPTURE. 47

Much more likely is it that indigenous Marriage forms should be employed in the celebration of intertribal marriages When they occurred. It is a fortiori, that in the circumstances which we have been Considering—those of tribes among which aS among civilized peoples, the law of Marriage is matrimonium hberum—no ‘ystem of capturing women for wives Could have arisen.

What circumstances then, what social idea, existing among rude tribes, could Produce a system of capturing the women of foreign tribes for wives? It will be convenient, that before we make the answer we have to offer to this question, We should consider the condition, in re- Spect of Marriage, of a class of tribes with

Which we believe this system did xof Tiginate. :

It is clear, that if members of a family

48 Jie ORLON IOI

or tribe ave forbidden to intermarry with members of other families or tribes, and free to marry among themselves, there is not room for fraud or force in the consti- tution of marriage. The bridegroom and

bride will live together in amity among

their common relatives. With the con- sent of her relations, a woman will be- come the wife of a suitor peaceably. If a suitor forces her, or carries her off against her will or that of her friends, he must separate from these to escape their vengeance. It follows that, among tribes of this class, which we shall call endogamous tribes,* betrothal followed by

* As the words endogamy and exogamy are new, an apology must be made for employing them. In- stead of endogamy we might, after some explanations, have used the word caste. But caste connotes several ideas besides that on which we desire to fix attention. On the other hand, the rule which declares the union of persons of the same blood to be incest has been

THE FORM OF CAPTURE. 49

Cohabitation at first, and, at a more ad- vanced stage, betrothal and a religious or Other formal ceremony of appropriation Of the spouses to one another, are the Natural modes of marriage. To the prac- tice of such tribes are to be referred the two modes of constituting marriage of which the Roman usus and confarreatio May be taken as the types. These are at any rate the forms appropriate to mar- Mages between members of the same family-group or tribe; and, so far as aPpears at present, they could only have Originated among endogamous tribes, or— in the case of marriage within the tribe—

hitherto unnamed, and it was convenient to give it a name. The words endogamy and exogamy (for Which botanical science affords parallels) appear to be well suited to express the ideas which stood in need of names, and so we have ventured to use them,

taking care in the text to make their meanings dis- tinct,

50 THE ORIGIN OF

among tribes which allowed their mem- bers to marry among themselves or into other groups indifferently.

The form of marriage by gift, or that by sale and purchase, could never have origi- nated with purely endogamous tribes. A tribe, in a primitive age, is just a group of kindred—more or less numerous, with common interests and possessions, where

they have any other property besides their

women; living together as an ungo- verned fraternity, or under the headship of a pater-familias. Obviously within such a group there can be neither barter nor sale—neither the selling nor the buy- ing of wives. On a marriage between two of its members, there is no foreign interest to be consulted or satisfied.

It is different if we conceive a number of such tribes aggregated in a political union to which the caste principle of its

ties eee a merman a

LHE FORM OF CAPTURE. 51

Parts is extended: so that, while formerly the members of each could only marry among themselves, the members of all have acquired the right of intermarrying With one another. In forming this con- ception, we pass from Marriages within | the tribe to inter-tribal marriages. In an Inter-tribal marriage one tribe loses a Woman, the other acquires one; or, as Sometimes happens, one loses a man, the Other acquires one. In either case, there

'S room and a necessity for compensa- tion. Such a marriage must be a subject

of bargain, a matter of sale and purchase. And we may now perceive that the mar- tages of which coemptio may be taken “S the civilised type, have their origin in intermarriages between distinct family Stoups or tribes.

But it is not in a primitive age, not “ntil after a very considerable advance

52 THE ORIGIN OF

has been made in civility, that tribes are ever found joined in a political union. Such union indicates a state of friendli- ness between the tribes, brought about by common action for common objects. And should inter-tribal marriages come to be permitted among endogamous tribes, they could from the first be carried through by

friendly negotiation. On the other hand,

the degree of political union presupposed to explain the intermarriages must be such as to exclude the idea of the members of any tribe resorting to violence to obtain wives from any other. We conclude that, among this class of tribes, marriage by capture could have had no place. Still more certain is it that they could never come to form such an association between marriage and the act of rapine as would lead them to adopt the symbol of capture in marriage ceremonies ; on the contrary,

LHE FORM OF CAPTURE. 53 ites ANRE

we should expect to find that they would, Sut of respect to immemorial usage in the case of marriages within the tribe, Celebrate even their intertribal mar- tages — though really brought about by Sale and purchase—by such cere-

Monies as had been customary among them in marriages between members of the tribe. And if the symbol of capture be ever found in the marriage ceremonies of an endogamous tribe, we may be sure that it is a relic of an early time at which the tribe was organised on another prin- ciple than that of endogamy.

- And now let us postulate the exist- “nce of tribes, organised on what we shall Call, for the want of a better name, the Principle of exogamy—that is, which ro- hibited marriage within the tribe—and Whose tribesmen were thus dependent on

Other tribes for their wives. It is obvious E

ka > THE ORIGIN OF

that inter-tribal marriages could only be peaceably arranged between tribes whose

relations were friendly. But peace and

friendship were unknown between sepa-

rate groups or tribes in early times, ex- cept when they were forced to unite

against common enemies. The sections

of the same family—when it fell into sec-

tions—became enemies by the mere fact of separation. And while this state of

enmity lasted, exogamous tribes never could get wives except by theft or force.

If it can be shown, firstly, that exoga- mous tribes exist, or have existed; and secondly, that in rude times the relations of separate tribes are uniformly, or almost uniformly, hostile, we have found a set of | circumstances in which men could get

wives only by capturing them—a social condition in which capture would be the necessary preliminary to marriage. And

` pe en ee Sanne

THE FORM OF CAPTURE. 55 ee.

if it be shown in a reasonable number of well-authenticated cases that these con- ditions — exogamy as tribal law, and hostility as the prevailing relation of Separate tribes towards each other—exist Or have existed, accompanied, as might have been expected, by a system of cap- turing wives, we shall be justified in con- cluding— failing the appearance of any Phenomena inconsistent with such an ex- Planation—that the same conditions have existed in every case where the system of capture prevailed, or where the form of “apture has been observed as a ceremony Of marriage. N othing more than this is Necessary to satisfy the conditions of a Sound hypothesis.

We are in a position to do this and Nore. We shall be able to point to many

tribes which habitually capture or cap-

lured their wives from foreign tribes ; to

56 THE ORIGIN OF

show that exogamy is or was the law of these tribes; also, that there are cases of exogamous tribes whose tribesmen, marry- ing women by compact, always go through the form of capturing such women ; that in all the modern instances where the

symbol of capture is best marked, mar-

riage within the tribe is prohibited as in- cestuous. We shall also find various cir- cumstances common to exogamous tribes, and traceable in their case to the prin- ciple of exogamy, appearing more or less marked in the case of historical tribes which have used the form of capture, sup- porting the conclusion that such tribes had once been exogamous. |

It may easily be conceived how, among exogamous tribes, out of respect to immemorial usage, when friendly rela- tions came to be established between tribes and families, and their members

THE FORM OF CAPTURE. ae

intermarried by purchase instead of cap- ture, the form of invasion and capture Should become an essential ceremony at Weddings. It was unheard of from the | remotest times that a woman became a Man’s wife except through being made his captive, forced or stolen away from her _ friends by him or for him. Surely some- l thing shall bé wanting if there is not at | least the appearance of a capture! So the Roman youths rush in with drawn Swords, and feign to enact a tragedy; so the Kalmuck girl rides, as if for life, from her lord and master by pre-arrange- Ment |

We now proceed to treat of the mat- ter, in order, under the three following heads Firstly, The prevalence of çap- turing wives de facto ; secondly, Whether, Where that practice prevails, marriage be- tween members of the same family-group,

58 LAE FORM OF CAPTURE.

clan, or tribe, is forbidden, and the pre-

valence of that limitation of the right of marriage; and, thirdly, How far the state of war prevails among primitive groups ?

PRACTICE OF CAPTURING WIVES. 59

——

ere:

CHAPTER TV

ON THE PREVALENCE OF THE PRACTICE OF CAPTURING WIVES, DE FACTO.

THE tribes amongst which prevails or has prevailed, the practice of getting wives by theft or force, are both numerous and

Widely distributed. We shall find them in America, in Australia, in New Zealand, in many of the islands of the Pacific, and in various parts of Asia and Europe.

It is among the tribes of American Indians that the practice is to be found in the greatest perfection. In particular, we find it fully displayed on the Ori- noco, on the Amazons, everywhere in fact, from the Caribbean Seach: ape Horn. The abject Fuegians, as we have

60 Ate of ed tae OF

seen,” have the practice in a modified or symbolised form in the marriages of men and women belonging to groups at peace with one another. But they have the reality as well as the fiction. Between many of their tribes there is a chronic state of war. “Strangers,” reported

Jemmy Button to Captain Fitzroy on one occasion,t “had been there, with whom he and his people had ‘ very much jaw; they fought, threw ‘great many stone, and stole two women (in exchange for whom Jemmy’s party stole one), but were obliged to retreat.” The Horse In- dians of Patagonia also, tribe against

tribe, are commonly at war with one another, or with the Canoe Indians, the

issues of victory in every case, being the

m See Wie, Te Ae. + “Voyages of Adventure and Beagle,” uz supra, VOL MM, B.. 224.

CAPTURING WIVES. 6I

capture of women and the slaughter of men. But the Oens or Coin-men would appear to be the most systematic of these Savage marauders, for every year at the time of ‘red leaf’ they are said to make excursions from the mountains in the north to plunder the Fuegians of their women, dogs, and arms.* Farther north still than the Oens men, we come successively on the tribes of the Amazons and of the Orinoco, all of which, excepting those re- duced into missions, are continually at feud with one another, and in turns rich

iN women or impoverished ; feelings of Mutual hate and the desire for means of Subsistence being concurring causes of War. Of the tribes on the Amazons the

accounts are not very distinct; but the habits of the Manaos in the Rio Negro

eer ase

* Idem, p. 205.

THE PRACTICE OF

district—which, as reported by Mr Bates,” are similar to those of the Coin-men— may be assumed not to be exceptional. There is no doubt, however, that the pri- mitive habits of most of the Indian tribes have been much changed by the slave- hunting expeditions, at one time fostered by the Dutch and Portuguese. On slave- hunting being introduced in America, as in Africa, a market was found for captives of both sexes, and men as well as women became spoils of victory. No argument is needed to show that when women are systematically captured as in the above cited cases, they are captured with a view to the raising of children—in fact, with a view to their performing the part of wives. The fulness of the idea of a

wife, according to our conceptions, is not,

st.

“ «The Naturalist on the Amazons.” Second Edition, 1864, p. 199.

LL eee Ser ee ES = ; h s n= A Po -a

CAPTURING WIVES. 63

SS r

—

SET

we need scarcely say, to be looked for amongst such savages. That idea can nowhere þe fully realised till the circum- Stances of a people enable men and women to enjoy, or at least to look forward with confidence, to a permanent consortship. Of the tribes of the great Caribbean nation we have happily'a pretty full ac- count from the pen of Alexander Von Humboldt.* The Caribbees fall into Small tribes or family groups, often not

S Eme merene oema mmea SS

———

ee eae ENESSSEESaaepaseaeneoee

SS

Numbering more than from 4o to 50 per- Sons; Humboldt, indeed, takes frequent Occasion to say that an Indian tribe is no Nore than a family. Where groups break Up into sections, as they tend to do, and

* “Personal Narrative of T ravels, etc.” (1826). The Passages bearing on the capturing of women among the tribes of the Orinoco, from which our account is taken, will be found at vol. v., pp. 210, 293, 422, A256, 348, 565; vol. vi, pp. 20, 21, 26: vol, vii, p. 449.

64 re PRADO OF

live apart from one another, the sections are found, though of one blood, and ori- ginally of one language, soon to speak dialects so different that they cannot un- derstand one another. Become strangers, they are enemies except when forced to unite to make common cause against some powerful tribe which has proved a scourge to them all; enemies, and being at least at the time when Humboldt wrote, can- nibals, not only disposed to slay but to eat one another. In their wars, we may imagine, that while their male captives furnished means of subsistence, the women were preserved to be wives and luxuries.* To such an extent, indeed, did all the tribes of the Caribbean nation practise

the capture of women—depend on aggres-

sion for their wives—that the women of any tribe were found to belong to different

* Compare Erskine’s “Pacific,” p. 425 (1863).

CAPTURING WIVES. 65

tribes, and to tribes of other nations, and that to such an extent, that nowhere were the men and. women of the Caribbean Tace found to speak in one tongue.

Going northwards—to the wild In- dians everywhere, as far as we follow them, the same account is applicable in varying degrees. It would indeed be misleading to omit to notice that in both North and South America tribes are to be found Occupying much more elevated platforms Of civility than those to which, for obvious reasons, we have given our attention. As among friendly groups of the Fuegians

we find marriages of consent and of pur-

chase (by labour commonly),* so also Among friendly Patagonians ; so also with the nations of the Huron tongue and the Attakapas, among whom the position of

litte

* See ante, p. 40.

66 fate 2RACIICE OF

the women is exceedingly good. Indeed, all the processes have been going on through which every species of marriage would in time be developed. Even the red men of America are far from being primitive. A really primitive people in fact exists nowhere. For many thou- sands of years now, the various races of men have been in the school of ex- perience, all making progress therein, though under different masters and in different forms. Hereafter we shall see how the old law of the red men, and of the natives of Australia, which counts blood relationship through females only, operates as an agent of civilization, and tends to supersede the barbarous practices of early savagery, and especially to obviate the necessity of capturing wives.

The capture of women for wives is found to prevail among the aborigines

fear” Ree as once St es Ay eee gave

+

CAPTURING WIVES. 67

Of the Deccan,* and in Affghanistan.t It prevailed, according to Olaus Mag- hus, in Muscovy, Lithuania, and Livo- nia} The form which it assumed among

the peoples last named, so closely re- sembled what Kames describes as the Custom among the Welsh, that we must quote the Archbishop’s account of it :— “ Quicunque enim paganorum, sive rus- ticorum, filius suus uxorem ut ducat in animo habet, agnatos, cognatos, Céterosque vicinos in unum convocat, illisque talem isto in pago puellam nubi-

lem versari, quam rapi, et suo filio in

conjugem adduci proponit: hi commo- dum ad hoc tempus expectantes, ac tunc

* Colonel Walter Campbell’s “Indian Journal,” ok P. 400.

“Latham’s Descriptive Bibiaiaen? Vol. ii, P. sis

“ Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus.” “Book xiv, » Cap. ix., p. 481. Rome, 1555.

68 Tite PRACT oe

armati, equites suo more unius ad ædes conveniunt, posteaque ad eam rapiendam profisciscuntur. Puella autem quoad matrimonii contradictionem libera, ex in- sidiis opera exploratorum ubi moretur per eos direpta, plurimum eiulando opem consanguineorum amicorumque ad se libe- randam implorat: quod si consanguinei vicinique clamorem istum exaudierunt, ipso momento armati adcurrunt, atque pro ea liberanda proelium committunt ut qui victores ista in pugna extiterunt his puella cedat.” The difference between the Welsh and the Muscovite practice lay in this, that in Wales, in the celebra- tion of the marriage, betrothal came first, and the (sham) fight afterwards; while among the Muscovites an actual invasion came first, and if the bridegroom’s party succeeded in carrying off the lady, there followed the consent of parents and the

CAPTURING WIVES. 69

sponsalia :—‘‘ Nec ante completam hanc celebritatem mutua carnali copula, pacto parentum interveniente, se commiscere Solent conjungendi ; quia immane cunctis gentibus crimen apparere dignoscitur si ante sponsalia sacra stupri illecebris virgo temeratur ; immo summoperé cavent _ Puellæ ne copulam anticepent quia per- petuam cum prole sic suscepta infamiam luent.”* The intervention of the spon- Salia and consent of parents before the consummation of the marriage, marks this aS a transitional form of the practice. But it is none the less a case of actual capture. Another advance and the spon- Salia will precede the capture, and the fight be a farce.

According to Seignior Gaya,t this transitional form of the practice prevailed

—

* « Olaus Magnus,” ut supra, p. 482. = Marriage Ceremonies,” etc., ut supra, p. 35. F

70 LE PRACLIGE OF

in his time in Poland, parts of Prussia, Samogithia and Lithuania. A lad’s father having found where a girl lived, who would make a suitable wife for his son, he assembled his kindred and carried the lady off, after which application was made to her father for consent to complete the marriage.

There is ample reason to believe that the practice was general among the nations in the north of Europe and Asia. Olaus Magnus,* indeed, represents the tribes of the north as having been continually at war with one another either on account of stolen women, or with the object of stealing women, “ propter raptas virgines aut arripiendas.” His brother Johannest dilates on the same topic, and mentions

* Uf supra, p. 328. | t History of the Goths, Book xviii.; and see “Kames,” ut supra, vol. i., p. 393.

Sees Sor Rees ee aa ee

CAPTURING WIVES. 71

humerous cases in which the plunderers were of the royal houses of Denmark or Sweden. As did the kings, so did their Subjects. Among the Scandinavians, be- fore they became Christians, wives were almost invariably fought for and wedded

at the sword-point. In Sweden, even long after the introduction of Chris- tianity, women were often carried off When on the way to the church to be married. A wedding cortege was a party of armed men, and for greater security,

Marriages were generally celebrated at night. -A pile of lances is said to be still Preserved in the ancient church of Husaby in Gothland, into which were fitted torches;

these weapons were borne by the grooms- men, and served the double purpose of Siving light and protection.* Such a

* “ Book of Days,” vol. i, p. 720. The grooms- Men are said to have been called “best men” in the

72 THE PRACTICE OF

prevalence of lawlessness existing after the introduction of Christianity and com- parative civilization, helps us to conceive what the habits of these people were in a more primitive age.

We find capture de facto coexistent with capture as a form, and not unfre- quent, among most of the rude tribes observing the form ; its frequency depend- ing partly on the degree of friendliness

established between the tribes, and partly

on the degree of fixity given by usage to the price to be paid for a bride. Where the parties cannot agree about the price, nothing is more common among the Kal- mucks, Kirghiz, Nogais, and Circassians, than to carry the lady off by actual force of arms. The wooer having once got the lady into his yurt, she is his wife by the

north from the strongest and stoutest of the bride- groom’s friends being chosen for this duty.

CAPTURING WIVES. 73

law, and peace is established by her rela- tions coming to terms as to the price, after the thing has gone so far that they cannot help themselves. It is important to ob- Serve, that among these races the capture,

though an irfegular proceeding, makes

Marriage, even previous to terms being Made between the capturer and the friends of the lady, and whether they are made Or not. ;

That the practice of getting wives by capture de facto, prevails among the Natives of Australia, is a fact familiar to Most readers. It is not, however, uow the sole or regular mode of getting a wife among the Australian tribes ; and we do not claim to do more than show that there at present exists among them a practice of capturing wives so common as almost to bea system. And as we shall hereafter Show that they are exogamous, and also

i. THE PRACTICE OF

that exogamous tribes which begin with a system of capturing wives, may pro- gress—consistently with exogamy—to a system of betrothals, we shall ask the reader, conceding to us for the present that we shall be able to do SO, to agree with us that so general a practice of cap- ture, subsisting as it does among the Australians alongside of a system of | betrothals, points unmistakeably to a previous stage when wives were usually captured.

Among the Australasians, according to one account,* when a man sees a woman whom he likes, he tells her to follow him, and when she refuses, he forces her to accompany him by blows, ending by knocking her down and carrying her

* See Appendix B, for an account of the practice ` among the Australian Blacks, which has appeared as this work was going through the press, °

Saha far Sains. mei Se ee apg

CAPTURING WIVES. 75

off." The same account (somewhat suspi- Clously) bears that this mode of courtship is rather relished by the ladies as a Species of rough gallantry. The cases Must indeed be rare in which a man finds a woman detached from her lord and protector, or the other members of

her family; nor is it in human flesh and blood to take kicks and cuffs as compli- Ments, in whatever spirit they may be administered. The following is the ac- Count given by Sir George Grey—a good authority :—‘ Even supposing a woman to give no encouragement to her admirers,”

he says,t “ many plots are always laid to Carry her off, and in the encounters which

result from these, she is almost certain to

* Turnbull, “Voyage Round the World,” 1805. Vol. i, » pp. 81, 82.

t “Travels in North- Western Australia,” 1841. Vol. ii, p. 249.

76 THE PRACTICE OF

receive some violent injury, for each of the combatants orders her to follow him, and in the event of her refusing, throws a spear at her. The early life of a young

woman at all celebrated for beauty 1S

generally one continued series of cap- tivity to different masters, of ghastly wounds, of wanderings in strange fami- lies, of rapid flights, of bad treatment from other females, amongst whom she is brought a stranger by her captor ; and rarely do you see a form of unusual grace and elegance, but it is marked and scarred by the furrows of old wounds ; and many a female thus wanders aa hundred miles from the home of her infancy, be- ing carried off successively to ‘distant and more distant points.” As an Aus- tralian woman is always a wife, being. betrothed after birth to some man of a different tribe or family-stock from her

n — SI in a a nen HD Se e wr T Rape Or a = Xa ve _ Sa - s v-ati - te

CAPTURING WIVES.

Own, a stolen or captured wife is always Stolen or taken from a prior husband. And as men do not readily part with their Wives, and their tribesmen are bound to make common cause with them for the re- Paration of injuries, the capture of wives is a signal for war; and: as. the tribes have little property, except their weapons and their women, the women are at once the cause of war, and the spoils of victory.*

The tribes, as might be expected, are

exceedingly numerous, and exceedingly small,t being a species of family groups, and, chiefly from the causes specified, they are continually at. war with one another: The reader. may imagine the

* “Turnbull,” uż supra, 22, :

+ Sir George Grey says that the largest number Of natives his party ever saw together, “numbered Nearly two hundred, women and children included,” “ supra. Vol, hy He Ah.

t Grey's “ Travels,” wt supra. Vol. 1., p. 256.

78 LLLE RAL AGE OL

extent to which, among these myriad hordes of savages, the women are being knocked about, and the men accustomed to associate the acquisition of a wife with acts of violence and rapine.*

The native songs make frequent allu- sion to the practice of capturing wives. Here is the burden of one, sung by a heavy-hearted woman, upbraiding her lord, whose affections some recently ac- quired captive has drawn away from her,—

Wherefore came you, Weerang, In my beauty’s pride,

Stealing cautiously,

Like the tawny boreang,

On an unwilling bride,

’Twas thus you stole me

From one who loved me tenderly. A better man he was than thee,

* The reader will find, p. 318, vol. ii. of “ Grey’s Travels,” a curious illustrative instance of the Way in which a war about women may arise. -

CAPTURING WIVES.

Who having forced me thus to wed, Now so oft deserts my bed.

Yang, yang, yang, yoh.

Oh, where is he who won

My youthful heart ;

Who oft used to bless

And call me loved one:

You, Weerang, tore apart

From his fond caress _

Her whom you desert and shun ;

Out upon the faithless one!

Oh, may the Boyl-yas bite and tear

Her, whom you take your bed to share. Yang, yang, yang, yoh.*

Concerning the New Zealanders, it Must suffice to say that the theft or Cap- ture of women plays a leading part in their popular legends, testifying to the Prevalence of the practice, at least in their Carly history.t In New Zealand, and 'n the Feejee and other islands of the

* Grey’s “Travels,” vol. dij PE 98s. T “Polynesian Mythology, etc.” Sir George Grey, 1855, pp. 138, 147, 207, 235, 301.

80 TILI RAE PL OOF

Pacific, the capture of wives appears to have been conjoined with cannibalism— the object of inter-tribal war being at once to procure women for wives and men for food, except in some districts where there

was a special relish for the flesh of

females.*

In the Institutes of Menu we have marriage by capture enumerated among “the eight forms of the nuptial ceremony used by the four classes.” +t It is the marriage called Racshasa, and is thus defined mo ihe seizure of a maiden by force from.her house while she weeps and calls for assistance, after her kins- men and friends have been slain in battle or wounded, and their houses broken open, is the marriage called Racshasa.”

* Erskine’s “Islands of the Western Pacific,” and Jackson’s “ Narrative.” + Chap. iii. 33 (Jones and Houghton),

CAPTURING WIVES. SI

Elsewhere* in the code it is mentioned aS appropriated to the military class. “For a military man the before-men- tioned marriages of Gandharvas and

Racshases—whether Separate or mixed,

as when a girl is made captive by her lover, after a victory over her kinsmen— are permitted by law.” The full scope and effect of this provision we shall have to consider hereafter. Meanwhile we Notice that we have here the exact pro- totype of the Roman and Spartan forms, embalmed in a code of laws a thousand years before the commencement of our ‘Ta; not as a form, but as living sub- Stance. This we hold to exclude any hypothesis except that which we are Maintaining.+

* Chap, iii, 26 (Jones and Houghton), ) Tt For the probable origin of the name Racshases, See Appendix B.

ne

= = rea = = ee

PE PP RACIIOL OF

We may notice, as further illustrating the subject, and as being in itself curi- ous, that by the Mosaic Code the mili- tary class were, in defiance of the gene- ral law which declared that there was no connubium between Jews and Gentiles, allowed to take to wife women whom they captured in war, to whatever races they belonged. In Deut. xx. 10-14, the reader will find forms and regulations provided

for the constitution of this species of mar-

riage, and if interested to know the mean- ing of the rules, he will find a copious and learned discussion of them in the works of Selden. *

Thus far we have been dealing with facts. If we are right in our theory of the symbol of capture, it must be held that the Dorians, or at least some of the tribes

* «De Jure Naturali et Gentium Juxta Disciplinam Ebreorum.” Lib. v., cap. xiii., fol. 617,

CAPTURING WIVES. 83

TS Sie SR

Composing the Spartan nation, and the Latins, or at least some of the tribes form- ing the commonalty of Rome, long had experience in the capturing of wives by force or stratagem. We leave to our Hellenists to consider how far the Doric legends may have new light thrown upon them by our view of the Spartan custom. How far, for instance, may the slaughter by Hercules of Eurylus and his sons, and the Carrying away of Iole to be the wife of Hyllus—of Hyllus, who never occurs in mythology except in connection with the Dorians—be a mythical tradition of a tape of women from another tribe? How far may the genealogies of Doric heroes Connected with the taking of Ephyra,— the Capture of Astyocheia,—the feat of Hercules at Thespize—the stories of Pluto and Proserpine, and of Boreas and Orithya be but traditions of a quasi Caribbean

a LIM PRACLIL LE. Ge,

prowess? It must be kept in mind, too, that the case cited from Herodotus in proof of the custom at Sparta is one of actual violence. At least, the lady was not carried off in terms of arrangement. Farther, to judge by what is reported of Theseus—even accepting the tradition as fabulous—we may conclude that the an- cient Greeks generally were very lawless in this matter. To that hero’s charge are laid numerous rapes of women whom he carried off to be his wives—his crimes of this description culminating in the seizure of Helen. Plutarch, indeed, in describing that affair, mentions a compact as having been entered into between Theseus and his companion in the seizure—Tyndarus —to the effect that he who should gain Helen by lot should have her to wife, but be obliged to assist in procuring a wife for the other; which shows that these

CAPTURING WIVES. 85

Worthies trusted to their prowess to pro- Cure them wives.* As to the Romans— "pon our theory—the story of the rape of the Sabines must be accepted as a mere Mythical tradition of the ancient me- thod of getting wives. The story, as might be expected, is reproduced in the

traditions of many tribes, in many places, baad in many forms. For instance, in

the Irish Nennius+ there is a tradition

* There is no evidence that the Doric hordes who °Verran and established themselves in the Peloponnesus, Were accompanied by their wives or children. It is Most unlikely that they were so attended; and, except à surmise founded on the degree of influence en- JOyed at a subsequent period by the women of Sparta, there is nothing in favour of the supposition, But that Surmise proceeds on the ground that wives of a tace alien to that of their husbands are not so likely to be well treated as they would be if they were of the same blood. Against this we must simply pro- Ounce as being contrary to evidence.

T Pp, 245-2651,

G

86 iE PRACTICE OF

of such a rape of wives by the Picts from the Gael. In the very old poem, “The Cruithnians who propagated in the land of noble Alba,”* the Irish are represented as giving three hundred wives to the Picts, on the condition that the succession to the crown among the Picts should always be through their females :—

“There were oaths imposed on them, By the stars, by the earth, That from the nobility of the mother Should always be the right to the sovereignty.”

The story of the oaths is no doubt a fable

to explain the descensus per umbilicum pi tke FPrS: pit ii ap Gircan- ash,” t a poem on the origin of the Goed- hel, reciting the same event, the Picts are represented as Stealing the three hundred Wives :—

* Vv, 115-120. The Irish version of Nennius,

1848, p. 141. T Vv. 178-180, ut supra, p. 245.

i

CAPTURING WIVES. 87

“Cruithne, son of Cuig, took their women from them— It is directly stated— Except Tea, wife of Hermion, Son of Miledh.”

And in consequence of the capture, the Gael, being left wifeless, had to form alliances with the aboriginal tribes of Ireland.

“ There were no charming noble wives

For their young men,

Their women having been stolen, they made alliance

With the Tuatha Dea.”

We have the same story in the history of the Jews. Chapters xx. and xxi. of the Book of Judges contain highly instructive Matter on this point, in a Story, which, though laid in the time of the Judges, we Must hold to be of very old date—a Jewish tradition belonging to the earliest history Of Israel. The women of the tribe of Benjamin had been destroyed, and certain Of the tribes of Israel had sworn not to

ae Ie Yaaro. OF

give their daughters as wives to the men of Benjamin, who again could not take wives to themselves from the Gentiles, as

by law they could marry only into one or other of the tribes of Israel. The difficulty | of procuring wives for Benjamin—which Israel made its own difficulty—was solved by the wholesale slaughter of the inhabi- tants of Jabez-Gilead, whose population yielded 400 virgins: and next by the men of Benjamin enacting a rape of the Sabines for themselves, each man seizing and carrying off one of the daughters of Shiloh to be his wife, on an occasion when the women met for a festival in certain vine- yards near Bethel.*

* See Smiths Bible Dictionary—Art. MARRIAGE— where it is remarked, that the phrase in the Old Testament (eg, Num. xii. 1 ; 1 Chron. ii. 21), “taking a wife,” would seem to require to be taken in its literal meaning in the run of cases ; “the taking” being the

CAPTURING WIVES. 89

We can now say we have found the capture of women very extensively prac- tised ; and there can be no doubt that in Most of the cases cited, the women cap- tured were kept to be used as wives. In a number of well-marked cases we have found a system of capture—in the case Of the Caribbean tribes of America, a System so general, that the women of a tribe were commonly not only not of the Same tribe with the men, but did not “ven speak the same language. We have Seen among tribes in a transition state,

some cases, capture almost systemati- cally practised, alongside of more civi-

lized institutions ; and in other cases, the

chief ceremony in the constitution of marriage. If the Writer of that article is correct, we must believe that the Jews observed the form of capture, for in many cases where the phrase occurs we know the marriages Were preceded by contracts.

rere) He PRAGTIC£ OF

practice of capture in various stages of progress towards a symbolism. We have seen the marriage by capture embodied in the code of India as an institution in favour of the only class which could be benefited by it—the warrior class; and no argument is needed to show that such a rule must have been a generalisation founded upon practice. A similar rule subsisted in favour of warriors among the Israelites. The former of these cases is, perhaps, chiefly valuable as presenting in a distinct shape the ante-type of the form of capture—a description of marriage by an actual capture so vividly recalling incidents of fictitious capture, as practised

at Rome and elsewhere, as (in our opinion) to set at rest the question in what way the fiction originated. The latter case shows a provision made for marriage

with foreign women, if captured, among

CAPTURING WIVES. QI

tribes which, in no other case, allowed of Marriage with foreign women ; a provi- sion indicating a very remarkable asso- ciation between capture and marriage.

It is not easy to believe that such a regu-

lation, existing among endogamous tribes, is referable to the feeling that a victorious warrior should -have the full disposal of Spoils of war ; it is much more likely that it was a relic of a time when the tribes— Or rather the race from which they sprung were not endogamous; and, if so, it Carries us back to a remote antiquity When marriage and prowess in war were Closely associated. We have seen that the mythic legends of various races, of which hitherto no rational explanation has been Siven, can, with great appearance of pro- bability, be referred to the existence amongst such races in ancient times of a Systematic capture of wives. |

92: PRACTICE OF CAPTURING WIVES.

Farther research, and the observation of tribes hitherto unreported upon—at present we have not been able to say any- thing that would be satisfactory of the races of the continent of Africa*—vwill, we confidently expect, afford much addi- tional evidence of the prevalence of this practice. But we have done enough to entitle us to affirm that there has existed amongst various races of mankind a system of capturing women for wives. |

* See Appendix B.

EXOGAMY.

CHAPTER V

OF THE RULE AGAINST MARRIAGE BETWEEN MEMBERS OF THE SAME TRIBE—OF THE COINCIDENCE OF THIS RULE WITH THE PRACTICE OF CAPTURING WIVES DE FACTO, AND WITH THE FORM OF CAPTURE IN MARRIAGE CEREMONIES.

WE proceed to show the prevalence of the rule forbidding marriage within the tribe or group of kindred, and the con- Currence of this ban with the fact or Pretence of capturing wives.

Here, still more than in our former investigation, we are made to feel how imperfect and unconnected is the record from which our facts have to be drawn; and farther, how difficult it is to brinig together such facts as have been observed,

94 EXOGAMY AND THE

owing to the wide field over which they lie sparsely scattered. In many cases, the authorities are silent just on the points on which we are most eager for informa- tion ; while on matters of no moment they | enlarge ad nauseam. But, too often, they have nothing to tell. Skirting a coast- line the traveller sees natives at points here and there, and can describe their dress and personal appearance; of their habits he is as ignorant as a child of the free life of the beasts he sees in a caravan. Where the opportunities of observation are better, the observer often does not know what to look for. Of the jus connubit among the Kalmucks not one word is said by Clarke or Pallas or Strahlenberg ! and but for some remarks of Bergman’s we should be entirely in the dark on the subject. 3 | E We begin with the Khonds. This

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 95

People presents us with capture as a Jorm. Major-General Campbell says that the Khonds marry women from remote places, the reason of which he takes to be, that they have to buy their wives, and can Set them at lower prices at a distance. ‘They pretend, moreover,” he adds “to regard it as degrading to bestow their daughters in marriage on men of

their own tribe; and consider it more

Manly to seek their wives in a distant “ountry.” Major M‘Pherson—a more in- telligent witness—gives us the distinct Statement, that among the Khonds inter- Marriage between persons of the same tribe, however large or scattered, is con- Sidered incestuous, and punishable by death ;} a view more consistent with other |

* Ut supra, p. 141. ee T “An Account of the Religion of the Khonds in

aa SS lS PR me a

96 EXOGAMY AND THE

known facts than that of General Camp- bell. ‘‘ Marriage,” Major M‘Pherson tells us, “can take place only betwixt members of different tribes, and not even with strangers who have been long adopted into or domesticated with a tribe, and a state of war or peace appears to make little difference as to the practice of inter- marriage between tribes. The people of Bara Mootah and of Burra Des, in Goomsur, have been at war time out of

mind, and annually engage in fierce con- flicts, but they intermarry every day. The women of each tribe, after a fight, visit each other to condole on the loss of their nearest common relations.” No doubt these friendly intermarriages must in time alter the relations of the tribes to one another; no doubt also the time

Orissa” p. 57; and see M‘Pherson’s Report on the Khonds, already referred to.

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 97

was when the marriages were of effected in friendly fashion. | Let us now examine the cases of the Kalmucks and Circassians. To under- Stand that of the former, we must attend a little to their political system. The Kalmucks are divided into four great Nations or tribes under hereditary chiefs or khans;—the Khoskots, the Dzun- Sars, the Derbets, and the Torgots. Each Of these, according to Pallas,* is under the command of many little and nearly independent princes, called Noions. The horde commanded by a Noion is called an Oulouss, and is subdivided into Several Aimaks, each of which again is commanded by a noble called Sais- Sang. The Aimaks again are sub-

* “Voyages dans Plusieurs Provinces de l'Empire de Russie, etc.,” Paris (no date), vol. ii., p. 191. Nou- velle Edition,

98 EXOGAMY AND THE

divided into many companies or khatoun, consisting of from ten to twelve tents, for convenience in pasturing; and each kha- toun has its chief, but whether of the noble class we are not informed. It will thus be seen that there is among the Kalmucks a very large governing of princely class. Now, it appears that they have two systems of marriage law; one for the common people, and one for the nobles, or princely class. The common people, we are told by Bergman,* enter into no unions in which the parties are not dis- tant from one another by three or four degrees ; but how the degrees are counted we are not informed. We are told that they have great abhorrence for the mar- riages of near relatives, and have a pro- verb—‘‘ The great folk and dogs know

* Bergman's “Streiferein.” Riga, 1804, vol. iii, Pp. 145, er seq.

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 99

no relationship”—which Bergman says is due to members of the princely class some- times Marrying sisters-in-law. We find, however, that these sisters-in-law are uniformly women of an entirely different Stock from their husbands — different, Or what is taken for different. For no

Man of the princely class (and it is in the marriages of the Kalmucks of this class, according to De Hell, that the form of capture is chiefly observed*), in any of | the tribes, can marry a woman of his own | tribe or nation. Not only must his wife bea noble, but she must be a noble of a different stock. For princely marriages, Says Bergman, “the bride is chosen from another people’s stock—among the Der- bets from the Torgot stock; and among the Torgots from the Derbet stock ; and

5o on.” Here, then, we have the principle Sent e

* See ante, p. 30,

EXOGAMY AND THE

of exogamy in full force in regard to the marriages of the governing classes—a large body in each nation, as we have seen,

and, which is most to our present purpose,

the body in whose marriages the form of capture is said to be observed. Whether or not the commonalty, with whom the nobles have no intermarriage—the people of black birth, as they are called—were originally of an alien, inferior, and con- quered race; and whether or not the go- verning classes were originally independ- ent exogamous tribes, we have the pro- hibition against marriage within the stock here concurrent with the form of capture in the weddings of the nobility. How far the commonalty observe the form we have no information, but it is not un- likely that they mimic, after a fashion, the marriage ceremonies of their superiors. The case of the Circassians is simple,

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. IOI

and quickly told:—“ The Circassian word for their societies or fraternities,” says Bell,* “is ‘tleish,’ which signifies also ‘seeds.’ The tradition with regard to them is, that the members of each all sprang from the same stock or ancestry ; and thus they may be considered as so many septs Or clans, with this peculiarity, that, like seeds, all are considered equal. These Cousins-german, or members of the same fraternity, are not only themselves inter- dicted from intermarrying, but their serfs, too, must wed with the serfs of another fraternity ; and where, as is generally the Case, many fraternities enter into one Seneral bond, this law in regard to mar- riage must be observed by all. The con- fidential dependant, or steward, of our host here is a tokao who fled to his pro-

* James Stanislaus Bell. “Journal of a Residence in Circassia,” 1840, vol. i, p. 347. H

se = I aR AS a ie

102 | EXOGAMY AND THE

tection from Notwhatsh, because, having fallen in love with and married a woman of his own fraternity, he had become liable to punishment for this infraction of Cir- cassian law. Yet his fraternity contained perhaps several thousand members. For- merly, such a marriage was looked upon as incest, and punished by drowning ; now a fine of two hundred oxen, and the resti- tution of the wife to her parents, only are exacted.” Elsewhere,* Bell observes that these fraternities sometimes embrace thou- sands of persons, between whom marriage is by this ancient law totally prohibited. Here, too, ascin Khondistan, and among the Kalmucks, we find the form of capture as well as the principle of exogamy.

Our next case is that of the Yurak Sa- moyeds (Siberia) among whom no man can

a ac a N E

* Ut supra, vol. il., 110.

FACE & FORM OF CAPTURE. 103

take a wife from the tribe to which he be- | longs.* These Samoyeds hold kinsman- | Ship to be coextensive with the tribe. All.

the members of the tribe, however large Or small, consider themselves relations, €ven where the common ancestor is un-

known, and the evidence of consanguinity.

is wholly wanting. They fall into three divisions; the members of any of which May take wives from either of the other two, but not from their own; and as these divisions occupy sites far removed from One another, the Samoyeds have to go Sreat distances for their wives.

We find the same state of things among the Kafirs, the Sodhas of northern India, the Beduanda Kallung (Singapore), and many others, including the Kirghiz and the Nogais.t

* Latham, “Descriptive Ethnology,” vol. ii. p. 455. + It must not be thought that the form of capture

a ramae

—

o raea

—————— a es aN Ter

Se

ee “a> — s e, |

SSS

it i a eT Sal a

LO4 EXOGAMY AND THE

The Warali (India) tribes fall into divi- sions, and no man may marry a woman of his own division; he must go for a wife to one of the others. The Magar tribes fall into thums, all the members of each of which are supposed to be de- scended from a common ancestor: the Magar husband and wife must belong to

_ different thums; within one and the same

thum there is no marriage. Latham, in noticing the Magars, says—‘ This is the first time* I have found occasion to men- tion this practice. It will not be the last ; on the contrary, the principle it suggests is so common as to be almost universal.

occurs wherever exogamy prevails—that exogamy and the practice of capturing wives, which at a certain stage must be the resource of exogamous tribes, will in every case leave the form of capture behind them. We shall see the explanation of this hereafter. We have no information whether or not the Samoyeds ` practise the form of capture. * Vol. i. p. 80, “Descriptive Ethnology.”

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 105

‘We find it in Australia, in North and South America, in Africa, in Europe; we Shall suspect and infer it in many places Where the actual evidence of its existence

is incomplete.” This is a sweeping state-

ment ; but before we conclude we hope to Show that it may fairly be accepted as Correct.

In the institutes of Menu it is laid down that a twice-born man might elect for nuptials “a woman not descended from his paternal or maternal ancestors within the sixth degree, and who is not known dy her family name to be of the same primitive Stock with his father.”* This passage might

* « Institutes of Menu,” cap. iii, sec. 5. The words “or mother” occur in the gloss of Calluca. The rule fixing the stock by the father is, as we hope to show, far from being archaic. The twice-born classes are the sacerdotal, military, and commercial (Menu x. 4). Meaty all the Indian ‘castes aré nok Hivided into Nations that do not intermarry ; the nations into sects,

ERE GR SIPEG wa Sige

106 BA OGAM VY AND THE

be taken as a text for the discussion of the

whole question of prohibited marriages, and we must dwell upon it somewhat, as it has an important bearing on the present investigation. The object of the rule is

to prevent marriages between members of the same primitive stock; and it points out the family name as the test whether persons are of the same stock or not. It

isas if a Fraser might not marry a Fraser, nor a M‘Intosh a M‘Intosh. By compar- ing the former state of the Highlands of Scotland with their present condition, especially with the condition of the town populations, we may clear our ideas regard-

some of which do not intermarry. All the nations are divided into certain families, called gotrams ,; a man cannot marry a woman of his own gotram. Buchanan's “Journey from Madras,” 1807, vol. i. pp- 273, 300, 354, 396, 419, 421, 423; Muir’s “Sanskrit: Texts,” Part II. 1859, pp. 378, 387; “Vivada Chinta- mani,” Calcutta, 1863, Preface, p. 45.

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 107

ing the origin, meaning, and effect of this institution. Of old each clan inhabited its particular strath or glen, and had its Own well-defined hill ranges. In the Aird district there were none but Frasers; about Moy were none but M‘Intoshes. The mem- bers of the clans are now interfused even in the country districts, and in towns like Inverness or Dingwall may be found mem- bers of all the clans. Now, suppose that Originally a man was not allowed to marry a woman of his own clan, and that, sub- Sequent to the interfusion of the clans, that ancient prejudice remained; the rule for enforcing it—the question of degrees of affinity apart—would just be the rule of Menu. So, in considering the origin of that rule, are we not remanded from the Social state in which it was fixed in a code, to an earlier state, in which the population consisted of distinct clans or tribes organ-

108 EXOGAMY AND THE

ised on the principle of exogamy, and liv- ing apart from one another, as all tribes do in early times, until they are brought, by conquest or.otherwise, under a com-

mon government? We have already had examples of tribes with this rule, so that, in this conception of the early state of the Indian population, we are making no im-

probable supposition. On the contrary, it is not only probable in itself, but it is the only supposition that will explain the fact; and if we accept it as indicating the origin of the rule of Menu, it gives us such an idea of the prevalence of this law of incest as we could never reach by the contemplation of the individual tribes among which it is the law. It will be re- collected that the form of capture is found among the Hindus.*

* Ante, p. 27, and see Appendix A.

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 109

We believe it may still be possible, in the case of some communities in which Marriage between persons of the same family name is prohibited, to analyse the Population into its constituent (stock) tribes, and to prove that the tribes had this law of incest. In one case, in par- ticular, investigation seems to be courted. The Munnieporees, and the following tribes inhabiting the hills round Munnie- Pore—the Koupooees, the Mows, the Murams, and’ the Murring—are each and all divided into four families—Koo- mul, Looang, Angom, and N ingthaja. A Member of any of these families may Marry a member of any other, but the intermarriage of members of the same family is strictly prohibited. In explana- tion, so far, of these family divisions,*

3 “Account of the Valley of Munniepore and of the Hill Tribes.” M‘Culloch, 1859, pp. 49-69.

IIO EXOGAMY AND THE

we have the fact, well authenticated in the history of Munniepore, that the Koomul and Looang formerly existed as distinct and powerful tribes, and that the Koomul, in particular, at one time pre-

ponderated in the valley. Presuming that these tribes held intermarriages of their members to be incestuous, the origin of two of the family divisions, and of the marriage law, is plain enough, at least so far as the hill tribes are concerned ; and it is in the hills alone that the law is strictly enforced. Most of the members of the tribes would remain in the valley and mix with the Meithei, by whose prowess they were vanquished; but we can conceive that bands of the Koomul and Looang might escape to the hills, and mix with each other and with the tribes of the Angom and Ningthaja, whose ex- istence in former times we must postulate,

LACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. III

in explanation of the family divisions of the same names. Is it beyond hope that the farther examination of local tradi- tions, or exploration of the wilds to the South and north-east of Munniepore, may yet furnish us with information regarding the Angom and Ningthajà, or with data from which their existence in former times may be legitimately inferred, apart from the present speculation ?

The conclusion at which we have ar- rived as to the origin of the rule of Menu, will also explain the case of the native populations of Australia, North and South America, and the islands in the Pacific. In these quarters we obtain light regarding the causes which lead to

the break up of the primitive exogamous Sroups, and to the intermixture in local

tribes of people recognised as being of dif- ferent bloods. Let us first attend to the

mA EXOGAMY AND THE

Australians, whom we find divided into small tribes named after the districts which they inhabit; for though they are nomads, their wanderings, like those of the nomadic agriculturists of the Indian hills, are circumscribed within well-defined bounds. It appears that the tribe inhabit- ing a particular district regards itself as the owner thereof, and the intrusion of any other tribe upon that district as an invasion to be resented and punished; and that within the district individuals have por- tions of land appropriated to them.* Thus

the tribal system is in force, with an ap- parent perfect separation and independ- ence of the tribes. But, on close exami- nation, the tribes are found to be fused and welded together by blood-ties in the most extraordinary manner. According

* Letter, Dr. Laing to Dr. Hodgkin, 1840. “ Re- ports of the Aboriginal Protection Society.”

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 113

to credible accounts,” the natives of dif- ferent tribes extending over a great por- tion of the continent, are divided into a few families, and all the members of 4 family, in whatever local tribes they May be, bear the same name as a second Or family name. These family names

and divisions are perpetuated and Spread | throughout the country by the operation Of two laws: first, that the children of €ither sex always take the name of the Mother; and second, that a man cannot Marry a woman of his own family name.

The members of these families, though Scattered over the country, are yet to some

intents as much united as if they formed Separate and independent tribes ; in par- ticular, the members of each family are bound to unite for the purposes of de-

* « Grey’s Journals,” etc., vol. ua chap. xi.

114 EXOGAMY AND THE

fence and vengeance, the consequence being that every quarrel which arises be- tween the tribes is a signal for so many

young men to leave the tribes in which they were born, and occupy new hunting grounds, or ally themselves with tribes in which the families of their mothers may happen to be strong, or which con- tain their own and their mother’s nearest relatives. This secession, if we may so call it, is not always possible, but it is of frequent occurrence notwithstanding ; where it is impossible, the presence of so many of the enemy within the camp affords ready means of satisfying the call for ven- geance ; it being immaterial, according to the native code, by whose blood the blood- feud is satisfied, provided it be blood of the offender’s kindred. Thus, as the Aus- tralians are polygamists, and a man often has wives belonging to different families,

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 115

"itis not in quarrels uncommon to find chil- dren of the same father arranged against One another; or, indeed, against their father himself, for by their peculiar law the father can never be a relative of his children.* Among the Kamilaroi, a nume-

* Mr. Maine has been unable to conceive how human beings could be grouped on any principle more Primitive than that of the patriarchal system, or be bound together by any ruder blood-ties than those of agnation derived from the patria potestas,

€ think his mistake has arisen from a too exclusive attention, in his researches, to those systems of an- cient law which, like the Hindoo, Roman, and Jewish, belonged to races which were far advanced at the earliest dates to which their history goes back. Had he examined the primitive races now extant, he cer- tainly would not have written the following passage :* “It is obvious that the organisation of primitive so- Cleties would have been confounded if men had called themselves relatives of their mother’s relatives, The ference would have been that a person might be Subject to two distinct patriz potestates ; but distinct Patriæ potestates implied distinct jurisdictions, so that

* « Ancient Law,” 1861, p- 149.

EEO. - EXOGAMY AND THE

rous tribe residing to the north-west of Sidney, the rules in force are very complex and peculiar. These tribesmen fall into

anybody amenable to two of them at the same time would have lived under two dispensations, As long as the family was an imperium in imperio, a com- munity within the commonwealth, governed by its own institutions, of which the parent was the source, the limitation of relationship to the agnates was a necessary security against a conflict of laws in the domestic forum.” Here we see the ingenious thinker trammelled by notions derived from Roman jurispru- dence. Among the Australian Blacks—to confine our- selves to a single instance—we have seen that men are relatives of their mother’s relatives, and of none other; and that their societies are, aliunde, held together, notwithstanding the conflict of laws in the domestic forum, engendered by polygamy, exogamy, and female kinship. Kinship depends, in fact, not at all on con- venience. The first kinship is the first possible—that through mothers, about whose parental relation to children there can be no mistake. And the system of kinship through mothers only, operates to throw difficulties in the way of the rise of the patria potestas, and of the system of agnation. But of this here-

after.

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 17

divisions resembling castes, and at the Same time observe the rule against mar- riages between members of the same family.*

Our information is so imperfect that we do not know whether there exist any- where in Australia tribes whòse distinc- tive names are those of the families into Which the population is divided. But we should not expect to find such tribes. The constant tendency of groups to fall to pieces, and of the parts to separa- tion and independence of one another, and the practice of naming groups from their lands, would tend to obliterate the traces of the original stock-groups, except So far as they have been preserved in the names of families to keep the blood pure by avoidance of marriage between mem-

* Mr. Ridley’s account quoted, p. 491, vol. ii, Pritchard’s “Natural History of Man.” Norris’ edition. I

118 ELXOGAMY AND THE

bers of the same stock. But we cannot doubt that such stock-groups at one time existed, organised on the principle of exo- gamy, and were the germs of the native population. Whencesoever they were derived, it was inevitable, that the law which recognised blood relationship as existing only through females, conspir- ing with the primitive instinct of the race against marriage between members of the same stock, should tend in the process of time to transfuse the blood of each stock through all the tribal divisions. The men of the group A marrying women of the group B; and the men of the group B marrying women of the group A; and all the children of the women of B being counted of the stock of B; and all the children of the women of A being counted of the stock of A; we at once have so many B’s within A, and so

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 119

Many A’s within B. And so on, until in time A’s from the northmost point appear in the homes of Z at the southmost - and Z’s in the homes of A. Each local tribe would thus contain within itself members between whom there was connubium ; the original tribal divisions would be lost sight of, and nothing would remain of the stock- groups but the family names to which

they gave birth. Should the process of

transfusion go far enough, the state of matters which would lead to the practice of capturing wives would be modified, but hot extinct. The system of polygamy of itself, and any want of balance between the sexes of different families within a tribe, would long tend to maintain this Practice; which, moreover, like every other Practice connected with marriage or reli- Sion, must be credited with a special tenacity of existence. As we have seen

120 EXOGAMY AND THE

there prevails among the Australians a system of betrothals—always between | persons of different stocks—along with an extensive practice of capturing wives. This is just what might be expected if our theory of the origin of capture be a sound one. Since the tribes of Austra- lians, while exogamous in principle, con- tain persons who regard each other as of different descent and free to intermarry, marriage can be, and is, made the subject of bargain. Again, habits formed in pre- vious times of necessity—and no doubt occasional necessity still existing—keep up the practice of capture.

We now take the case of the Ameri- can Indians—North and South. They have political and district divisions;* but besides these the nations among them

* « Archeologia Americana,” vol. ii. p. 109.

~ + = p> r tile. rte ee oe = < — Sy j Sn eee M aa ME E eee Sonam ne ee ee eee wia Sg e n none mpra a E a ai z - q Varre

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. I2I

have had from time immemorial divisions into families or clans. “At present, or till very lately’—we quote from the Ar- chzeologia Americana—“ every nation was

divided into a number of clans, varying in the several nations from three to eight or ten, the members of which respectively Were dispersed indiscriminately through- Out the whole nation. It has been fully |

ascertained that the inviolable regulations by which these clans were perpetuated amongst the southern nations were, first, that no man could marry in his own clan: Secondly, that every child should belong to his or her mother’s clan. Among: the Choctaws there are two great divisions, €ach of which is subdivided into four Clans, and no man can marry in any of the four clans belonging to his division. The restriction among the Cherookees, the Creeks, and the Natches, does not extend

122 EXOGAMY AND THE

beyond the clan to which the man belongs. There are sufficient proofs that the same division into clans,commonly called tribes, exists among almost all the other primi- tive nations. But it is not so clear that they are subject to the same regulations which prevail amongst the southern In- dians.” At the root of these divisions and prohibitions we find here, as in Austra- lia, the feeling that marriage between persons of the same blood is incestuous. “They profess to consider it highly cri- minal for a man to marry a woman whose totem (family name) is the same as his own, and they relate instances when young men, for a violation of this rule, have been put to death by their own relatives.”* The

* From a circular letter by Mr. L. H. Morgan of Rochester, New York, issued by the United States. Government to its diplomatic agents and consuls in foreign countries, and which contains much interesting

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. T28

Indian nations, they say, were divided into tribes just lest any one might, through

information regarding the laws of primitive relation- ship, we quote the following passage as the most recent and authoritative statement regarding the tribal divisions of the red men :—

“ Nearly all, if not all, of the Indian Nations upon

this continent were anciently subdivided into Tribes ot Families. These tribes, with a few exceptions, were named after animals. Many of them are now thus ‘subdivided. . It is so with the Iroquois, Delawares, lowas, Creeks, Mohaves, Wyandottes, Winnebagoes, Otoes, Kaws, Shawnees, Choctaws, Otawas, Ojibewas, Potowottomies, etc.

“The following tribes are known to exist, or to have existed in the several Indian Nations—the number ranging from three to eighteen in each: The Wolf, Bear, Beaver, Turtle, Deer, Snipe, Heron, Hawk, Crane, Duck, Loon, Turkey, Musk-rat, Sable, Pike, Cat-fish, Sturgeon, Carp, Buffalo, Elk, Rein-deer, Eagle, Hare, Rabbit, and Snake; also, the Reed- grass, Sand, Water, Rock, and Tobacco-plant.

“ Among the Iroquois—and the rule is the same to the present day in most of the nations enumerated— ho man is allowed to marry a woman of his own tribe, all the members of which are consanguinii, This was

124. EXOGAMY AND THE

temptation or accident, marry a near rela- tion, which ‘‘at present is scarcely possible,

unquestionably the ancient law. It follows that hus- band and wife were always of different tribes. The children are of the tribe of the mother, in a majority of the nations ; but the rule, if anciently universal, is not so at the present day. Where descent in the female line prevailed, it was followed by several im- portant results, of which the most remarkable was the perpetual disinheritance of the male line. Since all titles as well as property descended in the female line, and were hereditary, in strictness, in the tribe itself, a son could never succeed to his father’s title of Sachem, nor inherit even his medal or his tomahawk. If the Sachem, for example, was of the Wolf tribe, the title must remain in that tribe, and his son, who was neces- sarily of the tribe of his mother, would be out of the line of succession ; but the brothers of the deceased Sachem would be of the Wolf tribe, being of the same mother, and so would the sons of his sisters: hence we find that the succession fell either upon a brother of the deceased ruler or upon a nephew. Between a brother of the deceased, and the son of a sister, there was no law establishing a preference: neither as þe- . tween several brothers on one side, or several sisters on the other, was there any law of primogeniture.

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 125

for whoever intends to marry must take a Person of a different tribe,”* and the same feeling has been remarked by Dobuzhof- fer in South America.t ;

What we have said of the Australians May be assumed to have been true, at One time at least, of the New Zealanders. In “The Curse of Mania” and several other of the New Zealand legends we have

evidence that the wife never belonged to the tribe of her husband, and that the children belonged to the family of their mother. So among the Feejees, who appear to count

They were all equally eligible, and the law of election ‘ame in to decide between them.”—Camébrian Fournal, Vol. iii, second series, p. 149.

* Tanners “Narrative,” p. 313, quoted in Arch. Amer, and by Grey, ut supra.

T “ Account of the Abipones,” vol. i. p. 69.

f “ Polynesian Mythology,” wz supra, p. 162. In “ The Curse of Mania” the reader will find an instance of children fleeing from the tribe of birth to that of the mother’s kindred, :

126, EXOGAMY AND THE

blood relationship through the mother

only. In the system of vasu-ing, which

determines the claims of children upon the tribe of their mother, we have evi- dence that the mother always belongs to adifferent tribe from the father, and that the children are held to be of the family or tribe of their mother.* At any rate, vasu-ing is a relic of a stage in the development of the Feejees wherein that was the rule.

Curiously enough, there is reason for believing that exogamy prevailed among the Picts ; in other words, according to the most approved doctrine, among the Gael or Highlanders; which fact bears at once on the rapes of the Cruithnians, the old Welsh and French customs, and the plebeian marriage-ceremonies of Rome, for the Celtic element was strong © in

* Erskine’s “Pacific,” ut supra, pp. 153-215.

rr Se eae me =A z ee - <—4 SR, ae m E ee ae = oA CS

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 127

Rome. That the Celts were anciently lax in their morals, and recognised relation-

‘Ship through mothers only, are facts well vouched ;* and of such facts it is the usual concomitant, that the children Should be named after the mother. The facts brought out by the distinguished antiquary, Mr. Skene, from a study of the list of Pictish kings down to 731, when Bede says that the law of succession through females was still in force, may to some extent be explained by the sons taking the names of their mothers; but they point to something beyond this. By favour of Mr. Skene, we are at liberty to

give here the results at which he has ar- rived, and which have not hitherto been published.

* Cæsar, “De Bello Gallico,” lib. v. § 14. Xiphiline, Monum. Histor. Ixi. Solinus, idem. Irish Nennius, liv, ;

CA OG AMY: AND THE

ist, That brothers always succeeded each other.

2d, That in no case does a son suc-

ceed a father; after the brothers have reigned a new family comes in.

3d, That the names of the fathers and of the sons are quite different. In no case does the name borne by any of the sons appear among the names of the fathers, nor conversely is there an instance of a father’s name appearing among the sons.

4th, The names of the sons consist of a few Pictish names borne by sons of dif- ferent fathers: These are—6 Drusts, 2 Talorgs, 3 Nectans, 2 Galans, 6 Gart- naidhs, 4 Brudes. In no case does the name of a father occur twice in the list of fathers.

5th, In the list there are two cases of sons bearing Pictish names whose fathers

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 129

are known to have been strangers, and these ave the only fathers of whom we have any account. They are—1.Talorg Macainfrit. His father was undoubtedly Ainfrit, son of Aethelfrith, King of N orthumbria, who took refuge among the Picts, and after- Wards became King of Northumbria; 2. Brude Mac Bile. His father was a Welsh- _ Man, King of the Strath-Clyde Britons. In an old poem Brude Mac Bile is called Son of theKing of Ailcluaide, ż.e., Dumbar- ton; and when, by the battle of Drunichen, he became King of the Picts, another old Poem says, “ to-day Brude fights a battle about the land of his grandfather.”

The fact that the only fathers of whom We have any account are known to have

been strangers—especially when taken along with the other facts which we pos- Sess about the Picts—raises a strong pre- sumption that all the fathers were men of

130 EXOGAMY AND THE

other tribes. At any rate there remains the fact, after every deduction has been made, that the fathers and mothers were in no case of the same family name.

We have now, by an irresistible array of instances, established the fact of exo- gamy being a most widely prevailing principle of marriage-law among primitive races. We have found the areas to be, for the chief part, conterminous within which exogamy and the practice of captur- ing wives de facto prevails. Farther, in all the modern instances in which the symbol of capture is most marked, we have found that marriage within the tribe is prohibited as incest, as among the Khonds, the Fuegeans, the Kalmucks, and Circassians; also that in several cases

where traces of the symbol appear, as among the Nogais and the Kirghiz, exo- gamy is more or less perfectly observed.

RA iaa e ee ot era een SS ae aces Se i ee SS Sete = - Sa z a sna a a in <a -e Sr

FACT & FORM OF CAPTURE. 131 SR paper

We have seen good reason for thinking that exogamy and the practice of capture de facto, co-existed among the old Celts ; and that in that co-existence lies the ex- Planation of the symbol among the French, the Welsh, and the plebeians of Rome. Of the jus connubit of the Muscovites and Livonians in former times we have no

direct information. Magnus is silent on the subject. But it is implied in his nar- rative that husband and wife invariably belonged to different kinships and village communities. We have found exogamy and the symbol co-existing in ancient India. Not to dwell on the slighter and More doubtful instances, we think it must how be admitted that we have sufficiently Proved both the existence of exogamous tribes, and that among such tribes there Prevails, or has prevailed, a system of Capturing women for wives.

eee

1332: ON LAA STALE OP GOSLILITY.

——

CHAPTER

ON THE STATE OF HOSTILITY.

THE state of hostility is a theme which requires no research to illustrate it. It is a fact too familiar to require demonstra- tion. If war is a lamentable feature of human life, it is not quite so ugly among savages as when waged by civilized men. In proportion to their masses and the weight of the interests at stake, the ad- vanced nations are perhaps quite as frequently embroiled as the most bar- barous; also in their case the natural beneficence—if we may so call it—of the impulse to feud is not always apparent. In the lower stages of society we recognise war as a condition of the rise of govern- ments, of the subordination of classes, of

ON THE SATS OF HOSTILITY. 433

civility—its agonies as the growing pains of civil society; in the higher it appears too often as a mere scourge of mankind, de- forming and impairing, if not destroying, the precious results and accumulations of long periods of peace and industry.

If the wars of savages are petty, they are habitual. While the domestic affections are little pronounced, the social are con- fined to the smallest fraction of humanity. Whoever is foreign to a group is hostile to it. Even in comparatively advanced Stages of savagery, groups rarely combine forcommon purposes; when they do— the object of the combination being ac- complished—they return to their isolated independence. And when tribes have ` combined in nations, and the nations have become polite, it is yet some time before a distinction is drawn between strangers

and enemies. No wonder if the dis- K

134 OMNIA OPIATE OF FOSTILITY.

tinction be not made by savages. Who- ever is not with them is against them —a rival in the competition for food, a possible plunderer of their camp and ravisher of their women. Lay out the map of the world, and wherever you find populations unrestrained by the strong hand of government there you will find perpetual feud, tribe against tribe, and family against family.

It would be superfluous to select particular districts from which to illus- trate this truth, exemplifications of which we have already, in so many instances, had occasion to see. The state of hosti- lity is the normal state of the race in early times. It is incidental to the sepa- ration and independence of men in small communities; and, while the arts are as yet in their infancy, small communities are a necessary result of the conditions of

ON THE Sage OF HOSTILITY. Ags

Subsistence. Thus Lot separates from Abraham. Jacob goes one way and Esau goes another. And with separation comes estrangement—differencesof language and habits—hostility. Till in a short time blood relations are as much apart—as foreign to one another—as people of dif- ferent races and states.

EXOGAMY AND

Cea PEER: OV de

EXOGAMY: ITS ORIGIN — COMPARATIVE ARCHAISM OF EXOGAMY AND EN- DOGAMY.

AT the outset of our argument it was seen that if it could be shown that exo- gamous tribes existed, and that the usual relations of savage tribes to each other were those of hostility, we should have found a social condition in which it was inevitable that wives should systemati- cally be procured by capture. It also ap- peared that if the existence of exogamous tribes either actually capturing their wives, or observing the symbol of cap- ture in their marriage ceremonies, should be established in a reasonable number of

cases, it would be a legitimate inference

ENDOGAMY. 137

that exogamy has prevailed wherever we find a system of capture, or the form of Capture, existing. We now confidently Submit that the conditions requisite for this inference have been amply esta- blished in the three preceding chapters ; So that we may conclude that wherever capture, or the form of capture, prevails, or has prevailed, there prevails, or has prevailed, exogamy. Conversely, we may Say that, wherever exogamy can be found, we may confidently expect to find, after due investigation, at least traces of a System of capture. We have traced the law and the corresponding practice among tribes scattered over a large portion of the globe. What farther knowledge of rude tribes now existing may show to us it would be idle to conjecture; but it might be plausibly maintained, upon the facts already known to us, that the prin-

138 EXOGAMY AND

ciple of exogamy has in fact prevailed, and the system of capturing wives in fact been practised at a certain stage among every race of mankind.

Perhaps there is no question leading deeper into the foundations of civil so- ciety than that which regards the origin of exogamy, unless it be the cognate question of the origin of caste, which ad- mits, however, more readily of ingenious surmises, and what mathematicians call singular solutions. We believe this re- striction on marriage to be connected with the practice in early times of female in- fanticide, which, rendering women scarce, led at once to polyandry within the tribe, and the capturing of women from without. Female infanticide — common among

Savages everywhere — prevails as a sys- tem, and has been customary from time immemorial amongst many of the races

ENDOGAMY. 139

that exhibit the symbol of capture.* With some of the exogamous races it appears to be the rule to kill all female children, except the first-born when a female. To | tribes surrounded by enemies, and, un- aided by art, contending with the diffi- culties of subsistence, sons were a source of strength, both for defence and in the quest for food, daughters a source of weakness. Hence the cruel custom which, leaving the primitive human hordes with very few young women of

their own — occasionally with nonet —

* The Circassians have not the practice. But there is reason to believe that they only commenced Sparing their daughters when they found a profitable market for them. For an explanation of the effect of the law of blood-feud on the practice of infanticide, see the end of chap. viii.

t In one village of the Phweelongmai, on the eastern frontier of India, Colonel Macculloch found in 1849 that there was not a single female child.

140 — EXOGAMY AND

and, in any case, seriously disturbing the balance of the sexes within the hordes, forced them to prey upon one another for wives. Usage, induced by | necessity, would in time establish a pre- | judice among the tribes observing it— a prejudice strong as a principle of reli- gion, as every prejudice relating to mar- riage is apt to be—against marrying women of their own stock. A survey of the facts of primitive life, and. the break- down of exogamy in advancing commu- nities, exclude the notion that the law originated in any innate or primary feel- ing against marriage with kinsfolk. In- deed, we shall hereafter see that T probable that necessity may have estab- lished the prejudice against marrying women of the group even before the facts of blood-relationship had made any deep _ impression on the human mind. At pre-

ENDOGAMY. I4I

sent it may be observed that the exist- ence of infanticide, so wide-spread in it- self, indicates how slight the strength of blood-ties was in primitive times. To form an adequate notion, on the other hand, of. the extent to which tribes might, by means of infanticide, deprive them- Selves of their women, we have only to bear in mind the multitude of facts which testify to the thoughtlessness and impro- vidence of men during the childish stage of the human mind.

To show that the analysis by which the true solution of the questions respect- ing endogamy and exogamy is to be Obtained, is the analysis of a series of

Phenomena which appears to form a pro- §tession, we notice the following as the divisions into which the less advanced

Portions of mankind fall when ranked ac- cording to their rules as to connubium :—

EXOGAMY AND

Exocamy Pure.—t. Tribal (or family)

system.—Tribes separate. All the mem- bers of each tribe of the same blood, or feigning themselves to be so. Marriage prohibited between the members of the tribe.

2. Tribal system.—Tribe a congeries of family groups, falling into divisions, clans, thums, etc. No connubium be- tween members of same division : connu- bium between all the divisions.

3. Tribal system.—Tribe a congeries of family groups embracing several village communities or nomadic hordes: mem- bers of families (or primitive stock groups) somewhat interfused. No connubium be- tween persons whose family name points them out as being of the same stock.

4. Tribal system.—Tribe in divisions. No connubium between members of the same divisions : connubium between some

ENDOGAMY. 143

of the divisions; only partial connubium between others—e. g., a man of one may Marry a woman of another, but a woman of the former may not marry a man of the latter. Approach to caste.

5. -Tribal system.—Tribe in divisions. No connubium between persons of the Same stock: connubium between each division and some other. No connubium between some of the divisions. Caste.

ENDOGAMY Purr.—6. Tribal (or family) system.—Tribes separate. All the Members of each tribe of the same blood, or feigning themselves to be so. Connu- bium between members of the tribe: mar- riage without the tribe forbidden and Punished.

7- Tribal system indistinct. — Mem-

bers of primitive (stock) groups interfused. (I.) Marriage forbidden except between Persons whose family name points them

144 EXOGAMY AND

out as being of the same stock. (2.) Mar- riage forbidden except between the mem- bers of particular families. Persons having connubium marked as a caste, old tribal divisions being lost sight of.

Although these tribal systems may be arranged as above so as to seem to form a progression, of which the extremes are pure exogamy on the one hand, and en- dogamy—transmuted into caste of the Mantchu and Hindu types — on the other, we have at present no right to say that these systems were developed in anything like this order in tribal history. They may represent a progression from exogamy to endogamy, or from endo- gamy to exogamy ; or the middle terms, so to speak, may have been produced by the combination of groups severally or- ganised on the one and the other of these

principles. The two types of organisa-

ENDOGAMY. 145

— E

tion may be equally archaic. Men must Originally have been free of any pre-

Judice against marriage between relations

~—hot necessarily endogamous, 7. e., for- bidding marriage except between kindred, but still more given to such unions than to unions with strangers. From this Primitive indifference they may have ad- vanced, some to endogamy, some to exo- gamy.

The separate endogamous tribes are nearly as numerous, and they are in some respects as rude, as the separate exoga- Mous tribes. It may be noted, however, that endogamy appears in populations formed by the fusion of many tribes, as the almost uniform characteristic of the dominant race. Hereafter we shall sce how a tribe organised on the principle of €ndogamy might be developed from one Organised on the principle of exogamy,

146 EXOGAMY AND

in perfect consistency with the law against - the intermarriage of relations. And while the existence of tribes like those pof the Mantchu Tartars, who prohibit | marriages between persons whose family names ave different, is of great weight in favour of endogamy as a primitive type of organisation; on the other hand, castes like those of India, embracing members of several different families, and with a marriage law like that of Menu, strongly suggest that many endogamous tribes have been developed from tribes organised on the opposite principle. Since, moreover, the reconversion of 4 caste or of an endogamous tribe into an exogamous tribe is inconceivable—we have no experience of caste disappearing except in advanced communities, and then only on a revolution of sentiment being

produced by political influences — the

ENDOGAMY. Pe choice seems to be between regarding the two classes of tribes as organised ad

initio on distinct principles, or holding the €xogamous to be the more archaic.

We may notice as Strange, that fre- quently tribes thus oppositely organised are found inhabiting the same area. On the sub-Himalayan ranges, for ex- ample, are the Sodhas, who intermarry with the Rajputs, not with each other; the Magars, who prohibit marriages be- tween members of the same thum; and, again, the Kocch, Bodo, Ho, and Dhumal, who are forbidden to Marry except to mem- bers of their own tribes or kiels. And, in Some districts—as in the. hills on the. north-eastern frontier of India, in the Cau- “asus, and the hill ranges of Syria—we find a variety of tribes, proved, by physical Characteristics and the affinities of lan- Suage, of one and the same original stock,

148 EXOGAMY AND

| yet in this particular differing zofo cælo

from one another—some forbidding mar- riage within the tribe, and some proscrib- ing marriage without it.

What has been said is enough to show that the question of the comparative archaism of exogamy and endogamy is aS” difficult as it is interesting. We shall in the next chapter lead up to a fuller dis- cussion of that question, while investigat- ing more minutely than we have hitherto done the conditions of the form of cap- ture being evolved. We shall there endeavour to establish the following pro- positions :—1. That the most ancient system in which the idea of blood-rela- tionship was embodied, was the system of kinship through females only. 2. That the primitive groups were, or were as- sumed to be, homogeneous. 3. That the- system of kinship through females only

ENDOGAMY. ? 149

tended to render the exogamous groups

heterogeneous, and thus to supersede

the system of capturing wives. 4. That in the advance from savagery the system of kinship through females only was suc- ceeded by a system which acknowledged kinship through males also; and which, in most cases passed into a system which acknowledged kinship through males only. 5. That the system of kinship through males tended to rear up homogeneous groups, and thus to restore the original condition of affairs—where the exoga- mous prejudice survived—as regards both the practice of capturing wives and the evolution of the form of capture. 6. That a local tribe, under the combined influ- ence of exogamy and the system of female kinship, might attain a balance of persons of different sexes regarded as being of

different descent, and that thus its mem- k

150 EXOGAMY AND ENDOGAMY.

bers might be able to intermarry with one another, and wholly within the tribe, consistently with the principle of exo-

agamy. 7. That a local tribe, having reached this stage and grown proud through success in war, might decline intermarriage with other local tribes and become a caste. 8. That on kinship be- coming agnatic, the members of such a tribe might yield to the universal tendency of rude races to eponomy, and feign them- selves to be all derived from a common ancestor, and so become endogamous. And 9g. That there is reason to think that some endogamous tribes became endo- gamous in this manner.

SYSTEMS OF KINSHIP.

CHAPTER VIII.

ANCIENT SYSTEMS OF KINSHIP AND THEIR INFLUENCE ON THE STRUC- TURE OF PRIMITIVE GROUPS.

Tue earliest human groups can have had No idea of kinship. We do not mean to Say that there ever was a time when men Were not bound together by a feeling of Kindred. The filial and fraternal affec- tions may be instinctive. They are ob-

viously independent of any theory of |

kinship, its origin or consequences ; they are distinct from the perception of the unity of blood upon which kinship de- Pends; and they may have existed long before kinship became an object of thought. What we would say is,. that ideas of kinship must be regarded as

152 ANCIENT SYSTEMS

growths—must have grown like all other ideas related to matters primarily cogniz- able only by the senses; and that the fact of consanguinity must have long re- mained unperceived as other facts, quite

as obvious, have done. In other words, at the root of kinship is a physical fact, which could be discerned only through observation and reflection—a fact, there- fore, which must for a time have been overlooked. No advocate of innate ideas, we should imagine, will maintain theif existence On a subject so CONN as relationship by blood.

A group of kindred in that stage of ignorance is the rudest that can be ima- gined. Though they were chiefly held together by the feeling of kindred, the apparent bond of fellowship between the members of such a group would be that they and theirs had always been com-

OF KINSHIP. 153

panions in war or the chase—joint-ten- ants of the same cave or grove. To one another they would simply be as com- fades. As distinguished from men of Other groups, they would be of the group, and named after it.

Hence, most naturally, on the idea of blood-relationship arising, would be formed the conception of Stocks. Previ- ously individuals had been affiliated not

to persons, but to some group. The new idea of blood-relationship would more readily demonstrate the group to be composed of kindred than it would evolve

a special system of blood-ties between Certain of the individuals in the group. The members of a group would now have become brethren. As distinguished from men of other groups, they would be of the group-stock, and named after the group.”

* It is a question for philologists how far the

THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

The development of the idea of blood- relationship into a system of kinship, must have been a work of time—at least the establishment over any great area of any such system as an institution of cus- tomary law must have been slowly ef- fected. It is most improbable that that idea, when first formed, was anywhere at once embodied in a well-defined system of kinship.

We shall endeavour to show—

I. That the most ancient system in which the idea of blood-relationship was

earliest words which denote a human group involve the idea of blood. In one case they seem not to have done so. Grant, in his “Origin and Descent of the Gael,” says that teadhloch and cuediche or coediche, Gaelic names for family, mean the first having a com- mon residence ; the second those who eat together. The Gael had, however, the more general terms finne and cinne—the former meaning born of the same stock, and the latter denoting the tribe.

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 155

embodied, was a system of kinship through females only.

Once a man has perceived the fact of consanguinity in the simplest case— namely, that he has his mother’s blood in his veins, he may quickly see that he is of the same blood with her other child- ren. A little more reflection will enable him to see that he is of one blood with the brothers and sisters of his mother. On further thought he will perceive that he is of the same blood with the chil- dren of his mother’s sister. And, in pro- cess of time, following the ties of blood through his mother, and females of the same blood, he must arrive at a system of kinship through females. The blood- ties through females being obvious and indisputable, the idea of blood-relation- Ship, as soon as it was formed, must have begun to develop, however slowly, into a

156 THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

system embracing them. What further development this idea might have— whether it would simultaneously have a development in the direction of kinship through males—must have depended on the circumstances connected with paternity. If the paternity of a child were usually as indisputable as the ma- ternity, we might expect to find kinship through males acknowledged soon after kinship through females.* But however

* It has been doubted whether the blood-tie through the father is entitled to rank with that through the mother. It may be that the connec- tion between father and child is less intimate than that between mother and child as regards the trans- mission of characteristics, mental or physical. And the former tie is unquestionably less obvious than the latter. It is, however, an undoubted blood-tie, and must have been thought of soon after that through mothers. All that it concerns us to show in the text is, that when the idea of it was formed it could only receive development into a system of

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 157 2 eae eee ee

Natural it might be that men should think of blood-ties as possible to be propa- gated through fathers, blood-ties through fathers could not find a place in a system of kinship, unless circumstances usually allowed of some degree of certainty as to who the father of a child was, or of certainty as to the father’s blood.* A System of relationship through fathers could only be formed—as we have seen

that a system of relationship through mothers would be formed—after a good deal of reflection upon the fact of pater- nity. And fathers must usually be known before men will think of relation- Ship through fathers—indeed, before the

kinship on certain conditions, which were not easily Satisfied.

* It will be seen that there may be certainty as to the father’s blood (as where all the possible fathers are brothers) without there being certainty as to the father.

158 SHO LO hee OF REV SHIP

idea of a father can be formed. There could be no system of kinship through males if paternity was usually, or in a great proportion of cases, uncertain. The requisite degree of certainty can be had only when the mother is appropriated to a particular man as his wife, or to men of one blood as wife, and when women thus appropriated are usually found faithful to their lords.

Considering that the history of, all the races of men, so far as we know it, is the history of a progress from the

savage state; considering the social con- dition of rude tribes still upon the earth, —remembering that the races which can be traced in history had all a previous history, which remains unwritten,—it cannot seem a very strange proposition that there has been a stage in the de- velopment of human races when there

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 159

was no such appropriation of women to particular men—when, in short, marriage, as it exists among civilized nations, was | not practised. We believe we shall | show, to a sufficient degree of proba- bility, that there have been times when marriage, in this sense, was yet undreamt of. Wherever this has been the case the paternity of children must have been uncertain; the conditions essential] to a system of kinship through males being formed would therefore be wanting; no Such system would be formed < there would be— there could be— kinship through females only. |

Not to assume that the progress of the various races of men from savagery has been a uniform process, that all the stages which any of them has gone through have been passed in their order by all, we shall be justified in believing that more or less

160 THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

of promiscuity in the connection of the sexes, and a system of kinship through females only have subsisted among races of men among which no traces of them remain, when we have shown their exist- ence in a considerable number of cases— if in these there appear nothing exceptional. After what has been said above, it must be plain that kinship through females only, if it exist at all, must be a more archaic systemof relationship than kinshipthrough males—the product of an earlier and ruder stage in human developmentthan the latter —somewhat more than a step farther back in the direction of savagery. To prove its existence on such a scale as to entitle it to rank among the normal phenomena of human development, is, we may now say, to prove it the most ancient system of kinship. As customs tend to perpetuate _ themselves and die hard, it will not in any

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 161

degree make against our explanation of the origin of kinship through females only, that it should be found in some cases along with marriage relations which allow of certainty as to fathers. It is inconceiv- able that any thing but the want of cer- tainty on that point could have long pre- vented the acknowledgment of kinship through males; and in such cases we shall be able to conclude that such cer-

tainty has formerly been wanting—that

more or less promiscuous intercourse be- tween the sexes has formerly prevailed. The connection between these two things —uncertain paternity and kinship through females only, seems so necessary—that of cause and effect—that we may confidently infer the one where we find the other. Let us see, then, what can be said for the proposition that there has been a Stage in the progress of men in which a

162 THES YS LEM OF KINSHIP

woman was not usually appropriated to a particular man as his wife.

All the evidence we have goes to show _ that men were from the beginning gre- | garious. The geological record distinctly exhibits them in groups—naked hunters or feeders upon shell fish leading a pre- carious life of squalid misery. This testimony is confirmed by all history. We hear nothing in the most ancient times of individuals except as being members of groups. The history of pro- perty is the history of the development of proprietary rights zzside groups, which were at first the only owners,* and of all other personal rights—even including the right in offspring—it may be said that their history is that of the gradual asser- tion of the claims of individuals against the traditional rights of groups. |

* « Ancient Law,” -ut supra, p. 268.

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 163

We, of course, know nothing about the - co-ordination of the sexes in the earliest groups. The reader knows already what must be our conjecture as to what it was. We can trace the line of human progress far back towards brutishness ; finding as we go back the noble faculties peculiar to man weaker and weaker in their manifest- ations, producing less and less effect,—at last scarcely any effect at all—upon his position and habits. As we go back, we find more and more in men the traits of gregarious animals; slighter and slighter indications of operative intellect. AS among other gregarious animals, the unions of the sexes were probably in the €arliest times, loose, transitory, and in some degree promiscuous.

Before the invention of the arts, and the formation of provident habits, the

Struggle for existence must often have be-

164 THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

come very serious. The instincts of self- preservation, therefore, must have fre- quently predominated and shaped the features of society freely, as if the unsel- fish affections had no place in human nature. None of the races of mankind can have been spared the cruel experience of this initiatory stage; or can have escaped the effects of that experience on its character and customs. Even those most favourably situated must have had

long periods of trial, and have suffered

from the incessant hostility of neighbours. So, without supposing the course of human events to have been uniform, we must conceive of early human society as having been throughout affected by influences of the same general, unfriendly, character, and as having been determined, though perhaps by unequal pressures, towards one uniform type in all its parts.

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 165

Foremost among the results of this early struggle for food and security, must have been an effect upon the balance of the sexes. As braves and hunters were required and valued, it would be the in- terest of every horde to rear, when possi- ble, its healthy male children. It would be less its interest to rear females, as they | would be less capable of self-support, and _ of contributing, by their exertions, to the common good. In this lies the only ex+ planation which can be accepted of the origin of those systems of female infanti-\

cide still existing, the discovery of which from time to time, in out of the way Places, so shocks our humanity. It is

of no consequence by what theories the races who practise infanticide now de- fend the practice.* There can be no

* Often, as among the Khonds, it is found to be an institution of religion. _ M

166 THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

doubt that its origin is everywhere re- ferable to that early time of struggle and necessity which we have been con- templating.

What is now true in varying degrees of all the rudest races may be assumed to have been true of all the earliest groups. We may predicate of the primitive groups

that they were all or nearly all marked by a want of balance between the sexes—the

| | males being in the majority. The reader will have little difficulty in granting that we may do so when he reflects on the pre- valence of exogamy, the origin of which must be referred to that want of balance. And we think he will be still more ready to make the concession when we shall have surveyed the facts connected with f polyandry—the origin of which must be |! referred to the same cause. What diminished the number of the

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 167

female sex would increase the importance of women. The first result of the balance | of the sexes being against the females, | must have been to give every woman | more than one, it might be several wooers. Apart from any disproportion of the ' Sexes, we might expect the more engag- ing females of a horde to be surrounded

by suitors. Savages are unrestrained by |

any sense of delicacy from a copartnery in sexual enjoyments; and, indeed, in the civilised state, the sin of great cities Shows that there are no natural restraints sufficient to hold men back from grosser Copartneries. But within a horde possess- ing few women, such copartneries would be a necessity. And as savages assert for themselves a high degree of independ- ence, it is obvious that grave difficulties must have surrounded the constitution and regulation of such copartneries. And

168 THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

to the consideration of these difficulties we are led, the instant we conceive of the primitive groups as containing fewer women than men.

The men of a group must either have quarrelled about their women and se- parated, splitting the horde into hostile sections ; or, in the spirit of indifference, indulged in savage promiscuity. That quarrels and divisions were of frequent occurrence cannot be. doubted. These were the first wars for women, and they went to form the habits which established exogamy. And whether quarrels arose or not, we are led to contemplate groups —the horde or its sections—indulging in | a promiscuity more or less general. The quarrels must have been between sections of the hordes rather than between indivi- || duals. No individual at that stage could `

Lavell carry off a woman, isolate himself,

misem ne n A a E

—_. oe eset emp some es coe ee ee eee

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 169

and found a family. However brave and Strong, he could scarcely maintain his independence for any time against nume- rous assailants. Unless these quarrels went the length of completely disin- tegrating the groups—a result which the gregarious nature of men tended to prevent — we must arrive at last at groups within which harmony was maintained through indifference and pro- miscuity.

These groups would hold their women,

like their other goods, in common. And the children, while attached to mothers, would belong to the horde.* We find

* The tie between mother and child, which exists as a matter of necessity during infancy, is not unfre- quently found to be lost sight of among savages on the age of independence being reached. The liability of mothers to be carried off would, among exogamous races, simplify the general filiation of children to the §roup, rather than to mothers.

170 THE: SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

traces of the former existence of groups of this description ; and it is probable that before the rise of kinship, all the human groups were of that model. On the rise of kinship, the difficulty due to the scarcity of women would more easily be overcome. The first advance from a- general promiscuity—assuming its.exist- ence—would naturally be toa promiscuity less general—to arrangements between small sets of men to attach themselves to a particular woman. Previous to the establishment of a system of kinship— when men were bound to each other only by the tribal tie—it is obvious that there would constantly be difficulties in the

way of their forming such combinations. When, however, the system of kinship through females only, had been firmly established, every group stood resolved into a number of small brotherhoods,

oueres aes wne

a ees paren tie a

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 171

each composed of sons of the same mother. And within these, the feeling of close kinship would simplify the con- stitution of the polyandrous arrange- ment.

Now, here, at length, we are upon the firm ground of fact. We have examples of general promiscuity ; and examples of modified promiscuity, in which, with a pretence of marriage, the woman may bestow her favours upon any one, under certain restrictions as to rank and family. We have numerous examples of poly- | andry, and they are such as to show that | polyandry must be regarded as a modi- | fication of and advance from promiscuity. | We have examples of polyandry in which \ | the wife has several husbands, who are | | not necessarily relatives; and very many examples of polyandry in which the hus- bands are all brothers. We often find

172 THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

these two forms of polyandry in the same district, in different sections of the popu- lation: here, the husbands as a rule, are no relations; there, the husbands as a rule, are brothers. Farther, where the hus- bands are not brothers, we find the system of relationship through females only; and, so enduring is custom, we very often find that system where marriage has long been so regulated as to permit of kin- ship through males. In many cases we find traces of the system of kinship through females only, lingering about the laws of marriage and succession to estates and titles, even where male kinship has been long established. Moreover, in nearly all the cases in which traces are to be found of kinship through females only, traces of polyandry also remain. Thus, what we find is just what was

to be expected if the account we have

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 173

oe a SI

offered of the origin of polyandry were correct.

We repeat, that in showing the pre- valence of polyandry, we shall be showing |

the prevalence of a modification of pro- | miscuity. This is manifest as regards i the ruder species of polyandry, in which |

the husbands are not relations. It is | equally, though less obviously, true of — the less rude polyandry in which the husbands are brothers. From the way in which polyandry is presented to us, we shall have a proof that the less rude polyandry was developed from the ruder by the help of the system of kinship through females only—was superinduced, that is, upon a promiscuity less quali- fied than itself. Promiscuity, produ- cing uncertainty of fatherhood, led to the system of kinship through mothers only. This kinship paved the way for

174 THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

polyandry such as we commonly find it; and this form of polyandry introduced male kinship.“ That, along with the ruder polyandry, we always find the sys- tem of kinship through females only, and that where the less rude form prevails we can generally trace that system, is more- over a proof a posteriori of what we have shown must be the case, that the origin of kinship through females only is refer- able to uncertainty of male parentage. We shall not concern ourselves with the direct evidence which might be ad- duced to show that there once prevailed

* We shall see farther on how numerous the known cases are in which the progress to male kinship and the patriarchal system was a progress having this kind of polyandry for one of its stages. The other main highway of progress must have lain through the system of confining women—a system probably es- tablished by exogamy and the practice of capturing wives.

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 175

among men a promiscuity less quali- fied than polyandry. We may how- ever recall the fact, that tradition is found everywhere pointing to a time when marriage was unknown, and to some legislator to whom it owed its institution: among the Egyptians to Menes ; the Chinese to Fohi; the Greeks to Cecrops; the Hindus to Svetaketu.* And we shall proceed to show how much evidence remains to give verisimilitude to these traditions. Passing over com- munities in which, according to ancient historians, something like a general pro- miscuity prevailed—such as the Massa- get, Agathyrsi, and the ancient Spar- tans; passing over also the numerous races now existing, which, according to modern travellers, have no conception

* See Muir’s Sanskrit Texts, 1860. Part ii, p. 336.

176. see SES LEO KINSHIP

——

of conjugal fidelity*—we shall now go on to consider the regulated promiscuity

* It may be as well to append some modern ex- amples of promiscuity, and of practices which have the same effect in rendering uncertain male parentage. The Ansarians have their wives in common ; the people of Martawan, of the tribe of Ansarians, let out their wives and daughters (Volney, “Travels,” chap. xxvii.) The Keiaz (Paropamisans) lend their wives to their guests (Latham, “Des. Ethn.,” vol. ii, p.246) ; so do the Eimauk (Caubul),—Elphinstone, 1815, p 483; so, we are informed, do the Kandyans, The Mpongme (Africa) lend wives (Reade, “Say. Afr.,” Pp. 259); so do the Koryaks and Chukchi, who lend out daugh- ters as well (N. E. Siberia)—Erkman, vol. ti: pban and v. Cochrane's “ Journey,” 1825, vol.i. p. 336. The Koryaks are also polyandrous, The same disregard of conjugal fidelity appeared in Caindu, Cascar (Turk- istan Tartary), and in Cumana (Gaya, p. 104; Marco Polo, uż tnfra, p. 258). We find it now among the Aimaks (“Des. Ethno.” vol. i. p. 333). It was cus- tomary in Kamul (Marco Polo, Bohn’s edition, p. 110). Montesquieu, b. 16, c. vii, remarks on the licentious wantonness of the women of Patan, against which the men had to adopt measures of self-protec- tion. Mr. Wilson of Mussoorie, in an admirable report

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 177

known as polyandry, and see to what ex- tent it exists, and what traces of its former existence still remain.

on the Puharies of Gurwhal (“A Summer Ramble in the Himalayas,” q. v. p. 182), says of the Gun- | garees and Perbuttees: “Their immorality is some- ` thing incredible—chastity being little appreciated, even where it does exist.” In various other quarters we find practices fatal to certainty of male parentage, such as frequent divorces, e. g., among the Bedouins, Burckhardt, “Notes,” I. 111; and Marriages for an agreed upon term of endurance, usually short. Such marriages were usual in Sounan, Arabia Felix (Hamiltons “New Account of the East Indies,” vol. i. p. 51); in Siam (Id., vol. ii. p. 279). In China such marriages are said to be still cus- tomary. In a recent report of the proceedings of the Society of Sainte-Enfance in China, in the Asper- ance of Nancy, it is said that, in many parts, China- men may repudiate their wives, and marry again, every year. Asa result, the children belong to the mother, who has over them the power of life or death. The Same must have been the case in Turkistan (Marco Polo, ut supra, p. 99). According to Livingstone (“ Travels,” p. 394), marriage in Loando is almost un- known—an unsettled concubinage. And see Idem,

178 THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

Let us first see what is the area over which polyandry now prevails. It pre- vails universally in Tibet, and is common in the Himalayan and Sub-Himalayan regions adjoining Tibet; in the valley of Kashmir; among the Spiti, in Ladak; in Kistewar and Sirmor. It occurs

p. 436, for an example of savage indifference as to marital purity. In the Polynesian Mythology, we have an excellent casual proof of the uncertainty of male parentage, even where there is marriage (poly- gamous). A young man distinguishes himself, and turns out to be the chief’s son. He was “a young man, the name of whose father had never been told by his mother.” The lady was one of the chief’s wives! And see Turners “ Tibet,” p. 10, and M‘Cul- loch’s “Munniepore,” for examples of a system of pawning wives. See also, for similar or worse cus- toms, Buchanan’s “Journey from Madras,” 1807, vol. il. pp. 129, 492, and vol. iii. p.66; Krusenstern’s “Voy- age,” 1813, vol. ii. p. 245 (Kamschatka) ; La Perouse’s Voyage,” 1798, vol. ii, p. 195 (Island of Maouna) ;_ Maundeville, chap. xxiii. (Chatay) ; and Huc’s “Travels,” vol. ii. p. 142, Nat. Illus. Lib.

among the Telingese; in the Sivalik mountains, and in Kasia. There are un- mistakeable traces of its existence till re- cently in Gurwhal, Sylhet and Cachar. Farther south in India we find poly- andry among the Tudas of the Nil- gherry Hills, the Coorgs of Mysore, and the Nairs, the Maleres, and Poleres of Malabar. We find it off the Indian coast in Ceylon; and going eastward strike on it as an ancient though now almost superseded custom in New Zea- land, and in one or two of the Pacific Islands. Going northward we meet it again in the Aleutian Islands; and taking the continent to the west and north of the Aleutians we find it among the Koryaks to the north of the Okhotsk Sea. Cross- ing the Russian Empire to the west side we find polyandry among the Saporogian Cossacks; we thus have traced it at

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY 179

180 PIS SO VSL OL BAN SHIP

points half round the globe. This is not all, however. Polyandry is found in several parts of Africa and of America. We have the authority of Humboldt for its prevalence among the tribes on the Orinocco, and he also vouches for its former prevalence in Lancerota one of the Canary Islands.*

* Turner’s “ Tibet,” 1800, p. 348. Vigne’s “ Kash- mir,” 1842, vol. i. p. 37. Cunninghams “ Ladak,” 1854, p. 306. Buchanan’s “Journey,” etc., 1807, vol. ti. pp. 408-412. Archers “Upper India,” 1833, vol. i. p. 185. Latham’s “Descriptive Ethnology,” 1859, vol. i. pp. 24-28 ; vol. ii. pp. 398, 496, and 462. Humboldt’s “Personal Narrative” (William’s Transla- tion), 1819, chap. i, vol. i. p. 84, and vol. v., part ii, p. 549. Hamiltons “New Account of the East Indies,” 1727, vol. i, p. 274 and 308. Reade’s “Savage Africa,” p. 43. Erkman’s “Travels in Siberia,” vol. ii. p. 531. “Marriage Ceremonies,” by Seignior Gaya, 1698, pp. 70 and 96. Tennent’s “Ceylon,” 1859, vol. ii. p. 429. “Legend of Rupe,” Grey’s “Polynesian Mythology,” 1854, p. 81. “A Summer Ramble in the Himalayas,” 1860, p. 202.

oe Te See

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 181

From ancient history we learn that polyandry at one time existed over even a greater area. Traces of it remained in the time of Tacitus among the Germans.* And while in certain cantons of Media, according to Strabo, t polygunia was au- thorised by express law which ordained every inhabitant to maintain at least seven wives; in other cantons the op- posite rule was in force: a woman was allowed to have many husbands, and they looked with contempt on those who had less than five. Cæsar informs us that in his time polyandry prevailed among the

Fisher’s “Memoir of Sylhet, etc.” in Journal of Asiatic Soc., Bengal, vol. ix. p. 834. “Asiat. Res,” vol. v. Pp. 13. Our information regarding the Saporogian Cossacks has been obtained from Sir John M Neil. Ta Gennai” SE, Lathama Edn., p. 67, et seg. t Lib. L p. 709- and see Goquet, vol. iii. book

VIG i

182 LHL SY SLIEMA. OF KINSHIP

SP: AON nae SOC SANT CNT ies

Britons.* We find direct evidence of its existence among the Picts in the Irish Nennius,t not to mention traces of it in the Pictish Laws of Succession. Fur- ther we find traditions of it among the Hindus {— especially among the Raj- puts. And we find it among the Getes of Transaxiana (the Yuti or Yuechi of the Chinese historians).§ To see where

else it prevailed we must go back upon

our authorities and examine the various phases of polyandry which they present, and obtain a test for detecting its pre- sence where historical evidence of its existence is awanting.

The ruder form of polyandry, as we

* « De Bello Gallico,” lib. v., c. xiv,

t Appendix LI.

i Tod’s “ Annals, etc. of Rajasthan,” 1820, p. 48 ; and see Max Miiller’s “ Hist. of Sans. Anc. Lit.” pp. 45, et seg.; Tods “ Travels,” 1839, pi 464.

§ Tod’s “ Travels,” ut supra. 7

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 183 pe E eee

have said, is that in which the husbands are wot brothers; the less rude is that in which they ave brothers. The polyandry of the Kasias, the Nairs, and the Saporo- gian Cossacks, appears to be purely of the ruder sort, and is attended by the system of kinship through females only. It is left doubtful what.is the form of the institution in some instances, as in the

Aleutian Islands, and among the Koryaks. But in all the other cases in which poly- andry occurs, the authorities show that the ruder form occurs among the lower classes wherever the less rude occurs, except in Tibet, where polyandry is universal and the husbands are always brothers ; except in Malabar, where polyandry is universally practised by all classes, saving the Brah- mans only, but is of the ruder species among the high caste Nairs, and of the less rude among the lower castes, the

184 FH SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

Teers, Maleres, and Poleres. It is in the nature of the case that all the possible forms of polyandry must lie in between, or be embraced in, the Nair and Tibetan forms.

Let us attend then to the accounts we have of these two forms. Of the Nair polyandry we have three accounts. The account in the ‘Asiatic Researches”* is that among the Nairs it is the custom for one woman “to have attached to her two males, or four, or perhaps more, and they cohabit according to rules.” With this account that of Hamilton agrees,f except- ing that he states that a Nair woman could have no more than twelve husbands, and had to select these under certain re- strictions as to rank and caste. On the

oa Geo i3. + “Account of the East Indies,” wz supra, vol. i. p. 308.

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 185

other hand, Buchanan states* that the women after marriaget are free to co- habit with any number of men, under certain restrictions as to tribe and caste. It is consistent with the three accounts, and is directly stated by Hamil- ton, that a Nair may be one in several combinations of husbands; that is, he may have any number of wives. The accounts, however, differ in regard to one important particular. Buchanan repre- sents the wife as living in family with her mother or brother, while Hamilton represents her as having “ an house built for her own conveniency” on being mar- ried to the first of her husbands. In the

* Buchanan’s “Journey,” vol. ii. p. 411.

+ In the “Asiatic Researches” it is said, “The Nairs practice not marriage, except as far as may be implied from their tying a thread round the neck of the woman on the first occasion,” |

186 fT SP SLEU OP LIN SHIP

“ Asiatic Researches” the wife is represented as living with her mother or brother. The probability is that both arrangements are occasionally adopted, the more usual course being for the wife to remain in the family of her mother and brothers. In Ceylon, where the higher and lower poly- andry co-exist, marriage is of two sorts— Deega or Beena—according as the wife

goes to live in the house and village of

her husbands, or as the husband or hus- bands come to live with her in or near the house of her birth.* And among the Kandyans the rights of inheritance of a

* See Forbes’ “ Ceylon,” 1840, vol. i. po 333. Me Starke, late Chief-Justice of Ceylon, says that “some- times a deega married girl returned to her parents’ house and was there provided with a beena husband who lived with her in family” (private letter). The beena husband’s tenure of office seems to have been very insecure. See Forbes, wt supra. The Kandyans are now under British rule, and their marriages regu- . lated by a special ordinance.

F - - — sear aia a os es ee ges = ASE i crepe ctl pss — ie oe S m na ani = a ES a rae SR ee ea

LHROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 187

woman and her children are found to de- pend on whether the woman is a beena or

a deega wife.

The three accounts which we have of the Nair polyandry are agreed that the Nair husbands are usually not brothers— usually not relatives—and that the institu- tion leaves male parentage and the father’s blood quite uncertain. ‘ In consequence of this strange manner of propagating

the species,” says Buchanan,* “no Nair knows his father, and every man looks upon his sister’s children as his heirs.

He indeed looks upon them with the same fondness that fathers in other parts

of the world have for their own children, and he would be considered as an un- natural monster were he to show such signs of grief at the death of a child, which from long cohabitation and love

* Ut supra, vol. ii. p. 412.

188 THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

with its mother, he might suppose to be his own, as he did at the death of a child of his sister. A man’s mother manages his family; and after her death his eldest sister assumes the direction. Brothers almost always live under the same roof ; but if one of the family separates from the rest he is always accompanied by his favourite sister. A man’s movable pro- perty, after his death, is divided among the sons and daughters of all his sisters; and if there are lands, their management falls to the eldest male of the family.” * Now here, derived from the ruder polyandry, is an exceedingly rude, ¢he vudest, form of family system with which we are acquainted. And it is a sort of family system which is found, more or less modified in some of its features, in

several cases, where marriage is now

* See Buchanan, vol. ii. p. 594.

LHROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 189

either monogamous or polygamous. Its chief features are the absence of a pater- nal head, and the system of female suc- cession. Among the Kocch, with whom Marriage is now monogamous, we find the same system, excepting that the family circle includes the daughter’s hus- band, as a subordinate member of the family. A Kocch man goes, on his mar- riage, like the beena husband of Ceylon, to live in family with his wife and her mother ; on his marriage all his property is made over to his wife; and on her death her heirs are her daughters.* Here we conclude that the advance from the tuder polyandry to monogamy took place in some way consistent with the pre- servation of the main features of the family system peculiar to the ruder poly- andry — consistent with the mother’s

* “Dee, Eth yolk ip, 06.

190 THE SVSTEM OF KINSHIP

maintaining her position as the head of the family, and with an increase of the influence of women as connecting links in the social and proprietary systems. We shall presently see that the advance in this direction must be counted excep tional; at the same time it cannot well be doubted that such a family system as we find among the Kocch had its origin in the ruder species of polyandry.

What, then, was the normal line of progress? We think that we shall be able to show what it was—that it lay between the lower and higher polyandry. In the accounts we have, we can detect stages of preparation for the change from the former species of polyandry to the latter. We must regard as the rudest cases those in which the wife lives not | with her husbands, but with her mother or brothers. In these cases a woman’s

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. IQI

children are born in and belong to her mother’s house. In the cases next in order of rudeness, the wife passes into cohabitation, according to fixed rules, with the husbands, in a house of her own—becoming thus detached from her family, though still connected with it through the right of her children to be- come heirs to the family estate. Her children would still belong to her mother’s

family—the want of a community of blood and interests among the husbands preventing the appropriation of the child-

ren to them. Such cases, however—de- taching the woman from her family— would prepare the way for a species of marriage still less rude, in which the woman passed from her family, not into a house of her own, but into the family of her husbands, in which her children would be born, and to which they would

192 THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

belong. This could only happen when the husbands were all of one blood, and had common rights of property—in short, when they were brothers.

This last was a most important step inadvance. The girl of a house no longer remained at home with her mother and brothers—aiding in and succeeding to the management; she passed into another family, associating with the sons thereof as wife; while her place at home was assumed by a stranger—as wife to her brothers. There being now a commu- nity of blood and interests in the hus- bands, there was nothing to prevent the appropriation to them of her children —an appropriation which would dis- qualify the children for being heirs to the property of her mother and brothers. To give effect now to the old law of succession, would be, not to keep pro-

et A nn OS me ie Sn ran eS gst pg aaa RR aS ac ag a ESTESE T a ea

PART gnaw ne ee

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 193

perty in families, but to introduce a system of exchanges of family estates. Moreover, when this form of marriage became general, and when conjugal fide- lity was secured by penalties, we shduld expect to find that the system of kinship through males would appear—this species

of marriage allowing of certainty as to the father’s blood, though not of certainty

as to fathers. A woman's children would become the heirs of the husband’s family in which they would be born, and to which they would belong.

Now it is this highest development of polyandry, and of the family system which polyandry admitted of, which we find in Tibet.

P Says ‘Turner, speaking of | Tibet,* “we find a practice—that of poly- | andry—universally prevailing; and see

* Tumere SAN? T800, p 348.

194. THE SVSTEM OF KINSHIP |

one female associating her fate and for- tune with all the brothers of a family,

without any restriction of age or of num- _ bers. The choice of a wife is the privilege | of the elder brother The number ~ of husbands is not, as far as I could learn, defined or restricted within any limits; it sometimes happens that in a small family there is but one male; and the number, perhaps, may seldom exceed that which a native of rank, during my residence at Teshoo Loomboo, pointed out to me in a family resident in the neighbourhood, in which five brothers were then living very happily with one female, under the same connubial compact. Nor is this sort of league confined to the lower ranks of people alone: it is found also fre- quently in the most opulent families.” Let us now see to what extent poly-: andry of the Tibetan type can be traced

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 195

elsewhere than in Tibet; and what evi- dence there is of its being an advance from — the Nair species of polyandry. The autho- rities already cited* exhibit the Tibetan as the prevailing species of polyandry in nearly the whole of the Himalayan and sub-Himalayan regions: Kashmir, Ladak, Kinawer, Kistewar, and Sirmor. itis the general form of polyandry in Ceylon. It is the form which Humboldt found among the red-men. “ Among the Avaroes and the Maypures,” he says, “brothers have often but one wife.” Tt is the form which Cæsar found among the Britons. ‘“ Uxores habent deni duo- denique inter se communes, ef maxime fratres cum fratribus, et parentes cum liberis ; sed si qui sunt ex his nati, eorum habentur liberi a quibus primum virgines queeque ductz sunt.”t And to show that

ee aS ey * Ante, p. 180. t “De Bello Gallico,” v. xiv.

Bens a ae eer

= See PI a gn mae as Se cde a te mee

196 PHE SVSTAU A ZINSAS

the two forms of polyandry are stages in a progress, we repeat that almost every- where, outside Tibet, we find the lower form accompanying the higher. In some quarters the lower only is known—as in Kasia and among the Nairs. In others —Kooloo, for example—the lower form is prevalent; the higher* also is known, but is exceptional. Again, in numerous quarters the higher is the general form, and the lower the exceptional—as in Ceylon; and lastly, in some quarters, as in Tibet, we lose sight of the lower form

* Archer, in his “Upper India” (1833), v. i PP 235-6, says of the Grooah (Kooloo): “Here one woman cohabits with two, three, and four men, and they may even be all brothers; this practice is univer- sal. I was informed of the rules and modes of inter- course, all evincing a state of society least beholden to civilization, or less sophisticated than any yet known.”

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 197

altogether. The higher polyandry has become a national institution. | And finding the higher polyandry a National institution, we observe that we are in a position to show that most pro- | bably polyandry formerly prevailed over | a still vaster area than that within which | we have hitherto found it. We have | seen that with polyandry, of the Tibetan type, wherever it was long and generally established, kinship through males must have been introduced ; the father’s blood, though not the father, being certain, where the wife was faithful. We have

also seen, in the case of the Britons, that the children of the woman were accounted

to belong to the husband who first es- poused her; and that in Tibet, the right of choosing the wife belongs to the eldest brother, to whom, also, the children of

the marriage are held to belong. We O

Sp a S a

198 THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

must now, to obtain what we have been in search of—a test of the former presence of polyandry—look at the Tibetan form of polyandry in a state of decadence. We find it in such a state in Ladak. “In Ladak,” says Moorcroft,* “when an eldest son marries, the property of his father (more properly the family estate) descends to him, and he is charged with the maintenance of his parents. The parents may continue to live with him, if

he and his wife please; if not, a separate dwelling is provided for them.t A

younger son is usually made a Lama. Should there be more brothers, and they agree to the arrangement, the juniors become inferior husbands to the wife;

* Moorcroft’s and Trebeck’s “Travels,” 1841, V- i. p. 320.

+ See M‘Culloch’s “Munniepore,” pp. 8 and 67, for a similar custom among the Loohoopas.

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 100 s re all the children, however, are considered as belonging to the head of the family. The younger brothers have no authority ; they wait upon the elder as his servants, and can be turned out of doors at his pleasure, without it being incumbent upon him to provide for them. Oz the death of the eldest brother, his property, authority, and widow, devolve upon his next brother.” And that whether the

younger brother has agreed to the poly- androus arrangement or not. He has a a customary right of succession to his brother’s property, and to his widow, and he cannot take the one without taking the

other.

Here we are brought to consider the meaning and origin of the legal obli- gation which we find laid on younger brothers, among certain peoples, to marry in their turn the widow of their de-

200 THE SVSTEM OF KINSHIP

ceased elder brother. There can be no doubt that that obligation was in its origin the counterpart of a legal right of

succession. It is so with the’ Kirghiz, Aenezes, and Mongols—the next brother being heir even where the elder leaves issue. i

When history begins, the Hebrew law preferred the issue to the next brother ; but when he or the next of kin succeeded, it was on the old footing. This is clear from the book of Ruth.* The heveditatis emptor of the deceased took to wife at the same time his widow, “to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheri- tance.” The obligation to marry the widow was the counterpart of the right of succession. And we can see the con- nection between the obligation and heir-

* Chap. iv. ver. 6.

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 201

ship dropping slowly out of view. In Deuteronomy* it is provided that the husband’s brother shall “perform the duty of an husband’s brother” to the widow, only when the brethren dwell together, and one of them dies childless. The obligation is here presented pure— as a duty falling on the brother, which it was disgraceful to neglect.

In India, by the time when the In- stitutes of Menu were compiled, the ob- ligation was laid on the brother only in Case the deceased left no son. Grave doubts had arisen as to the extent and propriety of the obligation, the number of sons to be begotten on the widow, t and the terms on which the brother Should live with her. “The first object of the appointment being obtained, ac-

* Chap. xxv, ver. 5-10. + Chap. ix. ver. 61, 62.

202 THE SYSTEM OF KINSHIP

cording to law, both the brother and the widow must live together like a father and daughter by affinity.” Again, it is doubted whether the obligation extends to the twice-born classes. “ Such a com- mission to a brother or other near kins- man is nowhere mentioned in the nuptial texts of the Veda. . . . This practice, fit only for cattle, is reprehended by learned Brahmans ; yet it is declared to have been the practice even of men while Vena had sovereign power.”* Yet elsewhere in the code the obligation is contemplated as legal, and provision is made for the rights of succession of the issue of the Levirate union. “ Should a younger bro- ther have begotten a son on the wife of his deceased elder brother, the division (of the estate) must then be made equally

* Chap. ix. ver. 66,

THROUGH FEMALES ONLY. 203

between that son, who represents the de- ceased, and his natural father: thus is the law settled.” We repeat, that in Menu’s time the obligation had not only been, to some extent, dissociated from the corresponding right of inheritance, but was falling into disrepute. We see it also falling into desuetude among the Hebrews. In the earliest age the Levir had no alternative but to take the widow; indeed she was his wife without any form of marriage.* By the Mosaic Law, how- ever, he might get quit of her if he chose by submitting to the ceremony of “ loos- ing the shoe.”

It is impossible not to believe that we have here presented to us successive Stages of decay of one and the same ori- ginal institution ; impossible not to con-