CHAPTER XXVI

240Institutes of Vishnu, xxxi. 7.Laws of Manu, ii. 230.

241Institutes of Vishnu, xxxi. 9sq.Cf.Laws of Manu, ii. 233sq.

242Plato,Leges, ix. 881.

243Institutes of Vishnu, lxxxii. 28sqq.

244Vasishtha, xv. 19sq.

245Baudháyana, iii. 6. 5.Institutes of Vishnu, xlviii. 20.

246Dhammapada, 109.

247Griffis,Corea, p. 236.

248Precepts of Ptah-Hotep, 39.

249Clavigero,op. cit.i. 332. Torquemada,Monarchia Indiana, ii. 493.

250Torquemada,op. cit.ii. 415.

251Veniaminof, quoted by Petroff,loc. cit.p. 155.

252Mariner,op. cit.ii. 237, 155.

253Ibid.ii. 238.

Why are the blessings and curses of parents supposed to possess such an extraordinary power? One reason is no doubt the mystery of old age and the nearness of death. As appears from several of the cases already referred to, it is not parents only but old people generally that are held capable of giving due effect to their good and evil wishes, and this capacity is believed to increase when life is drawing to its close. The Herero “know really no blessing save that conferred by the father on his death-bed.”254According to old Teutonic ideas, the curse of a dying person was the strongest of all curses.255A similar notion prevailed among the ancient Arabs;256and among the Hebrews the father’s mystic privilege of determining the weal or woe of his children was particularly obvious when his days were manifestly numbered.257But, at the same time, parental benedictions and imprecations possess a potency of their own owing to the parents’ superior position in the family and the respect in which they are naturally held. The influence which such a superiority has upon the efficacy of curses is well brought out by various facts. According to the Greek notion, the Erinyes avenged wrongs done by younger members of a family to elder ones, even brothers and sisters, but notvice versâ.258The Arabs of Morocco say that the curse of a husband is as potent as that of a father. The Tonga Islanders believethat curses have no effect “if the party who curses is considerably lower in rank than the party cursed.”259Moreover, where the father was invested with sacerdotal functions—as was the case among the ancient nations of culture—his blessings and curses would for that reason also be efficacious in an exceptional degree.260

254Ratzel,History of Mankind, ii. 468.

255Grimm,Teutonic Mythology, iv. 1690.

256Wellhausen,Reste arabischen Heidentums, pp. 139, 191.

257Cheyne, inEncyclopædia Biblica, i. 592.

258Iliad, xv. 204: “Thou knowest how the Erinyes do always follow to aid the elder-born.”Cf.Müller,Dissertations on the Eumenides, p. 155sq.

259Mariner,op. cit.ii. 238.

260Cf.Nowack, inJewish Encyclopedia, iii. 243sq.

However, the facts which we have hitherto considered are hardly sufficient to account for the extraordinary development of the paternal authority in the archaic State. Great though it be, the influence which magic and religious beliefs exercise upon the paternal authority is, as we have just seen, largely of a reactive character. A father’s blessings would not be so eagerly sought for, nor would his curses be so greatly feared, if he were a less important personage in the family. So, too, as Sir Henry Maine aptly remarks, the father’s power is older than the practice of worshipping him. “Why should the dead father be worshipped more than any other member of the household unless he was the most prominent—it may be said, the most awful—figure in it during his life?”261We must assume that there exists some connection between the organisation of the family and the political constitution of the society. At the lower stages of civilisation—though hardly at the very lowest—we frequently find that the clan has attained such an overwhelming importance that only a very limited amount of authority could be claimed by the head of each separate family. But, as will be shown in a following chapter, this was changed when clans and tribes were united into a State. The new State tended to weaken and destroy the clan-system, whereas at the same time the family-tie grew in strength. In early society there seems to be an antagonism between the family and the clan. Where the clan-bond is very strong it encroaches upon the family feeling, and where it is loosened the family gains. Hence Dr. Grosse is probably right in hisassumption that the father became a patriarch, in the true sense of the word, only as the inheritor of the authority which formerly belonged to the clan.262

261Maine,Early Law and Custom, p. 76.

262Grosse,Die Formen der Familie, p. 219.

But whilst in its early days the State strengthened the family by weakening the clan, its later development had a different tendency. When national life grew more intense, when members of separate families drew nearer to one another in pursuit of a common goal, the family again lost in importance. It has been observed that in England and America, where political life is most highly developed, children’s respect for their parents is at a particularly low ebb.263Other factors also, inherent in progressive civilisation, contributed to the downfall of the paternal power—the extinction of ancestor-worship, the decay of certain superstitious beliefs, the declining influence of religion, and last, but not least, the spread of a keener mutual sympathy throughout the State, which could not tolerate that the liberty of children should be sacrificed to the despotic rule of their fathers.

263Monier Williams,Indian Wisdom, p. 440, n. 1.

AMONGthe lower races, as a rule, a woman is always more or less in a state of dependence. When she is emancipated by marriage from the power of her father, she generally passes into the power of her husband. But the authority which the latter possesses over his wife varies extremely among different peoples.

Frequently the wife is said to be the property or slave of her husband. In Fiji “the women are kept in great subjection…. Like other property, wives may be sold at pleasure, and the usual price is a musket.”1“The Carib woman is always in bondage to her male relations. To her father, brother, or husband she is ever a slave, and seldom has any power in the disposal of herself.”2Many North American Indians are said to treat their wives much as they treat their dogs.3Among the Shoshones “the man is the sole proprietor of his wives and daughters, and can barter them away, or dispose of them in any manner he may think proper.”4Among the East African Wanika a woman “is a toy, a tool, a slave in the very worst sense; indeed she is treated as though she were amere brute.”5Many other statements to a similar effect are met with in ethnographical literature.6

1Wilkes,U.S. Exploring Expedition, iii. 332.

2Brett,Indian Tribes of Guiana, p. 353.

3Harmon,Journal of Voyages in the Interior of North America, p. 344.

4Lewis and Clarke,Travels to the Source of the Missouri River, p. 307.

5New,Life, Wanderings, and Labourings in Eastern Africa, p. 119.

6Gibbs, ‘Tribes of Western Washington and Northwestern Oregon,’ inContributions to N. American Ethnology, i. 198. von Martius,Beiträge zur Ethnographie Amerika’s, i. 104 (Brazilian Indians). Reade,Savage Africa, p. 548 (Negroes of Equatorial Africa). Proyart, ‘History of Loango,’ in Pinkerton,Collection of Voyages and Travels, xvi. 570 (Negroes of Loango). Andersson,Notes on Travel in South Africa, p. 236 (Ovambo). Castrén,Nordiska resor och forskningar, i. 310; ii. 56 (Ostyaks). In all these cases women are said to be mere articles of commerce, or slaves, or kept in a state of dependence bordering on slavery. In other instances women are said to be oppressed by their husbands, or treated as inferior beings (Waitz [-Gerland],Anthropologie der Naturvölker, iii. 100 [North American Indians]; vi. 626 [Melanesians]. Bancroft,Native Races of the Pacific States, i. 121 [Hare and Sheep Indians]. Powers,Tribes of California, p. 133 [Yuki]. Tuckey,Expedition to Explore the River Zaire, p. 371 [Negroes]. Ling Roth,Aborigines of Tasmania, p. 54).

Yet it seems that even in cases where the husband’s power over his wife is described as absolute, custom has not left her entirely destitute of rights. Of the Australian aborigines in general it is said that “the husband is the absolute owner of his wife (or wives)”;7of the natives of Central Australia, that “each father of a family rules absolutely over his own circle”;8of certain tribes in West Australia, that the state of slavery in which the women are kept is truly deplorable, and that the mere presence of their husbands makes them tremble.9But we have reason to believe that there is some exaggeration in these statements, and they certainly do not hold good of the whole Australian race. We have noticed above that custom does not really allow the Australian husband full liberty to kill his wife.10For punishing or divorcing her he must sometimes have the consent of the tribe.11There are even cases in which a wife whose husband has been unfaithful to her may complain of his conduct to the elders of the tribe, and he may have to suffer for it.12In North-West-Central Queensland the women are on one special occasionallowed themselves to inflict punishments upon the men: at a certain stage of the initiation ceremony “each woman can exercise her right of punishing any man who may have ill-treated, abused, or ‘hammered’ her, and for whom she may have waited months or perhaps years to chastise.”13Of the natives of Central Australia Messrs. Spencer and Gillen say that “the women are certainly not treated usually with anything which could be called excessive harshness”;14and we hear from various authorities that in several Australian tribes married people are often much attached to each other, and continue to be so even when they grow old.15Among the aborigines of New South Wales, for instance, “the husbands are as a general rule fond of their wives, and the wives loyal and affectionate to their husbands.”16Nay, white men who have lived among the blacks assure us that there are henpecked husbands even in the Australian desert.17

7Curr,The Australian Race, i. 109.

8Eyre,Expeditions of Discovery into Central Australia, ii. 317.

9Salvado,Mémoires historiques sur l’Australie, p. 279. For other similar statements referring to the Australian aborigines, see Nieboer,Slavery as an Industrial System, p. 11.

10Supra,p. 418.

11Nieboer,op. cit.p. 17.

12Ibid.p. 18.

13Roth,Ethnol. Studies among the North-West-Central Queensland Aborigines, pp. 141, 176.

14Spencer and Gillen,Native Tribes of Central Australia, p. 50.

15Westermarck,History of Human Marriage, p. 359. Stirling,Report of the Horn Expedition to Central Australia, Anthropology, p. 36.

16Hill and Thornton,Aborigines of New South Wales, p. 7.

17Calvert,Aborigines of Western Australia, p. 31.

Other instances may be added to show that the so-called absolute authority of husbands over their wives is not to be taken too literally. Of the Guiana Indians Sir E. F. Im Thurn observes:—“The woman is held to be as completely the property of the man as his dog. He may even sell her if he chooses.”18But in another place the same authority admits not only that the women in a quiet way may have a considerable influence with the men, but that, “even if the men were—though this is in fact quite contrary to their nature—inclined to treat them cruelly, public opinion would prevent this.”19Of the Plains Indians of the United States Colonel Dodge writes:—“The husband owns his wife entirely. He may abuse her, beat her, even kill her without question. She is more absolutely a slave than any negro before the war of rebellion.” Buton the following page we are told that custom gives to every married woman of the tribes “the absolute right to leave her husband and become the wife of any other man, the sole condition being that the new husband must have the means to pay for her.”20Among the Chippewyans the women are said to be “as much in the power of the men as any other articles of their property,” although, at the same time, “they are always consulted, and possess a very considerable influence in the traffic with Europeans, and other important concerns.”21Among the Mongols a woman is “entirely dependent on her husband”; yet “in the household the rights of the wife are nearly equal to those of the husband.”22Dr. Paulitschke tells us that among the Somals, Danakil, and Gallas, a wife has no rights whatever in relation to her husband, being merely a piece of property; but subsequently we learn that she is his equal, and “a mistress of her own will.”23We must certainly not, like Mr. Spencer, conclude that where women are exchangeable for oxen or other beasts they are “of course” regarded as equally without personal rights.24The bride-price is a compensation for the loss sustained in the giving up of the girl, and a remuneration for the expenses incurred in her maintenance till the time of her marriage;25it does noteo ipsoconfer on the husband absolute rights over her. With reference to certain tribes in South-Eastern Africa, the Rev. James Macdonald observes:—“A man obtains a wife by giving her father a certain number of cattle. This, though often called such, is not purchase in the usual sense of the word. The woman does not become a chattel. She cannot be resold or ill-treated beyond well-defined legal limits. She retains certain rights to property and an interest in the cattle paid for her. They are a guarantee for the husband’s goodbehaviour.”26There are even peoples among whom the husband’s authority hardly exists, although he has had to pay for his wife.27

18Im Thurn,Indians of Guiana, p. 223.

19Ibid.p. 215.

20Dodge,Our Wild Indians, p. 205sq.

21Mackenzie,Voyages to the Frozen and Pacific Oceans, p. cxxii.sq.Schoolcraft,Archives of Aboriginal Knowledge, v. 176.

22Prejevalsky,Mongolia, i. 69sqq.

23Paulitschke,Ethnographie Nordost-Afrikas, pp. 189, 190, 244.

24Spencer,Principles of Sociology, i. 750.

25Westermarck,History of Human Marriage, p. 402.

26Macdonald,Light in Africa, p. 159.

27E.g., the Navahos and Pelew Islanders (Westermarck,op. cit.pp. 392, 393, 398sq.For the position of wives among these peoples, seeinfra, pp.638,643).

Among many peoples the hardest drudgeries of life are said to be imposed on the women. Among the Kutchin “the women are literally beasts of burden to their lords and masters. All the heavy work is performed by them.”28The Californian Karok, while on a journey, lays by far the greatest burdens on his wife, whom he regards as a drudge.29Among the Kenistenos the life of the women is an uninterrupted succession of toil and pain, hence “they are sometimes known to destroy their female children, to save them from the miseries which they themselves have suffered.”30“The condition of the women among the Chaymas,” says von Humboldt, “like that in all semi-barbarous nations, is a state of privation and suffering. The hardest labour is their share.”31Among the Australian aborigines “wives have to undergo all the drudgery of the camp and the march, have the poorest food and the hardest work.”32In Eastern Central Africa “the women hold an inferior position. They are viewed as beasts of burden, which do all the harder work.”33Among the Kakhyens “the men are averse to labour, but the lot of all women, irrespective of rank, is one of drudgery”;34and so forth.35But it seems thatthese and similar statements, however correct they be, hardly express the whole truth. In early society each sex has its own pursuits. The man is responsible for the protection of the family, and, ultimately, for its support. His occupations are such as require strength and agility—fighting, hunting, fishing, the construction of implements for the chase and war, and, frequently, the cutting of trees and the building of lodges.36The woman may accompany him as a helpmate on his expeditions, sometimes even participating in the battle,37and when they travel she generally carries the baggage. But her principal occupations are universally of a domestic kind: she procures wood and water, prepares the food, dresses skins, makes clothes, takes care of the children. She, moreover, supplies the household with vegetable food, gathers roots, berries, acorns, and so forth, and among agricultural peoples very frequently cultivates the soil. Whilst cattle-rearing, having developed out of the chase, is largely a masculine pursuit,38agriculture, having developed out of collecting seeds and plants, originally devolves on the women.39

28Hardisty, ‘Loucheux Indians,’ inSmithsonian Report, 1866, p. 312.

29Powers,op. cit.p. 23sq.

30Schoolcraft,Archives of Aboriginal Knowledge, v. 167.

31von Humboldt,Personal Narrative of Travels, iii. 238.

32Curr,The Australian Race, i. 110.

33Macdonald,Africana, i. 35.

34Anderson,Mandalay to Momien, p. 137.

35For other instances, see Mackenzie,Voyages to the Frozen and Pacific Oceans, p. 147 (Rocky Mountain Indians); Parker, in Schoolcraft,Archives, v. 684 (Comanches); Im Thurn,op. cit.p. 215 (Guiana Indians); Keane, ‘Botocudos,’ inJour. Anthr. Inst.xiii. 206; Weddell,Voyage towards the South Pole, p. 156, Darwin,Journal of Researches, p. 216, and Bove,Patagonia, p. 131 (Fuegians); Nieboer,op. cit.p. 13sqq.(Australian aborigines); Williams and Calvert,Fiji, p. 145; Forster,Voyage round the World, ii. 324 (natives of Tana, of the New Hebrides); Zimmermann,Inseln des indischen und stillen Meeres, ii. 17 (New Caledonians), 105 (New Irelanders); Lewin,Wild Races of South-Eastern India, pp. 192 (Toungtha), 254sq.(Kukis); Rowney,Wild Tribes of India, p. 214 (most of the wild tribes of India); Reade,op. cit.pp. 51, 259, 545 (various African peoples); Waitz,Anthropologie der Naturvölker, ii. 117 (Negroes); Valdau, ‘Om Ba-Kwileh folket,’ inYmer, v. 167, 169.

36See Spencer,Principles of Sociology, i. 750sqq.

37For women taking part in battles, see Schoolcraft,Indian Tribes of the United States, i. 236 (Comanches); Powers,op. cit.pp. 246 (Shastika Indians of California), 253 (Modok Indians of California); Waitz [-Gerland],op. cit.iii. 375 (Caribs), vi. 121 (Maoris); Wilkes,op. cit.v. 93 (Kingsmill Islanders); Kotzebue,Voyage of Discovery into the South Sea, iii. 171 (natives of Radack).

38Grosse,Die Formen der Familie, p. 92sqq.

39Ibid.p. 159. Hildebrand,Recht und Sitte auf den verschiedenen wirthschaftlichen Kulturstufen, p. 44sqq.Dargun, ‘Ursprung und Entwicklungsgeschichte des Eigenthums,’ inZeitschr. f. vergl. Rechtswiss.v. 39, 110. Bücher,Die Entstehung der Volkswirthschaft, p. 36sqq.Schurtz,Das afrikanische Gewerbe, p. 7. Ling Roth, ‘Origin of Agriculture,’ inJour. Anthr. Inst.xvi. 119sq.Mason,Woman’s Share in Primitive Culture, pp. 15sqq., 146sqq., 277sq.Havelock Ellis,Man and Woman, p. 5. von den Steinen,Unter den Naturvölkern Zentral-Brasiliens, p. 214. von Schuetz-Holzhausen,Der Amazonas, p. 67 (Peruvian Indians). Waitz,op. cit.iii. 376 (Caribs). Prescott, in Schoolcraft,Indian Tribes of the United States, i. 235 (Dacotahs). Colden,ibid.iii. 191; Seaver,Narrative of the Life of Mrs. Mary Jemison, p. 168 (Iroquois). ‘Die Baluga-Negritos der Provinz Pampanga (Luzon),’ inGlobus, xli. 238. Zöller,Kamerun, iii. 58 (Banaka and Bapuku). Möller, Pagels, and Gleerup,Tre år i Kongo, i. 129, 137 (Kuilu Negroes), 270 (Bakongo). Valdau, inYmer, v. 165 (Bakwileh). Burrows, ‘Natives of the Upper Welle District,’ inJour. Anthr. Inst.xxviii. 41 (Niam-Niam). New,op. cit.pp. 114 (Wanika), 359 (Wataveta). Stuhlmann,Mit Emin Pascha ins Herz von Afrika, p. 182 (Waganda). Pogge,Im Reiche des Muata Jamwo, p. 243 (Kalunda of Mussumba). Decle,Three Years in Savage Africa, pp. 78, 79, 85 (Barotse), 160 (Matabele). von Weber,Vier Jahre in Afrika, ii. 195 (Zulus). There are, however, exceptions to the rule. Among the Creeks and Cherokee Indians not a third part as many women as men are seen at work in their plantations (Bartram, inTrans. American Ethn. Soc.iii. pt i. 31). Among the Wakamba both sexes work in the fields, all heavy work, such as clearing and breaking new ground, being done by men (Decle,op. cit.p. 493). Among various peoples, indeed, such agricultural work as requires considerable strength devolves on the male sex (Hildebrand,op. cit.p. 44sqq.Havelock Ellis,Man and Woman, p. 5). In the Malay Archipelago the men are chiefly engaged in the field-work (Ratzel,History of Mankind, i. 441). In the Kingsmill Islands (Wilkes,op. cit.v. 91), Tonga (Cook,Voyage to the Pacific Ocean, i. 390sqq.), and the Caroline Group (Cantova, quotedibid.i. 392, note) the soil is cultivated by the men. Among the Gallas, “whilst the women tend the sheep and oxen in the field, and manage the hives of bees, the men plough, sow, and reap” (Harris,Highlands of Aethiopia, iii. 47).

The various occupations of life are thus divided between the sexes according to rules; and, though the formation of these rules no doubt has been more or less influenced by the egoism of the stronger sex, the essential principle from which they spring lies deeper. They are on the whole in conformity with the indications which nature herself has given. Take, for instance, the apparently cruel custom of using the women as beasts of burden. To the superficial observer, as M. Pinart remarks—with special reference to the Panama Indians,—it may indeed seem strange that the woman should be charged with a heavy load, while the man walking before her carries nothing but his weapons. But a little reflection will make it plain that the man has good reason for keeping himself free and mobile. The little caravan is surrounded with dangers: when traversing a savannah or a forest a hostile Indian may appear at any moment, or a tiger or a snake may lie in wait for the travellers. Hence the man must be on the alert, and ready in an instant to catch his arms to defend himself and his family against the aggressor.40Dobrizhoffer writes, “The luggage being all committed to the women, the Abipones travel armedwith a spear alone, that they may be disengaged to fight or hunt, if occasion require.”41

40Pinart, quoted by Nieboer,op. cit.p. 21.

41Dobrizhoffer,Account of the Abipones, ii. 118.Cf.Wied-NeuwiedReise nach Brasilien, ii. 17, 37 (Botocudos); Giddings,Principles of Sociology, p. 266sq.

Moreover, whatever may have been the original reason for allotting a certain occupation to the one sex to the exclusion of the other, any such restriction has subsequently been much emphasised by custom, and in many cases by superstition as well.42In Africa it is a common belief that the cattle get ill if women have anything to do with them.43Hence among most Negro races milking is only permitted to men.44In South-Eastern Africa “a woman must not enter the cattle fold.”45The Bechuanas never allow women to touch their cattle, hence the men have to plough themselves.46In North America Indian custom and superstition ordain that the wife must carefully keep away from all that belongs to her husband’s sphere of action.47On the other hand, among the Dacotahs “the men do not often interfere with the work of the women; neither will they help them if they can avoid it, for fear of being laughed at and called a woman.”48In Abyssinia “it is infamy for a man to go to market to buy anything. He cannot carry water or bake bread; but he must wash the clothes belonging to both sexes, and, in this function, the women cannot help him.”49Among the Beni Aḥsen tribe in Morocco the women of the village where I was staying were quite horrified when one of my native servants set out to fetch water; they would on no account allow him to do what they said was a woman’s business. The Greenlander regards it as scandalous for a man to interfere with any occupation which belongs to the women. When he has brought his booty to land, he troubles himself no further about it; “for it would be a stigma on his character,if he so much as drew a seal out of the water.”50Among the Bakongo a man would be much ridiculed by the women themselves, if he wanted to help them in their work in the field.51Sometimes agriculture is supposed to be dependent for success on a magic quality in woman, intimately connected with child-bearing.52Some Orinoco Indians said to Father Gumilla:—“When the women plant maize the stalk produces two or three ears; when they set the manioc the plant produces two or three baskets of root; and thus everything is multiplied. Why? Because women know how to produce children, and know how to plant the corn so as to ensure its germinating. Then, let them plant it; we do not know so much as they do.”53

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