The Truth About Woman Part 10

VII. It is important to note that the causes which led to the change in the position of the s.e.xes had no direct connection with moral development; it was not due, as many have held, to the recognition of fatherhood. The cause was quite different and was founded on property.

It arose, in the first instance, through a property value being connected with women themselves. As soon as the women's kin began to see in their women a means by exchange of obtaining wives for themselves, and also the possibility of gaining worldly goods, both in the property held by women, and by means of the service and presents that could be claimed from their lovers, we find them exercising more or less strict supervision over the alliances of their female relatives.

VIII. At first, and for a long time, the early freedom of women persisted in the widely spread custom of a preliminary period before marriage of unrestricted s.e.xual relationships. But permanent unions became subject to the consent of the woman's kindred.

It was in this way, I am certain, and for no moral considerations that the stringency of the s.e.xual code was first tightened for women.

IX. At a much later date virginity came to have a special market-value, from which time a jealous watch began to be kept upon maidenhood.

It seems to me of very great importance that women should grasp firmly this truth: the virtue of chast.i.ty owes its origin to property. Our minds fall so readily under the spell of such ideas as chast.i.ty and purity. There is a ma.s.s of real superst.i.tion on this question--a belief in a kind of magic in purity. But, indeed, chast.i.ty had at first no connection with morals. The sense of ownership has been the seed-plot of our moral code. To it we are indebted for the first germs of the s.e.xual inhibitions which, sanctified by religion and supported by custom, have, under the unreasoned idealism of the common mind, filled life with cruelties and jealous exclusions, with suicides and murders and secret shames.

X. This intrusion of economics into the s.e.xual relationships brought about the revolution in the status of women. As soon as women became s.e.xually marketable, their early power was doomed. First came what I hold to have been the transitional stage of the mother-age. This will explain how it is that, even where matrilineal descent is in full force, we may find the patriarchal subjection of women. The mother's authority has been usurped by her male kindred, usually her brother.

XI. We have noted the alien position of the father even among peoples at a stage of development where paternity was fully established. This subjection, which, perhaps, would not be felt in the earlier stage of mother-right, must have been increased by the intrusion of the authority of the wife's male kindred. The impulse to dominate by virtue of strength or of property possessions has manifested itself in every age. As society advanced property would increase in value, and the social and political significance of its possession would also increase. It is clear that such a position of insecurity for the husband and father would tend to become impossible.

XII. One way of escape--which doubtless took place at a very early stage--was by the capture of women. Side by side with the customary marriages in which the husband resided in the home of the wife, without rights and subject to her clan-kindred, we find the practice of a man keeping one or more captive wives in his own home for his use and service. It will be readily seen that the special rights in the home over these owned wives (rights, moreover, that were recognised by the tribe) would come to be desired by other men. But the capture of wives was always difficult as it frequently led to a quarrel and even warfare with the woman's tribe, and for this reason was never widely practised. It would, therefore, be necessary for another way of escape to be found. This was done by changing the conditions of the customary marriage. Nor do I think it unlikely that such change may have been received favourably by women. The captive wives may even have been envied by the regular wife. An arrangement that would give a more individual relationship to marriage and the protection of a husband for herself and the children of their union may well have been preferred by woman to her position of subjection that had now arisen to the authority of her brother or other male relative. The alteration from the old custom may thus be said to have been due, in part, to the interests of the husband, but also, in part, to the inclination of the wife.

XIII. The change was gained by elopement, by simulated capture, by the gift or exchange of women, and by the payment of a bride-price. The bride-price came to be the most usual custom, gradually displacing the others. As we have seen, it was often regarded as a condition, not of the marriage itself, but of the transfer of the wife to the home of the husband and of the children to his kin.

XIV. It was in this way, for economic reasons, and the personal needs of both the woman and the man, and not, I believe, specially through the fighting propensities of the males, and certainly not by any unfair domination or tyranny on the part of the husband that the position of the s.e.xes was reversed.

XV. But be this as it may, to woman the result was no less far-reaching and disastrous. She had become the property of one master, residing in her husband's tribe, which had no rights or duties in regard to her, where she was a stranger, perhaps speaking a different language. And her children kept her bound to this alien home in a much closer way than the husband could ever have been bound to her home under the earlier custom. Woman's early power rested in her organised position among her own kin: this was now lost.

XVI. The change was not brought about quickly. For long the mother's influence persisted as a matter of habit. We have its rather empty shadow with us to-day.

XVII. But, under the pressure of the new conditions, the old custom of tracing descent and the inheritance of property in the female line (so favourable to women) died. Mother-right pa.s.sed away, remaining only as a tradition, or practised in isolated cases among primitive peoples.

The patriarchal age, which still endures, succeeded. Women became slaves, who of old had been dominant.

One final word more.

The opinion that the subjection of women arose from male mastery, or was due to any special cruelty, must be set aside. To me the history of the mother-age does not teach this. I believe this charge could not have arisen, at all events it would not have persisted, if women, with the power they then enjoyed, had not desired the gaining of a closer relationship with the father of their children. With all the evils that father-right has brought to woman, we have got to remember that woman owes the individual relation of the man to herself and her children to the patriarchal system. The father's right in his children (which, unlike the right of the mother, was not founded on kinship, but rested on the quite different and insecure basis of property) had to be established. Without this being done, the family in its full and perfect development was impossible. We women need to remember this, lest bitterness stains our sense of justice. It may be that progress social and moral could not have been accomplished otherwise; that the cost of love's development has been the enslavement of woman. If so, then women will not, in the long account of Nature, have lost in the payment of the price. They may be (when they come at last to understand the truth) better fitted for their refound freedom.

Neither mother-right alone, nor father-right alone, can satisfy the new ideals of the true relationship of the s.e.xes. The spiritual force, slowly unfolding, that has uplifted, and is still uplifting, womanhood, is the foundation of woman's claim that the further progress of humanity is bound up with her restoration to a position of freedom and human equality. But this position she must not take from man--that, indeed, would be a step backwards. No, she is to share it with him, and this for her own sake and for his, and, more than all, for the sake of their children and all the children of the race.

This replacement of the mother side by side with the father in the home and in the larger home of the State is the true work of the Woman's Movement.

FOOTNOTES:

[97] It is abundantly evident to any one who looks carefully into the past that s.e.x occupied a large share of the consciousness of primitive races. The elaborate courtship rites and s.e.x festivals alone give proof of this. It is, unfortunately, impossible for me to follow this question and give examples. I must refer the reader to H. Ellis's _Psychology of s.e.x_, Vol. III. pp. 34-44, where a number of typical cases are given of the courtship customs of the primitive peoples. See also Thomas, _s.e.x and Society_, chapter on "The Psychology of Exogamy," pp. 175-179.

[98] This is the mistake that Westermark--in his valuable _History of Human Marriage_--as well as many writers have fallen into; a.s.suming that because monogamy is found among man's nearest ancestors, the anthropoid apes, primitive human groups must have had a tendency towards monogamy. Whereas the exact opposite of this is true. There is, it would seem, a deeply rooted dislike in studying s.e.x matters to face truth. This habit of fear explains the many elaborate efforts undertaken to establish the theory that primitive races practised a stricter s.e.xual code than the facts prove. Letourneau, in _The Evolution of Marriage_, appears to adopt this view, and forces evidence in trying to prove the non-existence of a widespread early period of promiscuity (pp. 37-44). Mention may be made, on the other side, of Iwan Bloch, who, writing from a different standpoint and much deeper psychology, has no doubt at all of the early existence of, and even the continued tendency towards, promiscuity.--_The s.e.xual Life of Our Times_, pp. 188-195.

[99] Our knowledge of the habits of primitive races has increased greatly of late years. The cla.s.sical works of Bachofen, Waitz, Kulischer, Giraud-Teulon, von h.e.l.lwald, Krauss, Ploss-Bartels and other ethnologists, and the investigation of Morgan, McLennan, Muller, and many others, have opened up wide sources of information.

[100] Thomas, _s.e.x and Society_, p. 68, and Letourneau, _Evolution of Marriage_, pp. 269-270, 320.

[101] Lubbock, _Origin of Civilisation_, p. 9.

[102] This opinion is founded on the anthropological investigations during the past half century. See Hartland, _Primitive Paternity_, Vol. I. pp. 256-257; H. Ellis, _Psychology of s.e.x_, Vol. VI. pp.

390-382, and "The Changing Status of Women," _Westminster Review_, October 1886; Thomas, _s.e.x and Society_, p. 58, and Bloch, _s.e.xual History of our Times_, pp. 190-196.

[103] For a full and illuminative treatment of this subject I would refer my readers to the essays of Professor Karl Pearson, _The Chances of Death_, Vol. II.--"Woman as Witch: Evidences of Mother-Right in the Customs of Mediaeval Witchcraft"; "Ashiepattle, or Hans Seeks his Luck"; "Kindred Group Marriage," Part I.; "The Mother-Age Civilisation," Part II.; "General Words for s.e.x and Kinship," Part III.; "Special Words for s.e.x and Relationship." In these suggestive essays Professor Pearson has brought together a great number of facts which give a new and charming significance to the early position of women. Perhaps the most interesting essay is that of "Woman as Witch,"

in which he shows that the beliefs and practices connected with mediaeval witchcraft were really perverted rites, survivals of mother-age customs.

[104] Bede, II. 1-7.

[105] F. Frazer, _Golden Bough_, Pt. I. _The Magic Art_, Vol. II. pp.

282-283. Canute's marriage was clearly one of policy: Emma was much older than he was, she was then living in Normandy, and it is doubtful if the Danish king had ever seen her. Such marriages with the widow of a king were common. The familiar example of Hamlet's uncle is one, who, after murdering his brother, married his wife, and became king.

His acceptance by the people, in spite of his crime, is explained if it was the old Danish custom for marriage with the king's widow to carry the kingdom with it. In Hamlet's position as avenger, and his curious hesitancy, we have really an indication of the conflict between the old and new ways of reckoning descent.

[106] Strabo, IV. 5, 4. Hartland, _Primitive Paternity_, Vol. II. p.

132. It must not be thought that mother-descent was always accompanied by promiscuity, or even with what we should call laxity of morals. We shall find that it was not. But the early custom of group marriages was frequent, in which women often changed their mates at will, and perhaps retained none of them long. We shall see that this freedom, whatever were its evils, carried with it many privileges for women.

[107] H. Ellis, citing Rhys and Brynmor-Jones, _The Welsh People_, p.

214.

[108] Gen. xxiv. 5-53.

[109] Gen. x.x.xi. 41, 43.

[110] Judges xv. 1.

[111] Num. x.x.xii. 8-11.

[112] Letourneau, _Evolution of Marriage_, p. 326.

[113] Num. x.x.xvi. 4-8.

[114] Gen. xii.

[115] 2 Sam. xiii. 16.

[116] Exod. vi. 20.

[117] Gen. xi. 26-29.

[118] See Thomas, _s.e.x and Society_, pp. 63-64.

[119] Morgan, _House and House-life of the American Aborigines_, p.

64. This example of mother-descent may be taken as typical of Indian life in all parts of America at the epoch of European discovery.

[120] Morgan, _Anc. Soc._, 62, 71, 76; Hartland, _Primitive Paternity_, Vol. I. p. 298, Vol. II. p. 65.

[121] McLennan, _Studies_, I. p. 271. Thus among the Choctas, if a boy is to be placed at school, his uncle, instead of his father, takes him to the mission and makes arrangements.

[122] Report of an Official for Indian Affairs on two of the Iroquoian tribes, cited by Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. I. p. 298. McLennan attributes the arrangement of the marriages to the mothers (_Studies_, ii. p. 339). This would be the earlier custom and is still practised among several tribes.

[123] Charlevoix, V. p. 418, quoted by Hartland, _op. cit._, Vol. II.

p. 66.