A History of Matrimonial Institutions (Vol. 1-3). George Elliott Howard
Hence it is that among many peoples "true conjugal life does not begin before a child is born;" and there are other races who "consider that the birth of a child out of wedlock makes it obligatory for the parents to marry."[300]
As a result of the first argument, then, marriage appears as a fundamental institution, whose beginnings are anterior to the dawn of human history. But there is need of a new definition, one broad enough to satisfy the demands of science. For most existing definitions are of a "merely juridical or ethical nature, comprehending either what is required to make the union legal, or what, in the eye of an idealist, the union ought to be." Hence Westermarck defines marriage, from a scientific point of view, as a "more or less durable connection between male and female, lasting beyond the mere act of propagation till after the birth of offspring;" and Starcke, in like spirit, declares that marriage in the widest sense is "only a connection between man and woman which is of more than momentary duration, and as long as it endures they seek for subsistence in common."[301]
The second or physiological argument may be very briefly stated. It rests upon the evidence, referred to by Sir Henry Maine, that promiscuous intercourse between the sexes "tends nowadays to a pathological condition very unfavorable to fecundity; and infecundity, amid perpetually belligerent savages, implies weakness and ultimate destruction."[302] Thus Dr. Carpenter, "who visited the West Indies before the abolition of slavery, well remembers the efforts of the planters to form the negroes into families, as the promiscuity into which they were liable to fall produced infertility, and fertility had become important to the slave-owner through the prohibition of the slave-trade."[303] Again "it is a well-known fact that prostitutes very seldom have children, while, according to Dr. Roubaud, those of them who marry young easily become mothers."[304] Furthermore, as Westermarck urges, "in a community where all the women equally belonged to all the men, the younger and prettier ones would of course be most sought after, and take up a position somewhat akin to that of the prostitutes of modern society."[305] Nor is the objection, that "the practice of polyandry prevails among several peoples without any evil results as regards fecundity being heard of," insuperable. For "polyandry scarcely ever implies continued promiscuous intercourse of many men with one woman;" and where it exists the relations of the woman with her husbands is often so regulated as to make the union practically monogamous.[306] In this connection also should be considered the infertility and other evils resulting from the intermarriage of near kindred.[307] For in a state of promiscuity such unions must have been very frequent; and at one stage of social development, if the theory of Morgan were to be accepted, they must have constituted the general rule.
According to Westermarck, the strongest objection to ancient promiscuity "is derived from the psychical nature of man and other animals."[308] The third or psychological argument therefore alleges the universal prevalence of sexual jealousy among the races of men.[309] Darwin declares that this passion is found among all male quadrupeds with which he is acquainted; and comes to the conclusion, therefore, that "looking far enough back in the stream of time, and judging from the social habits of man as he now exists, the most probable view is that he aboriginally lived in small communities, each with a single wife, or if powerful with several, whom he jealously guarded against all other men."[310] That jealousy is unknown among "almost all uncivilized peoples" is, indeed, asserted by many adherents of the horde theory.[311] But a mass of evidence relating to savage and barbarous races in all parts of the world shows that such assertions are without foundation. In many tribes the suspected wife is exposed to the vengeful fury of the jealous husband. For example, among the California Indians, according to Powers, "if a married woman is seen even walking in the forest with another man than her husband she is chastised by him;" and "a repetition of the offense is generally punished with speedy death."[312] So "among the Creek 'it was formerly reckoned adultery, if a man took a pitcher of water off a married woman's head and drank of it.'"[313] Women, we are told, are held in little esteem among the Innuit on the coast of Labrador; yet "the men are very jealous," and death is often the penalty for adultery on the part of either spouse.[314] Magalhães, who visited "more than a hundred villages" among "thirty tribes" of Brazilian natives, some of them "already half civilized and others still entirely free from any participation in our institutions, ideas, and pre-conceived notions," records as a result of his observations that "there exists in the Indian family all grades from institutions strict to a degree exceeding anything history tells us about down to the community of women.... Thus I know tribes where there is no marriage, and I know others in which a woman committing adultery is punished by being burned."[315] Moreover, he emphatically warns us that he is speaking here of the "uncatechised" native, not yet demoralized by missionary influence.[316] According to Dobrizhoffer, the Abipones of Paraguay are conspicuous for "conjugal fidelity;" and they are very jealous, taking swift vengeance when infidelity is suspected.[317] Souza, who "lived in Brazil, in what is now the state of Bahia, from 1570 to 1587,"[318] says that "there are always jealousies among" the wives of the polygamous Tupinambás, especially on the part of the first wife, because usually she is "older than the others and less gentle."[319] On the other hand, the Jesuit Anchieta, who was in the same country "from 1553 until his death in 1597," declares that women frequently abandon their consorts to take other men "without any feeling upon the part of the husbands; and I never saw and never heard of any Indian killing any of his wives on account of any feeling about adultery;" but his narrative reveals unmistakable evidence of the existence of sexual jealousies.[320]
In fact, among primitive peoples, as suggested by the preceding examples, death or other severe punishment is often the penalty for adultery. It is so in Polynesia, although the fault of the man is usually "condoned;"[321] as also in Micronesia, where the husband does not escape so easily.[322] Extraordinary precautions are sometimes taken to prevent marriage with an impure bride. Frequently the husband requires that the "woman he chooses for his wife shall belong to him, not during his life-time only, but after his death." Hence the widespread practice of sacrificing the wife at the death of the husband; and the frequent restraint upon the remarriage of widows is ascribed to the same cause.[323]
As a final result of his minute examination, Westermarck concludes that there is "not a shred of genuine evidence for the notion that promiscuity ever formed a general stage in the social history of mankind." The hypothesis, he declares, is "essentially unscientific." How, then, it may be asked, can the series of phenomena adduced by McLennan and others to support that hypothesis be otherwise explained?
In the first place, it is believed, the direct evidence as to the existence of races living promiscuously in ancient and modern times will not stand the test of criticism.[324] Often the statements of writers and travelers prove on examination to be erroneous. Thus, for instance, Sir Edward Belcher's assertion, that among the Andaman Islanders "the custom is for the man and woman to remain together until the child is weaned, when they separate, and each seeks a new partner,"[325] has been "disproved by Mr. Man, who, after a very careful investigation of this people, says not only that they are strictly monogamous, but that divorce is unknown, and conjugal fidelity till death not the exception but the rule among them."[326] Sometimes the "facts adduced are not really instances of promiscuity." This appears to be true, as already seen, of the alleged Australian group-marriages. So also the "communism" practiced among the Cahyapós, "who seem to be the most numerous tribe of the central plateaux of Brazil," turns out on examination to be something very different from promiscuity, resembling more the "temporary" marriages already mentioned, though combined with polygyny. "The communism of wives among them," says Magalhães,[327] "is as follows: The woman as soon as she reaches the age at which she is permitted to have relations with a man, conceives by the one who pleases her. During the period of gestation and nursing she is maintained by the father of the child, who may have others in similar charge and these others during similar periods live in the same cabin. As soon as the woman begins to work she is free to conceive by the same man or she may procure another, the charge of supporting the earlier offspring passing to the latter."[328] This institution, it is clear, involves considerable social regulation. Indeed we are particularly warned that "by communism of women is not to be understood anything like prostitution.... This distinction is the more important for the proper comprehension of the savage family, since it is certain that in those same tribes where this communism exists, prostitutes are held in great displeasure." The custom "is a mode of family existence that they judge best according to their ideas