A History of Matrimonial Institutions, Vol. 1 of 3Howard, George Elliott
History
A History of Matrimonial Institutions, Vol. 1 of 3
Howard, George Elliott
Families; Marriage -- History
4. Wife-capture leads directly to exogamy, or the rule of not
marrying within the group of recognized kindred; that is, at first,
among those having the same totem. Exogamy is therefore not regarded
as the result of a prejudice against intermarriage of those related
by blood. For a time, doubtless, marriage within and without the
group was practiced indifferently, as pleasure or opportunity
favored. But eventually the possession of a foreign woman was
looked upon as the more honorable or respectable; and so at last
marriage within the kindred was entirely forbidden. With the rise
of wife-capture the original homogeneity of the group gave place to
a growing heterogeneity. Soon many alien stocks were represented
in the horde. Where polygyny existed, or where several wives were
taken in succession, the same family might comprise children
representing several totems. These children like their mothers were
counted as foreigners. Thus a modified form of exogamy arose. "So
far as the system of infanticide allowed, the hordes contained young
men and women accounted of different stocks, who might intermarry
consistently" with the original rule of exogamy. "Hence grew up a
system of betrothals, and of marriage by sale and purchase." But the
effect of the system of kinship through males, when it superseded
the maternal system, was to "arrest the progress of heterogeneity,"
and to "restore the original condition of affairs among exogamous
races, as regards both the practice of capturing wives and the
evolution of the forms of capture."[257]
[257] _Ibid._, I, 127-40, 50-71.
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