It does not appear that the marriage tie possessed any grave significance in ancient Japan, or that any wedding ceremony was performed; unless, indeed, the three circuits made by Izanagi and Izanami prior to cohabitation round a "heavenly august pillar" be interpreted as the circumambulatory rite observed in certain primitive societies. Pouring water over a bride seems, however, to have been practised and is still customary in some provinces, though as to its antiquity nothing can be said. An exchange of presents is the only fact made clear by the annals. There did not exist in Japan, as in China, a veto on marriages between people of the same tribe, but this difference does not signify any reproach to Japan: the interdict was purely political in China's case, and corresponding conditions did not exist in Japan. On the other hand, the Japanese system permitted a degree of licence which in the Occident is called incest: brothers and sisters might intermarry provided that they had not been brought up together. To understand this condition it is necessary to observe that a bride generally continued to live in her family dwelling where she received her husband's visits, and since there was nothing to prevent a husband from contracting many such alliances, it was possible for him to have several groups of children, the members of each group being altogether unknown to the members of all the rest. In a later, but not definitely ascertained era, it became customary for a husband to take his wife to his own home, and thereafter the veto upon such unions soon became imperative, so that a Prince Imperial in the fifth century who cohabited with his sister forfeited the succession and had to commit suicide, his conduct being described in the Chronicles as "a barbarous outrage." In all eras sisters might marry the same man, and polygamy was common. A Chinese book, compiled in the early years of the Christian epoch, speaks of women being so numerous in Japan that nobles had four or five wives and commoners two or three. Of course, the reason assigned for this custom is incorrect: not plenitude of females but desire of abundant progeny was primarily the cause. It is notable that although the line between nobles and commoners was strictly drawn and rigidly observed, it did not extend to marriage in one sense: a nobleman could always take a wife or a concubine from the family of an inferior. In fact, orders were commonly issued to this or that province to furnish so many ladies-in-waiting (uneme)--a term having deeper significance than it suggests--and several instances are recorded of sovereigns summoning to court girls famed for beauty. That no distinction was made between wives and concubines has been alleged, but is not confirmed by the annals. Differentiation by rank appears to have been always practised, and the offspring was certainly thus distinguished. BIRTH AND EDUCATION