But returning to the tribal life, we find that the houses were of the rudest kind, made of undressed lumber or logs, with a hole in the roof for the smoke to pass out, with but one door and sometimes no window. There were no cities among the Germans until they were taught by contact with Rome to build them. The villages were, as a rule, an irregular collection of houses, more or less scattered, as is customary where land is {287} plentiful and of no particular value. There were no regularly laid out streets, the villagers being a group of kinsmen of the same tribe, grouped together for convenience. Around the village was constructed a ditch and a hedge as a rampart for protection. This was called a "tun" (German _Zoun_), from which word we derive our name "town." The house generally had but one room, which was used for all purposes. There was another class of houses, belonging to the nobility and the chiefs, called halls. They consisted of one long room, which sometimes had transepts or alcoves for the women, partitioned off by curtains from the main hall. This large room was the place where the lord and his companions were accustomed to sit at the great feasts after their return from a successful expedition. This is the "beer hall" that we read so much about in song, epic, and legend. Here the beer and the mead were passed; here arose the songs and the mirth of the warriors. On the walls of the hall might be seen the rude arms of the warrior, the shield and the spear, or decorations composed of the heads and the skins of wild beasts--all of which bring us to the early type of the hall of the great baron of the feudal age. Until the age of chivalry, women were not present at these rude feasts. The religious life of the early Germans was tribal rather than personal or of the simple family. There were certain times at which members of the same tribe were wont to assemble and sacrifice to the gods. There was a common meeting-place from year to year. As it has been related, this had a tendency to cement the tribe together and enhance political unity. This custom must have had its influence on social order and must have, in a measure, arrested the tendency of the people to an unsocial and selfish life.