In this way, no doubt, sprang up a new relationship between the family chiefs, a relationship not provided for in the construction of the patriarchal family. We might expect perhaps that a special pre-eminence would be accorded to the original family from which the others had separated, and possibly some traces of this pre-eminence may here and there be discovered. Why we have not more traces of it may be difficult to explain. For upon the whole the relationship among the different heads of households seems generally to be one of equality. As we do not know exactly by what process families became divided, it is useless to speculate how this equality arose. Alongside of this new reign of equality among the different patriarchs or heads of households, went a decrease in the power of the patriarch within his own circle. The family had ceased to be the bond of union of the community at large, albeit the units composing the new combination were themselves groups constructed on the patriarchal type; so that the fact that they were now only parts of larger groups had the effect of weakening the force of patriarchal customs. When the household was the only state of which an individual was a member, to leave it was to lose all share in its rights and property, to become an outlaw in every possible sense. But when the family became part of the village, the facilities for separating from it were necessarily increased. Households would more readily subdivide, now that after separation their component parts continued united in the community. Thus by degrees the old patriarchal life decayed, and gave place to this new and more elastic social formation. The importance of an individual’s relation to the family became less, that of the family to the community became greater; so that in time the community took to itself the regulation of many affairs originally within the exclusive power of the patriarch.