In Japan, as formerly among the Basques, filiation is subordinated to the transmission of the patrimony whole and inalienated. It is to the first-born, whether boy or girl, that the inheritance is transmitted, and he or she is forbidden to abandon it. At the time of marriage the husband or wife must take the name of the heir or heiress, who marries and personifies the property. Filiation is therefore sometimes maternal and sometimes paternal; but the maternal uncle still bears the name of “second little father”; the paternal aunt is called “little mother,” the paternal uncle is called “little father,” etc.[1038] Marriage between groups of brothers and other groups of sisters has been common enough in primitive societies to enable us to see in this familial nomenclature the traces of one of those ancient unions at once monogamic and polygamic. In China the language itself attests the ancient existence of a marriage contracted by a group of brothers having their wives in common, but not marrying their sisters. A Chinaman always calls the sons of his brother his “sons,” whilst he considers those of his sister as his nephews;[1039] but the virtual, or rather fictitious fathers, brothers, and sons, are distinguished from the real fathers, brothers, and sons, by the epithet “class” added to their appellation. Thus they say, “class-father, class-son, class-brother”--that is to say, the man who belongs to the class of the father, to that of the son, or to that of the brother. It is therefore simply the American nomenclature perfected.[1040] We have previously seen that in China proper, not only the paternal family, but the patriarchate, are rigorously established; that woman is in extreme subjection, and always disinherited;[1041] but certain impediments to marriage can only relate to an ancient familial organisation which has now disappeared. In all the vast Chinese empire there are scarcely more than from one to two hundred family names, and the Chinese call themselves the “people of a hundred families.” Now in China all marriage between persons bearing the same name is prohibited.[1042] In certain villages every one has the same family name; two or three thousand persons, for example, are called “sheep,” “ox,” “horse,” etc., all of them appellations agreeing well with clans having corresponding _totems_.[1043] But however it may have been in the past, at the present day masculine filiation is well established in China, and nine degrees of kinship in the direct line are distinguished, which an old Chinese author has enumerated as follows:--“All men who come into the world have nine degrees of kinship--namely, my own generation in the first place, then that of my father, of my grandfather, and of the father and grandfather of my grandfather. In a descending line come the generation of my son, that of my grandson, then that of his son and his grandson. All the members of one same generation are brothers to each other.”[1044] Let us note