It is a question whether polygamy in itself ever existed in Japan, but there is no question about concubinage, as it began at an early time, for the Emperor was allowed twelve supplementary wives and the nobles (samurai) two. It seems from the earliest there was one legal wife, and whatever the other women were they were subservient to her. But concubinage did not prevail very much among the middle and lower classes, and with the upper classes only with the wealthier members. These concubines were kept in the home unless the legal wife was strong enough to keep them out, when they were furnished separate dwellings. They were ever a discordant element in the life of the family. Since both Shintoism and Confucianism called for ancestral worship, where there were no offspring by the legal wife, this might call for concubinage to raise up children, and sometimes where there was no heir, the wife might for that cause urge the husband to take a handmaid to raise up sons to preserve the ancestral line. If the child of a concubine was adopted into the family, it was taken from the mother and she became no more to it than any other of the servants and had no more to do with it than they did. During feudalism in Japan, the legal status of women was very low. They had no legal rights and their evidence was not admitted in a court of justice. The husband had unlimited power of divorce, but under no circumstances could a wife demand to be separated from her husband, but she had to abide his will. A great reason for a wife suffering much and not leaving her husband was that the children belonged to him and in case of a separation their disposal rested absolutely with him. "Seven causes for justifiable divorce are laid down in the classics of Confucius, which are the basis of legal morals in Japan as in China, or as those of Justinian are with us. The wife may be divorced: 1. If she be disobedient to her parents-in-law. (After marriage, in her husband's home, his parents become hers in a far more significant sense than among us.) 2. If she be barren. (If the husband loves his childless wife, he keeps and supports her.) 3. If she be lewd or licentious. (She must not be given to loose talk or wine. It is not proper for her even to write a letter to any other man.) 4. If she be jealous (of other women's clothes, or children, or especially of her husband). 5. If she have a loathsome or contagious disease. (If dearly beloved, she may be kept in a separate room and cared for.) 6. If she steal. 7. If she talk too much.