The _motă_ marriage was a purely personal contract, founded on consent between a man and a woman, without any intervention on the part of the woman’s kin.... Now the fact that there was no contract with the woman’s kin—such as was necessary when the wife left her own people and came under the authority of her husband—and that, indeed, her kin might know nothing about it, can have only one explanation: in _motă_ marriage the woman did not leave her home, her people gave up no rights which they had over her, and the children of the marriage did not belong to the husband. _Motă_ marriage, in short, is simply the last remains of that type of marriage which corresponds to a law of mother-kinship, and Islam condemns it, and makes it “the sister of harlotry,” because it does not give the husband a legitimate offspring, _i. e._, an offspring that is reckoned to his own tribe and has rights of inheritance within it.[125] [125] Prof. W. R. Smith, _Kinship and Marriage_, p. 69. Before the separation of the Hebrews and Aramæans, the wife remained within her own tent where she received her husband, the children of such unions taking her name and becoming her heirs. This kind of conjugal union is known to have been in existence in many portions of the world. In Ceylon it is designated as the _beena_ marriage. In ancient Arabia, not only did women control their own homes, but they owned flocks and herds, and were absolutely independent of male relations. As late as the fourteenth century of our era, although the women of certain Arabian tribes were willing to marry strangers, they never followed them to their homes. Among the Bedouins it is a rare thing for a woman at marriage to leave her home and kindred. When a woman marries a man he settles among her kinsmen, and, as she presents him with a spear and a tent by way of dowry, it would seem that he is expected to join her relations and assist in the common defence. The marks of authority under gentile rule are the possession of a tent and a lance; yet we find that these are the objects which, under matriarchal usages, the wife tenders her husband when he enters her family; the first doubtless as a symbol of her protection, the second as indicating her authority and the services which he is expected to render her and her people. Until a late period in Rome it was the custom, during the solemnities of marriage, to pass a lance over the head of the wife in token of the power which the husband was about to gain over her.[126] [126] Ortolan, _History of Roman Law_, p. 80.