quest, or other duty, of the men is such that many lives
are lost and so the adults of the two sexes are unequal in number.[1147]
Therefore, in a normal population, polygamy would compel many men, and
polyandry many women, to remain unmarried. Polyandry might then be
supplemented by female infanticide. That any persons in a primitive
society should be destined to celibacy is so arbitrary and strange an
arrangement that strong motives for it must be found in the life
conditions. Two forms of polygamy must be distinguished. (_a_) In
primitive society women are laborers, and the industrial system is often
such that there is an economic advantage in having a number of women to
one man. In those cases polygamy becomes interwoven with the whole
social and political system. Other customs will also affect the
expediency of polygamy. Every well-to-do man of the Bassari, in Togo,
has three wives, because children are suckled for three years.[1148]
(_b_) In higher civilization, with surplus wealth, polygamy is an affair
of luxury, sensuality, and ostentation. It is only in the former case
that polygamy is socially expedient, and that women welcome more wives
to help do the work and do not quarrel with each other. In the latter
case, polygamy is an aberration of the mores, due to selfish force.
There are very many examples of polygamy in which the two motives are
combined. These are transition stages. Polyandry is due to a hard
struggle for existence or to a policy of not dividing property. A
Spartan who had a land allotment was forced to marry. His younger
brothers lived with him and sometimes were also husbands to his wife.
Wives were also lent out of friendship or in order to get vigorous
offspring.[1149] Here state policy or the assumed advantage of physical
vigor overrode the motives of monogamy which prevailed in the
surrounding civilization. In Plautus's comedy _Stichus_ a case is
referred to in which two slaves have one woman (wife). Roman epitaphs
are cited in which two men jointly celebrate a common wife.[1150] These
are cases of return to an abandoned usage, under the stress of poverty.
An emigrating group must generally have contained more men than women.
Polyandry was very sure to occur. It is said that immigrant groups can
be found in the United States in which polyandry exists, being produced
in this way. Many aboriginal tribes in India, amongst which the Todas
are the best known, practice polyandry. Przewalsky says th