as only dimly perceived by Morgan in
1871. There is no antithesis between endogamy and exogamy; no exogamous
"tribes" have been found up to the present time. But at the time when
communal marriage still existed--and in all probability it once existed
everywhere--a tribe was subdivided into a number of
groups--"gentes"--consanguineous on the mother's side, within which
intermarrying was strictly forbidden. The men of a certain "gens,"
therefore, could choose their wives within the tribe, and did so as a
rule, but had to choose them outside of the "gens." And while thus the
"gens" was strictly exogamous, the tribe comprising an aggregate of
"gentes" was equally endogamous. This fact gave the final blow to
McLennan's artificial structure.

But Morgan did not rest here. The "gens" of the American Indians
furthermore assisted him in gaining another important step in the field
under investigation. He found that this "gens," organized in conformity
with maternal law, was the original form out of which later on the
"gens" by paternal law developed, such as we find it among the civilized
nations of antiquity. The Greek and Roman "gens," an unsolved riddle to
all historians up to our time, found its explanation in the Indian
"gens." A new foundation was discovered for the entire primeval history.

The repeated discovery that the original maternal "gens" was a
preliminary stage of the paternal "gens" of civilized nations has the
same signification for primeval history that Darwin's theory of
evolution had for biology and Marx's theory of surplus value for
political economy. Morgan was thereby enabled to sketch the outline of a
history of the family, showing in bold strokes at least the classic
stages of development, so far as the available material will at present
permit such a thing. It is clearly obvious that this marks a new epoch
in the treatment of primeval history. The maternal "gens" has become the
pivot on which this whole science revolves. Since its discovery we know
in what direction to continue our researches, what to investigate and
how to arrange the results of our studies. In consequence, progress in
this field is now much more rapid than before the publication of
Morgan's book.

The discoveries of Morgan are now universally recognized, or rather
appropriated, even by the archaeologists of England. But hardly one of
them openly admits that we owe this revolution of thought to Morgan. His
book is ignored in England