ich had special
relation to motherhood. Under this influence, the marital rights of
the male members were restricted and confined. A system of taboos was
established, which as time advanced was greatly strengthened by the
sacred totem marks, and became of inexorable strictness. In this way
association between the jealous fighting males was made possible.

Here, then, are the reasons that led to the formation of the maternal
family and the communal clan. It was a movement that had nothing about
it that was exceptional; it was a perfectly natural arrangement--the
practical outgrowth of the practical needs of primitive peoples. The
strong and certain claim for the acceptance for the mother-age, with
its privileged position for women, rests on this foundation.

Let us be quite clear as to the real question involved, for it is a
crucial one. I refer to the complete disturbance arising through this
change in the family organisation in the relationships between the two
sexes. A wife was no longer the husband's property. Her position was
unchanged by marriage, for her rights were safeguarded by her kindred,
whose own interests could be protected only through her freedom.

If we turn next to the status of men--of the husband and father--in
the maternal kindred group, we find their power and influence at first
gradually, and then rapidly, decreasing. It was under these conditions
of family communism that the rights of the husband and father were
restricted on every side. Not only does he not stand out as a
principal person from the background of the familial clan; he has not
even any recognised social existence in the family group. This
restriction of the husband and father was clearly dependent on the
form of marriage. We have seen that the individual relationships
between the sexes began with the reception of temporary lovers by the
woman in her own home. But a relationship thus formed would tend under
favourable circumstances to be continued, and, in some cases,
perpetuated. The lover became the husband; he left the home of his
mother to reside with his wife among her kin; he was still without
property or any recognised rights in her clan, with no--or very
little--control over the woman and none over her children, occupying,
indeed, the position of a more or less permanent guest in her hut or
tent. The wife's position and that of her children was assured, and in
the case of a separation it was the man who departed, leaving h