Polyandry

“ I take it, polygyny, monogamy, and polyandry (or its equivalents) must have occurred in every district from the first;" but the cases of polyandry would be much more numerous. "Polyandry, in my view, is an advance from, and contraction of, promiscuity. It gives men wives. Till men have wives they may have tastes, but they have no obligations in matters of sex. You may be sure polygyny in the early stage never had the sanction of group opinion." ”

“ Helen Phædra Swan Butler is merely a degenerate imitation of the Amazons, who changed their husbands annually and deserted their children. A survival of polyandry, if you please. Formerly women looked sternly and sorrowfully from their lofty pure plateau upon polygamy and bigamy as the horrible heinous luxury of wicked, despotic men; now they are stepping down into the mire, claiming equal rights in sin, and the emancipated new female clamors for easy divorce and the freedom of polyandry. ”

“ The two systems which Mr M’Lennan distinguishes as “rude” and “regulated polyandry,” are so essentially different that I fail to trace the possibility of progression from one to the other. “Rude polyandry” is barely distinguishable from promiscuity, and not at all if we regard it as only promiscuity, necessarily limited through infanticide, or other causes destroying the balance of the sexes. ”

“ But this is too favorable an estimate of the relative social value of polygyny. It is doubtful, to say the least, whether morally and physically it is more favorable to the offspring than polyandry; and it is almost certain that it is far worse in its effects upon the home and condition of women. ”

“ Marriage, like the family itself, is variable, and an indefinite number of forms may be found among various peoples. We shall notice, however, only the three leading forms,—polyandry, polygyny, and monogamy,—and attempt to show the natural conditions which favor each. It is evident that if we assume that the primitive form of the family was that of a simple pairing monogamy, the burden is laid upon us to show how such different types as polyandry and polygyny arose. ”

“ Women would not have been thus rendered scarce, and polyandry would not have been practised; for hardly any other cause, except the scarcity of women seems sufficient to break down the natural and widely prevalent feeling of jealousy, and the desire of each male to possess a female for himself. Polyandry would be a natural stepping-stone to communal marriages or almost promiscuous intercourse; though the best authorities believe that this latter habit preceded polyandry. ”

“ Among the Nairs, for several centuries, the law was of polyandry, pure and simple, the wife having several husbands according to her own good pleasure. In late years the actual habit of polyandry is to all intents defunct and only in very few cases, if at all, could a Nair lady be found who consorts with more than one husband. ”

“ There is nothing to indicate that the band of brothers, as such, take a wife in common; that is, that the marriage is the act of the whole community." Hence "polyandry belongs to the category of facts which have to do with the ordinary family communism;" and it does not forfeit its character of a marriage in which the individual does not quite lose his personality in the group. ”

“ We do not go so far as to advocate polyandry. Polyandry is a condition based on a low state of civilization. But basing our proposition on physical grounds, we venture to assert that tetragamy, reorganized and protected by law, would be a married state doing away with most of the evils of monogamy from the man's standpoint, while contributing to woman's happiness. ”

“ Now, one of the most remarkable customs connected with polyandry is that of a brother taking to wife a deceased brother's widow, and reckoning the children born of the new union as the children of the deceased. This custom originates from the practice, in polyandrous unions, of the children always being considered the offspring of the husband who first espouses the wife. The first husband is considered the head of the household, the family property is vested in him, and all the children are feigned to be his. At his decease the brother next in age succeeds to the headship ”

“ Polyandry is to be carefully differentiated from communal marriage, where the woman is the property of any and every member of the tribe. Two distinct kinds of polyandry are practised: one, often called Nair, in which, as among the Nairs of India, the husbands are not related to each other; and the second, the Tibetan or fraternal polyandry, in which the woman is married to all the brothers of one family. ”

“ It is of special interest, because in its progressive phases it is held to be the medium of transition from the maternal to the parental and agnatic systems of kinship; and, therefore, through the aid of contract in the form of wife-purchase, to modern conceptions of the marriage relation. Polyandry is represented as a universal phase of social evolution, constituting the first general modification of promiscuity. ”

“ Polygamy is thus not always due to a surplus of female births, or to the death of many men, but often to religious prescripts, as among the Islamites and Mormons. In polyandry, poverty often plays a greater part than consanguineous marriages or surplus of male births. Religious prescription of the husband's continence during his wife's menstrual periods, pregnancy, and even the period of nursing, a period which often lasts from two to four years in savages, is an important cause of polyandry. ”

“ Even if, by doing violence to our common sense, we suppose such a thing to be possible on the part of the men, how would the women submit to a state of affairs which would compel at least three women out of every four, supposing the sexes to be equally balanced, to remain unmarried? It is obvious, however, that polyandry could in its origin only be induced by necessity. ”

“ This intense desire to beget sons has doubtless played a great part in the institution of polygamy, and, conceivably, a still greater one as regards polyandry, especially polyandry of the type practised by the Todas of India, where the brothers of a family unite as husbands of one woman 80 that among the Todas, in asking a man if he is married, one says, “Is there a son?” ”

“ The next institution originating in scarcity of women is polyandry, a form of sexual relations which, by the adherents of the horde-theory, is regarded as the earliest type of the family, properly so called: a family resting upon marriage, that is, upon a courtship "of men and women, protected by public opinion." ”

“ Any increase, however, in the number of women does not appear to have led to any great diminution of polyandrous marriages, but polyandry is often combined with polygyny. Two or more brothers may have two or more wives in common. In such marriages, however, it seems to be a growing custom that one brother should give the bow and arrow to one wife, and another brother to another wife. ”

“ In order to judge impartially of polyandric marriage we must remember these elementary truths. Not, certainly, that polyandry is rare amongst us, but it is censured, counted as criminal, and obliged to hide itself. The legal and regulated possession, publicly acknowledged, of one woman by several men, who are all husbands by the same title, shocks our feelings and morality extremely in the present day. ”

“ In human society both forms of marriage prevail, and there can be no doubt, from the history of such customs, that of the two types, polygamy is much to be preferred. It is certain that no race which practices polyandry can do more than hold its own, and that in a low grade of development. ”

“ On the other hand, women object to polyandry, because polyandry enables the best women to monopolize all the men, just as polygyny enables the best men to monopolize all the women. That is why all our ordinary men and women are unanimous in defence of monogamy, the men because it excludes polygyny, and the women because it excludes polyandry. The women, left to themselves, would tolerate polygyny. The men, left to themselves, would tolerate polyandry. But polygyny would condemn a great many men, and polyandry a great many women, to the celibacy of neglect. ”

“ The enormous consumption of men, necessitated by a savage or barbarous life, has often given an impulse to polygamy. It is only in certain societies where the practice of female infanticide exceeded all measure, or in certain islands, or certain regions with little or no [Pg 77] population, where conquerors badly off for wives came to settle, that polyandry has become general and enduring. It is surely only an exceptional form of marriage, and we can enumerate the countries where it has been or is still in use. ”

“ Among the peoples of America, Africa, and the Pacific Islands, just referred to, polyandry, in almost every case, is confined to a very small part of the population; and among the polyandrous nations of India and Central Asia it is by no means the exclusive form of marriage. ”

“ On the contrary, in the patriarchal polyandry, the woman, captured or bought, is almost entirely uprooted; she leaves her natural protectors to go and live with her husbands, to whom she belongs, who are limited in number, are nearly always brothers or relations, and to whom she cannot be unfaithful without authorisation.
Both forms of polyandric marriage suppose a complete absence of modesty, of sexual reserve and moral delicacy. But we know that these qualities can only be the fruit of long culture. In this respect both matriarchal and patriarchal polygamy are equal. ”

“ This type of marriage affords sometimes to women, "as in Thibetan polyandry, freedom and equality of companionship with men." It everywhere gives her such measure of power as her physical strength can command; and by interesting many men, although ever so slightly, in the welfare of some one household, it offers the beginning of protection to offspring, in supplies of food and defense in war.
The next step up in marriage types is to what we call polygyny, or the union of several wives with one husband. ”

“ Moreover, where polygyny occurs, it is modified, as a rule, in two ways that tend towards monogamy: through the higher position granted to one of the wives, generally the first married, and through the favour constantly shown by the husband to the wife he likes best. Among certain peoples polyandry occurs, and, like polygyny, is modified in a monogamous direction, the first husband usually being the chief husband. Among the causes by which the forms of marriage are influenced, the numerical proportion between the sexes plays an important part. ”

“ Among the higher animals apart from Man, both polygamy and polyandry are met with, and this with no apparent detriment to the race. It is significant, however, that polyandry is never met with among the mammals, and but rarely among the birds, when, as will be shown, this form of sexual relationship has been accompanied by a profound modification of the behaviour of the sexes in regard, not only to courtship, but to the offspring. The male has lost his masculinity, and the female her femininity. ”

“ Of course, however, should you desire at this inauspicious moment—as you must permit me to term it—to air any of your polyandric experiences—"
"My vote," broke in the Doctor, "is for the polyandric experiences. You've been giving us matriarchy straight from the shoulder for the last hour, Judge. Even the Bishop on polyandry will be good for a change. ”

“ Accordingly as a general result of his argument, Westermarck concludes that there is some reason to believe that polyandry originates in a surplus of men "due, on the one hand, to poor conditions of life, on the other, to close inter-marrying. As a matter of fact, the chief polyandrous peoples either live in sterile mountain regions, or are endogamous in a very high degree." [429] It does not follow, however, that a surplus of men will always produce polyandry, any more than a plurality of women will always lead to polygyny. ”

“ Like everything else, polyandric marriage has evolved, from its most complete form, that of the Naïrs, to the polyandry in use in Thibet, which already inclines towards monandry and the paternal family. Primitive polyandry has easily arisen from the marriage by classes practised by many savage clans; but most often it is polygamy which has sprung from it. And the latter must frequently have been established from the first in primitive hordes, simply by the right of the strongest. ”

“ Polyandry and polygamy are both evidences of a crude and half-evolved humanity.
They belong to a society which has not learned the law of self-control as a part of its religious creed and the march of progress. The light of science makes havoc of all such primitive conditions. ”

“ My friend supposes that the Almighty might have created more women than one out of Adam's ribs; but Adam had not ribs enough to create fifty women. My friend speaks against polyandry, or the right of woman to have more husbands than one. He bases his argument upon the increase of progeny. Science affirms that where polygamy or polygyny, or a plurality of wives prevails, there is a tendency to a preponderance or predominance of one sex over the other, either male or female, which amounts to an extermination of the race. ”