Mutual Aid - Peter Kropotkin (ereader that reads to you .TXT) 📗

other as if they were brothers and sisters, while the individuals of a younger category will address their mothers’ sisters as mothers, and so on. To say that this must be a simple façon de parler⁠—a way of expressing respect to age⁠—is certainly an easy method of getting rid of the difficulty of explaining, why this special mode of expressing respect, and not some other, has prevailed among so many peoples of different origin, so as to survive with many of them up to the present day? One may surely admit that ma and pa are the syllables which are easiest to pronounce for a baby, but the question is⁠—Why this part of “baby language” is used by full-grown people, and is applied to a certain strictly-defined category of persons? Why, with so many tribes in which the mother and her sisters are called ma, the father is designated by tiatia (similar to diadia⁠—uncle), dad, da or pa? Why the appellation of mother given to maternal aunts is supplanted later on by a separate name? And so on. But when we learn that with many savages the mother’s sister takes as responsible a part in bringing up a child as the mother itself, and that, if death takes away a beloved child, the other “mother” (the mother’s sister) will sacrifice herself to accompany the child in its journey into the other world⁠—we surely see in these names something much more profound than a mere façon de parler, or a way of testifying respect. The more so when we learn of the existence of quite a cycle of survivals (Lubbock, Kovalevsky, Post have fully discussed them), all pointing in the same direction. Of course it may be said that kinship is reckoned on the maternal side “because the child remains more with its mother,” or we may explain the fact that a man’s children by several wives of different tribes belong to their mothers’ clans in consequence of the savages’ “ignorance of physiology;” but these are not arguments even approximately adequate to the seriousness of the questions involved⁠—especially when it is known that the obligation of bearing the mother’s name implies belonging to the mother’s clan in all respects: that is, involves a right to all the belongings of the maternal clan, as well as the right of being protected by it, never to be assailed by any one of it, and the duty of revenging offences on its behalf.

Even if we were to admit for a moment the satisfactory nature of such explanations, we should soon find out that a separate explanation has to be given for each category of such facts⁠—and they are very numerous. To mention but a few of them, there is: the division of clans into classes, at a time when there is no division as regards property or social condition; exogamy and all the consequent customs enumerated by Lubbock; the blood covenant and a series of similar customs intended to testify the unity of descent; the appearance of family gods subsequent to the existence of clan gods; the exchange of wives which exists not only with Eskimos in times of calamity, but is also widely spread among many other tribes of a quite different origin; the looseness of nuptial ties the lower we descend in civilization; the compound marriages⁠—several men marrying one wife who belongs to them in turns; the abolition of the marriage restrictions during festivals, or on each fifth, sixth, etc., day; the cohabitation of families in “long houses”; the obligation of rearing the orphan falling, even at a late period, upon the maternal uncle; the considerable number of transitory forms showing the gradual passage from maternal descent to paternal descent; the limitation of the number of children by the clan⁠—not by the family⁠—and the abolition of this harsh clause in times of plenty; family restrictions coming after the clan restrictions; the sacrifice of the old relatives to the tribe; the tribal lex talionis and many other habits and customs which become a “family matter” only when we find the family, in the modern sense of the word, finally constituted; the nuptial and prenuptial ceremonies of which striking illustrations may be found in the work of Sir John Lubbock, and of several modern Russian explorers; the absence of marriage solemnities where the line of descent is matriarchal, and the appearance of such solemnities with tribes following the paternal line of descent⁠—all these and many others317 showing that, as Durckheim remarks, marriage proper “is only tolerated and prevented by antagonist forces;” the destruction at the death of the individual of what belonged to him personally; and finally, all the formidable array of survivals,318 myths (Bachofen and his many followers), folklore, etc., all telling in the same direction.

Of course, all this does not prove that there was a period when woman was regarded as superior to man, or was the “head” of the clan; this is a quite distinct matter, and my personal opinion is that no such period has ever existed; nor does it prove that there was a time when no tribal restrictions to the union of sexes existed⁠—this would have been absolutely contrary to all known evidence. But when all the facts lately brought to light are considered in their mutual dependency, it is impossible not to recognize that if isolated couples, with their children, have possibly existed even in the primitive clan, these incipient families were tolerated exceptions only, not the institution of the time.

VIII Destruction of Private Property on the Grave

In a remarkable work, The Religious Systems of China, published in 1892⁠–⁠97 by J. M. de Groot at Leyden, we find the confirmation of this idea. There was in China (as elsewhere) a time when all personal belongings of a dead person were destroyed on his tomb⁠—his mobiliary goods, his chattels, his slaves, and