Lastly, I wish to bring forward a very striking example of the complete maternal family among the Seri Indians, on the south-west coast of North America, now reduced to a single tribe. Their curious and interesting marriage customs have been described by McGee, who visited the people to report on their customs for the American Government. The Seri are probably the most primitive tribe in the American continent. At the time of Mr. McGee’s visit they preserved the maternal system in its early form, and are therefore an instructive example by which to estimate the position of the women.[72]
“The tribe is divided into exogamous totem clans. Marriage is arranged exclusively by the women. The elder woman of the suitor’s family carries the proposal to the girl’s clan mother. If this is entertained, the question of marriage is discussed at length by the matrons of the two clans. The girl herself is consulted; a jacal is erected for her, and after many deliberations, the bridegroom is provisionally received into the wife’s clan for a year under conditions of the most exacting character. He is expected to prove his worthiness of a permanent relationship by demonstrating his ability as a provider, and by showing himself an implacable foe to aliens. He is compelled to support all the female relatives of his bride’s family by the products of his skill and industry in hunting and fishing for one year. There is also another provision of a very curious nature. The lover is permitted to share the jacal, or sleeping-robe, provided for the prospective matron by her kinswomen, not as a privileged spouse, but merely as a protective companion; and throughout this probationary time he is compelled to maintain continence—he must display the most indubitable proof of his moral force.”
This test of the Seri lover must not mistakenly be thought to be connected, as might appear, with the modern idea of continence. As is pointed out by McGee, it arose out of the primitive sexual taboos, and is imposed on the young man as a test of his strength to abstain from any sexual relationships outside the proscribed limits. Such a moral test may once have been common, but seems to have been lost except among the Seri; though a curious vestige appears in the anti-nuptial treatment of the bridegroom, in the Salish tribe. The material test is common among many peoples, and must not be confused with the later custom of payment for the wife by presents given to her family. Still this Seri marriage is one of the most curious I know among any primitive peoples. And the continence demanded from the bridegroom appears more extraordinary if we compare it with the freedom granted to the bride. “During this period the always dignified position occupied by the daughters of the house culminates.” Among other privileges she is allowed to receive the “most intimate attentions from the clan-fellows of the group.” “She is the receiver of the supplies furnished by her lover, measuring his competence as would-be husband. Through his energy she is enabled to dispense largess with a lavish hand, and thus to dignify her clan and honour her spouse in the most effective way known to primitive life; and at the same time she enjoys the immeasurable moral stimulus of realising she is the arbiter of the fate of a man who becomes a warrior or an outcast at her bidding, and through him of the future of two clans—she is raised to a responsibility in both personal and tribal affairs which, albeit temporary, is hardly lower than that of the warrior chief.” At the close of the year, if all goes well, the probation ends in a feast provided by the lover, who now becomes the husband, and finally enters his wife’s jacal as “consort-guest.” His position is wholly subordinate, and without any authority whatever, either over his children or over the property. In his mother’s hut he has rights, which seem to continue after his marriage, but in his wife’s hut he has none.
I have now collected together, with as much exactitude as I could, what is known of the maternal family in the American continents. There are many tribes in which descent is reckoned through the father, and it would be bold to assert that these have all passed through the maternal stage. An examination of their customs shows, in some cases, survivals, which point to such conclusion; among other tribes it seems probable that the maternal clan has not developed. As illustrations of mother-power, I claim the examples given speak for themselves. It may, of course, be urged that these complete maternal families are exceptions, and thus to dismiss them as unimportant. But this is surely an unscientific way of settling the question. One has to accept these cases, or to prove that they are untrue. Moreover, I have by no means exhausted the evidence; and to these complete maternal families might be added examples from other tribes which would furnish similar proofs, but there is such consistency of custom among them all that further accounts may be dispensed with.
There is one other matter for which I would claim attention before closing this chapter on the American Indians, and that is the remarkable similarity to be noticed in many tribes between the faces of the men and the women. To me this is a point of deep interest, though I do not claim to understand it. My attention was first drawn to notice this likeness between the two sexes when I came to know some Iroquois natives who live in England. I was at once struck with the appearance of the men: though strong and powerfully built, they were strikingly like women. Since then I have examined many portraits of the North Indian tribes; I have found that the great majority of men approach much more nearly to the feminine than the male type. I might, however, hesitate to bring the matter forward, were it founded only on my own observation. But in my reading I have found an important reference to the question in a recent work, “The Indians of North America in Recent Times,” by Mr. Cyrus Thomas, Ph.D., Archæologist, in the Bureau of American Ethnology. He writes as follows (p. 41)—
“Another curious fact, which has not hitherto received special notice, though apparently of considerable interest, is the prevailing feminine physiognomy of the males, at least of those of the northern section. If any one will take the trouble to study carefully a hundred or more good photographs of males of pure blood he will find that two thirds, if not a greater proportion, show feminine faces. The full significance of this fact is not apparent, but it seems to bear to some extent upon the question of the evolution of the race.”
What this fact suggests is a problem to which it is very difficult even to guess at an answer. Does this lack of differentiation in the physiognomy of the Indians point to something much deeper? Are the men really like the women? Such a conception opens up considerations of very great significance. So far as I understand the matter, it appears that, as well as the deep inherent differences between the two sexes, there are other differences due to divergence in function. It seems probable that changes in environment or in function (as when one sex, for some reason or other, performs the duties usually undertaken by the other sex), may alter or modify the differences which tend to thrust the sexes apart. I feel very sure that there can be changes in the secondary sexual characters of the male and female. This is sufficiently proved by many examples. Can we, then, accept the theory that an environment, which favours women’s forceful function, may modify the infinitely complicated characters of sex, which, as yet, we so imperfectly understand? I do not know with any certainty. Yet I can see no other interpretation; and, if I mistake not, it may be possible in this way to cast a light on one of the most difficult problems with which we are faced to-day.
FOOTNOTES:
[40] The Mystic Rose, pp. 460-461.
[41] This is the number given by Prof. Tylor. “The Matriarchal Family System,” Nineteenth Century, July 1896.