Andersson remarks that, among the Bushmans, woman is only too often belli teterrima causa.[2262] Speaking of the Bechuanas, Mr. Conder says, “As regards wedding ceremonies, there is one of casting an arrow into the hut by the bridegroom, which is worthy of notice as symbolic.”[2263] Among the Wakamba, marriage is an affair of purchase, but the bridegroom “must then carry off the bride by force or stratagem.”[2264] The Wa-taïta and Wa-chaga of Eastern Equatorial Africa have also a marriage ceremony of capture;[2265] and the like is the case with the Inland Negroes mentioned by Lord Kames,[2266] and the Abyssinians.[2267] Among the tribes of Eastern Central Africa described by Mr. Macdonald, marriage by capture occurs not as a symbol only.[2268]
According to a common belief, the Australian method of obtaining wives is capture in its most brutal form.[2269] But contrary to Mr. Howitt,[2270] Mr. Curr informs us that only on rare occasions is a wife captured from another tribe, and carried off.[2271] The possession of a stolen woman would lead to constant attacks, hence the tribes set themselves very generally against the practice.[2272] Even elopements, according to Mr. Mathew, are now usually more fictitious than real;[2273] but there are strong reasons for believing that formerly, when the continent was only partially occupied, elopements from within the tribe frequently occurred.[2274]
In Tasmania the capture of women for wives from hostile and alien tribes was generally prevalent.[2275] Among the Maoris, the ancient and most general way of obtaining a wife was for the man to get together a party of his friends and carry off the woman by force, apparent or actual.[2276] A similar practice occurs on the larger islands of the Fiji Group,[2277] in Samoa,[2278] Tukopia,[2279] New Guinea,[2280] and extremely frequently in the Indian Archipelago,[2281] and among the wild tribes of India.[2282] Among the Arabs,[2283] Tartars,[2284] and other peoples of Central Asia, as also in European Russia,[2285] traces of capture occur in the marriage ceremony, whilst the Tangutans,[2286] Samoyedes,[2287] Votyaks,[2288] &c.,[2289] are still in the habit of stealing wives, or elope with their sweethearts, if the bridegroom cannot afford to pay the fixed purchase-sum. Among the Laplanders,[2290] Esthonians,[2291] and Finns,[2292] marriage by capture occurred in former days, and in some parts of Finland symbolical traces of it in the marriage ceremony have been found in modern times.[2293]
The same practice prevailed among the peoples of the Aryan race. According to the ‘Laws of Manu,’ one of the eight legal forms of the marriage ceremony was the Râkshasa rite, i.e., “the forcible abduction of a maiden from her home, while she cries out and weeps, after her kinsmen have been slain or wounded, and their houses broken open.” This rite was permitted for the Kshatriyas by the sacred tradition.[2294] According to Dionysius of Halicarnassus, marriage by capture was at one time customary throughout ancient Greece;[2295] and, as Plutarch informs us, it was retained by the Spartans as an important symbol in the marriage ceremony.[2296] Even now, according to Sakellarios, capture of wives occasionally occurs in Greece.[2297] Among the Romans, the bride fled to the lap of her mother, and was carried off by force by the bridegroom and his friends.[2298] In the historical age this was a ceremony only, but at an earlier time the capture seems to have been a reality. “Les premiers Romains,” says M. Ortolan, “d’après leurs traditions héroïques, ont été obligés de recourir à la surprise et à la force pour enlever leurs premières femmes.”[2299] The ancient Teutons frequently captured women for wives.[2300] Speaking of the Scandinavian nations, Olaus Magnus says that they were continually at war with one another, “propter raptas virgines aut arripiendas.”[2301] Among the Welsh, on the morning of the wedding-day, the bridegroom, accompanied by his friends on horseback, carried off the bride.[2302] The Slavs in early times, according to Nestor, practised marriage by capture;[2303] and in the marriage ceremonies of the Russians and other Slavonian nations, reminiscences of this custom still survive.[2304] Indeed, among the South Slavonians, capture de facto was in full force no longer ago than the beginning of the present century.[2305] According to Olaus Magnus, it prevailed in Muscovy, Lithuania, and Livonia;[2306] and, according to Seignior de Gaya, the symbol of it occurred in his time in Poland, Prussia, and Samogithia.[2307]
The list of peoples among whom marriage by capture occurs, either as a reality or as a symbol, might easily be enlarged.[2308] There are peoples, however, who seem to have nothing of the kind. As regards the Chinese, Mr. Jamieson says, “Of the capture of wives there is, as far as I am aware, historically no trace, nor is the form to be found among any of the ceremonies of marriage with which I am acquainted.”[2309] Moreover, it is doubtful whether the ceremonies given as instances of symbolical capture are, in every case, survivals of capture de facto, in the real sense of the term, that is, taking the woman against not only her own will, but that of her parents. Mr. Spencer suggests that one origin of the form of capture may be the resistance of the pursued woman, due to coyness, partly real and partly assumed;[2310] and, though this suggestion has been much attacked, it can scarcely be disproved. On the East Coast of Greenland, according to Dr. Nansen, the only method of contracting a marriage is still for the man to go to the girl’s tent, catch her by the hair or anything else which offers a hold, and drag her off to his dwelling without further ado. Violent scenes are often the result, as single women always affect the utmost bashfulness and aversion to any proposal of marriage, lest they should lose their reputation for modesty. But “the woman’s relations meanwhile stand quietly looking on, as the struggle is considered a purely private affair, and the natural desire of the Greenlander to stand on a good footing with his neighbour prevents him from attempting any interference with another’s business.”[2311] Again, according to Mr. Abercromby, marriage with capture—by which he understands capture of a bride, associated with some other form of marriage, such as that by purchase—may be regarded rather as a result of the innate universal desire to display courage, than as a survival of a still older practice of taking women captive in time of war.[2312]
Mr. McLennan thinks that marriage by capture arose from the rule of exogamy. But there are peoples—the Maoris, Ahts, &c.—among whom this practice occurs or has remained as a symbol, who are, nevertheless, what Mr. McLennan would call endogamous. We are not entitled to say that, “wherever exogamy can be found, we may confidently expect to find, after due investigation, at least traces of a system of capture.”[2313] On reckoning up the peoples among whom the combination of capture and exogamy is met with, Dr. Tylor observes that the number, “though enough to show that they coexist freely, falls short of what would justify the inference that they are cause and effect.”[2314]
It seems to me extremely probable that the practice of capturing women for wives is due chiefly to the aversion to close intermarriage—existing, as we have seen, among endogamous tribes also,—together with the difficulty a savage man has in procuring a wife in a friendly manner, without giving compensation for the loss he inflicts on her father. Being something quite different from the wrestling for wives, already mentioned as the most primitive method of courtship, marriage by capture flourished at that stage of social growth when family ties had become stronger, and man lived in small groups of nearly related persons, but when the idea of barter had scarcely occurred to his mind.[2315] From the universality of the horror of incest, and from the fact that primitive hordes were in a chronic state of warfare with one another, the general prevalence of this custom may be easily explained. But as it is impossible to believe that there ever was a time when friendly negotiations between families who could intermarry were altogether unknown, we cannot suppose that capture was at any period the exclusive form of contracting marriage, although it may have been the normal form. In Australia, where marriage by capture takes place between members of hostile communities only,[2316] we are aware of no tribe—exogamous or endogamous—living in a state of absolute isolation. On the contrary, every tribe entertains constant relations, for the most part amicable, with one, two, or more tribes; and marriages between their members are the rule.[2317] Moreover, the custom, prevalent among many savage tribes, of a husband taking up his abode in his wife’s family seems to have arisen very early in man’s history. And Dr. Tylor’s schedules show that there are in different parts of the world even twelve or thirteen well-marked exogamous peoples among whom this habit occurs.[2318]
As appears from the instances quoted, the practice of capturing wives is, in the main, a thing of the past. Among most existing uncivilized peoples a man has, in some way or other, to give compensation for his bride.[2319] Marriage by capture has been succeeded by marriage by purchase.
The simplest way of purchasing a wife is no doubt to give a kinswoman in exchange for her. “The Australian male,” says Mr. Curr, “almost invariably obtains his wife or wives, either as a survivor of a married brother, or in exchange for his sisters, or later on in life for his daughters.”[2320] A similar exchange is sometimes effected in Sumatra.[2321]