of Mudar are Qays and Hindif, and the latter is said to be wife of Al-Yas and great-granddaughter of Quda'a.. The joint-name of the Aws and Hazraj is Banu Qayla. Qayla seems to be the feminine of the well-known Himyarite title Qayl. The Banat Qayla are different. They appear to be an independent family, and Wellhausen formerly conjectured that they had matriarchy. The sons of Jadila are one of the two great branches of the Tayyi, and they are named after their mother. At the battle of Bu'ath the Banu 'Abd al-ashhal shout: We are the sons of Sahra-but Murra bint Zafar is their ancestress. The Fezarites are named Manula after the wife of Fezara."23 Considerations of space forbid any further enumeration of similar examples. The ownership of tents2+ by women, it is argued, is best explained by assuming an old law of female kinship.25 But this is far from convincing in view of the fact that primitive industrial arts were exclusively in the hands of women, the latter simply claiming as their own the products of their industrial habits.26 If the institution of matriarchy ever existed in ancient Babylonia, its traces have nearly all disappeared. A recent writer, quoting Sayce, remarks that whereas "in the old Sumerian hymns the 23 Kinship, 29, n. 1. "Ahl, equivalent to the Hebrew ohel, tent, family, kindred group. Kinship, 202 f.; Ehe, 478; Bertholet, S.I.J.F., 57, n. 5; Buhl, S.V.I., 28. Compare with this the development of private property on pages 228 f.; Cook, S. A., The Laws of Moses and the Code of Hammurabi, 92, n. 4. woman takes precedence of the man, the Semitic translation invariably reverses the order: the one has 'female and male,' the other 'male and female,' and this is reflected in the position of the goddess Ishtar, who, originally a goddess, the equal of the god, became changed into a male deity in Southern Arabia and Moab. "27 Buhl, in his Soziale Verhältnissen der Israeliten,28 would find a last survival of the institution in the fact that a son-in-law might be received into his wife's family by accepting the family cult. It is to be remembered, however, that even orphans and slaves could be adopted into Babylonian families under precisely the same terms. The argument is sometimes brought forth that the high position accorded women in the Code of Hammurabi bcomes intelligible by postulating the prevalence of matriarchy in pre-historic times. But the argument is not conclusive owing to the superior commercial development of the Babylonians as over against their neighbors. 27 Cook, S. A., p. 72, n. 2. 28 Page 28, n. 1., cp. Peiser, Mitteilungen der Vorderasiat. Gesellschaft I, 1896, 155. CHAPTER II PATRIARCHY On the strength of the material available it will be within the limits of probability to conjecture that the matriarchal clan was the dominant form of social organization prior to the settlement in Canaan. All the essential pre-suppositions of such an institution are met by the period of nomadism. A turning point in social development is reached by the passage from nomadism or semi-nomadism to agriculture. The acquisition of land, be it by conquest or by the cultivation of the soil, marks an important epoch in the scale of human culture. Land from now on becomes an economic factor to be reckoned with. The possession of land by an agricultural community naturally contributes its share to the conception of property. The idea of property again reacts on social integration as may be inferred from the transition of maternal to paternal relationship. In his work on Ancient Society,1 Mr. Morgan says: "After domestic animals began to be reared in flocks and herds, becoming thereby a source of subsistence as well as objects of individual property, and after tillage had led . . . to the ownership of houses and lands in severalty, an antagonism would be certain to arise against the prevailing form of gentile inheritance. With property accumulating in masses and assuming permanent forms, and with an increased proportion of it held by individual owner1p. 345. ship, descent in the female line was certain of overthrow and the substitution of the male line equally assured." To be sure, fossil remains of the older system make their appearance here and there, as above indicated, thus furnishing but one of many illustrations of the persistency of institutions in general. Descent in the female line could not survive in the face of changed conditions. Where the older custom was strong enough to assert itself, the change was often effected at the expense of a compromise. But under the monarchy patrilineal descent is an established principle, and all hereditary property descends in the male line. Having thus called attention to the change from maternal to paternal relationship after the settlement in Canaan, it does not necessarily follow that the latter is a purely Palestinian product. No great difficulty will be experienced in postulating a nomadic environment for the practice of reckoning descent through the mother. In surveying some of the material at our disposal we found that the maternal system is already a declining institution when first emerging into the light of history. From what we know of the growth of institutions in general, patriarchy, like its precursor of nomadic days, presupposes a long period of social development. The conditions of agriculture alone will not explain it. The beginnings of paternal relationship undoubtedly go back to a remote antiquity.2 Paternal authority ultimately triumphs on Palestinian soil. In referring to agnatic relationship technical terms are used at an early period. Corresponding terms denoting maternal relationship are unknown. This is at least indicative of an early predominance of patriarchy among the Hebrews, that is, if the testimony of language may be taken seriously.3 Under the system of patriarchy fathers exercised great rights over their families. "The chief lineaments of such a society as collected from the early chapters of Genesis are these:-The eldest male parent-the eldest ascendant-is absolutely supreme in his household. His dominion extends to life and death, and is as unqualified over his children and their houses as over his slaves; indeed, the relations of sonship and serfdom appear to differ in little beyond the higher capacity which the child in blood possesses of becoming one day the head of a family himself. The flocks and herds of the children are the flocks and herds of the father, and the possessions of the parent, which he holds in a representative rather than in a proprietary character, are equally divided at his death among his descendants in the first degree, the eldest son sometimes receiving a double share under the name of birthright, but more generally endowed with no hereditary advantage beyond an honorary precedence.'' Sir Henry Maine's contributions to the study of comparative jurisprudence gave a much-needed impetus to subsequent studies along kindred lines. With the advance of science, however, many of his views are no longer tenable. For instance, patria potestas of the Roman type cannot be fully applied to Hebrew society of historical times.5 Relics of what appears 'Ibid., 480 f.; Gesenius, H.W.B. (1905), 543. *Maine, Ancient Law, 119. |