an with the
reception of temporary lovers by the woman in her own home. But as
society progressed, a relationship thus formed would tend under
favourable circumstances to be continued, and, in some cases,
perpetuated. The lover thus became the husband, but he was still
without property right, with no--or very little--control over the
woman, and none over her children, occupying, indeed, the position of
a more or less permanent guest in her hut or tent.

V. The social organisation which followed this custom was in most
cases--and always, I believe, in their primitive form--favourable to
women. Kinship was recognised through the mother, and the continuity
of the family thus depending solely on the woman, it followed she was
the holder of all property. Her position and that of her children was,
by this means, assured, and in the case of a separation it was the man
who departed, leaving her in possession. The woman was the head of the
household, and in some instances held the position of tribal chief.

VI. This early power of women, arising from the recognition alone of
womb-kinship, with the resulting freedom in sexual relationships
permitted to women, could not continue. It was no more possible for
society to be built up on mother-right alone than it is possible for
it to remain permanently based on father-right.

VII. It is important to note that the causes which led to the change
in the position of the sexes had no direct connection with moral
development; it was not due, as many have held, to the recognition of
fatherhood. The cause was quite different and was founded on property.
It arose, in the first instance, through a property value being
connected with women themselves. As soon as the women's kin began to
see in their women a means by exchange of obtaining wives for
themselves, and also the possibility of gaining worldly goods, both in
the property held by women, and by means of the service and presents
that could be claimed from their lovers, we find them exercising more
or less strict supervision over the alliances of their female
relatives.

VIII. At first, and for a long time, the early freedom of women
persisted in the widely spread custom of a preliminary period before
marriage of unrestricted sexual relationships. But permanent unions
became subject to the consent of the woman's kindred.

It was in this way, I am certain, and for no moral considerations that
the stringency of the sexual code was firs