t civilization. We knew, for example, that even
as late as the Caesars, girls belonging to noble families at Thebes were
consecrated to the service of Amon, and were thus licensed to a life
of immorality, which, however, did not prevent them from making rich
marriages when age obliged them to retire from office. Theban women were
not the only people in the world to whom such licence was granted or
imposed upon them by law; wherever in a civilized country we see a
similar practice, we may recognize in it an ancient custom which in the
course of centuries has degenerated into a religious observance. The
institution of the women of Amon is a legacy from a time when the
practice of polyandry obtained, and marriage did not yet exist. Age and
maternity relieved them from this obligation, and preserved them from
those incestuous connections of which we find examples in other races.
A union of father and daughter, however, was perhaps not wholly
forbidden,[*] and that of brother and sister seems to have been regarded
as perfectly right and natural; the words brother and sister possessing
in Egyptian love-songs the same significance as lover and mistress with
us.

* E. de Rouge held that Rameses II. married at least two of
his daughters, Bint Anati and Honittui; Wiedemann admits
that Psammetichus I. had in the same way taken to wife
Nitocris, who had been born to him by the Theban princess
Shapenuapit. The Achaemenidan kings did the same: Artaxerxes
married two of his own daughters.

Paternity was necessarily doubtful in a community of this kind, and
hence the tie between fathers and children was slight; there being
no family, in the sense in which we understand the word, except as it
centred around the mother.

Maternal descent was, therefore, the only one openly acknowledged, and
the affiliation of the child was indicated by the name of the mother
alone. When the woman ceased to belong to all, and confined herself to
one husband, the man reserved to himself the privilege of taking as many
wives as he wished, or as he was able to keep, beginning with his own
sisters. All wives did not enjoy identical rights: those born of the
same parents as the man, or those of equal rank with himself, preserved
their independence. If the law pronounced him the master, _nibu_, to
whom they owed obedience and fidelity, they were mistresses of the
house, _nibit piru_, as well as wives, _himitu_, and the two words