against Pepin of Heristal for having two
wives, and their arraignment of Charlemagne's sins of concupiscence,
show how ineradicable this ancient Teutonic usage was. However, as early
as B.C. 57, Caesar mentions King Ariovistus's marriage to two wives as an
exception to Teutonic custom, due, perhaps, to political motives.
Tacitus praises the Germans as those who, with few exceptions, live in
monogamy, and though Tacitus is not an unimpeachable authority, owing to
the fact that he wished to idealize the vigorous race as a model to the
decadent Roman world of his time, his statements seem to prove that at
the dawn of Christianity southern and western German tribes at least had
the highest conception of family purity. Later on, under the teachings
of Christianity, polygamy was first modified, then abolished; and
marriage by capture was either suppressed or treated as a crime.

Upon the status of women among the Teutonic tribes the study of
philology sheds some light. From it we learn that the Gothic _quind_,
woman (in general), and _queue_, married woman, signifies the
child-bearing one, from the verb _quinan, gignere_; or _wip_ (Saxon
_wif_, Old Norse _vif_), indicating the root of _wib_, motion, the
mobile being; though _frouwa, frau_ (Old Norse, _freyja_), means
originally "joyous, mild, gracious," and is used to signify "illustrious
ladies" down to the thirteenth century.

The female child was allowed to live only by grace of the father. If
this right of the father over the life of his female child appears
barbarous, we must understand that the valuation of life in primitive
times is always very low. Not only among the early Teutons, but also
among the early Romans and Slavs, a custom prevailed by which the
children might kill their old or incurably sick parents, because of the
conception that life is valuable only so long as physical vigor dwells
in the body. Believing this, it is easy to conclude that when vigor
departed death was a blessing, the bestowal of which parents could
legitimately expect from their children.

The daughter was bought from the father for marriage purposes for a
value, and, without recourse, she was placed in the absolute possession
of the buyer, who might be an entire stranger to her. Friendship, favor,
or material advantage might induce the buyer to transfer his wife to
whomsoever he chose. Nothing was left to her but resignation, and,
obeying a stern necessity, she followed her husband and