matize the entirety of the problems and the requirements which have
resulted in recent times from the transformation of society with regard
to the position of woman among the two modern peoples. Many of the
questions belong to the domain of private and public law, of political
economy, of sociology, of education in all its phases. The leaders of
state and church and society, the higher schools and universities, are
signally undecided concerning the final solution, though the mist of the
conflict of opinion begins slowly to clear away. Even under the changed
conditions of modern society, one party still clings to the old
tradition of the family ideal of wifehood and motherhood, which is no
longer possible in all cases, as of yore, and considers extra-domestic
activity as abnormal, unhealthy, transient; the other extremists desire
to wipe out the natural differences and the limitations prescribed by
sex to human activity and capacity. A middle ground and a rational
solution will certainly be found during this century.

The author has strenuously endeavored to avail himself for every period
of all the source material and the secondary works accessible to him in
the Library of Congress and in the other libraries of the national
capital. The chapters on the Reformation Period, the Era of Desolation,
and on Woman Held in Tightening Bonds, a long period of dreariness so
distressing and humiliating to German pride, were prepared with skill
and scholarship by Miss Sarah H. Porter, A. M., at the time a graduate
student in the author's department. Credit for the chapter on Russian
Woman belongs to Mr. Alexis V. Babine, of the Library of Congress.

The author also expresses sincere gratitude to the publishers, and
especially to Mr. J. A. Burgan, the publishers' editor, for his careful
revision of the English text and for the generous, vigilant aid extended
to the author throughout the entire work.

HERMANN SCHOENFELD.

The George Washington University.

CHAPTER I

THE WOMEN OF THE PAGAN TEUTONS

Women were valued by the primeval Teutonic race, as by all other races
of the human family, as mere chattels means whereby the profit or the
pleasure of man might be maintained or increased. The custom of burning
the wife or wives with the dead master and husband was, from the
prehistoric times until far into the light of historic days, prevalent
in the tribes of the Teutonic family. Sacrifices of widows were
especially pres