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The case is much the same with the problem of exogamy, which is closely connected with the question of kinship. According to McLennan, as already seen, exogamy, or the prohibition of marriage within the clan, owes its rise to wife-capture occasioned by scarcity of women through female infanticide; and it is contrasted with the opposite custom of endogamy, which, it is alleged, usually implies a higher stage of civilization. This account of its origin, he thinks, is, on the whole, the "only one which will bear examination."

How far it really falls short of the truth was first pointed out by Herbert Spencer. "In all times and places, among savage and civilized," he says, "victory is followed by pillage. Whatever portable things of worth the conquerors find, they take.... The taking of women is manifestly but a part of this process of spoiling the vanquished. Women are prized as wives, as concubines, as drudges; and, the men having been killed, the women are carried off along with the other moveables." Thus "women-stealing" is an "incident of successful war." But a woman so taken has a double value. "Beyond her intrinsic value she has an extrinsic value. Like a native wife, she serves as a slave: but unlike a native wife, she serves also as a trophy." A warrior possessing such a token of prowess gains social distinction. "In a tribe not habitually at war, or not habitually successful in war, no decided effect is likely to be produced on the marriage customs." But in warlike and successful tribes an "increasing ambition to get foreign wives" will arise. Among savages, proofs of courage are often required as qualifications for marriage. Hence it is not surprising that the abduction of a foreign woman should be accepted as the best proof of all. "What more natural than that where many warriors of the tribe are distinguished by stolen wives, the stealing of a wife should become the required proof of fitness to have one? Hence would follow a peremptory law of exogamy." Spencer's interpretation, therefore, agrees with that of McLennan in finding the origin of exogamy in wife-capture and in implying that usage grows into law. But it does not, "like his, assume either that this usage originated in a primordial instinct, or that it resulted from a scarcity of women caused by infanticide.[356] Moreover, unlike Mr. McLennan's, the explanation so reached is consistent with the fact that exogamy and endogamy in many cases co-exist; and with the fact that exogamy often co-exists with polygyny;" nor does it "involve us in the difficulty raised by supposing a peremptory law of exogamy to be obeyed throughout a cluster of tribes." For if exogamy would be likely to arise in tribes usually successful in war, peaceful tribes and those usually worsted in war, though living side by side with the successful and warlike, would be naturally led to adopt the rule of endogamy. Furthermore, among tribes not differing much from one another in strength, endogamy and exogamy may coexist. "Stealing of wives will not be reprobated, because the tribes robbed are not too strong to be defied; and it will not be insisted on, because the men who have stolen wives will not be numerous enough to determine the average opinion." Spencer also maintains that the symbol of rape in the marriage ceremony does not necessarily imply the previous existence either of foreign wife-stealing or of exogamy, assigning three other reasons which singly or together may account for it. First, it may result from a struggle for women within the tribe. "There still exist rude tribes in which men fight for possession of women, the taking possession of a woman naturally comes as a sequence to an act of capture. That monopoly which constitutes her a wife in the only sense known by the primitive man is a result of successful violence."[357] Secondly, contrary to the view of Sir John Lubbock,[358] the symbol of rape may be due to the struggle of the bride and her female friends, many manifestations of which are found in the marriage customs of primitive races; though the dread of harsh treatment is thought to be an additional motive. But Starcke, doubting whether among savages there is much to choose between the brutality of the husband and that of the father, thinks the weeping of the woman merely symbolizes her sorrow "on leaving her former home; her close dependence on her family is expressed by her lamentation." The existence of such symbols is not surprising in "communities of which the family bond is the alpha and omega."[359] The ceremony of capture, finally, may be due to the resistance of the father and other male friends of the bride. A woman has an economic value, "not only as a wife but also as a daughter; and all through, from the lowest to the highest stages of social progress, we find a tacit or avowed claim to her service by her father." Her service is an object of purchase; and in English law "we have evidence that it was originally so among ourselves: in an action for seduction the deprivation of a daughter's services is the injury alleged."[360]

Sir John Lubbock is likewise an adherent of the view that exogamy originates in wife-capture; but he connects his explanation with his peculiar theory of the communistic family, and it cannot therefore be accepted, if that theory is to be rejected.[361] He holds that originally all the men and women of a tribe lived in sexual communism and individual marriage was looked upon "as an infringement of communal right." But "if a man captured a woman belonging to another tribe he thereby acquired an individual and peculiar right to her, and she became his exclusively." In this way, the practice of capturing foreign wives led to individual marriage, and its evident advantages eventually produced the rule of exogamy. Accordingly, the "symbol of rape became such an important part of the wedding ceremonies, because it was the symbol of giving up the woman to become the exclusive possession of one man."[362] McLennan, however, criticises this view on the ground that "in almost all cases the form of capture is the symbol of a group act—of a siege, or a pitched battle, or an invasion of a house by an armed band." Seldom does it represent a capture by an individual. "On the one side are the kindred of the husband; on the other the kindred of the wife." Furthermore, if women were commonly captured by the men of a group or parties of them, as he justly observes, it is hard to see how an individual who had captured a woman could appropriate her more easily than he could appropriate any woman of his own group for whom he had a fancy.[363] Very different is the explanation offered by Tylor, who regards exogamy as the primitive mode of alliance and "political self-preservation." "Among tribes of low culture there is but one means known of keeping up permanent alliance, and that means is intermarriage." Often the alternative has been "marrying out" or "being killed out." Endogamy, on the other hand, "is a policy of isolation, cutting off a horde or village, even from the parent stock whence it separated."[364] That exogamy has often, perhaps generally, served the political purpose suggested by Tylor is not improbable, and his view is sustained by that of Post and Kohler;[365] but this will not account for its origin.

Both Lubbock and Spencer, it will be observed, agree with McLennan in assigning the origin of exogamy to wife-capture. On the other hand, a group of writers, differing widely on ancillary questions, unite in identifying the causes which have produced exogamy with those which, in general, have led to the establishment of forbidden degrees of consanguinity in marriage. In other words, tribal or clan exogamy is but one of many rules for the prevention of close intermarriage between kindred. It must be admitted that a profound horror of incest is now "an almost universal characteristic of mankind, the cases which seem to indicate a perfect absence of this feeling being so exceedingly rare that they must be regarded merely as anomalous aberrations from a general rule."[366] But, from the beginning, has there been an innate aversion to the sexual union of persons closely related by blood? Is that aversion derived from experience of the injurious results of such unions? Did it originally extend only to marriage and not to irregular sexual connections? Or, finally, is it the indirect result of a custom, such as wife-capture, hardening into a rule of forbidden degrees? These are questions to which very different answers have been given.

Adherents of the horde theory, of course, deny that horror of incest is a primitive instinct. Such is the view also of Spencer, who thinks that "regular relations of the sexes are results of evolution, and that the sentiments upholding them have been gradually established,"[367] though—somewhat inconsistently, as we have seen—he agrees with McLennan in regarding exogamy as the result of custom growing into law. Lubbock takes a similar position, denying that we can "attribute to savages any such farsighted ideas" as the recognition of the injurious effects of close intermarriage.[368] On the other hand, Morgan, whose consanguine family implies the absence of any primitive abhorrence of incest, considers exogamy "explainable, and only explainable as a reformatory movement to break up the intermarriage of blood relations," thus implying that the aversion to such a union is derived from experience.[369] But knowledge which "can only be gained by lengthened observation," Dr. Peschel believes, "is 'unattainable by unsettled and childishly heedless races,' among whom, nevertheless, a horror of incest is developed most strongly."[370] Sir Henry Maine, on the contrary, "cannot see why the men who discovered the use of fire and selected the wild forms of certain animals for domestication and of vegetables for cultivation should not find out that children of unsound constitution were born of nearly related parents."[371] The researches of Starcke, and still more those of Westermarck, render it almost certain, however, that Morgan and Maine are mistaken in their view, though it may point the way to the truth.[372]

Starcke's argument leads up to the conclusion that the basis of exogamy is to be sought in the causes which produced the clan; for between the clans of a tribe exogamy almost always prevails, and, without exception, clanless tribes are "endogamous or at least not exogamous." Furthermore, tribes divided into clans are usually endogamous as to the tribe.[373] Now, prohibitions are found which cannot be due to "exogamy as a definition of the clan;" such is the prohibition of marriage between mother and son where agnation is in force, and "between father and daughter where the uterine line prevails." Since, therefore, "exogamy as a definition of the clan cannot directly produce these prohibitions, which are found wherever exogamy occurs, and in some instances where it is absent," the inference follows that exogamy must have its origin in the abhorrence of close intermarriage and the ideas to which that is due. But these ideas are not necessarily the same as those underlying "the various prohibited degrees of marriage which are now in force;" nor do they imply that the injuriousness of such unions is the ground of the aversion. "In a community in which marriage takes place between consumptive and syphilitic persons, and those affected by hereditary disease, without being condemned by public opinion, and still less by the law, it cannot be said that the condemnation of incest is founded on our regard for posterity."[374] In harmony with his view that marriage is juridical, not founded on sexual relations, he finds the origin of the horror of marriage between near kindred in the legal incongruity of such unions and in their danger to the peculiar constitution of the ancient family itself. Marriage between a brother and sister or between a mother and son would usually be impossible because the "son possesses nothing which he could offer to the father as purchase-money." To accomplish the purpose by force would be an "unheard-of crime among savages." A connection between a father and daughter would seldom occur, "since a father is unwilling to renounce the advantages of bestowing his daughter in marriage."[375] "If in this way an impression arises that there is something unusual and incompatible with other ideas in marriage between such persons, an occasional calamity which befalls any of them will be enough to excite the imaginative faculty in the highest degree; and if no prohibition previously existed, the absolute condemnation of such marriages would then be pronounced." In a word, "the intermarriage of individuals of the same family implies that persons who have no legal right to dispose of themselves and their property nevertheless agree upon such legal disposition, an encroachment which would certainly be violently opposed by primitive men." In the same way, exogamy will arise between clans; and the co-existence of endogamy and exogamy seems to be consistently explained by this theory. "Exogamy prohibits marriage between persons who are so nearly related that they have no legal independence of each other; endogamy prohibits the marriage of persons whose legal status is too remote from each other."[376] In corroboration of his view, Starcke finds evidence that, here and there, a distinction is made between regular marriage and sexual intercourse, the former being forbidden, unless for special reasons, while the latter is allowed.[377]

If Starcke's explanation of the origin of the dread of close intermarriage between kindred is too vague and ill supported by definite proof, his original suggestion that exogamy must take its rise in that horror is sustained and placed on a broader foundation by the singularly interesting researches of Westermarck[378]—a scholar who has rendered to social science a very important service by carrying the principles of organic evolution into the sphere of domestic institutions. He starts with the assertion that horror of incest is universal. Writers have, indeed, collected evidence which they believe points to a time when such an aversion did not exist. Thus marriage with a sister is permitted in Ceylon and Annam; in the royal families of Siam, Burma, and the Sandwich Islands; while the same custom prevailed, as is well known, among the Ptolemies of Egypt, and among the kings of ancient Persia.[379] But these unions are either "anomalous aberrations" from the general rule; or else they are allowed in order to preserve the purity of caste or the royal blood; or, in case of half-sisters, because relationship is traced in one line only;[380] while occasionally they may result from "extreme isolation" or from "vitiated instincts."[381] Everywhere prohibitions exist, though they vary greatly in the "degrees of kinship within which union is forbidden." As a rule, "among peoples unaffected by modern civilization the prohibited degrees are more numerous than in advanced communities, the prohibitions in a great many cases referring even to all the members of the tribe or clan."

For instance, to select a few examples from the wealth of illustration provided by Westermarck, the "Californian Gualala account it 'poison,' as they say, for a person to marry a cousin or an avuncular relation, and strictly observe in marriage the Mosaic table of prohibited affinities."[382] Among the "Bogos of Eastern Africa, persons related within the seventh degree may not intermarry, whether the relationship be on the paternal or maternal side;" and a similar rule exists among the Pipiles of San Salvador. "Among the Kalmucks, no man can marry a relation on the father's side; and so deeply rooted is this custom among them, that a Kalmuck proverb says, 'The great folk and dogs know no relationship,' alluding to the fact that only a prince may marry a relative." Often clan exogamy is enforced by the severest penalties. "The Algonquins tell of cases where men, for breaking this rule, have been put to death by their nearest kinsfolk."[383]

Westermarck next takes up the origin of prohibited degrees; and after a critical examination of the various theories to explain it, he comes to the conclusion that in no case observed is the prohibition of incest founded on conscious experience of its injurious effects. It has not come into existence as the result of observation or calculation or through education on the part of the savage. Law and custom might thus arise; and these may "prevent passion from passing into action, they cannot wholly destroy its inward power." The home is kept pure "neither by laws, nor by customs, nor by education, but by an instinct which under normal circumstances makes sexual love between the nearest kin a psychical impossibility." But this instinct is not an "innate aversion to marriage with near relations." It is rather an "innate aversion to sexual intercourse between persons living very closely together from early youth;" and "as such persons are in most cases related, this feeling displays itself chiefly as a horror of intercourse between near kin." It is not "by the degrees of consanguinity, but by the close living together that prohibitory laws against intermarriage are determined."[384]

This theory, it will be noticed, coincides with that of Starcke in selecting local contiguity or the intimate association of family life as the fundamental fact. It differs, however, in several important particulars. The economic or legal motives are not emphasized; and Westermarck's explanation is broader than Starcke's, for he holds that the aversion extends to sexual connections outside of regular marriage.

It is impossible here to do more than indicate the character of the evidence by which Westermarck powerfully supports his conclusion. Among the Greenlanders, for instance, "it would be reckoned uncouth and blamable, if a lad and a girl, who had served and been educated in one family, desired to be married to one another." It is even "preferred that the contracting parties should belong to different settlements."[385] Among the Kandhs, according to Colonel Macpherson, "marriage cannot take place even with strangers who have been long adopted into, or domesticated with, a tribe;" and the Cis-Natalian Kafirs are reputed to "dislike marriage between persons who live very closely together, whether related or not."[386] Further proof is derived from the fact that "many peoples have a rule of exogamy, which does not depend on kinship at all." Piedrahita, in the seventeenth century, "relates of the Panches of Bogota that the men and women of one town did not intermarry, as they held themselves to be brothers and sisters, and the impediment of kinship was sacred to them; but such was their ignorance that, if a sister were born in a different town from her brother, he was not prevented from marrying her."[387] So also the "Yaméos, on the river Amazon, will not suffer an intermarriage between members of the same community 'as being friends in blood, though no real affinity between them can be proved;'" and the Uaupés, of the same region, "do not often marry with relations, or even neighbours, preferring those from a distance, or even from other tribes."[388]

The great variation in the extent of prohibited degrees found among nations is "nearly connected with their close living together." Savage and barbarous peoples, "if they have not remained in the most primitive social condition of man, live, not in separate families, but in large households or communities, all the members of which dwell in very close contact with each other." Such are the house-communities of the American aborigines, found everywhere, from the "long houses" of the Iroquois to the vast pueblos or "cities" of Mexico and Yucatan;[389] the "joint undivided families" of the Hindus and Southern Slavs;[390] and the trevs or clan households of ancient Wales, comprising four generations living in one inclosure, whose members are forbidden to intermarry.[391] It is significant that in all such cases we find extended prohibitions of close intermarriage, which do not exist "where the family lives more separately." In fact, there is a marked tendency, amounting almost to a law, that the larger the family or clan group, the wider is the circle of forbidden degrees; and, on the contrary, the more isolated and dispersed the manner of life, the greater is the liberty of matrimonial choice.[392]

In the same way prohibition of marriage on the ground of "affinity" or "spiritual relationship" may take place. "By association of ideas" the "feeling that two persons are intimately connected in some way" may "give rise to the notion that marriage or intercourse between them is incestuous." A strong argument is also derived from the "classificatory system of consanguinity." Tylor has shown that this system and the system of exogamy are, in most cases, found together. They are the "two sides of one institution."[393]

But a deeper and still more interesting question remains: "How has this instinctive aversion to marriage between persons living closely together originated?" We cannot help feeling that through his masterly solution of this difficult problem Westermarck has at last brought us very near to the truth. He finds the key to it in the biological law of similarity.[394] It is demonstrated that a "certain degree of similarity as regards the reproductive system of two individuals is required to make their union fertile and the progeny resulting from this union fully capable of propagation." But the similarity must not be too close. A certain amount of differentiation is requisite; but the differentiation must not be too great.[395] There must be homogeneity combined with heterogeneity. Among domestic animals close interbreeding, it is well known, leads to infertility and degeneration; and Darwin's researches prove that self-fertilization in the vegetable kingdom produces the same results.[396] There is abundant evidence tending to show that what is true of plants and the lower animals is true also of man. "Taking all these facts into consideration," says Westermarck, in closing his argument, "I cannot but believe that consanguineous marriages, in some way or other, are more or less detrimental to the species. And here, I think, we may find a quite sufficient explanation of the horror of incest; not because man at an early stage recognized the injurious influence of close intermarriage, but because the law of natural selection must inevitably have operated. Among the ancestors of man, as among other animals, there was no doubt a time when blood-relationship was no bar to sexual intercourse. But variations, here as elsewhere, would naturally present themselves; and those of our ancestors who avoided in-and-in breeding would survive, while the others would gradually decay and ultimately perish. Thus an instinct would be developed which would be powerful enough, as a rule, to prevent injurious unions. Of course it would display itself simply as an aversion on the part of individuals to union with others with whom they lived; but these, as a matter of fact, would be blood-relations, so that the result would be the survival of the fittest. Whether man inherited the feeling from the predecessors from whom he sprang, or whether it was developed after the evolution of distinctly human qualities, we do not know."[397]

Exogamy appears, then, to be the result of natural selection, arising "when single families united in small hordes. It could not but grow up if the idea of union between persons intimately associated with one another was an object of innate repugnance." Conversely, the law of similarity enables us to understand the coexistence of clan-exogamy and tribal endogamy. The one springs from a horror of sexual union between persons who are too near; the other arises in a dislike of connection between those who are too remote. Among primitive men, and sometimes even among those well advanced in civilization, there exists a shrinking from physical contact with strange races only less violent than the aversion which the dread of incest excites. But this prejudice yields to the sympathy produced by the growing similarity of interests, ideas, sentiments, and general culture among men. Sympathy, upon which affection mainly depends, has widened the sphere of sexual selection.[398]