Primitive Marriage
Preface
Section summary
McLennan presents his “little book” as an exercise in scientific history. Investigating the origin of the mock capture of the bride, he finds the symbol among Indo-European, Turanian and Semitic peoples alike, which suggests a phase of society once almost universal and convinces him that the races of mankind differ only in their rate of development. He names chapters VIII and IX, on ancient kinship, caste and endogamy, as the most important part of the work, and explains his spelling of place-names and his omission of diacritics.
In the course of some inquiries which I had been making into the early history of civil society, the meaning and origin of the Form of Capture in Marriage Ceremonies fell to be investigated. The subject being in itself curious, as well as obscure, and one which has never hitherto, so far as I am aware, been handled, I venture to lay the result of my investigation before the public, hoping that it may to some extent interest by its novelty. To the philosophic reader, I humbly submit my little book as an exercise in scientific history. If I am right in my conclusions as to the origin of the symbol of capture, my essay must be accepted as throwing new light on the primitive state. For it will be seen that the symbol is not peculiar to any of the families of mankind. It is at once Indo-European, Turanian, and Semitic; and the frequency of its occurrence is such as strongly to suggest—what I incline to believe—that the phase of society in which it originated existed, at some time or other, almost everywhere. Indeed, so far as my inquiries into early social phenomena have extended, I have found such similarity, so many correspondences, so much sameness in the forms of life prevailing among the races usually considered distinct, that I have come to regard the ethnological differences of the several families of mankind as of little or no weight compared with what they have in common. The most that can be attributed to those differences is, that they have affected the rate of development of the families, and the character of the development itself, in some of its secondary aspects.
Apart from the interest attaching to the Form of Capture as pointing out what most probably was the primitive form of human association, it will be found to have an important bearing on several social problems which have hitherto remained unsolved. I think that the most important portions of my work are Chapters VIII. and IX., in which the solution of some of these problems is attempted. These chapters, it will be seen, are strictly pertinent to the main subject of inquiry. In order to explain the appearance of the Form of Capture among endogamous peoples, it was necessary that I should examine the systems of kinship which anciently prevailed, and their influence on the structure of the primitive groups, so as to obtain a true view of the rise of caste and of endogamy.
I ought to mention that, in some cases, I have had much difficulty in ascertaining the proper names of places. For instance, Munniepore is sometimes written Munipur, and sometimes Mannipoor. In every such case I have followed the authority which I have had most frequent occasion to cite in regard to the place. I have farther to notice, that I have discarded the use of the signs ˆ ¯ ˍ. ˙ ´ ` ¨, and so on, commonly employed to indicate the orthoepy of foreign words. Such signs are of no use to the unlearned; and, in the run of cases, the learned may be presumed not to require their assistance. Besides, I have not found much agreement, among writers, in the use of such signs. The word Ramayana, for example, is written Rámáyaṇa by Professor Monier Williams, Rāmāyaṉa by Dr. Muir, and Râmâyaṇa by Professor Max Müller. In writing it simply Ramayana, I follow Mr. Tagore, in his recent translation of the ‘Vivada Chintamani,’ in which work, as in the present, the signs referred to are wholly discarded.