Studies in Ancient History: comprising a Reprint of “Primitive Marriage”

Abstract

THE first edition of “Primitive Marriage” appeared in 1865, and the book was already extremely rare when, in 1876, it was reprinted as the first part of the “Studies in Ancient History.” The reprint also soon became scarce, and while the influence of the author has been steadily growing, and almost all students of early society have come to attach great importance to his speculations, his principal writings have for some years been almost inaccessible. This new edition therefore supplies a real want, and it is doubly welcome for the sparing, but judicious, notes and appendixes which the editor, Mr. D. McLennan, has attached to his brother's book. “Primitive Marriage” broke ground in a new field of research, and, as the point of view was wholly novel, the collection, sifting, and marshalling of the evidence on which the argument was based was entirely pioneer's work. At the close of his life, McLennan was in possession of a much larger material; he had pursued his argument in new directions and to further conclusions, and on one or two points he had come to change his views. But new research had only confirmed the main lines of the argument sketched with so firm a hand in. his original essay; and read with the caveats which his brother has introduced at one or two points—chiefly as regards the interpretation of the Levirate, and the prevalence of Agnation“ the present reprint may be taken as generally representing, so far as it goes, the author's final conclusions on the subjects discussed. I say so far as it goes, for in many directions his conclusions had been added to and his views developed. The editor promises us a second volume, to consist for the most part of writings hitherto unpublished, which will throw a good deal of light on these new developments; meanwhile he has restricted himself in the notes “to certain matters on which the author had announced a change of view, and to certain others where circumstances had made an additional statement imperative.” Of the additional statements, the most important is contained in two long notes appended to the essay on Morgan's “classificatory system” of relationships, in which it is clearly made out that Morgan's theory rests on misconception of the facts, and that the supposed classificatory system of relationship is not a system of relationship at all, but a system of terms of ceremonial or friendly address, used in conversation even between persons who are not related to one another in any way. This comes out so clearly in the cases about which we are best informed, that it is very questionable whether the facts so laboriously collected by Mr. Morgan can be used to throw light on the early history of the family.

Studies in Ancient History: comprising a Reprint of “Primitive Marriage.”

By the late John Ferguson McLennan. A New Edition. (London: Macmillan and Co., 1886.)