Marriage by Purchase

As appears from the instances quoted, the practice of capturing wives is, in the main, a thing of the past. Among most existing uncivilized peoples a man has, in some way or other, to give compensation for his bride.²³¹⁹ Marriage by capture has been succeeded by marriage by purchase.

The simplest way of purchasing a wife is no doubt to give a kinswoman in exchange for her. “The Australian male,” says Mr. Curr, “almost invariably obtains his wife or wives, either as a survivor of a married brother, or in exchange for his sisters, or later on in life for his daughters.”²³²⁰ A similar exchange is sometimes effected in Sumatra.²³²¹

Much more common is the custom of obtaining a wife by services rendered to her father. The man goes to live with the family of the girl for a certain time, during which he works as a servant. This practice, with which Hebrew tradition has familiarized us, is widely diffused among the uncivilized races of America,²³²² Africa,²³²³ Asia,²³²⁴ and391 the Indian Archipelago.²³²⁵ Often it is only those men who are too poor to pay cash that serve in the father-in-law’s house till they have given an equivalent in labour; but sometimes not even money can save the bridegroom from this sort of servitude.²³²⁶ In some cases he has to serve his time before he is allowed to marry the girl; in others he gets her in advance. Again, among several peoples, already mentioned, the man goes over to the woman’s family or tribe to live there for ever; but Dr. Starcke suggests that this custom has a different origin from the other, being an expression of the strong clan sentiment, and not a question of gain.²³²⁷

According to Mr. Spencer, the obtaining of wives by services rendered, instead of by property paid, constitutes a higher form of marriage, and is developed along with the industrial type of society. “This modification,” he says, “practicable with difficulty among rude predatory tribes becomes more practicable as there arise established industries affording spheres in which services may be rendered.”²³²⁸ But it should be noticed that, even at a very low stage of civilization, a man may help his father-in-law in fishing and hunting, whilst industrial work promotes accumulation of property, and consequently makes it easier for the man to acquire his wife by real purchase. We find also the practice of serving for wives prevalent among such rude races as the Fuegians and the Bushmans; and, in the ‘Eyrbyggja Saga,’ Vîgstyr says to the berserk Halli, who asked for the hand of his daughter392 Âsdî, “As you are a poor man, I shall do as the ancients did and let you deserve your marriage by hard work.”²³²⁹ It seems then, almost probable that marriage by services is a more archaic form than marriage by purchase; but generally they occur simultaneously.

The most common compensation for a bride is property paid to her owner. Her price varies indefinitely. A pretty, healthy, and able-bodied girl commands of course a better price than one who is ugly and weak;²³³⁰ a girl of rank, a better price than one who is mean and poor;²³³¹ a virgin, generally a better than a widow or a repudiated wife.²³³² Among the Californian Karok, for instance, a wife is seldom purchased for less than half a string of dentalium shell, but “when she belongs to an aristocratic family, is pretty, and skillful in making acorn-bread and weaving baskets, she sometimes costs as high as two strings.”²³³³ The bride-price however, varies most according to the circumstances of the parties, and according to the value set on female labour. In British Columbia and Vancouver Island, the value of the articles given for the bride ranges from £20 to £40 sterling.²³³⁴ The Indians of Oregon buy their wives for horses, blankets, or buffalo robes.²³³⁵ Among the Shastika in California, “a wife is purchased of her father for shell-money or horses, ten or twelve cayuse ponies being paid for a maid of great attractions.”²³³⁶ Again, the Navajos of New Mexico consider twelve horses so exorbitant a price for a wife, that it is paid only for393 “one possessing unusual qualifications, such as beauty, industry, and skill in their necessary employments”;²³³⁷ and the Patagonians give mares, horses, or silver ornaments for the bride.²³³⁸

In Africa, not horses but cattle are considered the most proper equivalent for a good wife. Among the Kaffirs, three, five, or ten cows are a low price, twenty or thirty a rather high; but, according to Barrow, a man frequently obtained a wife for an ox or a couple of cows.²³³⁹ The Damaras are so poor a people that they are often glad to take one cow for a daughter.²³⁴⁰ Among the Banyai, many heads of cattle or goats are given to induce the parents of the girl “to give her up,” as it is termed, i.e., to forgo all claim on her offspring, for if nothing is given, the family from which she comes can claim the children as part of itself.²³⁴¹ In Uganda, the ordinary price of a wife is either three or four bullocks, six sewing needles, or a small box of percussion caps, but Mr. Wilson was often offered one in exchange for a coat or a pair of shoes.²³⁴² In the Mangoni country, two skins of a buck are considered a fair price,²³⁴³ and among the Negroes of Bondo, a goat;²³⁴⁴ whereas, among the Mandingoes, as we are told by Caillié, no wife is to be had otherwise than by the presentation of slaves to the parents of the mistress.²³⁴⁵

The Chulims paid from five to fifty roubles for a wife, the Turalinzes usually from five to ten.²³⁴⁶ Rich Bashkirs pay sometimes even 3,000 roubles, but the poorest may buy a wife for a cart-load of wood or hay.²³⁴⁷ In Tartary, parents sell a daughter for some horses, oxen, sheep, or pounds of butter; among the Samoyedes and Ostyaks, for a certain number of394 reindeer.²³⁴⁸ Among the Indian Kisáns, “two baskets of rice and a rupee in cash constitute the compensatory offering given to the parents of the girl.”²³⁴⁹ Among the Mishmis, a rich man gives for a wife twenty mithuns (a kind of oxen), but a poor man can get a wife for a pig.²³⁵⁰ In Timor-laut, according to Mr. Forbes, “no wife can be purchased without elephants’ tusks.”²³⁵¹ In the Caroline Islands, “the man makes a present to the father of the girl whom he marries, consisting of fruits, fish, and similar things!”²³⁵² In Samoa, the bride-price included canoes, pigs, and foreign property of any kind which might fall into their hands;²³⁵³ and, among the Fijians, “the usual price is a whale’s tooth, or a musket.”²³⁵⁴

Among some peoples marriage may take place on credit, though, generally, the wife and her children cannot leave the parental home until the price is paid in full.²³⁵⁵ In Unyoro, according to Emin Pasha, when a poor man is unable to procure the cattle required for his marriage at once, he may, by agreement with the bride’s father, pay them by instalments; the children, however, born in the meantime belong to the wife’s father, and each of them must be redeemed with a cow.²³⁵⁶

Marriage by exchange or purchase is not only generally prevalent among existing lower races; it occurs, or formerly occurred, among civilized nations as well. In Central America and Peru, a man had to serve for his bride.²³⁵⁷ In China, a present is given by the father of the suitor, the amount of which is not left to the goodwill of the parties, as the term “present” would suggest, but is exactly stipulated395 for by the negotiators of the marriage; hence, as Mr. Jamieson remarks, it is no doubt a survival of the time when the transaction was one of ordinary bargain.²³⁵⁸ In Japan, the proposed husband sends certain prescribed presents to his future bride, and this sending of presents forms one of the most important parts of the marriage ceremony. In fact, when once the presents have been sent and accepted, the contract is completed, and neither party can retract. Mr. Küchler says he has been unable to find out the exact meaning of these presents: the native books on marriage are silent on the subject, and the Japanese themselves have no other explanation to give than that the custom has been handed down from ancient times.²³⁵⁹ But from the facts recorded in the next chapter it is evident that the sending of presents is a relic of a previous custom of marrying by purchase.

In all branches of the Semitic race men had to buy or serve for their wives, the “mohar” or “mahr” being originally the same as a purchase-sum.²³⁶⁰ In the Books of Ruth and Hosea, the bridegroom actually says that he has bought the bride;²³⁶¹ and the modern Jews, according to Michaelis, have a sham purchase among their marriage ceremonies, which is called “marrying by the penny.”²³⁶² In Mohammedan countries marriage differs but little from a real purchase.²³⁶³ The same custom prevailed among the Chaldeans, Babylonians,²³⁶⁴ and Assyrians.²³⁶⁵

Speaking of the ancient Finns, the Finnish philologist and traveller, Castrén, remarks,396 “There are many reasons for believing that a cap full of silver and gold was one of the best proxies in wooing among our ancestors.”²³⁶⁶ Evident traces of marriage by purchase are, indeed, found in the ‘Kalevala’ and the ‘Kanteletar’;²³⁶⁷ and, in parts of Finland, symbols of it are still left in the marriage ceremony.²³⁶⁸ Among the East Finnish peoples, marriage by purchase exists even now, or did so till quite lately.²³⁶⁹

Wife purchase, as Dr. Winternitz remarks, was the basis of Indo-European marriage before the separation of peoples took place.²³⁷⁰ The Hindu bride, in Vedic times, had to be won by rich presents to the future father-in-law;²³⁷¹ and one of the eight forms of marriage mentioned, though disapproved of, by Manu—the Âsura form—was marriage by purchase. According to Dubois, to marry and to buy a wife are in India synonymous terms.²³⁷² Aristotle tells us that the ancient Greeks were in the habit of purchasing wives,²³⁷³ and in the Homeric age a maid was called “ἀλφεσίβοια,” i.e., one “who yields her parents many oxen as presents from her suitor.” Among the Thracians, according to Herodotus, marriage was contracted by purchase.²³⁷⁴ So also throughout Teutonic antiquity.²³⁷⁵ The ancient Scandinavians believed that even the gods had bought their wives.²³⁷⁶ In Germany, the expression “to purchase a wife” was in use till the end of the Middle Ages, and we find the same term in Christian IV.'s Norwegian Law of 1604.²³⁷⁷ As late as the middle of the sixteenth century the English preserved in their marriage397 ritual traces of this ancient legal procedure;²³⁷⁸ whilst in Thuringia, according to Franz Schmidt, the betrothal ceremony even to this day indicates its former occurrence.²³⁷⁹

Purchase, as Dr. Schrader remarks, cannot with equal certainty be established as the oldest form of marriage on Roman soil.²³⁸⁰ But the symbolical process of coemptio—the form of marriage among the plebeians—preserved a reminiscence of the original custom in force if not at Rome, at least among the ancestors of the Romans.²³⁸¹ In Ireland and Wales, in ancient times, the bride-price consisted usually of articles of gold, silver, and bronze, sometimes even of land.²³⁸² The Slavs, also, used to buy their wives;²³⁸³ and, among the South Slavonians, the custom of purchasing the bride still partially prevails, or recently did so. In Servia, at the beginning of the present century, the price of girls reached such a height that Black George limited it to one ducat.²³⁸⁴

In spite of this general prevalence of marriage by purchase, we have no evidence that it is a stage through which every race has passed. It must be observed, first, that in sundry tribes the presents given by the bridegroom are intended not exactly to compensate the parents for the bride, but rather to dispose them favourably to the match. Colonel Dalton says, for example, that, among the Pádams, one of the lowest peoples of India, it is customary for a lover to show his inclinations whilst courting by presenting his sweetheart and her parents with small delicacies, such as field mice and squirrels, though the parents seldom interfere with the young couple’s designs, and it would be regarded as an indelible disgrace to barter a child’s happiness for money.²³⁸⁵ The Ainos398 of Yesso, says Mr. Bickmore, “do not buy their wives, but make presents to the parents of saki, tobacco, and fish;”²³⁸⁶ and the amount of these gifts is never settled beforehand.²³⁸⁷ The game and fruits given by the bridegroom immediately before marriage, among the Puris, Coroados, and Coropos, seem to v. Martius to be rather a proof of his ability to keep a wife than a means of exchange; whereas the more civilized tribes of the Brazilian aborigines carry on an actual trade in women.²³⁸⁸

Speaking of the Yukonikhotana, a tribe of Alaska, Petroff states that the custom of purchasing wives does not exist among them.²³⁸⁹ The Californian Wintun, who rank among the lower types of the race, generally pay nothing for their brides.²³⁹⁰ The Niam-Niam and some other African peoples,²³⁹¹ most of the Chittagong Hill tribes,²³⁹² the aboriginal inhabitants of Kola and Kobroor, of the Aru Archipelago, who live in trees or caves,²³⁹³ and apparently also the Andamanese are in the habit of marrying without making any payment for the bride. Among the Veddahs, according to M. Le Mesurier, no marriage presents are given on either side,²³⁹⁴ but Mr. Hartshorne states that “a marriage is attended with no ceremony beyond the presentation of some food to the parents of the bride.”²³⁹⁵

In Ponapé, says Dr. Finsch, marriage is not based on purchase;²³⁹⁶ but this is contrary to the general custom in the Carolines,²³⁹⁷ as also in the adjacent Pelew Islands,²³⁹⁸ where399 women are bought as wives by means of presents to the father. In the Kingsmill Group, according to Wilkes, “a wife is never bought, but it is generally supposed that each party will contribute something towards the household stock.”²³⁹⁹ With regard to the Hawaiians, Ellis remarks, “We are not aware that the parents of the woman received anything from the husband, or gave any dowry with the wife.”²⁴⁰⁰ And Mr. Angas even asserts that the practice of purchasing wives is not generally adopted in Polynesia.²⁴⁰¹ But the statement is doubtful, as, at least in Samoa,²⁴⁰² Tahiti,²⁴⁰³ and Nukahiva,²⁴⁰⁴ the bridegroom gains the bride by presents to her father. And in Melanesia marriage by purchase is certainly universal.²⁴⁰⁵ Among the South Australian Kurnai, according to Mr. Howitt, marriages were brought about “most frequently by elopement, less frequently by capture, and least frequently by exchange or by gift.”²⁴⁰⁶

Purchase of wives may, with even more reason than marriage by capture, be said to form a general stage in the social history of man. Although the two practices often occur simultaneously, the former has, as a rule, succeeded the latter, as barter in general has followed upon robbery. The more recent character of marriage by purchase appears clearly from the fact that marriage by capture very frequently occurs as a symbol where marriage by purchase occurs as a400 reality. Moreover, there can be little doubt that barter and commerce are comparatively late inventions of man.

Dr. Peschel, indeed, contends that barter existed in those ages in which we find the earliest signs of our race. But we have no evidence that it was in this way that the cave-dwellers of Périgord, of the reindeer period, obtained the rock crystals, the Atlantic shells, and the horns of the Polish Saiga antelope, which have been found in their settlements; and we may not in any case, conclude that “commerce has existed in all ages, and among all inhabitants of the world.”²⁴⁰⁷ There are even in modern times instances of savage peoples who seem to have a very vague idea of barter, or perhaps none at all. Concerning certain Solomon Islanders, Labillardière states, “We could not learn whether these people are in the habit of making exchanges; but it is very certain that it was impossible for us to obtain anything from them in this way; ... yet they were very eager to receive everything that we gave them.”²⁴⁰⁸ For some time after Captain Weddell began to associate with the Fuegians, they gave him any small article he expressed a wish for, without asking any return; but afterwards they “acquired an idea of barter.”²⁴⁰⁹ Nor did the Australians whom Cook saw, and the Patagonians visited by Captain Wallis in 1766, understand traffic, though they now understand it.²⁴¹⁰ Again, with regard to the Andamanese Mr. Man remarks,401 “They set no fixed value on their various properties, and rarely make or procure anything with the express object of disposing of it in barter. Apparently they prefer to regard their transactions as presentations, for their mode of negotiating is to give such objects as are desired by another in the hope of receiving in return something for which they have expressed a wish, it being tacitly understood that unless otherwise mentioned beforehand, no ‘present’ is to be accepted without an equivalent being rendered. The natural consequence of this system is that most of the quarrels which so frequently occur among them originate in failure on the part of the recipient in making such a return as had been confidently expected.”²⁴¹¹ It must also be noted that those uncivilized peoples among whom marriage by purchase does not occur are, for the most part, exceedingly rude races.

As M. Koenigswarter²⁴¹² and Mr. Spencer²⁴¹³ have suggested, the transition from marriage by capture to marriage by purchase was probably brought about in the following way: abduction, in spite of parents, was the primary form; then there came the offering of compensation to escape vengeance; and this grew eventually into the making of presents beforehand. Thus, among the Ahts, according to Mr. Sproat, when a man steals a wife, a purchase follows, “as the friends of the woman must be pacified with presents.”²⁴¹⁴ In New Guinea²⁴¹⁵ and Bali,²⁴¹⁶ as also among the Chukmas²⁴¹⁷ and Araucanians,²⁴¹⁸ it often happens that the bridegroom carries off, or elopes with, his bride, and afterwards pays a compensation-price to her parents. Among the Bodo and Mech, who still preserve the form of forcible abduction in their marriage ceremony, the successful lover, after having captured the girl, gives a feast to the bride’s friends and with a present conciliates the father, who is supposed to be incensed.²⁴¹⁹ The same is reported of the Maoris,²⁴²⁰ whilst among the Tangutans, according to Prejevalsky, the ravisher who has stolen his neighbour’s wife pays the husband a good sum as compensation, but keeps the wife.²⁴²¹

It is a matter of no importance in this connection that among certain peoples, the price of the bride is paid not to the father, but to some other nearly related person, especially an uncle,²⁴²² or to some other relatives as well as to the father.²⁴²³402 In any case the price is to be regarded as a compensation for the loss sustained in the giving up of the girl, and as a remuneration for the expenses incurred in her maintenance till the time of her marriage.²⁴²⁴ Sometimes, as among several negro peoples, daughters are trained for the purpose of being disposed of at a profit; but this is a modern invention, irreconcilable with savage ideas. Thus, among the Kafirs, the practice of making an express bargain about women hardly prevailed in the first quarter of this century, and the verb applied to the act of giving cattle for a girl, according to Mr. Shooter, involves not the idea of an actual trade, but rather that of reward for her birth and nurture.²⁴²⁵

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To most savages there seems nothing objectionable in marriage by purchase. On the contrary, Mr. Bancroft states that the Indians in Columbia consider it in the highest degree disgraceful to the girl’s family, if she is given away without a price;²⁴²⁶ and, in certain tribes of California, “the children of a woman for whom no money was paid are accounted no better than bastards, and the whole family are contemned.”²⁴²⁷ It was left for a higher civilization to raise women from this state of debasement. In the next chapter we shall consider the process by which marriage ceased to be a purchase contract, and woman an object of trade.