The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State. Friedrich Engels
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has the same signification for primeval history that Darwin's theory of evolution had for biology and Marx's theory of surplus value for political economy. Morgan was thereby enabled to sketch the outline of a history of the family, showing in bold strokes at least the classic stages of development, so far as the available material will at present permit such a thing. It is clearly obvious that this marks a new epoch in the treatment of primeval history. The maternal "gens" has become the pivot on which this whole science revolves. Since its discovery we know in what direction to continue our researches, what to investigate and how to arrange the results of our studies. In consequence, progress in this field is now much more rapid than before the publication of Morgan's book.
The discoveries of Morgan are now universally recognized, or rather appropriated, even by the archaeologists of England. But hardly one of them openly admits that we owe this revolution of thought to Morgan. His book is ignored in England as much as possible, and he himself is dismissed with condescending praise for the excellence of his former works. The details of his discussion are diligently criticised, but his really great discoveries are covered up obstinately. The original edition of "Ancient Society" is out of print; there is no paying market for a work of this kind in America; in England, it appears, the book was systematically suppressed, and the only edition of this epochal work still circulating in the market is—the German translation.
Whence this reserve? We can hardly refrain from calling it a conspiracy to kill by silence, especially in view of the numerous meaningless and polite quotations and of other manifestations of fellowship in which the writings of our recognized archaeologists abound. Is it because Morgan is an American, and because it is rather hard on the English archaeologists to be dependent on two talented foreigners like Bachofen and Morgan for the outlines determining the arrangement and grouping of their material, in spite of all praiseworthy diligence in accumulating material. They could have borne with the German, but an American? In face of an American, every Englishman becomes patriotic. I have seen amusing illustrations of this fact in the United States. Moreover, it must be remembered that McLennan was, so to say, the official founder and leader of the English prehistoric school. It was almost a requirement of good prehistoric manners to refer in terms of highest admiration to his artificial construction of history leading from infanticide through polyandry and abduction to maternal law. The least doubt in the strictly independent existence of exogamous and endogamous tribes was considered a frivolous sacrilege. According to this view, Morgan, in reducing all these sacred dogmas to thin air, committed an act of wanton destruction. And worse still, his mere manner of reducing them sufficed to show their instability, so that the admirers of McLennan, who hitherto had been stumbling about helplessly between exogamy and endogamy, were almost forced to slap their foreheads and exclaim: "How silly of us, not to have found that out long ago!"
Just as if Morgan had not committed crimes enough against the official archaeologists to justify them in discarding all fair methods and assuming an attitude of cool neglect, he persisted in filling their cup to overflowing. Not only does he criticise civilization, the society of production for profit, the fundamental form of human society, in a manner savoring of Fourier, but he also speaks of a future reorganization of society in language that Karl Marx might have used. Consequently, he receives his just deserts, when McLennan indignantly charges him with a profound antipathy against historical methods, and when Professor Giraud-Teulon of Geneva endorses the same view in 1884. For was not the same Professor Giraud-Teulon still wandering about aimlessly in the maze of McLennan's exogamy in 1874 (Origines de la famille)? And was it not Morgan who finally had to set him free?
It is not necessary to dwell in this preface on the other forms of progress which primeval history owes to Morgan. Reference to them will be found in the course of my work. During the fourteen years that have elapsed since the publication of his main work, the material contributing to the history of primeval society has been considerably enriched. Anthropologists, travelers and professional historians were joined by comparative jurists who added new matter and opened up new points of view. Here and there, some special hypothesis of Morgan has been shaken or even become obsolete. But in no instance has the new material led to a weakening of his leading propositions. The order he established in primeval history still holds good in its main outlines to this day. We may even say that this order receives recognition in the exact degree, in which the authorship of this great progress is concealed.
London, June 16th, 1891.
Frederick Engels.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Ancient Society or Researches in the Lines of Human Progress from Savagery, through Barbarism, to Civilization. By Lewis H. Morgan. Henry Holt & Co. 1877. The book, printed in America, was singularly difficult to obtain in London. The author died a few years ago.
[2] McLennan, Studies in Ancient History, 1886. Primitive Marriage, p. 124.
[3] Latham, Descriptive Ethnology, 1859.
[4] McLennan, Studies In Ancient History, 1886. Primitive Marriage, p. 140.
[5] Ibidem, p. 146.
THE ORIGIN OF THE FAMILY
CHAPTER I. PREHISTORIC STAGES.
Morgan was the first to make an attempt at introducing a logical order into the history of primeval society. Until considerably more material is obtained, no further changes will be necessary and his arrangement will surely remain in force.
Of the three main epochs—savagery, barbarism and civilization—naturally only the first two and the transition to the third required his attention. He subdivided each of these into a lower, middle and higher stage, according to the progress in the production of the means of sustenance. His reason for doing so is that the degree of human supremacy over nature is conditioned on the ability to produce the necessities of life. For of all living beings, man alone has acquired an almost unlimited control over food production. All great epochs of human progress, according to Morgan, coincide more or less directly with times of greater abundance in the means that sustain life. The evolution of the family proceeds in the same measure without, however, offering equally convenient marks for sub-division.
I. SAVAGERY.
1. Lower Stage. Infancy of the human race. Human beings still dwelt in their original habitation, in tropical or subtropical forests. They lived at least part of the time in trees, for only in this way they could escape the attacks of large beasts of prey and survive. Fruit, nuts, and roots served as food. The formation of articulated speech is the principal result of this period. Not a single one of all the nations that have become known in historic times dates back to this primeval stage.
Although the latter may extend over thousands of years, we have no means of proving its existence by direct evidence. But once the descent of man from the Animal Kingdom is acknowledged, the acceptance of this stage of transition becomes inevitable.
2. Middle Stage: Commencing with the utilization of fish (including crabs, mollusks and other aquatic