Note Back to Main Text — Chapter I · ANCIENT AMERICA.

Not only the food was common property, but many chattels, including the children, belonged to the gens or clan. When a young woman got married she brought her husband home with her. Though thenceforth an inmate of this household he remained an alien to her clan. "If he proved lazy and failed to do his share of the providing, woe be to him. Summary divorce. No matter how many children, or whatever goods he might have in the house, he might at any time be ordered to pick up his blanket and budge; and after such orders it would not be healthful for him to disobey; the house would be too hot for him; and unless saved by the intercession of some aunt or grandmother [of his wife] he must retreat to his own clan, or, as was often done, go and start a new matrimonial alliance in some other.... The female portion ruled the house."[76]