Note 503 — Chapter V · A CRITICISM OF THE HYPOTHESIS OF PROMISCUITY

In dealing with the pretended group-marriages of the Australians, we have noted the distortion of facts to which Mr. Morgan’s hypothesis has given rise. Nowhere has this distortion appeared in an odder way than in Professor Bernhöft’s pamphlet, entitled ‘Verwandtschaftsnamen und Eheformen der nordamerikanischen Volksstämme.’ The author, misled by the systems of nomenclature, asserts that even now group-marriages are extremely common (have ‘eine ungeheure Verbreitung’) not only among the Australians, but also throughout America and Africa, and in many parts of Asia (pp. 8, 16). In a paper of more recent date (‘Altindische Familien-Organisation,’ in ‘Zeitschr. f. vgl. Rechtswiss.,’ vol. ix. p. 7), however, Professor Bernhöft admits that the actual practice has mostly become different from that which the terms indicate, and that the progress to individual marriage has already often taken place.