POLITICAL HEADS CHIEFS, KINGS, ETC. 729 



chiefly rule, display a filial submission which is mostly small and 

 ceases early. 



But now under what circumstances does respect for age take that 

 pronounced form seen in societies distinguished by great political sub- 

 ordination? It was pointed out that when men, passing from the 

 hunting stage into the j^astoral stage, began to wander in search of 

 food for their domesticated animals, they fell into conditions favoring 

 the formation of that patriarchal group, at once family and miniature 

 society, constituting the unit of composition of societies which reach 

 the highest stages of evolution. We saw that, in the primitive pastoral 

 horde, the man, dissociated from those earlier tribal influences which 

 interfere with paternal power, and which prevent settled relations of 

 the sexes, was so placed as to acquire headship of a coherent group : 

 the father became, " by right of the strong hand, leader, owner, master, 

 of wife, children, and all he carried with him." There were enumer- 

 ated the influences which tended to make the eldest male a patriarch ; 

 and it was shown that not only the Semites, Aryans, and Turanians 

 have exemplified this relation between pastoral habits and the patri- 

 archal organization, but that it recurs in South African races. 



Be the causes what they may, however, we find abundant proof 

 that this family supremacy of the eldest male, common among pastoral 

 peoples and peoples who have passed through the j)astoral stage into 

 the agricultural stage, naturally develops into political suj^remacy. 

 Of the Santals Hunter says : '" The village government is purely patri- 

 archal. Each hamlet has an original founder (the manjhi-hanan), 

 who is regarded as the father of the community. He receives divine 

 honors in the sacred grove and transmits his authority to his descend- 

 ants." Of the compound family among the Khonds we read in Mac- 

 pherson that "there it [paternal authority] reigns nearly absolute. 

 It is a Khond's maxim that a man's father is his god, disobedience to 

 whom is the greatest crime ; and all the members of a family live 

 iTnited in strict subordination to its head until his death." And the 

 growth of groups thus arising, into compound and doubly compound 

 groups, acknowledging the authority of one who unites family head- 

 ship with political headship, has been made familiar by Sir Henry 

 Maine and others as common to early Greeks, Romans, Teutons, and 

 as still affecting social organization among Hindoos and Slavs. 



Here, then, we have making its appearance a factor which conduces 

 to permanence of political headship. As was pointed out in a forego- 

 ing chapter, while succession by efficiency gives plasticity to social 

 organization, succession by inheritance gives it stability. Ko settled 

 arrangement can arise in a primitive community so long as the func- 

 tion of each unit is determined exclusively by his fitness ; since, at 

 his death, the arrangement, in so far he was a part of it, must be 

 recommenced. Only when his place is forthwith filled by one- whose 

 claim is admitted, does there begin a differentiation which survives 



