SPECIAL WORDS FOR SEX AND RELATIONSHIP 203 



maid on a farm. Luther writes in his Table - Talk 

 of one " der seine mutter und sonst fiinf mumen gar 

 auszgesogen," which reminds us at once of Heimdall and 

 his nine mothers (see pp. 142, 235). In A.S. we have 

 mddrige, mddrie, and in O.H.G. muoterjd, 0. Fries. 

 medder and moye, all used much as mdme. Muomun- 

 suni stands glossed consobrini, cousin-german on the 

 mother's side. The serf, mumbling, shall follow, we 

 are told, the nearest of his mother's relatives within the 

 proscribed degrees of marriage, evidence for the ancient 

 mother-custom of descent. 1 Lastly, we note that the 

 sexual freedom of the old group of mothers is still 

 shadowed in the early glosses amasia for mdme, in its 

 use for students' concubines, and in the term muhmen- 

 liaus for brothel, another link to the many which 

 connect that resort with the frauengadem of the old 

 group -dwelling. In these words, then, for mother's sister 

 we find evidence again of the old sex-customs, and of a 

 group of females hardly distinguished in name from each 

 other, and all termed muhme, mdme, or mamma by the 

 children of the next generation. 



Probably closely related to mdme, mama, is amme. 

 This in O.N. stands for grandmother, in Swabia and 

 other parts of Germany it is used for mother, but more 

 generally it signifies one who gives suck, the foster- 

 mother, and simply nurse. Possibly, like mdme, it was 



1 Perhaps one of the best and yet least recognised fossils of this custom from 

 the root md is to be found in the word matriculation from Latin matricula, 

 a public register or list. This is only the diminutive of matrix signifying in 

 succession, womb, mother, stem, and descent, and is then used of a list in which 

 originally the descent was stated. The reader may note also how progenies, 

 descent, and progenitor, ancestor, are probably primarily associated with the 

 producing of the mother. Cf. O.H.G. chonot from Tcone glossed genealogia. 



