2i6 KINDRED GROUP-MARRIAGE 



son, correspond to the first heirs of a man under mother- 

 right custom. 1 



The most widespread German word for father's 

 sister is O.H.G. basa, L.G. wasa, and Modern German 

 base. In O.H.G. we find basa, wasa, and pasa all 

 glossed amita. In Modern German its use has occasion- 

 ally been rather wide, thus Luther uses it for father's 

 brother's wife, and in Low German we find it used even 

 for mother's sister. Dialect uses show a still more general 

 value. An old woman I knew, who used to sell wine in 

 a tower at Lorch on the Rhine, was termed by the whole 

 neighbourhood (in 1879) Sette bas, she being a public 

 character on account of her having seen the Russians 

 cross the Rhine when the Allies marched on Paris. 

 In Bavaria the term basl is applied to any married 

 woman, especially if she be old, and the term basele 

 to any not fully grown girl. The origin of the word is 

 very obscure. Grimm appears in favour of a derivation 

 analogous to the Norse faster =farsyster, and would 

 equate basa and fadarsuestor. Graff, Deecke, and 

 others connect basa with bosam, bdsm, English bosom. 

 Thus gebusamen is glossed consanguineos, blood- 

 relatives. According to the patriarchal system of 

 these writers, the father's sister is the one who takes 

 the motherless child of her brother to her bosom. But 

 bdsam in this sense denotes bosom, lap, relationship 

 through the womb. In 0. Fries, boste, N. Fries, boaste 

 is marriage, and 0. Fries, bostigia, N. Fries, boostgjan is 

 to marry, and boesen to kiss. This certainly does not 



1 That the oheim, like the muhme, originally belonged to a sub-group of the 

 kin-group is supported by the Zend brdttiirya, for oheim as well as muhme. 



