274 PRIMITIVE PATERNITY 



in the sum paid. 1 If a Chevsur husband murder his 

 wife, he is required to pay blood-money to her brother. 2 

 In our own island among the ancient Welsh, the law 

 declared that when a man was murdered compensation 

 for the personal injury or indignity to him (called 

 saraacT) was due as well as the galanas or blood- money, 

 compensation for his value as a member of the stock. 

 Of the saraad or compensation for the personal affront 

 the wife was entitled to a share. In the galanas or 

 compensation to the stock she had no interest : it was 

 divided among his relatives. In the same way if a 

 wife were slain her husband obtained a share of the 

 saraad, but to the galanas he had no claim. And 

 inasmuch as the liability to pay was commensurate 

 with the right to receive galanas neither husband nor 

 wife was liable for homicide by the other. 3 



Turning to the African continent we shall find the 

 same rule in even a more startling form, for mother- 

 right is still in full force over a large part of its area, 

 and where that stage has been passed much more than 

 traces linger. The Beni Amer on the shores of the 

 Red Sea and in the Barka valley have accepted Islam, 

 and with it of course a very different method of social 

 organisation from that of motherright, but not without 

 concessions to the older family ties. Thus when a 

 woman is murdered, the duty of revenge falls not on 

 her husband but on her blood-relations. 4 Further 

 to the south, the Kunama have not yet wholly 

 surrendered to the Mohammedan propaganda, and 



1 Darinsky, Zeits. vergl. Rechtsw. xiv. 196, 197. 



2 Kovalevsky, V Anthropologie, iv. 273. 



3 Ancient Laws and Institutes of Wales, 109, no, 112, 113, 199, 

 226, 253, 342, 364, 398, 554, 555. All the Welsh codes were 

 practically the same in this respect. * Munzinger, 321. 



