57 
women. They are called women’s servants by Heraclides 
Ponticns. However, it would be an error to understand the 
usage in question as a homage offered to the female sex. It. 
is rather rooted in primitive conditions of society, in which 
monogamy was not yet established with sufficient certainty 
to enable descent on the father’s side to be affirmed with 
assurance. Accordingly this usage extends far beyond the 
territory commanded by the Lycian nationality. It occurs 
even to this day in India. It may be demonstrated to have 
existed amongst the ancient Egyptians. It is mentioned by 
Sanchuniathon, where the reason for its existence is stated 
with great freedom. Hence we must regard the employ- 
ment of the maternal name for the designation of descent as 
the remains of an imperfect condition of social life and family 
law, which as life became more regulated was relinquished 
in favour of the usage, afterwards universal in Greece, of 
naming children after the father. This diversity of usage, 
which is of extreme importance for the history of ancient 
civilisation, has been recently discussed by Bachofen.” 
With respect to the language, Mr. Phillips furnishes me 
with the following interesting particulars : — “ The native 
tongue is very peculiar, but very musical. I fancy it would 
sound well sung. The sound of one word often determines 
that of several others in a sentence, as li-ilu de ami, chinkutu- 
chi-ami, malo-mami, where the alliteration is plainly per- 
ceived. Ami means ^my.’” In another letter is the fol- 
lowing : “ The language is a study of great interest, being 
one of the Bantu or alliterative languages, the peculiarity 
of which consists of euphonious changes of consonants for 
the sake of the alliteration. Thus one sound will often pre- 
dominate through a sentence governed by some principal 
word. It may be considered in the following light : 
Suppose it to contain several nouns — five or six — and each 
gender to depend on the sound of the first syllable, then let 
the pronouns, adjectives, verbs, all be declined, with the 
