Matrilineare Gesellschaften - Institute for Advanced Studies

Theorien zur Entstehung unilinearer Abstammungsgruppen 166
George Peter Murdock hat erkannt, daß es gravierende Unterschiede zwischen den
Geschlechtern gab und schreibt 1934 über die Irokesen folgendes:
The women work long and hard, and associate very little with the men. A
menstruating woman is considered unclean and dangerous. She must not
engage in agricultural operations, or come in contact with food and medicines,
or touch the implements belonging to the men. Facts like these led
one early observe to call the Iroquois woman ” the inferior, the dependent,
and the servant of man.“ Nothing could be farther from the truth. A husband
has no authority over his wife. One woman, urged by her spouse to
do something against her will, replied: ” I am my own mistress, I do what
I choose; and do thou what thou choosest.“ The wife enjoys strictly independent
property rights. She alone exercises authority over the children.
She is the mistress of the apartment in the long house occupied by the
family. The husband always goes to live with his wife, and he is present in
the home only on sufferance. ” No matter how many children, or whatever
goods he might have in the house, he might at any time be ordered to pick
up his blanket and budge; and after such orders it would not be healthful
for him to disobey.“ When he leaves, he can take nothing with him except
his clothing, weapons, and pipe, for the house and all its utensils and furniture,
stores of food, and land belong exclusively to the women. From these
and other social, political, and religious rights, the native women may be
said to enjoy a status at least equal, if not superior, to that of the men.
Indeed, of all the peoples of the earth, the Iroquois approach most closely
to that hypothetical form of society known as the ” matriarchate“. 137
Lange Zeit war das Fehlen von Besitz und Eigentum im europäischen Denken
kaum vorstellbar, ebenso das Fehlen von politischen Machtstrukturen. Wilhelm
Schmidt zitiert z.B. in diesem Zusammenhang J.N.B Hewitt, der die Darstellungen
von Morgan über das Besitzrecht der Frau an Grund und Boden in den
wesentlichen Punkten bestätigt:
Jedes Stück Land, das von einer owačira für den Pflanzenbau gehalten
wurde, und auf dem Feuerholz, Beeren, Nüsse, Wurzeln, Rinde, Medizinen
und Gifte gesammelt wurden, gehörte ausschließlich den Frauen ” der
owačira. 138
J.A. Noon übernahm die Darstellungen von W.E. Conney und schreibt, daß
während der Reservations-Periode, als die Indianer von den Weißen aus ihren
ursprünglichen Wohnsitzen entfernt und in den Reservationen angesiedelt wurden,
die Verwandtschaftsgruppen einer radikalen Verwandlung unterlagen: in der
Study of an American Indian Tribe. With the Original Illustrations, Introducty by William N.
Fenton, Reprint der Auflage von 1851, Citadel Press Book, Carol Communications, New York.
137 George Peter Murdock (1971): The Iroquois of Northern New York, in: G.P. Murdock, Our
Primitive Contemporaries, 27. Auflage der Ausgabe von 1934, Macmillan Company, New York
City, Kapitel 11, S.291–323, hier S.301–302.
138 Schmidt 1955, Das Mutterrecht, S.140.