Abstract
Yurok Marriage. From an analysis of a large number of genealogies of the Yurok of the lower Klamath River, north-west California, Messrs. T. T, Waterman and A. L. Kroeber have compiled a marriage census, which reveals some interesting facts relating to their marriage system and incidentally affords an example of a mechanism by which a patfilineal culture might become converted to a matrilineal (Univ. California, Pub. Amer. Archcæl. and Ethnol., 35, No. 1). Two types of marriage are recognised, ‘full marriage’ and ‘half-marriage’. In the former the man ‘pay's for his wife and takes her to live in his town and his house. In ‘half-marriage’, the man pays less, normally about half the value of his bride, and goes to live with his bride either in her father's house or nearby. He is more or less under his father-in-law's direction and the children belong to his wife's family, their bride price or any blood money going to his father-in-law, or in the event of his decease, to his wife's brothers. In ‘full marriage’ the children belong to the husband, and he retains them in the event of divorce, if he refuses to accept the refund of the marriage payment. ‘Half-marriage’ is perfectly legitimate and carries no disapprobation; but it indicates a lack of wealth and connotes a relatively low social standing in a society which equates wealth and rank. The census count shows about 23 per cent of marriages of the half-type, suggesting that either the plebs was small or that only part of it ‘half-married’. In fact, it is clear that ‘full marriage’ was of greater frequency than the incidence of aristocracy. It is also evident that the influence of social status was sufficiently strong to lead to the avoidance of ‘half-marriage’ except from necessity. Mere economy was no adequate motive. In certain cases, however, wealthy parents without male children might persuade a son-in-law to live with them on condition that he became the heir, and a declaration making this clear accompanied the acceptance of the half-payment.
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Research Items. Nature 134, 67–69 (1934). https://doi.org/10.1038/134067a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/134067a0