ABSTRACT
Anthropology is still to most laymen and to many specialists mainly an object of antiquarian interest. Savagery is still synonymous with absurd, cruel, and eccentric customs, with quaint superstitions and revolting practices. A fuller knowledge of the so-called savages has revealed "Ye beastly devices of Ye heathen" as the product of firm law and of strict tradition, due to biological, mental and social needs of human nature, rather than as the outcome of unbridled passion and unfettered excess. Law and order pervade the tribal usages of primitive races, they govern all the humdrum course of daily existence, as well as the leading acts of public life, whether these be quaint and sensational or important and venerable. The early German students of savage law again were all and one committed to the hypothesis of 'primitive promiscuity' and 'group-marriage', just as their British contemporary, Sir Henry Maine, was handicapped by his too narrow adhesion to the patriarchal scheme.
