over: namely, that in what concerns the evolution of marriage and of the family, there is no absolute law. Nevertheless, by reason of the familial and matrimonial confusion usual in the greater number of primitive societies, maternal filiation has been adopted more often than paternal, and has frequently preceded it.
VI. The Couvade.
There is a custom, at first sight extraordinary but still common enough, which must have arisen during transitional epochs, when, polygamic or monogamic marriage having become established, the husbands have exerted themselves to affirm their parental rights, and to substitute masculine filiation for the ancient uterine filiation. In the same way as in certain countries, Abyssinia,[1] for example, in order to proclaim an adoption, the adoptive father simulates some maternal practice, sometimes goes so far as to offer his breast solemnly to his adoptive son, so, in very different countries, the husband has found no better way to prove his paternity than to simulate childbirth; and hence the very singular custom of the couvade.
At first sight, it seems very foolish for the husband to take to his bed immediately after the delivery of his wife, and for a certain number of days to be nursed and tended by the mother herself.
The existence of the custom has often been questioned. It will not be out of place, therefore, to quote authentic facts which put all doubt to silence. These facts are numerous enough, and have been observed in various parts of the globe; in America, Asia, and Europe.
In New Mexico, among the Lagunero and the Ahomana, when a woman is delivered of a child, the father goes to bed for six or seven days, and scrupulously abstains from eating fish or meat.[2] As soon as a Carib became a father, he at once went to bed and simulated childbirth by suitable cries and contortions; the women of the hamlet hastened to his side and congratulated him on his happy delivery.[3]
