Historical Development of Matriarchal Theory

In discussing the women warriors of the ancient world, Herodotus recounted scary stories about Amazons as self-mutilating “men-slayers” (3: 12), seeding and cementing a long-standing Western resistance to considering the topic. Originally published in Greek, ca. 425.

A Jesuit missionary, Lafitau described daily Iroquoian life, recording that “nothing was more real” than the “superiority” of the women in northeastern North America (1: 69). Comparing Iroquoian matriarchal society to ancient, “classical” texts, led Lafitau to present the matriarchal Iroquois women in terms of the European ancients, starting an unfortunate but long-lasting habit. Originally published in French in 1724.

In the process of attempting to “prove” that Native Americans were the “Ten Lost tribes of Israel,” James Adair necessarily encountered the matriarchies of the eastern Woodlands. His shocked characterization of Indigenous matriarchies popularized among settlers his slur of “petticoat government” as a wanton and immoral way to live (Adair, 232). Originally published in 1775.

Heavily advised on Iroquoian culture by renown Seneca chief Häsanoanda (“Ely S. Parker”), Morgan helped found the social science of anthropology with his landmark study of the North American Iroquois League. The League of the Ho-dé-no-saunee study made possible, for the first time, a systematic look into the world of a highly developed, contemporary matriarchal culture. Originally published in 1851.

With Das Mutterrecht, or “mother right,” Bachofen worked from classical antiquity, laying the groundwork of the cultural-historical branch of matriarchal research. His significant contribution lay in comprehending his topic as “mother right,” creating a theoretical understanding of its features and development. But his theory remained problematic, shaped by the patriarchy of his own time and place. Originally published in German in 1861.

Carr described to denounce Iroquoian matriarchy. Declaring the system a “pure mockery of the man's helplessness,” Carr lamented that, “From the cradle to the grave, there was never a time when the Iroquoian man was not subject to some woman” (Carr, 222–23). His review of the powers, rights, and duties of the Clan Mothers nevertheless described a functioning matriarchy.

Fletcher upended racist stereotypes in her report on traditional Native American women's strengths. The Seneca Falls feminists appreciated the political powers of Clan Mothers, but failed to grasp the economic, spiritual, and social aspects of matriarchy.

Wagner's history of the Seneca Falls and nineteenth-century U.S. feminist movement examines its appreciation, appropriation, and illustrative use of the contemporary Iroquoian matriarchy in demanding social, political, and economic rights for Euro-American women.

Using Marx's notes, post-mortem, as well as his own, Engels argued that control over private property enabled men to overthrow matriarchy to seize control of the home, formerly a female domain. Not only a social institution, monogamy also had an economic basis, rooted in the patriarchal victory of private property over matriarchal, communal property. Originally published in German in 1884.

Reed argued that all culture had sprouted from the mother-child relationship. In the process, she biologized matriarchy, re-presenting many Engelian arguments. Because she was a Marxist, her representation of matriarchy was confined to Marxist preconceptions.

Morgan's problematic work constructed a unilineal, stages-of-history theory (savagery→barbarian→civilization), a form very popular among European theorists in the nineteenth century. His strict and universal theory of cultural evolution lurched forward through set steps, culminating in patriarchy, with Morgan categorizing matriarchy as “barbarian,” and necessarily also primitive, stage. This heavy interpretive framework was to prevail in Western culture over the next century.

Director of the U.S. Bureau of Ethnology, Powell's annual report recognized that matriarchy existed, but (following Morgan) admitted its presence only at the most “primitive” levels of culture. He asserted that matriarchy was properly replaced by patriarchy as the supposed advancement, the step before “civilization”, following the racist-sexist schema of then-Western science (Powell, civ–cv).

Briffault traced all basic patterns of social behavior and institutions back to the instinctual conduct that he supposed was characteristic of female, rather than of male, actors. A fundamental female influence, based on motherhood, was incomprehensible in regard to patriarchal societies, so Briffault concluded that development of large-scale social institutions was matriarchal in their early stages, but has to be understood as preliminary, not final.