When human beings reached the initial stage of building the society in ancient times, the society was matriarchal. There was, of course, the system of maternal lineage and there was also the system of maternal heritage. That is, lineage descended from mother to daughter. When people were asked their names, they also were asked what their mothers’, grandmothers’ and great-grandmothers’ names were, and so on. This applied to both men and women.

After marriage, a man changed his gotra [clan, lineage] to that of his in-laws, that is, the husband would adopt the gotra of his wife, who lived on a particular hill or under the rule of a particular matriarch. (Even today, this custom lingers on in a few communities of the world.) The right of inheritance was matrilineal, that is, sons and daughters would inherit property from their mothers. This system continued in the world for a long period. One of the great disadvantages that followed from this was that it was difficult to determine a child’s father, although it was easy to identify its mother. And as it was not easy to identify the father, it was difficult to know what excellent personal traits that person might have inherited.

Both the matrilineal and patrilineal social orders have their bright and dark sides. The dominance of the men was established because they were physically stronger. The social order became patriarchal. Although the patriarchal system had numerous defects, it had two benefits. First, in the matriarchal social system, a woman had to bear all the responsibilities, as a result of which her life became miserable. In the patriarchal social order the men, that is, the fathers, were compelled to bear a big part of the social responsibility of the family. Secondly, the system of marriage was introduced in order to divide responsibilities and to determine the paternity of the children. Long after the society became patriarchal, many men still did not like to come under the institution of marriage; that is, they were keen to become the masters, but they were not so willing to bear the responsibility. Shiva was the first to bear this great family responsibility. It was He who compelled the conscienceless men to come under the system of marriage.

Along with the influence of the matriarchal system in Bengal, there is also the influence of the matrilineal system to some extent. A sister’s son is entitled to the property of his heirless mother’s brother. In the absence of any offspring, a sister’s son is to perform the last rites of his maternal uncle, and he must observe the mourning rites for three days. After the death of a woman’s father, she is required, even if married, to observe the mourning rites for three days, and on the fourth day she performs a shráddha ceremony.⁽¹⁾

The influence of the matriarchal social system is slightly greater in Kerala than it is in Bengal. In Kerala, sons do not use the surnames of their fathers, but they use the surnames of their mothers. As in Bengal, they are entitled to inherit the property of their maternal uncles. Besides that, the children of inter-caste marriages receive the mother’s caste. The matriarchal social system is still fully prevalent in certain communities in Meghalaya. In the days when the society was totally matriarchal, the members of society would take the gotra of their mothers, grandmothers or great-grandmothers.

Footnotes

(1) The performance of the shráddha ceremony honouring her dead father indicates that the woman is still considered to have some relation to her parents. In some parts of India, after marriage, this would not be the case. –Trans.