There are, however, a number of communities in which the marriage bond is broken as regards the exclusiveness of sex with the consent of both partners and with the sanction of tribal law, custom and morality. In some societies the only occasion on which the wife is allowed connection with other men, nay, has to submit to their embraces, is at the very beginning of mar riage. This custom has apparently been known in mediaeval Europe under the name of "ius primae noctis." It certainly exists in many savage cultures (Brazilian Indians, Arawaks, Caribs, Nicaraguans, Tarahumare of S. and C. America; Ballante, Bagele, Berbers of Africa; Banaro and S. Massim of Melanesia; Aranda, Dieri and other Australian tribes). Such customs are to be regarded not so much as the abrogation of matrimonial exclusive ness, but rather as expressing the superstitious awe with which sexual intercourse, and above all defloration, is regarded by prim itive peoples (Crawley, Westermarck). As such they should be considered side by side with the numerous instances in which girls are artificially deprived of their virginity, without the intercourse of any man; with prenuptial defloration by strangers; with tem porary prostitution of a religious character, and with sexual inter course as a puberty rite.
A greater encroachment upon sexual exclusiveness in marriage is found in the custom of wife-lending as a form of hospitality. This is very widely distributed over the world (see the compre hensive references in Westermarck, History of Human Marriage, vol. 1, pp. 225-226). It must be realised that this practice is not an infringement of the husband's rights, but rather his assertion of authority in disposing of his wife's person. Very often indeed a man will offer his sister, daughter, slave or servant instead, a fact which indicates that this custom is not so much the right of another man to infringe upon the matrimonial bond as the right of the head of the household to dispose of its female inmates.
Very of ten sexual hospitality is exercised in anticipation of future reciprocal benefits, and must be considered side by side with the custom of wife-exchange (Gilyak, Tungus, Aleuts of N. E. Asia; Bangala, Herero, Banyoro, Akamba, Wayao of Africa; various Himalayan and Indian tribes; S. Massim of Melanesia; Marquesas, Hawaii, Maori of Polynesia; and various Australian tribes). At times there is an exchange of wives at feasts, when general orgiastic license prevails (Araucanos, Bororo, Keres of S. America; Arapahos, Gros Ventres and Lower Mississippi tribes of N. America ; Dayaks and Jakun of Indonesia ; Bhuiyas, Hos, Kotas of India ; Ashanti, Ekoi and various Bantu tribes of Africa ; Kiwai Papuans). On such festive and extraordinary occasions not only are the sexual restrictions removed, and the sexual appetite stim ulated, but the ordinary discipline is relaxed, the normal occupa tions abandoned and social barriers over-ridden, while at the same time people indulge in gluttony, in desire for amusement and social intercourse. Sexual license, as well as the other relaxations,
liberties and ebullitions at such feasts fulfils the important func tion of providing a safety-vent which relieves the normal repres sions, furnishes people with a different set of experiences, and thus again tends to safeguard ordinary institutions.
These cases where wives are exchanged for sexual intercourse only must be distinguished from the less frequent instances of prolonged exchange, with common habitation, more or less legal ised. Among the Eskimo of Repulse Bay, "If a man who is going on a journey has a wife encumbered with a child that would make travelling unpleasant, he exchanges wives with some friend who remains in camp and has no such inconvenience. Sometimes a man will want a younger wife to travel with, and in that case effects an exchange, and sometimes such exchanges are made for no special reason, and among friends it is a usual thing to exchange wives for a week or two about every two months" (Gilder, Schwatka's Search, p. 251). Analogous forms of prolonged ex change are found among certain tribes of S. India, while among the Siberian Chukchi a man will often enter on a bond of brother hood with those of his relatives who dwell in other villages, and when he visits such a village his relative will give him access to his wife, presently returning the visit in order to make the obliga tion mutual ; sometimes cousins will exchange wives for a pro longed period.
Again, among the Dieri, Arabana and cognate tribes of C. Australia, a married woman may be placed in the so-called pirrauru relationship to a man other than her husband. Such a man may, with the husband's permission, have access to her on rare occasions. Or if the husband be absent and give his consent the woman may join her paramour for some time at his camp, but this is apparently rare. In order to lend his wife in this way a man must wait until she is allotted by the tribal elders as the pirrauru to another man. Then he may consent to waive his mari tal rights for a short time, though we are expressly told he is un der no constraint to do so. Circumstances, jealousy, even the dis inclination of the woman are obstacles all of which must make the carrying-out of pirrauru rights extremely rare. This custom has been adduced as a present-day occurrence of group marriage, but this is obviously incorrect. It is always a temporary and partial surrender of marital rights consisting of a long and permanent connubium with occasional rare episodes of extra-marital liaison.