Lewis Henry Morgan (1818-1881)

L.H. Morgan was born in Aurora, New York in 1818. He studied law in Albany and settled as a lawyer in
Rochester. Here, he was in close contact with Iroquois Indians. Like many contemporary Americans, he
was attracted by clubs, lodge and similar fraternal societics. During his career as student, he formed the
Order of the Gordian Knot, which purpose was to study ancient Greek myth and to imitate Greek
customs. But when he became interested in the Iroquois, the lodge was remodeled and named as Grand
Order of the Iroquois. He himself was elected as the chief under the lodge name of Skenenancloah. The
members of this society called themselves as warriors. They discussed Iroquois Customs at their
meetings and carried little to mahawks. Morgan along with other became interested in the study of
Indian customs. Fortunately, Morgan met a young Seneca Indian in a book store, whose non-Indian
name was Ely Parker. Parker was also a student in law and spoke english fluently. With the help of
Parker, Morgan got opportunities to meet Indian chiefs and members of several Indian communities.
Once Parker was invited to deliver a lecture at a meeting of Grand Order on songs, myths and ancient
lore of his time, but instead he explained the miserable conditions of their Indian brotheren, who were
poor, unhappy, desperate and victims of exploitation. His speech melted the heart of the members of
society and Morgan made up his mind to take up the issue seriously. Not only that he assisted Seneca or
Parker in their legal struggle with the government over land rights, in this connection, Morgan became
aware that Indian cultures were rapidly changing and their customs should be recorded as early as
possible. Visiting and interviewing many Iroquois Indians, he gathered informations related to dances,
games, religion, language, material culture, form of government and family organisations. He analysed
these rescarch data systematically and published them in the form of a book entitled, League of the
Iroquois in 1851. The book was considered as the first account of an Indian tribe ever given to the world
and the best general book on this classic people.

While studying Iroquors Indian, he was keenly interested in government and family organisation of
these classic people. For this purposes, he probed deeply into Indian marriage rules and system of
matrilineal descent, but he was particularly struck by their system of naming relatives. He observed that
an Iroquois child called his mother's sisters as mother, father's brothers as father, grandmother's sisters
as grand-mother and so on. Children of two or more sisters called each other brother and sister, and
same was also true for children of two or more brothers. Morgan called this a classificatory kinship
system, contrasting with the descriptive kinship system of civilized societies. First believing that it was a
system of their own making, he soon discovered that Ojibwa Indians possessed a very similar system.
Both must be derived from a common source. Because it seemed unlikely to Morgan that such a strange
system could have been invented twice. It followed that if this system was prevalent or universal among
all American Indians, the unity of their origin would be proved. Furthermore, if the same system could
also be found to exist in Asia, it would prove that American Indians were Asiatic in origin, a question that
was by no means firmly settled in Morgan's time.

In order to test this hypothesis, Morgan took the help of questionnaire technique for data collection. He
constructed a seven-page questionnaire, containing more than 200 questions for this purpose. The
questionnaires were mailed to foreign missions and diplomatic representatives in United States and all
over the world with the financial assistance of Smithsonian Institution. Set of questionnaires was also
sent in India to collect informations from Tamil. Although many questionnaires were not returned dully
filled in, because everyone had no time and energy to complete the complex questionnaire. But
information’s received revealed that other American Indians used a similar kinship terminology.
Information received from Tamils in India indicated that they also used a classificatory system of kinship
terminology. Morgan was happily convinced that his hypothesis that American Indian Tribes were Asiatic
in origin, was true and obtained its definite proof. The details of questionnaires and analysis of data
were published in the form of book entitled, System of Consanquinity and Affinity of Human Family
(1870). The publication of the book received appreciation as well as severe criticism." Mayer Fortes
(1969:19) reviewed the book as golden vein of kinship and social organisation for scientific mining in the
history of the human sciences. McLennan, a British classical evolutionist, whose theory was that
patrilineality came first, while Morgan felt that matrilineality proceeded patrilineality, argued that
Morgan misunderstood kinship terms altogether and had overestimated their importance. Lord Avebury
observed that Morgan's own data revealed that classificatory kinship systems were present in Australia
and Polynesia, then why did American Indians originate in Asia, rather than in other parts of the world.

Morgan was very much influenced by a minister and Sanskrit Scholar named Joshua McIlvaine, who
pointed out to him that a wide spread occurrence of classificatory system did not merely indicate
American Indians relationship to Asia, but would prove that all primitive groups, who used it, were
related and that classificatory system might classify an earlier stage of human development.
Mellavaine's remarks compelled Morgan to purchase a copy of Darwin's Origin of Species. Before
reading this book, he believed in divine creation of man. It is not well known, at what precise moment,
Morgan felt to change his mind and to adopt the conclusion that man commenced at the bottom of
scale from which he worked himself up to his present status. Later on, Morgan explained the evolution
of marriage from 'endogamy' to 'exogamy' in terms of deleterious biological consequences of in
breeding. Morgan's paper entitled, "A Conjectural Solution to the Origin of the

Classificatory System of Relationship" was published by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in
1868. Thereafter, he emerged as a full. fledged evolutionist. In this paper, he traced the history of
human family from primitive sexual promiscuity through fifteen stages of evolution to modern
monogamy. In this reconstruction of history of marriage, he used a vast array of different types of
kinship nomenclature. From this time onward, he began to work on the reconstruction of world history
rather than that of American Indians alone. His thinking and researches in this direction produced
monumental book Ancient Society: Researches in Lines of Human Progress from Savagery through
Barbarism to Civilization in 1877.

In this book Morgan envisioned human history as consisting three major "ethnical periods" - Savagery,
Barbarism and Civilization. The first two periods were divided into sub-periods denoted Lower, Middle
and Upper. These ethnical periods and their subdivisions were defined by the following sequence of
technological innovations:

Ethnic Periods : Technological Development

Middle Savagery : Fish subsistence and the use of fire.

Upper Savagery : Bow and arrow.

Lower Barbarism : Pottery

Middle Barbarism : Domestication of animals in the old world, Cul-tivation of maize by irrigation, adobe
and stone brick buildings in New World.

Upper Barbarism : Iron-smelting and Iron tools.

Civilization : Phonetic alphabet and writing.

He was of opinion that each of these periods had a distinct culture and exhibits a mode of life more or
less special and peculiar to itself. This specialization of ethnical periods rendered it possible to treat a
particular society according to its condition of relative advancement and to

make it a subject of independent study and discussion (1877: 9-18). Edward B. Tylor had also talked
about the evolution of ethnical periods as savagery, barbarism and civilization but he never placed a
particular groups of cultures and technological inventions into any categories as Morgan did. His
assumption was that survivals of materials and non-material cultures were sufficient evidence to
indicate that the mankind has reached into complex form of civilization from simple form of savagery
through barbarism. Thus, unlike Tylor, Morgan assigned specific known cultures to the various stages of
development. He was of opinion that lower savagery had passed out of existence. Australians and most
polynesians were in middle savagery. Indian tribes cast of Missouri river were in the stage of lower
barbarism. Village Indians in Mexico, Central America and Peru were in middle barbarism, while Homeric
Greeks, Germanic tribes of Caesar's time, and ancient Italians were in the stage of upper barbarism.
Except for civilization, Morgan used criteria of subsistence and material culture for the recognition of his
periods of human history. He also established sequences of family organisation, kinship terminology,
descent pattern, socio-political organisation and rules of inheritance of property. At every point, he
asked himself how far and why institutions changed from one form to next. His observations revealed
that kinship based society proceeded the state formation, concept of property was not developed in
carly stage and inheritance pattern in those days was also absent. Therefore, he came to the conclusion
that descriptive kinship terminology and monogamy were relatively late in their emergence.

His correlations, sequence and conclusions were also criticised. His analysis was also of a functionalist
nature, particularly when he talked about the aspects of socio-political organisations interrelated with
one another and tied to technological developments and economic persuits.

The major weakness of Morgan's system rests in the confusion be-tween synchronic and diachronic
reconstructions. Extrapolating from living culture, he felt that past society could be fully recovered not
by archaeological evidence but by simple accepting the Idea that contemporary non-literate societies in
their totality were accurate reflections of the past. Tylor and McLennan were careful in explanations of
the comparative method. They reconstructed the sequences of specific institutions or of discrete
cultural elements, but not of whole cultures. Morgan's last book entitled Houses and House Life of
American Aborigines was published in 1881. This book was an another land mark in the field of
Anthropology. He was the first anthropologist to recognise that products of material culture do not
occur in isolation from other social developments. He showed that the patterns of architecture
interrelate with forms of family organisations and social life.

Weaknesses of Morgan's Scheme

The major weakness of Morgan's scheme was confusion between synchronic and diachronic approaches
to the study of historical reconstructions. Clear-cut application of comparative method did not appear in
his study. His characterisation of contemporary cultures in terms of historical stages was also faulty. His
correlations did not fit in and can be disproven even by a cursory glance at the ethnographic data. For
instance, Hawaiiyans with a kinship system was early in Morgan's scheme, developed agriculture, were
highly stratified and possessed a complex form of government. In the old world, civilization existed long
before the use of iron. The Aztecs worked with native metals and had no knowledge of iron smelting,
but nevertheless had a state government and developed a system of writing.

Enduring Aspects of Morgan's Scheme

In spite of severe criticism, Morgan made substantial contributions in the field of anthropology. His
kinship terminology attracted many scholars to study the kinship organisation as a result of which nearly
thousands of studies on kinship system were published after his death. His example of fieldwork, and
first hand data collection were followed energetically even by Baasian, who were critical of him. His
evolutionary schemes raised all problems basic to explanations of social change, and conclusive answers
for all these have not been found. Implicitly, he recognised cultures as a functional whole, because all
institutions were seen interrelated.

The present-day anthropologists have dropped the offensive words savagery and barbarism, but accept
a historical sequence from hunting and gathering to domestication of plant and animals, and writing as
the beginning of civilization. His observation that kinship based societies were the early form of
government which proceeded state formation was accepted by all.

He is often criticised that he did not study deeply into the role of religion. But it is often over looked. He
devoted on Iroquois religion in his book League of Iroquois. In his book Ancient Society he dealt with the
problem of interrelationship between totemism and kinship.
Morgan and Tylor on Evolutionary Theory

For Morgan and Tylor, there were two logical explanations for the development of cultures along similar
line, cither the major patterns were independently reinvented time after time or the patterns had dif-
fused from group to group as a result of intercultural communication. But what could cause the
similarity in two patterns that had been independently invented? Their answer in essence was that there
existed a basic 'psychic unity' among all man-kind. Morgan reasoned that all men possessed certain
'germ ideas' that served as the basis of parallel development of socio-cultural patterns. These 'germidca'
had been part of man kind's mental equipment from the lowest period of savagery. Morgan pointed out
(1877: 255) "human mind, specially the same in all individuals and in all the tribes and nations of
mankind, limited in range of power works and must work, in the same uniform channels, and within
narrow limits of variations. Its result in disconnected region of space, and in widely separated ages of
time articulates in a logically connected chain of common experiences. In the grand aggregate may still
be recognised the few primary germs of thought, working upon primary human necessitics, which
through the natural process of development have produced such vast result".

Tylor agreed, nothing that the mental processes of man everywhere were essentially similar and that
there were basic similarities of life ways among saves that were not due to diffusion (1871). In abstract,
both explanations psychic unity and independent invention were allowable. The rub came, when trying
to decide which of the two adequately explained the specific similarities between diverse groups. When
it was dis-covered that a given culture trait such as a specific family from, a game such as the Indian
Pachise, or metallurgy, was found among widely separated people, could the co-occurrence be due to
wide-spread trans-mission from a single origin or was it the result of a series of independent inventions
time after time in each of the groups?

There were profound implications riding on which of the two alternatives was finally to be selected and
again the issue of progress versus degeneration was involved. Some anthropologists observed that
degenerated savage group could progress only under the influence of more advanced people, i.c., due to
diffusion. But if Tylor were to combat this issue, he would have to push the independent invention as
alternative, i.c., evolution. This he did in Primitive Culture (1871) to the limits his empirical-oriented
conceive would allow. On the other hand, diffusion could have made the evidence for the universality of
certain mental processes much more questionable, because there would have been the dilemma of
whether the similarities were not actually due to wide-spread transmission of traits.

AAs a matter of fact, neither Tylor nor Morgan, ever argued exclusively for one of the two alternatives.
There were many instances of diffusion to be ignored for the sake of 'psychic unity'. Their conclusion
about which of the two, explanations, accounted for a given similarity, were drawn on the basis of
evidence as they saw to fit to use it. Tylor was perhaps the more cautious of the two, often presenting
the dilemma and then withdrawing to wait for more evidence to accumulate. Morgan, in a logical
contradiction to his germ idea concept, suggested a world wide diffusion of a given type of kinship group
from a single origin and suggested other world wide dispersals of specific family forms, based only on
the argument that forms were too complex to have been invented more than once (1877: 379-386).
There was still a sticky issue to be resolved. However, if 'Psychic unity' and 'diffusion' were both
operative, how could the simultaneous 19th century existence of both civilized and savage groups be
explained Why had some groups evolved faster or more rapidly than others? On this issue, Morgan and
Tylor became tangled in confusion of racial and socio-cultural factors as causes of evolutionary process.
The relative clarity of psychic unity/diffusion alternative became frustratingly muddied

Morgan and Tylor on Biological and Cultural Processes

Morgan and Tylor resorted at time to racist explanations for the un synchronised evolutionary
development along the mankind of the world. For instance, Morgan while describing the widespread
dispersion of Gonowanian family type, went beyond mere diffusion as an explanation and argued that
this form was transmitted with the blood (1870: 274). The mind of American Indian neyer experienced,
what could be called as 'Profit motive'. This was the great reason for his continuance in hunter stage.
Tylor (1881) compared civilised morality with that of savages and barbarians. His observations revealed
that there were differences in high and low races of men and dull-minded barbarians had no power of

thought enough to come up at civilized man's best moral standard. But how can these explanations be
fitted with notion of Psychic unity? The anthropologist, Marvin Harris (1968:139-140) offered his in
terpretation of Morgan's ideas:

As the races evolve, they pass through similar bio cultural stages. At any particular stage, the innate
mental condition of the descendants of any branch of human species tends to be essentially similar.
They thus, tend to react to similar conditions in similar ways and to move in parallel fashion from
savagery to civilization. Thus, there were superior and inferior races as indicted by the level of cultural
evolution. Of all racial groups, only white man had achieved the arbitrary standards of civilization by mid
19th century. However, Harris interpretation does not resolve the apparent contradiction of evolution of
human kind due to biological factor or cultural factor. Even Tylor and Morgan either did not see the
problem or simply ignored them. To make the confusion more profound, both writers seemed at times
to use the term races and cultures interchangeably. As they did not stick solely either to psychic unity or
diffusion for cultural similarities, in the same way they did not resort strictly to racial explanations for
the differences between savages and civilized men. Tylor (1881) for example, cited savage's lack of the
'large experience' of civilized cultures a difference that is not clearly the result of savage genes. But
whether this meant that savages lacked a large experience because they were inherently stupid or they
did not have access to the scholarly knowledge accumulated and stored in thousands of years of other
human literacy In fact, neither Tylor nor Morgan used biological analogics as extensively as Herbert
Spencer. Morgan reported that emergence of consanguine family among savages afforded a good
illustrations of the principle of natural selection, although he did not pursue the principle very actively
(1877: 425). Tylor (1871) wrote, 'History..... and ethnography..... combine to show that institutions,
which can best hold their own in world, gradually supersede the less fit ones, which determines the
general resultant course of culture. However, when such pronouncements are separated from analysis,
it becomes apparent that Tylor was not particularly interested in demonstrating the biological analogies,
nor was he willingly to acknowledge a great intellectual debt to Darwin.

Yet Tylor and Morgan both shared a degree in the 'Social Darwinist' notions prevalent in their time. This
was implicit in their assigning victorian England and America to the highest known stages of cultural
evolution. The bearers of civilization were 'better and happier than those at lower stages of evolution.
The application of the 'survival of the fittest' dogma imposed on much of their analysis a moralistic bias
that was contrary to modern caynons of objective social science. The racial explanation for differences in
evolutionary progress hindered scholarly inquiry in to the roles of psychic unity and diffusion in change
process.