The origin of the family, private property, and the state
- Language:
- English
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~68,800 words · 327 passages
Cite this work
- APAFriedrich Engels. (n.d.). The origin of the family, private property, and the state. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/friedrich-engels/the-origin-of-the-family-private-property-and-the-state
- MLAFriedrich Engels. The origin of the family, private property, and the state. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/friedrich-engels/the-origin-of-the-family-private-property-and-the-state.
- ChicagoFriedrich Engels. The origin of the family, private property, and the state. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/friedrich-engels/the-origin-of-the-family-private-property-and-the-state.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1884).
Context and history
Written from the notebooks Marx left at his death on the anthropologist Lewis Morgan. The thesis — that the monogamous family and the state arise with property and are not natural — gave twentieth-century feminism one of its central arguments. The ethnography it rests on has dated; the argument has not. An English translation. Engels's German original is not in the catalogue.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
Although the latter may extend over thousands of years, we have no means of proving its existence by direct evidence. But once the descent of man from the Animal Kingdom is acknowledged, the acceptance of this stage of transition becomes inevitable. 2. Middle Stage: Commencing with the utilization of fish (including crabs, mollusks and other aquatic animals) and the use of fire. Both these things belong together, because fish becomes thoroughly palatable by the help of fire only. With this new kind of food, human beings became completely independent of climate and locality. Following the course of rivers and coastlines, they could spread over the greater part of the earth even in the savage state. The so-called palaeolithic implements of the early stone age, made of rough, unsharpened stones, belong almost entirely to this period. Their wide distribution over all the continents testifies to the extent of these wanderings. The unceasing bent for discovery, together with the possession of fire gained by friction, created new products in the lately occupied regions. Such were farinaceous roots and tubers, baked in hot ashes or in baking pits (ground ovens). When the first weapons, club and spear, were invented, venison was occasionally added to the bill of fare. Nations subsisting exclusively by hunting, such as we sometimes find mentioned in books, have never existed; for the proceeds of hunting are too uncertain. In consequence of continued precariousness of the sources of sustenance, cannibalism seems to arise at this stage. It continues in force for a long while. Even in our day, Australians and Polynesians still remain in this middle stage of savagery. 3. Higher Stage: Coming with the invention of bow and arrow, this stage makes venison a regular part of daily fare and hunting a normal occupation.…