And
husbands among the Fellatahs are in the habit of adopting children,
though they may have sons or daughters of their own, and the adopted
children inherit the property.[139] In Indonesia a man sometimes
marries a woman and settles in her family, and the children belong
to her. But he may later carry her forcibly to his own group, and the
children then belong to him.[140]
Bosman relates that in Guinea religious symbolism was also introduced
by the husband to reinforce and lend dignity to this action. The
maternal system held with respect to the chief wife:
It was customary, however, for a man to buy and take to wife
a slave, a friendless person with whom he could deal at
pleasure, who had no kindred that could interfere for her,
and to consecrate her to his Bossum or god. The Bossum wife,
slave as she had been, ranked next to the chief wife, and was
like her exceptionally treated. She alone was very jealously
guarded, she alone was sacrificed at her husband's death.
She was, in fact, wife in a peculiar sense. And having, by
consecration, been made of the kindred and worship of her
husband, her children would be born of his kindred and
worship.
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