Our earliest authorities on the subject are Julius Caesar and Tacitus.  Caesar informs us[288] that among the Gauls marriage was a well recognized institution.  The husband contributed of his own goods the same amount that his wife brought by way of dowry; the combined property and its income were enjoyed on equal terms by husband and wife.  If husband or wife died, all the property became the possession of the surviving partner.  Yet the husband had full power of life and death over his wife as over his children; and if, upon the decease of a noble, there were suspicions regarding the manner of his death, his wife was put to inquisitorial torture and was burnt at the stake when adjudged guilty of murder.  Among the Germans women seem to have been held in somewhat greater respect.  German matrons were esteemed as prophetesses and no battle was entered upon unless they had first consulted the lots and given assurance that the fight would be successful.[289] As for the British, who were not a Germanic people, Caesar says that they practiced polygamy and near relatives were accustomed to have wives in common.[290]

[Sidenote:  The account of Tacitus.]

Tacitus wrote a century and a half after Julius Caesar when the tribes had become better known the Romans; hence we get from him more detailed information.  From him we learn that both the Sitones—­a people of northern Germany—­and the British often bestowed the royal power on women, a circumstance which aroused the strong contempt of Tacitus, who was in this respect of a conservative mind.[291] The Romans had, indeed, good reason to remember with sorrow the valiant Boadicea, queen of the Britons.[292] Regarding the Germans Tacitus wrote a whole book in which he idealises that nation as a contrast to the lax morality of civilised Rome, much as Rousseau in the eighteenth century extolled the virtues of savages in a state of nature.  What Tacitus says in regard to lofty morals we shall do well to take with a pinch of salt; but we may with more safety trust his accuracy when he depicts national customs.  From Tacitus we learn that the Germans believed something divine resided in women[293]; hence their respect for them as prophetesses.[294] One Velaeda by her soothsaying ruled the tribe of Bructeri completely[295] and was regarded as a goddess,[296] as were many others.[297] The German warrior fought his best that he might protect and please his wife.[298] The standard of conjugal fidelity was strict[299]; men were content with one wife, although high nobles were sometimes allowed several wives as an increase to the family prestige.[300] The dowry was brought not by the wife to the husband, but to the wife by the husband—­evidently a survival of the custom of wife purchase; but the wife was accustomed to present her husband with arms and the accoutrements of war.[301] She was reminded that she took her husband for better and worse, to be a faithful partner in joy and sorrow until death.[302] A woman guilty of adultery was shorn and her husband drove her naked through the village with blows.[303]