Likewise among savage tribes the same customs concerning childbirth prevail.  Among the Australian aborigines women are secluded at childbirth as at menstruation, and all vessels used by them during this seclusion are burned.[20] The Ewe-speaking people think a mother and babe unclean for forty days after childbirth.[24] At menstruation and childbirth a Chippeway wife may not eat with her husband; she must cook her food at a separate fire, since any one using her fire would fall ill.[10, v. ii, p.457] The Alaskan explorer Dall found that among the Kaniagmuts a woman was considered unclean for several days both after delivery and menstruation; in either case no one may touch her and she is fed with food at the end of a stick.[25] Amongst the tribes of the Hindu Kush the mother is considered unclean for seven days after the birth of her child, and no one will eat from her hand nor will she suckle her infant during that period.  In the Oxus valley north of the Hindu Kush the period is extended to forty days.[26]

This attitude which primitive man takes toward woman at the time of her sexual crises—­menstruation, pregnancy, childbirth—­are but an intensification of the feeling which he has toward her at all times.  Conflicting with his natural erotic inclinations are the emotions of awe and fear which she inspires in him as the potential source of contagion, for there is always some doubt as to her freedom from bad magic, and it is much safer to regard her as unclean.[27] Thus the every-day life of savage tribes is hedged in by all manner of restrictions concerning the females of their group.  The men have their own dwelling in many instances, where no woman may enter.  So, too, she may be barred out from the temples and excluded from the religious ceremonies when men worship their deity.  There are people who will not permit the women of their nation to touch the weapons, clothing, or any other possessions of the men, or to cook their food, lest even this indirect contact result in emasculation.  The same idea of sympathetic magic is at the root of taboos which forbid the wife to speak her husband’s name, or even to use the same dialect.  With social intercourse debarred, and often no common table even in family life, it is veritably true that men and women belong to two castes.

Of the primitive institution known as the “men’s house,” Hutton Webster says:  “Sexual separation is further secured and perpetuated by the institution known as the men’s house, of which examples are to be found among primitive peoples throughout the world.  It is usually the largest building in a tribal settlement ...  Here the most precious belongings of the community, such as trophies and religious emblems, are preserved.  Within its precincts ... women and children ... seldom or never enter ...  Family huts serve as little more than resorts for the women and children."[28]