Where women rule
Sir: Examples of matriarchal societies are not all that difficult to find and John Wain's state- ment (10 April) that 'we have re- cord of no society in which women hold more power than men' seems rashly dogmatic, like so much written on Women's Lib. One ex- ample is found in the Yungning duchies by the Yangtze, since the Hlihin have lived there as a ma-
triarchal society. It is recorded in Peter Goullart's book Forgotten Kingdoni that their property pas- sed from mother to daughter, and that women usually had several husbands who were referred to as
uncles.
This is an extreme case, but women have apparently long Wiel- ded economic power in some mountain regions in the Yunnan. Peter Goullart mentions the ori- ginal customs of the Nakhi, whom Ile lived amongst, which ordained that women could not sit in the presence of men or eat with them, yet in practice they acquired great power by being relegated to doing all the manual work : this resulted in their becoming adept in com- merce and emerging in the roles of traders, merchants and shop- keepers, leaving the men at home to lounge about and look after the children. Women were 'the brains of the family and the only founda- tion of prosperity in the household. to marry a Nakhi woman was to acquire a life insurance, and the ability to be idle for the rest of one's days.'
I. M. Millar 7 Avon Court, Keswick Road, London sw15
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