Monogamous family is a marriage and residence of two when he has only one partner – a woman- and she lives only with one man, her husband.
What are monogamous marriage, its origin, and its history? What are monogamous families, and what is the nature of modern monogamous marriage?
The origin of the monogamous family
Before talking about monogamy, you need to understand what couple marriage is and how it differs from monogamy. Friedrich Engels, in his study “The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State,” believed that in the age of marriage, there was an unstable relationship between man and woman. It was a kind of marriage that replaced the group that was homosexual and intersex between males and females.
The family, in this case, was fragile; the spouses lived separately in their clans. It did not include running a shared household. The children traced their ancestry back to the mother and inherited her property.
In the transition from marriage to patriarchy, marriage was replaced by the family structure – monogamous patriarchy. One man married several women. Over the centuries, this family relationship was replaced by a monopoly when one man started living with a single woman.
Thus arose the monogamous family, which became the support – the cell of society. The couple managed a joint household, and the children already considered their ancestry not on the mother’s side but the father’s.
About the reasons
Let’s talk about the reasons for the emergence of the monopolistic family. We should keep in mind the revolution in developing the productive forces of society. It includes all means of production and people. Man learned to make more advanced tools, leading to a better living standard.
From gathering nature’s gifts, the man moved on to cultivation. Subsistence fire replaced commodity production when there was a surplus of commodities. The relationship between a man and a woman took on a completely different essence. The role of the male sex in the family has increased significantly.
The emergence of a monopolistic family is the unification of the dominant part of men in the state. It happened with the introduction of private property and the stratification of society into rich and poor. Class society was created when the status of various groups of people became unequal—this affected family relationships.
Now the head of the family dictated his rights to the wife and children, and those who did not obey his orders could be kicked out of their home or disinherited. The concept of what a monogamous family means took on immense meaning; the father came to be considered the breadwinner of his wife and his children. And they switched to the role of helpless.
Conclusion
It is important to know! The modern monogamous family consists of a husband and wife and one or two children. Nowadays, three or more children are scarce.
