Transcriber’s Notes
Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variationsin hyphenation and accents have been standardised but all other spelling andpunctuation remains unchanged.
The precise location of footnote 256 is speculative since it is not indicated in the original.
The Sexes in Science
and
History
An Inquiry into the Dogma of Woman’s
Inferiority to Man
By
Eliza Burt Gamble
A revised edition of “The Evolution of Woman”
G. P. Putnam’s Sons
New York and London
The Knickerbocker Press
1916
Copyright, 1893
Under the title The Evolution of Woman, by
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
Copyright, 1916
for the revised edition, by
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
The Knickerbocker Press, New York
iii
PREFACE TO NEW EDITION
This volume is a revised edition of The Evolutionof Woman published by G. P. Putnam’sSons in 1894.
In this later work much added evidence appearsgoing to prove the correctness of the theory advancedin the former work. In it the subject ofsex-development has been brought down to thepresent time and in this later investigation it isfound that each and every fact connected with thebiological and sociological development of thelast twenty years is in strict accord not only withthe facts set forth in The Evolution of Womanbut with the conclusions therein arrived at.
In the concluding chapters of this volume theresults of the separate development of the twodiverging lines of sex demarcation are set forth.I have endeavoured to show that present conditionsare the legitimate outcome of the ascendencygained during the later ages of human history bythe egoistic or destructive agencies over thehigher or constructive forces developed in humannature.
E. B. G.
v
PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION
After a somewhat careful study of writtenhistory, and after an investigation extending overseveral years of all the accessible facts relativeto extant tribes representing the various stages ofhuman development, I had reached the conclusion,as early as the year 1882, that the femaleorganism is in no wise inferior to that of the male.For some time, however, I was unable to find anydetailed proof that could consistently be employedto substantiate the correctness of this hypothesis.
In the year 1885, with no special object in viewother than a desire for information, I began asystematized investigation of the facts which atthat time had been established by naturalistsrelative to the development of mankind fromlower orders of life. It was not, however, untilthe year 1886, after a careful reading of TheDescent of Man, by Mr. Darwin, that I first becameimpressed with the belief that the theoryof evolution, as enunciated by scientists, furnishesmuch evidence going to show that the femaleamong all the orders of life, man included, representsa higher stage of development than the male.viAlthough at the time indicated, the belief thatman has descended from lower orders in the scaleof being had been accepted by the leading mindsbo