Agnate

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Agnat (from Latin agnatus "the born / after-born") referred to in Roman law a male blood relative who descends from a common ancestor in an unbroken male line and legitimized by marriage. The members of the agnatic lineage were exclusively men, the agnates - with the exception of still living unmarried and brotherless daughters , the agnates . However, they could not have the agnation (blood relationship on the paternal side) through their offspringbecause they had to move in with their respective husbands after a marriage , their children took over his family name and continued his line, not the line of their mother or their father.

All daughters ever born within the agnatic line were regarded as " cognatic " (Latin "co-born"), but did not belong to the agnatic "male line" (including no married women). Agnatically, a son was not related to his father's sisters ( aunts ), strictly speaking not even to his own sisters.

A rule of descent , in which a son receives his social position , status and property only from his father, is ethnosociologically known as patrilinear (“in the line of the father”: paternal line), or as patrilineal . The agnatic view of daughters differs from other patrilineal systems, in which the women are also members of the patrilineal descent group , although only the male members of the Patri line can pass on membership in the line to their descendants, including their daughters.

In modern legal systems, agnation has lost all meaning (with the exception of the succession to the throne in the Japanese imperial family ). It played a special role in the old German law in the doctrine of legal succession (succession) in fiefdoms and family affidavits of the nobility : as long as an agnate - be it from a sideline, however distant - was still alive, any female family member was unable to succeed ( also that of an agnate in the sense of Roman law). If, as an exception, a female line came into play among the high nobility because there was no prince entitled to succession through agnation or hereditary brotherhood , the principle of inheritance of crown rights according to the agnatic-linear succession applied again from then on . Even today, many “ house laws ” of aristocratic families contain old regulations for such cases.

Differentiation between agnate and cognate

The Roman law met two distinctions regarding relationship :

  • Cognatio : any natural blood relationship ; it was based solely on procreation and the resulting "community of blood".
  • Agnatio ( cognatio civilis ): based exclusively on men and only on procreations that were legitimized by marriage.

The basis of the agnation was the Patria Potestas ("paternal power"): Since only men could possess it, it was only passed on and inherited by men. Agnates were therefore all persons who were under the same paternal power (or would have stood if the head connecting them had still been alive). As the end members of such an ancestral line , women (unmarried and brotherless) could also be viewed as agnates - however, they could not continue the agnation through their descendants because their husband would have claimed the children as his own, they had his family name, not that of their mother . A famous example of the extinction of an agnatic line is provided by Julia (* around 80–54 BC), the daughter of Gaius Iulius Caesar , who died without descendants and thus ended Caesar's lineage. An agnation could, however, also be continued in an artificial way, through an adoption .

In the middle of the 6th century, the Roman Emperor Justinian issued his amendment No. 118, on which the intestate inheritance law of common law is based (legal succession in the absence of a will or contract of inheritance). In it, the difference between agnates and cognates was almost completely eliminated, in that the intestate right of inheritance of the relatives was linked exclusively to the relationship of consanguinity.

See also

Web links

Wiktionary: Agnat  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations
  • Gabriele Rasuly-Paleczek: Introduction to the forms of social organization (part 2/5). (PDF: 1.85 MB) Institute for Cultural and Social Anthropology, University of Vienna, 2011, pp. 37–41 and 52–64 , archived from the original on October 21, 2013 (58 pages; documents relating to their lecture in the 2011 summer semester) .;
  • Hans-Rudolf Wicker: Matri-, patrilinearity and social evolution. (PDF: 387 kB, 47 pp.) In: Guide for the introductory lecture in social anthropology, 1995–2012. Institute for Social Anthropology, University of Bern, July 31, 2012, pp. 27–32 (revised version).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Duden online : Agnation, die. Retrieved March 13, 2020 : "Consanguinity on the father's side" . Ibid: Agnat: "male blood relative of the male line".
  2. ↑ a b Gabriele Rasuly-Paleczek: Patrilineare Deszendenz. (PDF: 1.85 MB) (No longer available online.) In: Introduction to the forms of social organization (Part 2/5). University of Vienna, 2011, p. 59 , archived from the original on October 21, 2013 ; accessed on March 13, 2020 : “The patrilineal descent, sometimes also called agnatic descent, is [...] a form of unilineal descent that is only derived from men. (VIVELO 1981: p.222) It should be noted in connection with patrilinearity [...] that although the descent occurs only through the men, the women are also members of the patrilinear descent group. Also ego 's sisters, Ego's daughters and Ego's patrilaterale aunts etc. are members of Ego's patriline. But it is only the male members of the patriline who can pass on membership in the patriline to their descendants. (cf. KEESING 1975: p.18) " .
  3. ↑ Hans-Rudolf Wicker: Matri-, patrilinearity and social evolution. (PDF: 387 kB, 47 pp.) In: Guide for the introductory lecture in social anthropology, 1995–2012. Institute for Social Anthropology, University of Bern, July 31, 2012, pp. 27–32 (revised version).
  4. ↑ Duden online: patrilinear. Retrieved on March 13, 2020 : “Following the paternal line in the line of succession; paternal law " . Ibid: Father Law: “1. legal order in which descent and succession follow the paternal line ”.
  5. ↑ Lexicon entry: Father Law. In: Bertelsmann: The new Universal Lexicon. Wissenmedia, Gütersloh / Munich 2006, p. 983 ( page preview in the Google book search); Quote: “Father's right, a social order, especially among pastoral peoples, the right of inheritance and the like. Relationship of the individual according to his descent in paternal. Line (patrilinear) determined. "