Notes[ 9 ]Brown and Darryl Forde, eds., African Systems of Kinship and Marriage (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 195), 183 – 184.
1. Guyer, “Beti Widow Inheritance,” .
11. T he a ssig n ment of t he ch i ld ren of a lev i rate u n ion to t he new pa r t ner is one
concession to objections to levirate. This is the practice among Christian and
Moslem Dukawa. Frank Salamone, “Will She or Won’t She? Choice and Dukawa
Widows,” in Potash, ed., Widows in African Societies, 168. This is also the practice
among some Arabs today; widows may marry their husband’s kin, but the unions
are not regarded as levirate and the children are the legal offspring of the new
husband.
1. Gluckman, “Kinship and Marriage Among the Lozi,” 183 ; I. Schapera, “K in-
ship and Marriage among the Tswana,” in Radcliffe-Brown and Forde, eds., Afri-
can Systems of Kinship and Marriage, 153.
13. Betty Potash, “Widows of the Grave: Widows in a Rural Luo Community,”
in Potash, ed., Widows in African Societies, 63.
14. Potash, “Widows of the Grave,” 6.
15. See Edward Westermarck, A History of Human Marriage (New York: Aller-
ton Book Co., 19 ), 3 :8 n. 1 , for an extensive list.
16. For discussions of levirate marriage in societies other than ancient Israel,
see Radcliffe-Brown and Forde, eds., African Systems of Kinship and Marriage;
Jack Goody, The Oriental, the Ancient and the Primitive (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 199 ); and Quale, A History of Marriage Systems.
1. In some cases, the close relationship between the widow and the levir
wou ld genera l ly be forbidden, but t he closeness is ig nored t h roug h cog n it ive d is-
sonance. See Mona Etienne, “Contradictions, Constraints and Choices: Widow
Remarriage Among the Baule of Ivory Coast,” in Potash, ed., Widows in Afri-
can Societies, 53 – 58. Etienne argues that the legal fiction that allows for such
unions among the Baule removes these unions from the categor y of levirate and
notes that the children of these unions are assigned to the genitor rather than
the deceased.
18. Reuben Ahroni, “The Levirate and Human Rights,” in Nahum Rakover, ed.,
Jewish Law and Current Legal Problems (Jerusalem: Library of Jewish Law, 1984 ),
68.
19. For a critique of this position, see Potash, ed., Widows in African Societies.
. Salamone, “Will She or Won’t She?” 163 – 1.
1. This freedom is not necessarily absolute; a surviving spouse in many
places w ill be responsible for t he debts of t he deceased spouse. However, in such
societies, the death of a spouse leaves the survivor free to remarry or to refrain
from remarriage as he or she chooses.
. Regina Smith Oboler, “Nandi Widows,” in Potash, ed., Widows in African
Societies, 66.
3. Potash, “Widows of the Grave,” 44 – 65.
4. Potash, “Widows of the Grave,” 49 – 5.
5. Potash, “Widows of the Grave,” 45.
6. Potash, “Widows of the Grave,” 45 – 46.
. Potash, “Widows of the Grave,” 6 – 6.
8. Oboler, “Nandi Widows,” 66 – 83.
9. An additional consideration might be the age of widows interviewed by
Oboler. Most were older and resided with adult sons. She agrees that younger
widows have more incentive to accept levirate unions, but her data indicate that
even they often choose not to do so.