The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory: Why an Invented Past Will Not Give Women a Future by Cynthia Eller

I'm going to start reading this work sometime this week to fulfill the Indo-Europeans Study Overview portion - though this may not be the only selection I read. I thought that before reading the book it would be prudent to lay out what I understand of actual matriarchy vs what is speculated.

Initially a definition is in order:

–noun, plural -chies.

1. a family, society, community, or state governed by women.

2. a form of social organization in which the mother is head of the family, and in which descent is reckoned in the female line, the children belonging to the mother's clan; matriarchal system.

Dictionary.com

Now, the first definition is the one I am most familiar with. I learned it in an anthropology course. To the best of my knowledge there is  no hard proof or evidence showing that an actual matriarchy as defined by the first statement has ever existed in human history (by definition this excludes prehistory but, again, as far as I know there's no *prehistoric* evidence either). Functional political matriarchies simply don't exist -yet, if ever they will.

The second definition is a bit trickier as there are/were matrilineal groups wherein the family line is traced through the mother and the mother's clan/family lends its name and history and is the one considered when social issues come up where lineage is of import. I would argue that this second definition veers more toward the matrilineal purview than not.

So that's what I know, or at least, think I know about historical matriarchy right now. Let's see what I find out :)