Editing Matriarchy (section)

==== Earliest prehistory and undated ====
The controversy surrounding prehistoric or "primal" matriarchy began in reaction to the 1861 book by Bachofen, ''Mother Right: An Investigation of the Religious and Juridical Character of Matriarchy in the Ancient World''. Several generations of ethnologists were inspired by his pseudo-evolutionary theory of archaic matriarchy. Following him and [[Jane Ellen Harrison]], several generations of scholars, usually arguing from known myths or oral traditions and examination of Neolithic female cult-figures, suggested that many ancient societies might have been matriarchal, or even that there existed a wide-ranging matriarchal society prior to the ancient cultures of which we are aware. After Bachofen's three-volume ''Myth, Religion, and Mother Right'', classicists such as Harrison, [[Arthur Evans]], [[Walter Burkert]], and [[James Mellaart]]<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=reU63yfgrWIC Ruether, Rosemary Radford, ''Goddesses and the Divine Feminine: A Western Religious History''], p.&nbsp;15.</ref> looked at the evidence of [[matriarchal religion]] in pre-Hellenic societies.<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=3qhQuWPNUckC&q=bachofen Bachofen, Johann Jakob, ''Myth, Religion, and Mother Right''].{{Page needed|date=November 2013}}</ref> The concept was further investigated by Lewis Morgan.<ref>[http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/morgan-lewis/ancient-society/ancient-society.zip Morgan, L., ''Ancient Society Or Researches in the Lines of Human Progress from Savagery through Barbarism to Civilization''].</ref> According to Uwe Wesel, Bachofen's myth interpretations have proved to be untenable.<ref>Wesel, Uwe, ''Der Mythos vom Matriarchat. Über Bachofens Mutterrecht und die Stellung von Frauen in frühen Gesellschaften'' (Frankfurt/M.: Suhrkamp, 1980).{{Page needed|date=October 2013}}</ref> According to historian [[Susan L. Mann|Susan Mann]], as of 2000, "few scholars these days find&nbsp;... [a "notion of a stage of primal matriarchy"] persuasive."<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Mann |first1=Susan |title=Presidential Address: Myths of Asian Womanhood |journal=The Journal of Asian Studies |date=November 2000 |volume=59 |issue=4 |pages=835–862 |doi=10.2307/2659214 |jstor=2659214 |s2cid=161399752 }}</ref>

[[Kurt Derungs]] is a recent non-academic author advocating an "anthropology of landscape" based on allegedly matriarchal traces in [[toponymy]] and folklore.<ref>{{cite book |last1=von Stuckrad |first1=Kocku |author1-link=Kocku von Stuckrad |chapter=Constructing Femininity – the Lilith Case |pages=67–92 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CjZWZt_Xs34C&pg=PA67 |editor1-last=Platzner |editor1-first=Robert Leonard |title=Gender, Tradition and Renewal |date=2005 |publisher=Peter Lang |isbn=978-3-906769-64-6 }}</ref>