‘God Hath Ordained to Man a Helper’: Hobbes, Patriarchy and Conjugal Right

There are two conflicting and equally misleading interpretations of Hobbes: either he is a patri-archalist like Filmer – but the premise of Hobbes's theory is that political right originates in maternal not paternal lordship; or he is an anti-patriarchalist – but he endorses the subjection of wives to husbands in civil society. To appreciate how Hobbes turns mother right into a specifically modern, non-paternal form of patriarchy, an understanding is required of his peculiar view of the family as a protective association of master and servants that originates in conquest (contract). Secondly, a conjectural history of the defeat of women by men in the natural condition and their incorporation into ‘families’ has to be provided. The overthrow of mother right enables men to enter the original contract, to create Leviathan in their own image, and to secure the fruits of their conquest by establishing patriarchal political right, exercised in large part as conjugal right.