Individual and Society in the Barbarian States [Part II]
A. Ia. Gurevich
While taking note of the dominance conformism in barbarian society, we must at same time emphasize that man never possessed a herd consciousness any stage his existence - not even most primitive. No matter how strongly he was integrated into collective, there could have been complete enslavement to tradition and total helplessness face it. We can suppose with greater justification primitive society came being distinctive often easily violated equilibrium between universal, normative mode behavior obligatory for all, on one hand, conduct individual manifestation personal will, characterized by certain deviations from norm other. The former had force an ethical imperitive; latter empirical reality. (1) Certainly, as general rule, member adhered without thinking automatica...
Soviet anthropology and archeology