Page:American Anthropologist NS vol. 1.djvu/769

 698 AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST [n. s., i, 1899

hypothetical beginning of a tribe through successive generations ; and still the ruler of the clan will be the elder-man of the clan and will govern not his own children and their descendants, but his sister's children and their descendants. We may therefore define a clan as a group of kindred people whose kinship is reckoned only through females.

A clan always has a name, which is called its totem ; and the object from which it is named is in like manner called its totem. Thus, in the two clans which we have considered, the wolf and the eagle are respectively called the totems of the clan. The totem derives great consideration in savage society. It is usually some beast, bird, or insect, or some important plant, such as the corn or the tobacco ; or it may be the wind, the rain, a star, or the sun. The totem of the clan is considered to be the progenitor or prototype of the clan. The people of the Wolf clan claim to have descended from the wolf ; the people of the Eagle clan, from the eagle ; the people of the Wind clan, from the wind ; and the people of the Sun clan, from the sun. The totem is also the tutelar deity of the clan.

There grows up about the clan a singular set of rules and observances which are rites on the one hand and prohibitions on the other. The prohibitions are usually called taboos. Thus, the members of the Wolf clan must not kill a wolf, as the killing of the wolf is tabooed to the clan ; but if they see one they must perform some ceremony. The rites and taboos of the totem are universal in this stage of society, and are held as sacred obliga- tions. One of these taboos is especially to be noted : A per- son must not marry into his own clan. The taboo is sacred ; and its violation is a horrible crime, which, in some tribes, is punish- able with death.

An individual is likely to have as many kindred through his father as through his mother ; and he is also likely to have as many kindred through his wife by affinity as through his father and mother by consanguinity. All those persons to whom the

�� �