Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 18, 1907.djvu/204

172 1, 2, 3 are the grandmother, mother, and the grandson; 4 is the brother of 1, 5 his daughter, and 6 his granddaughter. The man 7 is the husband of 1, 8 is the wife of 4, and it must be added that 7 and 8 are brother and sister, as are also 4 and 1.

The diagram therefore shows the alternations of the noa and kami relations. It also shows that the proper wife of the man 3 must be a woman who is his mother's, mother's, brother's, daughter's daughter,—that is, the woman 6; or, what is the same thing, his mother's, father's, sister's, daughter's daughter, who is the woman 6.

This shows that no one can, by any possibility, become the husband or wife of any other person than a member of the noa group which is complementary to his or hers.

I may now say, once for all, that the careful consideration which I have given to the evidence of the terms of relationship of the tribes of South-east Australia, during the past two years, has brought me to the definite opinion which I expressed in the communication to Folk-Lore, and which Mr. Thomas has now criticised.

I now address myself to the latter part of the extract which I am considering.

I consider the noa relationship as having restricted the range of an earlier and wider license, to the present limits of the pirrauru marriage. As I see it, the noa relationship was one of the earlier restrictions on marriage, the stages of which I enumerated in my Native Tribes, at page 282. All of those restrictions have, as I see it, had in view the prevention of marriage between those who, to use the language of the present Australians, were held to be of "too near flesh."

It is fortunate that there are, even now, traces of the manner in which the noa system has been developed in that direction.

The subjoined diagrams show the nupa relation of the Urabunna and the noa relation of the Dieri: