Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 18, 1907.djvu/214

182 "In the Dieri case we have the actual group-marriage with appropriate terms, while with the Kurnai there are only the vestigiary relationships, indicating the former conditions of marriage."

What I then said briefly, I have now explained in detail.

There is another passage, at page 305, in which Mr. Thomas says: "Dr. Howitt asks Mr. Lang to look at the Dieri terms, and says 'he will see their present meaning and that they are applied … to individuals … living under pirrauru.' If this statement were correct, the Dieri would be living, not under pirrauru, but under modified promiscuity; for this passage clearly suggests that all who are noa are also pirrauru. What Dr. Howitt actually means, however, is that some people who are noa are also pirrauru—a very different thing."

I must take this passage in parts, to avoid confusion:

(1) I have now shown what the actual meaning of the Dieri terms are, and that they are applied to persons living under pirrauru.

(2) This statement does not suggest to me anything else, and I am unable to see what Mr. Thomas says is the meaning. I therefore attribute this either to the want of "power of interpretation" which Mr. Thomas imputes to me, or perhaps to a "power of misinterpretation" which I think I might, with equal justice, assign to him.

(3) As to this, all that I have to say is that, in the passage referred to, I did not mean anything of the kind.

It will be well to further amplify my remarks at page 177 of my contribution to Folk-Lore, where I show that the terms noa and pirrauru include husband, husband's brother, and (female speaking) sister's husband; wife, wife's sister, and (male speaking) brother's wife. Referring to Diagram 1, the people 1, 2, 5, 6 are all in the noa relation. The term pirrauru includes 1 and 6, and 2 and 5; therefore, in this case it means "husband" and