Page:Native Tribes of South-East Australia.djvu/166

140 I am indebted to Dr. Roth for the following particulars as to the Annan River tribe. The sub-class names are held to be equivalent to those of an adjacent tribe belonging to those which have the four names, Kurkilla, Banbari, Wungko, Kupuru, but arranged in the following order, the effect being to bring out descent in the male line, thus agreeing with the descent in the Annandale tribe. It follows that in corresponding marriages in the adjacent tribe the arrangement of the Annan River sub-class names would be reversed.

This is another instance of a change made intentionally to effect a purpose.

To this I would add that it strengthens the view which Dr. Fison and I long ago advanced, that the changes made in the social organisation of the tribes, including the classificatory system of relationships, were matters of deliberate intention and not the result of chance.

In the following table I have given some of the systems which are the equivalents of each other. I have taken the classes and in some cases the sub-classes for comparison, omitting the totems which are not essential for my purpose, and which would be of use mainly to determine some doubtful case of equivalence. For the purpose of bringing this question into the shortest range of view, I have abbreviated the connected chain by taking those cases which are most typical, and which I have specially noticed in this section. But it must not be supposed that the tribes noticed touch each other in all cases, for some of them are hundreds of miles apart. It is the class system which touches another class system, as that of the Wotjobaluk touches that of the Wiimbaio, and the equivalence would be recognised by tribes of the respective