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 CHAPTER XVI.

THE FAMILIAL CLAN IN AUSTRALIA AND AMERICA.

I. The Family.

II. The Family in Melanesia.—Melanesian rape—First formation of societies—Exogamy—The Australian clans—Native marriage state—Marriage of clans among the Kamilaroi—Their social incest—How a clan originates—Fictitious fraternity and the totem—How individual marriage is made among the Kurnai—Maternal filiation—Agnation tends to be constituted—Evolution of the family in Melanesia. III. The Family in America.—The Redskin clans—Common dwellings—Rights and duties—Exogamy of the clan—Clans of the Pueblos—The family among the Indians of South America—Relationship among the Redskins—Communism—Maternal filiation—Distinction between the matriarchate and the maternal family—Origin of the ideas of relationship. I. The Family.

I shall now attempt to retrace as clearly as I can the history of the evolution of the family, first of all ascertaining the facts that have been observed, and then using these facts as a touchstone to try the solidity of the various sociological theories that have been put forth on the subject. Among these theories, there are some which have been very favourably received, and not without reason. Insufficient as they might be, they reduced a chaos of facts into order, and contained a certain amount of truth. All of them are open to criticism and contest, both because they are the fruit of a too hasty generalisation, and because their authors have claimed for them a certainty which sociological facts do not easily bear out. Human groups have always lived as they could, without caring about theories; their social