SW ANTON: ABORIGINAL TERMS FOR BROTHER AND SISTER 33 



each other, and the difference in time and circumstance under 

 which they were recorded, promises a very fair sample of what 

 may be looked for in primitive society as a whole. 



An inspection of the lists given by Morgan shows that the 

 terms for brother and sister — elder and younger being also fre- 

 quently distinguished — are employed by all tribes from which 

 information is supplied except the Eskimo, who are without 

 exogamous groups and therefore do not concern us. It is true 

 that among certain peoples, such as the Chippewa, Ottawa, 

 Potawatomi, Mohegan, Delaware, Spokane, and Creek, a dis- 

 tinction is introduced between the own brother and sister and 

 collateral brothers and sisters, who are often called " step- 

 brothers," " step-sisters," "other brothers," and so on; but we 

 find that in most cases these exceptional terms apply to both the 

 child of the father's brother and the child of the mother's sis- 

 ter; therefore their significance is mainly consanguineal and 

 their use strengthens rather than weakens the argument for 

 consanguinity. In one or two other cases the terms used are 

 alternatives. Rivers yields precisely the same testimony. In 

 his explanation of the terms employed in the island of Florida 

 he specifically states that those for brother and sister were 

 used "in the usual classificatory sense for all members of the 

 clan of the same generation" and that they were applied also 

 "in the same way to the children of the father's brothers, al- 

 though these may be of different clans." By implication the 

 same must be assumed in the systems recorded by him from 

 the Torres Islands, Santa Cruz, the Reef Islands, Guadalcanar, 

 Ysabel, and Savo, all of those in which there are more than two 

 exogamous divisions and from which information is vouchsafed. 

 The same is found, as we should expect, in tribes having two 

 exogamous groups, and also in tribes without exogamous groups. 

 In some cases these terms are so widely extended as to apply 

 to the cross-cousins as well, the children of the father's sister and 

 the mother's brother. The outstanding fact is, however, that 

 the application of the terms for brother and sister is evidently 

 governed by the relation of the parents of the persons so called 

 to self. 



