422 PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY 



A tribe is not a group or horde occupying a particular territory, but 

 a circle of consanguinei ; the fact of consanguinity being preserved by 

 the tribal name. They are mingled in the same family, since husband 

 and wife are necessarily of different tribes. The Kamilaroi tribe 

 would consist of two supposed female ancestors and their children, and 

 all their descendants in the female line in a continuous series. It would 

 include the two mothers and their children, and all the children of their 

 lineal female descendants ; the children of the females only belonging 

 to the tribe, whilst the children of the males would belong to the tribes 

 of their respective mothers. The tribe is also the unit of organization 

 in the political as well as, social system of barbarous and savage nations. 

 Among the Kamilaroi there was an antecedent and still powei'ful 

 organization upon the basis of sex, which might well claim this funda- 

 mental position. It afterwards became enfolded in the tribal organiza- 

 tion, with the principles of which, when fully developed, it would stand 

 in antagonism. The two organizations could not, at one and the same 

 time, occupy the starting-point of a social and political system. One 

 must give way. It will become apparent in the sequel that the tribal 

 organization is gradually subverting the classes among the Kamilaroi. 



Fifthly. Marriage also was restricted to particular classes, as we 

 have seen. Consequently, when there were but two tribes, one half of 

 all the females of one tribe were the wives of one half of all the males 

 of the other tribe. After the subdivision of the two original tribes 

 into six, the benefit of marrying out of the tribe, which was the chief 

 advantage of the tribal organization, was arrested, if not substantially 

 neutralized, by the restrictions mentioned. It resulted in continuous 

 in-and-in marriages, without the near degree of own brother and sister. 

 There are but four descents in Kamilaroi kinship, because there are 

 but four supposed female ancestors from whom all the people are de- 

 scended. Mata and Kapota, who are found in Iguana, Kangaroo, and 

 Opossum, must marry into Emu, Bandicoot, and Blacksnake ; and 

 Buta and Ippata, who are found in the last three, must marry into the 

 first three. Thus two entire tribes are excluded in marriage from 

 each tribe, as well as one half of the remaining tribe. This was the 

 original law of marriage ; but it has since been relaxed, as will be 

 elsewhere explained. 



If a diagram of descents is made of the descendants of Ippai and 

 Kapota, for example, and carried to the fifth generation, giving to each 

 intermediate pair two children, a male and a female, the following re- 



