[sAPiRl SOCIAL ORGANIZATION OF THE WEST COAST TRIBES 367 



definite seating at feasts, it is easy to see how the identification of an 

 individual with one sept rather than with another can be made visible. 

 This will indicate also that there are certain natural limitations to the 

 inheritance of all privileges that one has a theoretical claim to. This 

 sort of clan division, however, for the reason that it is too ill-defined 

 and vacillating, can hardly be considered as typical ofwhat we ordinarily 

 understand by clan organization. If, however, we once limit the in- 

 heritance of status and privileges to either the male or female line, to 

 the absolute exclusion of the other, we obtain a series of septs or 

 clans that are once and for all rigidly set ofï against each other. Among 

 the more northern tribes, then, who inherit through the female line 

 alone, there can never be the slightest doubt as to what clan a person 

 is to be identified with. 



Furthermore, among the more southern tribes intermarriage is 

 prohibited only between such as are demonstrably related by blood, 

 even if fairly rem^otely so. Owing to the structure of the village 

 community, this would in many cases mean that there are few persons 

 in a village that one is legally entitled to marry ; but it is important to 

 note that the village community as such need not be exogamous, 

 that is, does not specifically prohibit intermarriage among its members. 

 The clan of the northern tribes, which is more rigidly defined by 

 descent and which therefore gains in solidarity, is further accentuated 

 by strict exogamy. Whether such exogamy is a primary feature of 

 the clan itself or is only a necessary consequence of the exogamy of 

 certain larger groups known as phratries, which we shall take up in 

 a moment, is a question which I would not venture to decide and which 

 need not occupy us here. We spoke before of the fact that the original 

 village communities, before amalgamating, each had its peculiar 

 privileges. Certain of these privileges, particularly the crest paintings 

 and carvings, are emblematic of the communities and may be said 

 to give the septs or clans a totemic character. Among the southern 

 tribes, however, it would seem that the crests, which are generally 

 animals or supernatural beings, are employed exclusively by the 

 nobles and that a commoner, even though identified with a particular 

 sept, cannot be said to be in any sense associated with the crest. To 

 what extent the crests are characteristic of the clan generally in the 

 north and to what extent they are more especially in the nature of 

 privileges enjoyed by the nobles, has not been made perfectly clear. 

 It would seem that certain crests, whose origin is particularly remote, 

 have lost such individual value as they may have had and have become 

 clan emblems properly speaking, whereas others are more restricted 

 in their use and would seem to be the peculiar privilege of certain 

 titled individuals or families. 



