hi INTKODUCTION. 



tive emblem or totem. This connection of clan or family 

 was exceedingly strong, and by it the five nations of the 

 league were linked together as by an eightfold chain. 



The clans were by no means equal in numbers, influ- 

 ence, or honor. So marked were the distinctions among 

 them, that some of the early writers recognize only the 

 three most conspicuous, — those of the Tortoise, the Bear, 

 and the Wolf. To some of the clans, in each nation, 

 belonged the right of giving a chief to the nation and 

 to the league. Others had the right of giving three, or, 

 in one case, four chiefs ; while others could give none. 

 As Indian clanship was but an extension of the family 

 relation, these chiefs were, in a certain sense, hereditary ; 

 but the law of inheritance, though binding, was extremely 

 elastic, and capable of stretching to the farthest limits of 

 the clan. The chief was almost invariably succeeded by 

 a near relative, always through the female, as a brother 

 by the same mother, or a nephew by the sister's side. 

 But if these were manifestly unfit, they were passed over, 

 and a chief was chosen at a council of the clan from 

 among remoter kindred. In these cases, the successor is 

 said to have been nominated by the matron of the late 

 chief's household.^ Be this as it may, the choice was 



potato, Glycine apios. This clan, if it existed, was very inconspicuous, 

 and of little importance. 



Remarkable analogies exist between Iroquois clanship and that of 

 other tribes. The eight clans of the Iroquois were separated into two 

 divisions, four in each. Originally, marriage was interdicted between all 

 the members of the same division, but in time the interdict was limited 

 to the members of the individual clans. Another tribe, the Choctaws, re- 

 mote jfrom the Iroquois, and radically different in language, had also eight 

 clans, similarly divided, with a similar interdict of marriage. — Gallatin, 

 Synopsis, 109. 



The Creeks, according to the account given by their old chief, Seko- 

 pechi, to Mr. D. W. Eakins, were divided into nine clans, named in most 

 eases from animals: clanship being transmitted, as usual, through the 

 female. 



1 Lafitau, I. 471 



