10 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ANATOMICAL AND ANTHROPOLOGICAL 



but from another. To illustrate it from our own clan names, I should 

 put it in this way. A Mackenzie must not marry a Mackenzie, but 

 a woman of another clan, say a Macleod, and the children of the 

 marriage would be not Mackenzies but Macleods. Under a system 

 of polygamy a man may marry several wives who among the Yaos 

 must be themselves of different clans, and so the children of a 

 Mackenzie would be none of them Mackenzies but Macleods, Mac- 

 phersons, Mackintoshes, according to the number and clans of his 

 wives. 



Now all the relationships are counted through the clan and not 

 through the family as among ourselves, and the law of kinship among 

 the natives may be roughly laid down as follows : All members of 

 the same clan who are of the same generation are either brothers or 

 cousins, those of the older generation are either fathers or mothers or 

 uncles, while those of an older genaration still are either grandfathers 

 or grandmothers. Hence a man's brother means any fellow-clansman 

 of the same generation as himself, his father means any clansman 

 of the older generation, while grandfather denotes any male clans- 

 man of any older generation still. Thus a man may have many 

 grandfathers, still more fathers and mothers, while his brothers are 

 legion. 



Among the Yaos, descent being through the mother, it follows 

 that all property is inherited by the younger brother born of the same 

 mother, because he is the nearest relation of the same clan. Failing 

 him it is the sister's son who succeeds. Thus a man's heirs are never 

 his own family but either his younger brothers, or nephews by his 

 sister. With the property the heir takes the name of his predecessor 

 and also his wives. And not only so but he takes also all the 

 relationships of his predecessor and leaves his own original ones 

 behind him. Thus those who before were his mother or mothers are 

 now his sisters, while his original brothers now become his children 

 or even grandchildren. 



This system holds with slight modifications among the Mang'anja 

 and Anguru, but among the Angoni due probably to the influence of 



