BULL. '.W] 



CLAN AND GENS 



303 



lums.— Grunt in Jour. Roy. Geog. Soc, 293, 18.'i7. 

 Wooselalim.— Lane in Ind. Aff. Rep., 162, 1S.50. 



Clan and Gens. An American Indian 

 clan or gens is an intratribal exogamic 

 group of persons either actually or theo- 

 retically consanguine, organized to pro- 

 mote their social and political welfare, the 

 members being usually denoted by a com- 

 mon class name derived generally from 

 some fact relating to the habitat of the 

 group or to its usual tutelary being. In the 

 clan lineal descent, inheritance of per- 

 sonal and common property, and the 

 hereditary right to i)ublic office and trust 

 are traced through the female line, while 

 in the gens they devolve through the 

 male line. Clan and gentile organizations 

 are by no means universal among the 

 North American tribes; and totemism, 

 the possession or even the worshij) of per- 

 sonal or communal totems by individuals 

 or groups of persons, is not an essential 

 feature of clan and gentile organizations. 

 The terms clan and gens as defined and 

 employed by Powell denote useful dis- 

 criminations in social and political organi- 

 zation, and, no better names having been 

 proposed, they are used here practically 

 as defined by Powell. 



Consanguine kinship among the 

 Iroquoian and Muskhogean tribes is traced 

 through the blood of the woman only, 

 and niemljenship in a clan constitutes 

 citizenship in the tribe, conferring certain 

 social, poHtical, and religious privileges, 

 duties, and rights that are denied toaliens. 

 By the legal fiction of adoption the blood 

 of the alien might be changed into one of 

 the strains of Iroquoian l)lood, and thus 

 citizenship in the tribe could Ix* conferred 

 on a person of alien lineage. The primary 

 unit of the social and political organiza- 

 tion of Iroquoian and Muskhogean tribes 

 is the olnvachira, a Mohawk term signify- 

 ing the family, comprising all the male 

 and female progeny of a woman and of 

 all her female descendants in the female 

 line and of such other persons as may be 

 adopted into the oJt u-ac}i ira. An oh icach ira 

 never I^ears the name of a tutelary or other 

 deity. Its head is usually the eldest 

 woman in it. It ma}" be composed of one 

 or more firesides, and one or more olnra- 

 cJiiras may constitute a clan. The mem- 

 bers of an ohiracldra have ( 1 ) the right to 

 the name of the clan of which their o/nra- 

 c/n'raisameml)er; (2) the right of inherit- 

 ing property from deceased meml)ers; and 

 (3 ) the right to take part in councils cf the 

 ohirachira. The titles of chief and sub- 

 chief were the heritage of particul&r 

 ohirachiraii. In the development of a 

 clan by the coalescence of two or more 

 actually or theoretically relate<lo/(»y/r///ra.? 

 only certain ohmichiras obtained the in- 

 heritance and custody of the titles of and 

 consequently the right to choose chief 



and subchief. Very rarely were the off- 

 spring of an adoi)ted alien constituted an 

 ohwarhira having chiefship or subchief- 

 ship titles. The married women of child- 

 bearing age of such an ulurachira had the 

 right to hokl a council for the purpose of 

 choosing candidates for chief and sub- 

 chief of the clan, the chief matron of one 

 of the oJurarhiras being the trustee of the 

 titles, and the initial step in the deposition 

 of a chief or subchief was taken by the 

 women's council of the ohicadiira to 

 whom the title belongs. There were 

 clans in which several olnracJiiras pos- 

 sessed titles to chiefships. The Mohawk 

 and Oneida tribes have only 3 clans, each 

 of which, however, has 3 chiefships and 

 3 subchiefships. Every oJiwachira of the 

 Iroquois possessed and worshiped, in ad- 

 dition to those owned by individuals, one 

 or more tutelary deities, called olaron or 

 orhinagenda, which were customarily the 

 charge of wise women. An alien could 

 be taken into the clan and into the tribe 

 only through adoption into one of the 

 vhirachirax. All the land of an oli^vachira 

 was the exclusive property of its women. 

 The ohirachira was bound to purchase 

 the life of a member who had forfeited 

 it by the killing of a member of the 

 trilje or of an allied tribe, and it pos- 

 sessed the right to spare or to take the 

 life of prisoners made in its behalf or 

 offered to it for adoption. 



The clan among the Iroquoian and the 

 Muskhogean peoples is generally consti- 

 tuted of one or more olm-achlras. It was 

 developed apparenth' through the coa- 

 lescence of two or more oluvachiras hav- 

 inga commonabode. Amalgamation natu- 

 rally resulted in a higher organization and 

 an enlargement and multiplication of 

 rights, privileges, and obligations. Where 

 a single ohwachini represents a clan it was 

 almost always due to the extinction of 

 sister olnvacJiiras. In the event of the 

 extinction of an olarachini through death, 

 one of the fundamental rules of the con- 

 stitution of the League of the Iroquois 

 provides for the preservation of the titles 

 of chief and subchief of the oh tcachira, by 

 placing these titles in trust with a sister 

 ohirrichira of the same clan, if there be 

 such, during the pleasure of the League 

 council. The following are some of the 

 characteristic rights and privileges of the 

 approximately identical Iroquoian and 

 Muskhogean clans: (1) The right to a 

 common clan name, which is usually that 

 of an animal, bird, reptile, or natural ob- 

 ject that may formerly have been regarded 

 as a guardian deity. (2) Representation 

 in the council of the tril)e. (3) Its share 

 in the communal property of the tribe. 

 (4) The right to have its elected chief 

 and subchief of the clan confirmed and 

 installed by the tribal council, among the 



