450 



FALLACIES FAMILY 



[b. a. e. 



Fallacies. See Popular fallacies. 



Faluktabunnee. A Choctaw town, men- 

 tioned in the treaty of 1805, on the right 

 bank of Tombigbee r., in Choctaw co., 

 Ala.— Am. State Papers, Ind. Aff., i, 749, 

 1832; Royce in 18th Rep. B. A. E., pi. 

 cviii, 1899. 

 Fuketcheepoonta. — Am. State Papers, op. cit. 



Family. There are important material 

 differences in the organization and in the 

 functions of the family as found re.spec- 

 tively in savagery, barbarism, and civili- 

 zation, and even within each of these 

 planes of culture several marked types of 

 the family, differing radically one from 

 another in many characteristic features, 

 exist. 



To determine definitely even the main 

 organic features of the family systems in 

 a majority, not to say all, of the Indian 

 tribes n. of Mexico, is not yet possi- 

 ble, owing to lack of material. In com- 

 munities like those of the Muskhogean 

 and the Iroquoian tribes, in which the 

 clan system has been so highly developed, 

 two radically different organic groups of 

 persons exist to which the term family 

 may properly be applied; and within 

 each of these groups a more or less com- 

 plex system of relationships definitely 

 fixes the status of every person, a status 

 that, acquired liy l)irth or adoption, deter- 

 mines the civil or other rights, immunities, 

 and obligations of the person. Among 

 the Iroquois the ohwacldra (the common 

 Iroquoian name for the maternal blood 

 family) was becoming merged into the 

 clan (q. V. ) , so that in specific cases the two 

 are virtuallj^ identical, although in other 

 cases several ohwachira are comprised 

 under one clan. The term ohwachira is 

 common to all the known dialects of the 

 Iroquoian stock. On the other hand there 

 are found inthese dialects several differ- 

 ent names designating the group called a 

 clan, seemingly indicating the proba- 

 bility that the family as an in.stitution 

 existed long before the development of 

 the clan organization, when the several 

 triVjes still had a common history and 

 tradition. But it is not strictly accurate 

 to call an ohwachira a family, or a clan a 

 family. The first and larger group in- 

 cludes the entire body of kindred of some 

 one person, who is usually denominated 

 the propositus. 



In view of the rights and obligations of 

 the father's clan to a person, in addition 

 to those inherited from the clan of the 

 mother, it appears that the family group 

 among the Iroquois and Muskhogean 

 tribes is composed of the maternal and 

 paternal clans. The clan owes the child 

 of its son certain civil and religious rights, 

 and is bound to the child by obligations 

 which vitally concern the latter's life and 

 welfare, present and future. The youth's 



equipment for life would not be regarded 

 as complete were the performance of 

 these clan duties neglected. The tutelar 

 of every person is named and made by 

 the members of the paternal clan. The 

 duties just mentioned do not end with 

 the death of the person; if occasioned by 

 war or by murder the loss must be made 

 good by the paternal elan supplying a 

 prisoner or the scalp of an enemy. 



Some of the duties and obligations of 

 the clan or clans whose sons have taken 

 wives from a clan stricken by death are to 

 condole with it, prepare the death feasts, 

 provide suitable singers to chant the 

 dirges at the wake lasting one or more 

 nights, guard and care for the body lying 

 in state and prepare it for burial, make 

 the bark burial case or wooden coffin, 

 construct the scaffold or dig the grave, 

 and to perform all the other needful 

 duties due from clans bound together by 

 marriage. It was regarded as unseemly 

 for the stricken clan to do anything but 

 mourn until the body of the dead had 

 been placed in its final resting place and 

 until after the feast of ' ' reassociating with 

 the public," held ten days subsequent to 

 the death of the deceased, at which his 

 property was divided among his heirs 

 and friends. In case of the death of a 

 chief or other noted person the clan 

 mourned for an entire year, scrupulously 

 refraining from taking part in public 

 affairs until the expiration of this period 

 and until after the installation of a suc- 

 cessor to the dead officer. During the 

 interim the bereaved clan was represented 

 by the clan or clans bound to it by the 

 ties of marriage and offspring. 



The.se two clans are exogamic' groups, 

 entirely distinct before the child's birth, 

 and form two subdivisions of a larger 

 group of kindred — the family — of which 

 any given person, the propositus, is the 

 focal point or point of juncture. Strictly 

 speaking, both clans form incest groups 

 in relation to him. Every member of 

 the community is therefore the point of 

 contact and convergence of two exogamic 

 groups of persons, for in these communi- 

 ties the clan is exogamic; that is to .say, 

 each is an incest group in so far as its 

 own members are concerned. Within 

 these clans or exogamic groups the mem- 

 bers are governed by rules of a more or 

 le.ss complex system of relationships, 

 which fix absolutely the position and 

 status of everyone in the group, and the 

 clan is thus organized and limited. 

 Those, then, who have common blood 

 with one another, or with a third person, 

 belong to the same family and are kin- 

 dred. Both of these clans owe the off- 

 spring the rights and obligations of kin- 

 dred, but in differing degrees. Thus a 

 person may be said to have two clans, in 



