XXXII hurp:au of American ethnology 



quite conipleted at the end of the fiscal year, when Dr Jenks 

 was, at tlie request of the Director of the Phihppiiie Bureau of 

 Noncln-istian Tribes, fuHou(^hed for a year, with a view to the 

 more effective introduction of the methods of the Bureau of 

 American Ethnoh)g-y in the Phihppine researches. 



For several years Mr J. D. McGuire has been engaged in 

 investigating certain branches of aboriginal technology, and 

 some of his results have been published in the reports of the 

 United States National Museum. During the last fiscal year 

 he began, at the instance of the Director, a critical study of the 

 earliest records of aboriginal technology made by the con- 

 quistadores, missionaries, and other pioneers. During the year 

 just closed he continued the work, and has made a series of 

 extracts from the records which have proved of great use to 

 the Director and the collaborators engaged in field researches. 

 The extracts are arranged on cards, and these have been 

 acquii'ed for the use of the Bureau. 



Work in Sociology 



Throughout most of the year the time of the Ethnologist in 

 Charge has been so fully occupied with administrative work, 

 largely relating to publication of the reports, as to somewhat 

 delay his sociologic inquiries ; yet fair progress has been made. 

 One of the special inquiries of the year relates to what may be 

 called, by extension of common terms, aboriginal land tenure, 

 this investigation l^eing rendered timelv by current progress 

 in the allotment of lands in severalty to former tribesmen, as 

 well as l)y recent occupancy of territory formerly inhabited 

 by native tribes in Alaska, Hawaii, and the Philippines. The 

 researches indicate that primitive peoples have no conception 

 of land tenure in the sense in which the term is employed by 

 civilized and enlightened peoples. In the first place, there is 

 no recognition of individual rights to lands or natural wealth, 

 for such values are regarded as belonging to the clan, the gens, 

 or the tribe; that is, possession is communal rather than indi- 

 vidual. In the second place, the property sense is especialh' 

 inchoate as applied to lands, which are viewed as natural 

 ranges for men and animals, for local tribes and local fauna; and 



