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INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY PUBLICATION NO. 1 



twice before abandoning bis relatives for a set of 

 in-laws who may be hostile to him. 



The age requirements for marriage are very 

 elastic. Infant betrothal is not practiced, but 

 both boys and girls are often espoused before they 

 have reached the age of maturity- Girls, how- 

 ever, must undergo the puberty ceremonies prior 

 to intercourse and marriage. Boys, on the other 

 hand, undergo no rites or tests of any kind before 

 marriage. 



The negotiations for marriage are made be- 

 tween the potential spouses themselves, although 

 the parents-in-law usually know beforehand when 

 (he marriage is about to take place. The period 

 of courtship is brief. It consists principally in an 

 indulgence in sexual intercourse on the part of 

 the potential mates and in their arrival at a deci- 

 sion to set up house together. If a girl shows re- 

 luctance to marry with her potential spouse, she 

 is chided by her mother for her shortcomings and 

 is thus usually forced into the marriage by 

 ridicule. 



The marriage itself takes place without cere- 

 mony. This is literally true. No exchanges of 

 property occur. The wedding is not even signified 

 by such a simple act as a feast. The marriage 

 rite consists merely in ;i notification of the parents- 

 in-law of the decision to marry and of a removal 

 of the man's hammock (residence) from its accus- 

 tomed place in the house (next to that of his 

 parents) to a position next to that of his wife's 

 parents. Consequently matrilocal residence 

 among the Siriono, when marriage is endogamous, 

 consists of nothing more than a shift of locale 

 within the same house. It is true that newlyweds 

 become the butt of sexual jokes and horseplay for 

 several days, but formal occurrences accompany- 

 ing the union are completely lacking. In other 

 life crises, such as births and deaths, the immediate 

 participants are at least decorated with feathers, 

 but in the case of marriage even this sign of 

 festivity is lacking. 



Although matrilocal residence, in endogamous 

 marriages, does not involve a very great spatial 

 removal of a man from his relatives, it does 

 produce a considerable change in his social 

 obligations. After marriage, a man, instead of 

 hunting for his parents, his sisters, and his un- 

 married brothers, must hunt for his wife's parents, 

 for her sisters, and for her unmarried brothers. 

 While these obligations are reciprocal, a man 



usually supplies more game to his in-laws than he 

 receives in return. A man's relations with his 

 own family, however, are not completely dis- 

 rupted. Besides being related to his in-laws by 

 blood, he continues to reside in the same house 

 as his family. Moreover, his brother may be 

 married to his wife's sister. If not, his brother is 

 at least a potential husband of his own wife with 

 sex rights over her. Hence, brothers usually 

 maintain close bonds after marriage. They 

 continue to hunt together especially, even though 

 their game may be distributed in different ways. 



Only in exogamous marriages are a man's 

 relations with his family completely upset. Be- 

 cause of economic, factors, resistance to such 

 marriages sometimes arises. While I was at 

 Tibaera, an exogamous marriage occurred which 

 changed existing conditions considerably. A man 

 named Kimbai-neti (Little-man) had been previ- 

 ously married to a woman who died. Since there 

 was no available spouse in the band for him to 

 marry, he was without a wife. He continued to 

 reside, however, with his mother-in-law and her 

 other daughter who was married to another man. 

 Kimbai-neti was an excellent hunter and brought 

 a great deal of game into the household. When I 

 arrived from the forest in company with the band 

 of Aciba-eoko, Kimbai-neti located a potential 

 spouse in this band. A marriage was arranged. 

 His former mother-in-law, however, tried her best 

 to break up the match, but without success. 

 Kimbai-neti left her house and moved in with his 

 new wife and in-laws. Consequently his former 

 mother-in-law was forced to seek other means 

 of support. Before doing so, however, she tried 

 to convince Kimbai-neti and his new wife to 

 violate the rule of matrilocal residence and move 

 back to her house, but they would have none 

 of such a plan. 



Polygyny is allowed, and sororal polygyny is 

 preferred. Four of the fourteen marriages in 

 the band of Eantandu were plural marriages, 

 and three of these were sororal unions. Only 

 in one instance was a man married to as many 

 as five wives. Three of these were sisters, while 

 the other two were parallel cousins (classifica- 

 tory sisters) of these. This man was not a chief 

 but a person of considerable maturity and dis- 

 tinction, being about the best hunter in the 

 band. The chief, however, had three wives, two 

 of whom were sisters, while the third he had 



