BULL. 30] 



TRIBE 



815 



The tribe formed a political and ter- 

 ritorial unit which, as has been indi- 

 cated, was more or less permanently co- 

 hesive: its habitations were fixed, its 

 dwellings were relatively permanent, its 

 territorial boundaries were well estab- 

 lished, and within this geographical dis- 

 trict the people of the tribe represented 

 by their chiefs and headmen assembled 

 at stated times at a fixed place within 

 their habitation and constituted a court 

 of law and justice. At the time the 

 North American Indians were first 

 brought within the view of history, they 

 were segregated into organized bodies of 

 persons, and wherever they assembled 

 they constituted a state, for they united 

 the personal and the geographical ideas 

 in fact, if not in theory. 



Various terms have been employed by 

 discoverers, travelers, and historians to 

 designate this political and territorial 

 unity. French writers employed "can- 

 ton," "tribu," and "nation"; English 

 writers used "tribe," "canton," and 

 "kingdom"; while others have used 

 "pagus," "shire," and "gau," the ter- 

 ritorial meaning of which is that of a 

 section or division of a country, whereas 

 the concept to be expressed is that of a 

 country, an entire territorial unit. Be- 

 cause the word "tribe" in its European 

 denotation signifies a political unit only, 

 its use without a definition is also inac- 

 curate. The jejune and colorless terms 

 "band" and "local group" are often 

 employed as adequately descriptive of an 

 organized body of Indian people; but 

 neither of these expressions in the major- 

 ity of cases should be used except when, 

 from the lack of definite ethnologic infor- 

 mation regarding the institutions of the 

 people so designated, the employment of 

 a more precise and descriptive term is 

 precluded. 



The effective power of the tribe for of- 

 fense and defense was composed not only 

 of the accumulated wealth of its members 

 and the muscular strength, stamina, and 

 experience of its quota of warriors, but 

 also of the orenda (q. v.) , or magic power, 

 with which, it was assumed, its people, 

 their weapons and implements, and their 

 arte and institutions, were endowed. 



Some tribes constituted independent 

 states, while others through confedera- 

 tion with other tribes became organic 

 units of a higher organization, retaining 

 governmental control of purely local af- 

 fairs only. Sometimes alliances between 

 tribes were made to meet a passing emer- 

 gency, but there was no attempt to co- 

 ordinate structures of the social fabiic in 

 such manner as to secure permanency. 

 Nevertheless in North America a number 

 of complex, powerful, and well-planned 

 confederations were established on uni- 



versal principles of good government. Of 

 this kind the League of the Five Tribes 

 of the Iroquois in the closing decades of 

 the 16th century was especially typical. 

 This League was founded on the recogni- 

 tion and practice of six fundamentals: 

 ( 1 ) the establishment and maintenance of 

 public peace; (2) the security and health 

 or welfare of the body; (3) the doing of 

 justice or equity; (4) the advocacy and 

 defense of the doing of justice; (5) the 

 recognition of the authority of law, sup- 

 ported as it was by the body of warriors; 

 and (6) the use and preservation of the 

 orenda or magic power. The sum of the 

 activities of these six principles in the 

 public, foreign, and private life of these 

 tribes so confederated resulted in the 

 establishment and preservation of what 

 in their tongue is called the Great Com- 

 monwealth. 



In the history of the American Indian 

 tribes, differences in culture are as fre- 

 quent as coincidences. Different peoples 

 have different ideas, different ideals, 

 different methods of doing things, dif- 

 ferent modes of life, and of course dif- 

 ferent institutions in greatly different 

 degrees and kinds. The course of the 

 history of a people is not predeter- 

 mined, and it is divergent from vary- 

 ing and variable conditions. Different 

 results are consequent upon different 

 departures. In some places tribal organi- 

 zations are established on a clan or a gen- 

 tile basis; in other regions a system of 

 village communities was developed; and 

 in still others pueblos or village commu- 

 nities were founded. From thesedifferent 

 modes of life, influenced by varying en- 

 vironment and experiences, many new 

 departures, resulting in unlike issues, were 

 made. For the reason that the elemen- 

 tary group, the family, whence the other 

 units are directly or mediately derived, 

 is always preserved, coincidences are not 

 infrequent. The term "family" here is 

 taken in its broad socidlogic sense, which 

 is quite different from the modern use of 

 it as equivalent to fireside (see Family). 

 In gentile and clan tribal organizations a 

 family consists of the union of two per- 

 sons, each from a different gens or clan, 

 as the case might be, and their offspring, 

 who therefore have certain rights in, 

 and owe certain obligations to, the two 

 clans or gentes thus united in marriage 

 by the two parents. 



In historical times, in the group of Iro- 

 quois peoples, the tribes consisted of from 

 3 to 12 or 14 clans, irrespective of popula- 

 tion. For social, political, and religious 

 purposes the clans of a tril>e were inva- 

 riably organized into two trilial j)ortions 

 or organic units, commonly denominated 

 phratries, each of which units in council, 



