MORGAN] GENTES USUALLY NAMED AFTER ANIMALS. a 
- From lapse of time the Iroquois tribes have come to differ slightly in 
the number and in the names of their respective gentes, the largest number 
being eight, as follows: 
Senecas. Cayugas. Onondagas. Oneidas. Mohawks. 
.. Wolf. Wolf. Wolf. Wolf. Wolf. 
_. Bear. Bear. Bear. Bear. Bear. 
_.- Turtle. Turtle. Turtle. Turtle. Turtle. 
_.Beaver. Beaver. Beaver. 
_. Deer. Deer. Deer. 
. - Snipe. Snipe. Snipe. 
_. Heron. Eel. Eel. 
.-Hawk. Hawk. Ball. 
nanoanw fF wn 
Tuscaroras. 
Gray Wolf. 
Bear. 
Great Turtle. 
Beaver. 
Yellow Wolf. 
Snipe. 
Kel. 
Little Turtle. 
These changes show that certain gentes in some of the tribes have 
become extinct through the vicissitudes of time, and that others have been 
formed by the segmentation of over-full gentes. 
With a knowledge of the rights, privileges, and obligations of the 
members of a gens, its capabilities as the unit of a social and governmental 
system will be more fully understood, as well as the manner in which it 
entered into the higher organizations of the phratry, tribe, and confederacy. 
The gens is individualized by the following rights, privileges, and obli- 
gations conferred and imposed upon its members, and which made up the 
jus gentilicium: 
I. The right of electing its sachem and chiefs. 
Il. The right of deposing its sachem and chiefs. 
III. The obligation not to marry in the gens. 
IV. Mutual rights of inheritance of the property of deceased members. 
V. Reciprocal obligations of help, defense, and redress of injuries 
VI. The right of bestowing names upon its members. 
VIL. The right of adopting strangers into the gens. 
VIII. Common religious rites. 
IX. A common burial place. 
X. A council of the gens. 
These functions and attributes gave vitality as well as individuality to 
the organization, and protected the personal rights of its members. 
