10 HOUSES AND HOUSE-LIFE OF THE AMERICAN ABORIGINES. 
objects. These gentes were usually such as had been formed by the seg- 
mentation of an original gens. 
The phratry existed in a large number of the tribes of the American 
aborigines, where it is seen to arise by natural growth, and to stand as the 
second member of the organic series, as among the Grecian and Latin 
tribes. It did not possess original governmental functions, as the gens 
tribe and confederacy possessed them; but it was endowed with certain 
useful powers in the social system, from the necessity for some organization 
larger than a gens and smaller than a tribe, and especially when the tribe 
was large. ‘The same institution in essential features and in character, it 
presents the organization in its archaic form and with its archaic functions. 
A knowledge of the Indian phratry is necessary to an intelligent under- 
standing of the Grecian and the Roman. 
The eight gentes of the Seneca-Iroquois tribe were reintegrated in two 
phratries, as follows: 
First Phratry. 
Gentes—1. Bear. 2. Wolf. 3. Beaver. 4. Turtle. 
Second Phratry. 
Gentes—5. Deer. 6. Snipe. 7. Heron. 8. Hawk.. 
Each phratry (De-ai-non-di’-a-yoh) is a brotherhood, as this term also 
imports. The gentes in the same phratry are brother gentes to each other, 
and cousin gentes to those of the other phratry. They are equal in grade, 
character, and privileges. It is a common practice of the Senecas to call 
the gentes of their own phratry brother gentes, and those of the other 
phratry their cousin gentes, when they mention them in their relation to 
the phratries. Originally marriage was not allowed between the members 
of the same phratry; but the members of either could marry into any 
gens of the other. This prohibition tends to show that the gentes of each 
phratry were subdivisions of an original gens, and therefore the prohibition 
against marrying into a person’s own gens had followed to its subdivisions. 
This restriction, however, was long since*removed, except with respect to 
the gens of the individual. A tradition of the Senecas affirms that the 
Bear and the Deer were the original gentes, of which the others were sub- 
divisions. It is thus seen that the phratry had a natural foundation in the 
