708 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 137 



to friends by their husbands. As elsewhere, the sororate was in 

 vogue and polygamy fairly widespread, being apparently especially 

 common among the chiefs. Chiefs married with less ceremony than 

 commoners, but this was because the peculiar Natchez social system 

 compelled the chiefs, and the women of the nobility as well, to take 

 their spouses from the common people, in considerable measure 

 because wives and husbands of the upper class were killed on the 

 death of those to whom they had been united. One of our authori- 

 ties states that when there were several wives, the one who bore a 

 child first took precedence over the others. In marriages among 

 commoners, Le Petit tells us that the prospective groom first ap- 

 proached the father or brother of his intended. Du Pratz states 

 that marriages were arranged by the chiefs of the two families, who 

 were sometimes old enough to be great-gi-andparents, and that dur- 

 ing the ceremony the groom held a bow and arrows in his hand and 

 the bride held a laurel branch and an ear of corn. Le Petit states 

 that there was a marriage feast at which the pair ate out of the 

 same dish, and they lived with the parents of the groom until a 

 new house could be built. Cohabitation did not take place during 

 certain phases of the moon. In the material available there is no 

 reference to mother-in-law avoidance, but, as in so many other 

 tribes, there was a class of male prostitutes or berdaches (S wanton, 

 1911, pp. 94-100). 



Caddo girls enjoyed the same premarital freedom we have noted 

 elsewhere, and after marriage we are told that they frequently aban- 

 doned one husband for another, if they thought he would give them 

 more advantages. Some Caddo tribes are said to have been polyg- 

 amous, while in others the wife would not knowingly tolerate a rival, 

 and if she discovered that her husband had taken up with a woman 

 living at some distance, she would abandon him. 



If a man fancied a woman whom he knew to be a maiden, he would take to 

 her some of the best things he had. If her parents allowed her to accept the 

 gift, this was an assent to the marriage, but he could not take her along with 

 him until the caddi (chief) was first informed. If the woman was not a 

 maiden, all that was necessary was for the man to say, "Will you be my friend? 



I will give you ;" whatever he desired to offer. If his offer pleased her, she 



went with him. Sometimes the offer was made only for a few days, sometimes 

 it was stated it was to last forever. "But they never kept their word," nor were 

 there any penalties attached to unfaithfulness. 



However, 



in the xinesi (priestly) and caddi families and those of the officers there was 

 seldom anything of this, because no one dared to give the two first named an 

 affront, as it was punishable with death, and the officers, who were accounted 

 nobles, tried to imitate their superiors, and so set a good example to the 

 rest of the tribe. The wives of the xinesi and caddis were called by one 

 common name — Aquidau. That marked their station immediately, for all the 

 other women had each her individual name. 



