HOLMES ANNIVERSARY VOLUME 



elusion that the similarities within a given region are due to historical 

 connection. 1 



In the following pages I will cite a number of striking similarities 

 that are explicable as the result of historical connection and will 

 discuss the relation of these facts to a sociological interpretation. 



While the differentiation of elder and younger brothers and sisters 

 is of very common occurrence, a tripartite classification of Geschwister 

 is not found, so far as I know, except among the Eskimo. The Alaskan 

 Eskimo, according to notes supplied by Dr E. W. Hawkes, have dis- 

 tinct terms for elder brother, younger brother, and youngest brother. 

 Corresponding to this, we find among the Chukchee three distinct 

 terms for eldest brother, middle brother, and youngest brother; and 

 a similar nomenclature among the Koryak. 2 The peculiarly restricted 

 distribution of the phenomenon is such as at once to suggest diffusion. 

 Here, however, an alternative explanation may be given. Though 

 diffusion be the ultimate cause, the immediate antecedent of the 

 similarity may be similar social conditions. In other words, it is 

 certain social peculiarities relating to the status of eldest and youngest 

 brothers that may have been borrowed and the kinship terms may 

 have developed independently from these borrowed usages. 



A like perplexity confronts us when we consider the systems found 

 east of the Mississippi and some of the adjoining Plains territory to 

 the west. It is true that a characteristic trait of these systems — the 

 merging of collateral and lineal kin — occurs in a continuous, though 

 vast, area so that its distribution would, according to accepted criteria, 

 be explained by dissemination from a single source. However, it is 

 also true that this area is practically coextensive with the Eastern 

 area of clan exogamy. The hypothesis is, therefore, a priori tenable 

 that clan exogamy was the feature diffused, from which a correspond- 

 ing kinship nomenclature developed independently in a number of 

 cases. We must eliminate such possibilities if we are to establish the 

 historical significance of kinship terms themselves. 



Among the numerous tribes in the eastern and central United 

 States which designate collateral kin by the terms used for lineal 

 relatives there are nevertheless certain far-reaching differences con- 

 nected with the tendency to recognize or to ignore differences of 

 generation. Mr Leslie Spier's as yet unpublished researches in this 

 field indicate that this tendency appears primarily in the designation 

 of cross-cousins. This phenomenon had not escaped the attention of 



1 Classificatory Systems of Relationship, Jour. Royal Anlhr. Inst., xxxix, 1909, p. 81. 



2 M. A. Czaplicka, Aboriginal Siberia, Oxford, 1914, pp. 30, 35. 



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