264 R. H. MATHEWS AND M. M. EVERITT. 



A youth and a woman who are Nanarree to each other theor- 

 etically occupy the position of son-in-law and mother-in-law. He 

 is forbidden to speak to or even look at the woman, and she is 

 subject to the same ban in regard to him. This Nanarree 

 relationship has the good effect of preventing a man from having 

 any improper intimacy with a woman who might ultimately become 

 his mother-in-law; or, in other words, it precludes the possibility 

 of his being the father of his own wife. 



A woman who is Nanarree to a certain man may die before she 

 bears a daughter — or although a daughter be born she may die 

 before the intended husband gets her — therefore, to neutralize the 

 chances of a man not securing a wife, more than one woman is 

 usually appointed Nanarree to the same man. This also enables 

 a man to have more than one wife, polygamy being sanctioned. 

 In like manner the same woman may be Nanarree to several 

 young men, so that if the youth to whom her daughter has been 

 betrothed dies or is killed before he is old enough to claim her, 

 she then becomes the wife of one of the other men. As far as 

 practicable, it is arranged that when a girl is taken as the wife of 

 a particular man, this man's sister shall be given to his wife's 

 brother in exchange. This has the effect of binding the two 

 families together by ties of kinship, and strengthening their claims 

 to consideration in the tribal councils. 



Every child, whether male or female, inherits the name of some 

 animal, plant, or inanimate object, to which anthropologists have 

 given the name of totem — a word in use among the North American 

 Indians for the same purpose. The totem is inherited from the 

 male parent, thus, if the father be a native bear the sons and 

 daughters will be native bears, irrespectively of the totem of the 

 mother. Marriage between individuals of the same totem is 

 strictly forbidden, e.g., a man who is an iguana cannot marry a 

 woman who is an iguana. These totemic divisions of the members 

 of a community is of great help to the old men when making the 

 Nanarree appointments — the affinity of any given individuals 

 being by this means traced with greater facility. 



