SOCIAL ORGANIZATION OF WINNEBAGO INDIANS. 
35 
Bear, the doorway of his lodge; for the Wolf and Water-spirit, 
water. They were not obtained for all the clans. We indicated 
before that these “possessions” may have been primarily 
connected with the animals associated with the clan, upon 
which an additional socio-religious interpretation has been 
superimposed. The whole subject is, however, closely related 
to that of clan etiquette, for which no explanations can, of 
course, be given now. 
The Clan Marks of Identification . 
As if more fully to set off the social unit of the clan, there 
have come to be associated with it definite marks of identifica- 
tion, such as symbols, property marks, facial decorations, 
and songs. 
The symbols of only two clans were obtained, although a 
number of other clans seem to have possessed them. There 
were the war club ( nqmqtce ) of the Thunderbird clan, and the 
peculiarly whittled stick ( namqxmixtni ) of the Bear clan. 
When a member of the Thunderbird clan died, a miniature 
war club was buried with him. Whether the namqxmixtni 
was buried with a member of the Bear clan, we do not know. 
The property mark consisted of the effigy of the clan ani- 
mal, and was woven on such objects as bags, tobacco pouches, 
etc. It was also frequently engraved on wooden objects. 
Its most peculiar uses, however, were the emblematic earthen 
effigy mounds, in the shape of the clan animal, which were 
erected near the habitation of each clan in the village and in 
the centre of clan squash fields, corn fields, etc. 1 
Associated with every clan are also four clan songs. These 
are supposed to be the four songs sung by the ancestors of 
each clan when they came to this earth. They are always 
sung on the death of an individual, and are supposed to serve 
as a mark of identification in the journey of the soul to the 
land of the spirits. The use of these songs is so intimately 
associated with death, that when some hardened offender, 
1 For a fuller discussion of these, see Radin, Some Aspects of Winnebago 
Archaeology, American Anthropologist, N.S., 13, 1911, pp. 517-538. 
