Tauade - Kinship



Kin Groups and Descent. There is no word in the Tauade language to denote "kin" as distinct from affine or cognate. Nor are there generic terms for "clan" or "lineage," but there are named groups of kin, traditionally descended from a founding group of ancestors, that it is appropriate to call clans, and the reckoning of descent is patrilineal. This is not, however, a strict, jural principle, but rather it seems to be a result of the fact that influence and cooperation are organized in terms of social relationships between people. So it is possible for a person to claim membership in more than one clan. Clans not only claim tracts of land; each clan has a cave in which the bones of ancestors were deposited. (Today, burial in cemeteries is compulsory.) Very few marriages take place within clans, and homicide within clans seems not to occur. Clans are not formally subdivided into lineages, although important ancestors within the clan are genealogical reference points for their descendants.

Kinship Terminology. The terminology is of the Iroquois type.

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