THE IROQUOIS GENS.
We now come to another discovery of Morgan that is at least as important
as the reconstruction of the primeval form of the family from the
systems of kinship. It is the proof that the sex organizations within
the tribe of North American Indians, designated by animal names, are
essentially identical with the genea of the Greeks and the gentes of the
Romans; that the American form is the original from which the Greek and
Roman forms were later derived; that the whole organization of Greek and
Roman society during primeval times in gens, phratry and tribe finds its
faithful parallel in that of the American Indians; that the gens is an
institution common to all barbarians up to the time of civilization--at
least so far as our present sources of information reach. This
demonstration has cleared at a single stroke the most difficult passages
of remotest ancient Greek and Roman history. At the same time it has
given us unexpected information concerning the fundamental outlines of
the constitution of society in primeval times--before the introduction
of the state. Simple as the matter is after we have once found it out,
still it was only lately discovered by Morgan. In his work of 1871 he
had not yet unearthed this mystery. Its revelation has completely
silenced for the time being those generally so overconfident English
authorities on primeval history.
The Latin word gens, used by Morgan generally for the designation of
this sex organization, is derived, like the equivalent Greek word
genos, from the common Aryan root gan, signifying to beget. Gens, genos,
Sanskrit dschanas, Gothic kuni, ancient Norse and Anglesaxon kyn,
English kin, Middle High German künne, all signify lineage, descent.
Gens in Latin, genos in Greek, specially designate that sex organization
which boasted of common descent (from a common sire) and was united into
a separate community by certain social and religious institutions, but
the origin and nature of which nevertheless remained obscure to all our
historians.
Elsewhere, in speaking of the Punaluan family, we saw how the gens was
constituted in its original form. It consisted of all individuals who by
means of the Punaluan marriage and in conformity with the conceptions
necessarily arising in it made up the recognized offspring of a certain
ancestral mother, the founder of that gens. Since fatherhood is
uncertain in this form of the family, female lineage is alone valid. And
as brothers must not marry their sisters, but only women of foreign
descent, the children bred from these foreign women do not belong to the
gens, according to maternal law. Hence only the offspring of the
daughters of every generation remain in the same sex organization. The
descendants of the sons are transferred to the gentes of the new
mothers. What becomes of this group of kinship when it constitutes
itself a separate group, distinct from similar groups in the same tribe?
As the classical form of this original gens Morgan selects that of the
Iroquois, more especially that of the Seneca tribe. This tribe has eight
gentes named after animals: 1. Wolf. 2. Bear. 3. Turtle. 4. Beaver. 5.
Deer. 6. Snipe. 7. Heron. 8. Hawk. Every gens observes the following
customs:
1. The gens elects its sachem (official head during peace) and its chief
(leader in war). The sachem must be selected within the gens and his
office was in a sense hereditary. It had to be filled immediately after
a vacancy occurred. The chief could be selected outside of the gens, and
his office could even be temporarily vacant. The son never followed his
father in the office of sachem, because the Iroquois observed maternal
law, in consequence of which the son belonged to another gens. But the
brother or the son of a sister was often elected as a successor. Men and
women both voted in elections. The election, however, had to be
confirmed by the other seven gentes, and then only the sachem-elect was
solemnly invested, by the common council of the whole Iroquois
federation. The significance of this will be seen later. The power of
the sachem within the tribe was of a paternal, purely moral nature. He
had no means of coercion at his command. He was besides by virtue of his
office a member of the tribal council of the Senecas and of the federal
council of the whole Iroquois nation. The Chief had the right to command
only in times of war.
2. The gens can retire the sachem and the chief at will. This again is
done by men and women jointly. The retired men are considered simple
warriors and private persons like all others. The tribal council, by the
way, can also retire the sachems, even against the will of the tribe.
3. No member is permitted to marry within the gens. This is the
fundamental rule of the gens, the tie that holds it together. It is the
negative expression of the very positive blood relationship, by virtue
of which the individuals belonging to it become a gens. By the discovery
of this simple fact Morgan for the first time revealed the nature of the
gens. How little the gens had been understood before him is proven by
former reports on savages and barbarians, in which the different
organizations of which the gentile order is composed are jumbled
together without understanding and distinction as tribe, clan, thum,
etc. Sometimes it is stated that intermarrying within these
organizations is forbidden. This gave rise to the hopeless confusion, in
which McLennan could pose as Napoleon and establish order by the decree:
All tribes are divided into those that forbid intermarrying (exogamous)
and those that permit it (endogamous). And after he had thus made
confusion worse confounded, he could indulge in deep meditations which
of his two preposterous classes was the older: exogamy or endogamy. By
the discovery of the gens founded on affinity of blood and the resulting
impossibility of its members to intermarry, this nonsense found a
natural end. It is self understood that the marriage interdict within
the gens was strictly observed at the stage in which we find the
Iroquois.
4. The property of deceased members fell to the share of the other
gentiles; it had to remain in the gens. In view of the insignificance of
the objects an Iroquois could leave behind, the nearest gentile
relations divided the heritage. Was the deceased a man, then his natural
brothers, sisters and the brothers of the mother shared in his property.
Was it a woman, then her children and natural sisters shared, but not
her brothers. For this reason husband and wife could not inherit from
one another, nor the children from the father.
5. The gentile members owed to each other help, protection and
especially assistance in revenging injury inflicted by strangers. The
individual relied for his protection on the gens and could be assured of
it. Whoever injured the individual, injured the whole gens. From this
blood kinship arose the obligation to blood revenge that was
unconditionally recognized by the Iroquois. If a stranger killed a
gentile member, the whole gens of the slain man was pledged to revenge
his death. First mediation was tried. The gens of the slayer deliberated
and offered to the gentile council of the slain propositions for
atonement, consisting generally in expressions of regret and presents of
considerable value. If these were accepted, the matter was settled. In
the opposite case the injured gens appointed one or more avengers who
were obliged to pursue the slayer and to kill him. If they succeeded,
the gens of the slayer had no right to complain. The account was
squared.
6. The gens had certain distinct names or series of names, which no
other gens in the whole tribe could use, so that the name of the
individual indicated to what gens he belonged. A gentile name at the
same time bestowed gentile rights.
7. The gens may adopt strangers who thereby are adopted into the whole
tribe. The prisoners of war who were not killed became by adoption into
a gens tribal members of the Senecas and thus received full gentile and
tribal rights. The adoption took place on the motion of some gentile
members, of men who accepted the stranger as a brother or sister, of
women who accepted him as a child. The solemn introduction into the gens
was necessary to confirm the adoption. Frequently certain gentes that
had shrunk exceptionally were thus strengthened by mass adoptions from
another gens with the consent of the latter. Among the Iroquois the
solemn introduction into the gens took place in a public meeting of the
tribal council, whereby it actually became a religious ceremony.
The existence of special religious celebrations among Indian gentes can
hardly be demonstrated. But the religious rites of the Indians are more
or less connected with the gens. At the six annual religious festivals
of the Iroquois the sachems and chiefs of the different gentes were
added to the "Keepers of the Faith" and had the functions of priests.
9. The gens had a common burial place. Among the Iroquois of the State
of New York, who are crowded by white men all around them, the burial
place has disappeared, but it existed formerly. Among other Indians it
is still in existence, e. g., among the Tuscaroras, near relatives of
the Iroquois, where every gens has a row by itself in the burial place,
although they are Christians. The mother is buried in the same row as
her children, but not the father. And among the Iroquois the whole gens
of the deceased attends the funeral, prepares the grave and provides the
addresses, etc.
10. The gens had a council, the democratic assembly of all male and
female gentiles of adult age, all with equal suffrage. This council
elected and deposed its sachems and chiefs; likewise the other "Keepers
of the Faith." It deliberated on gifts of atonement or blood revenge for
murdered gentiles and it adopted strangers into the gens. In short, it
was the sovereign power in the gens.
The following are the rights and privileges of the typical Indian gens,
according to Morgan: "All the members of an Iroquois gens were
personally free, and they were bound to defend each other's freedom;
they were equal in privileges and in personal rights, the sachems and
chiefs claiming no superiority; and they were a brotherhood bound
together by ties of kin. Liberty, equality and fraternity, though never
formulated, were cardinal principles of the gens. These facts are
material, because the gens was the unit of a social and governmental
system, the foundation upon which Indian society was organized. A
structure composed of such units would of necessity bear the impress of
their character, for as the unit, so the compound. It serves to explain
that sense of independence and personal dignity universally an
attribute of Indian character."
At the time of the discovery the Indians of entire North America were
organized in gentes by maternal law. Only "in some tribes, as among the
Dakotas, the gentes had fallen out; in others as among the Ojibwas, the
Omahas and the Mayas of Yucatan, descent had been changed from the
female to the male line."
Among many Indian tribes with more than five or six gentes we find
three, four or more gentes united into a separate group, called phratry
by Morgan in accurate translation of the Indian name by its Greek
equivalent. Thus the Senecas have two phratries, the first comprising
gentes one to four, the second gentes five to eight. Closer
investigation shows that these phratries generally represent the
original gentes that formed the tribe in the beginning. For the marriage
interdict necessitated the existence of at least two gentes in a tribe
in order to realize its separate existence. As the tribe increased,
every gens segmented into two or more new gentes, while the original
gens comprising all the daughter gentes, lived on in the phratry. Among
the Senecas and most of the other Indians "the gentes in the same
phratry are brother gentes to each other, and cousin gentes to those of
the other phratry"--terms that have a very real and expressive meaning
in the American system of kinship, as we have seen. Originally no Seneca
was allowed to marry within his phratry, but this custom has long become
obsolete and is now confined to the gens. According to the tradition
among the Senecas, the bear and the deer were the two original gentes,
from which the others were formed by segmentation. After this new
institution had become well established it was modified according to
circumstances. If certain gentes became extinct, it sometimes happened
that by mutual consent the members of one gens were transferred in a
body from other phratries. Hence we find the gentes of the same name
differently grouped in the phratries of the different tribes.
"The phratry, among the Iroquois, was partly for social and partly for
religious objects." 1. In the ball game one phratry plays against
another. Each one sends its best players, the other members, upon
different sides of the field, watch the game and bet against one another
on the result. 2. In the tribal council the sachems and chiefs of each
phratry are seated opposite one another, every speaker addressing the
representatives of each phratry as separate bodies. 3. When a murder had
been committed in the tribe, the slayer and the slain belonging to
different phratries, the injured gens often appealed to its brother
gentes. These held a phratry council which in a body addressed itself to
the other phratry, in order to prevail on the latter to assemble in
council and effect a condonation of the matter. In this case the phratry
re-appears in its original gentile capacity, and with a better prospect
of success than the weaker gens, its daughter. 4. At the funeral of
prominent persons the opposite phratry prepared the interment and the
burial rites, while the phratry of the deceased attended the funeral as
mourners. If a sachem died, the opposite phratry notified the central
council of the Iroquois that the office of the deceased had become
vacant. 5. In electing a sachem the phratry council also came into
action. Endorsement by the brother gentes was generally considered a
matter of fact, but the gentes of the other phratry might oppose. In
such a case the council of this phratry met, and if it maintained its
opposition, the election was null and void. 6. Formerly the Iroquois had
special religious mysteries, called medicine lodges by the white men.
These mysteries were celebrated among the Senecas by two religious
societies that had a special form of initiation for new members; each
phratry was represented by one of these societies. 7. If, as is almost
certain, the four lineages occupying the four quarters of Tlascalá at
the time of the conquest were four phratries, then it is proved that the
phratries were at the same time military units, as were the Greek
phratries and similar sex organizations of the Germans. Each of these
four lineages went into battle as a separate group with its special
uniform and flag and its own leader.
Just as several gentes form a phratry so in the classical form several
phratries form a tribe. In some cases the middle group, the phratry, is
missing in strongly decimated tribes.
What constitutes an Indian tribe in America? 1. A distinct territory and
a distinct name. Every tribe had a considerable hunting and fishing
ground beside the place of its actual settlement. Beyond this territory
there was a wide neutral strip of land reaching over to the boundaries
of the next tribe; a smaller strip between tribes of related languages,
a larger between tribes of foreign languages. This corresponds to the
boundary forest of the Germans, the desert created by Caesar's Suevi
around their territory, the isârnholt (Danish jarnved, Latin limei
Danicus) between Danes and Germans, the sachsen wald (Saxon forest) and
the Slavish branibor between Slavs and Germans giving the province of
Brandenburg its name. The territory thus surrounded by neutral ground
was the collective property of a certain tribe, recognized as such by
other tribes and defended against the invasion of others. The
disadvantage of undefined boundaries became of practical importance
only after the population had increased considerably.
The tribal names generally seem to be more the result of chance than of
intentional selection. In course of time it frequently happened that a
tribe designated a neighboring tribe by another name than that chosen by
itself. In this manner the Germans received their first historical name
from the Celts.
2. A distinct dialect peculiar to this tribe. As a matter of fact the
tribe and the dialect are co-extensive. In America, the formation of new
tribes and dialects by segmentation was in progress until quite
recently, and doubtless it is still going on. Where two weak tribes
amalgamated into one, there it exceptionally happened that two closely
related dialects were simultaneously spoken in the same tribe. The
average strength of American tribes is less than 2,000 members. The
Cherokees, however, number about 26,000, the greatest number of Indians
in the United States speaking the same dialect.
3. The right to solemnly invest the sachems and chiefs elected by the
gentes, and
4. The right to depose them, even against the will of the gens. As these
sachems and chiefs are members of the tribal council, these rights of
the tribe explain themselves. Where a league of tribes had been formed
and all the tribes were represented in a feudal council, the latter
exercised these rights.
5. The possession of common religious conceptions (mythology) and rites.
"After the fashion of barbarians the American Indians were a religious
people." Their mythology has not yet been critically investigated. They
materialized their religious conceptions--spirits of all sorts--in human
shapes, but the lower stage of barbarism in which they lived, knows
nothing as yet of so-called idols. It is a cult of nature and of the
elements, in process of evolution to pantheism. The different tribes
had regular festivals with prescribed forms of worship, mainly dances
and games. Especially dancing was an essential part of all religious
celebrations. Every tribe celebrated by itself.
6. A tribal council for public affairs. It was composed of all the
sachems and chiefs of the different gentes, real representatives because
they could be deposed at any moment. It deliberated in public,
surrounded by the rest of the tribal members, who had a right to take
part in the discussions and claim attention. The council decided. As a
rule any one present gained a hearing on his demand. The women could
also present their views by a speaker of their choice. Among the
Iroquois the final resolution had to be passed unanimously, as was also
the case in some resolutions of German mark (border) communities. It was
the special duty of the tribal council to regulate the relations with
foreign tribes. The council received and despatched legations, declared
war and made peace. War was carried on principally by volunteers.
"Theoretically, each tribe was at war with every other tribe with which
it had not formed a treaty of peace."
Expeditions against such enemies were generally organized by certain
prominent warriors. They started a war dance, and whoever took part in
it thereby declared his intention to join the expedition. Ranks were
formed and the march began immediately. The defense of the attacked
tribal territory was also generally carried on by volunteers. The exodus
and the return of such columns was always the occasion of public
festivities. The consent of the tribal council for such expeditions was
not required, and was neither asked nor given. This corresponds to the
private war expeditions of German followers described by Tacitus. Only
these German groups of followers had already assumed a more permanent
character, forming a standing center organized during peace, around
which the other volunteers gathered in case of war. Such war columns
were rarely strong in numbers. The most important expeditions of the
Indians, even for long distances, were undertaken by insignificant
forces. If more than one group joined for a great expedition, every
group obeyed its own leader. The uniformity of the campaign plan was
secured as well as possible by a council of these leaders. This is the
mode of warfare among the Allemani in the fourth century on the Upper
Rhine, as described by Ammianus Marcellinus.
7. In some tribes we find a head chief, whose power, however, is
limited. He is one of the sachems who has to take provisional measures
in cases requiring immediate action, until the council can assemble and
decide. He represents a feeble, but generally undeveloped prototype of
an official with executive power. The latter, as we shall see, developed
in most cases out of the highest war chief.
The great majority of American Indians did not go beyond the league of
tribes. With a few tribes of small membership, separated by wide
boundary tracts, weakened by unceasing warfare, they occupied an immense
territory. Leagues were now and then formed by kindred tribes as the
result of momentary necessity and dissolved again under more favorable
conditions. But in certain districts, tribes of the same kin had again
found their way out of disbandment into permanent federations, making
the first step towards the formation of nations. In the United States we
find the highest form of such a league among the Iroquois. Emigrating
from their settlements west of the Mississippi, where they probably
formed a branch of the great Dakota family, they settled at last after
long wanderings in the present State of New York. They had five tribes:
Senecas, Cayugas, Onondagas, Oneidas and Mohawks. They lived on fish,
venison, and the products of rough gardening, inhabiting villages
protected by stockades. Their number never exceeded 20,000, and certain
gentes were common to all five tribes. They spoke closely related
dialects of the same language and occupied territories contiguous to one
another. As this land was won by conquest, it was natural for these
tribes to stand together against the expelled former inhabitants. This
led, not later than the beginning of the fifteenth century, to a regular
"eternal league," a sworn alliance that immediately assumed an
aggressive character, relying on its newly won strength. About 1675, at
the summit of its power, it had conquered large districts round about
and partly expelled the inhabitants, partly made them tributary. The
Iroquois League represented the most advanced social organization
attained by Indians that had not passed the lower stage of barbarism.
This excludes only the Mexicans, New Mexicans and Peruvians.
The fundamental provisions of the league were:
1. Eternal federation of the five consanguineous tribes on the basis of
perfect equality and independence in all internal tribal matters. This
consanguinity formed the true fundament of the league. Three of these
tribes, called father tribes, were brothers to one another; the other
two, also mutual brothers, were called son tribes. The three oldest
gentes were represented by living members in all five tribes, and these
members were all regarded as brothers. Three other gentes were still
alive in three tribes, and all of their members called one another
brothers. The common language, only modified by variations of dialect,
was the expression and proof of their common descent.
2. The official organ of the league was a federal council of fifty
sachems, all equal in rank and prominence. This council had the supreme
decision in all federal matters.
3. On founding this league the fifty sachems had been assigned to the
different tribes and gentes as holders of new offices created especially
for federal purposes. Vacancies were filled by new elections in the
gens, and the holders of these offices could be deposed at will. But the
right of installation belonged to the federal council.
4. These federal sachems were at the same time sachems of their tribe
and had a seat and a vote in the tribal council.
5. All decisions of the federal council had to be unanimous.
6. The votes were cast by tribes, so that every tribe and the council
members of each tribe had to vote together in order to adopt a final
resolution.
7. Any one of the five tribes could convoke the federal council, but the
council could not convene itself.
8. Federal meetings were held publicly in the presence of the assembled
people. Every Iroquois could have the word, but the final decision
rested with the council.
9. The league had no official head, no executive chief.
10. It had, however, two high chiefs of war, both with equal functions
and power (the two "kings" of Sparta, the two consuls of Rome).
This was the whole constitution, under which the Iroquois lived over
four hundred years and still live. I have described it more fully after
Morgan, because we have here an opportunity for studying the
organization of a society that does not yet know a state. The state
presupposes a public power of coërcion separated from the aggregate
body of its members. Maurer, with correct intuition, recognized the
constitution of the German Mark as a purely social institution,
essentially different from that of a state, though furnishing the
fundament on which a state constitution could be erected later on. Hence
in all of his writings, he traced the gradual rise of the public power
of coërcion from and by the side of primordial constitutions of marks,
villages, farms and towns. The North American Indians show how an
originally united tribe gradually spreads over an immense continent; how
tribes by segmentation become nations, whole groups of tribes; how
languages change so that they not only become unintelligible to one
another, but also lose every trace of former unity; how at the same time
one gens splits up into several gentes, how the old mother gentes are
preserved in the phratries and how the names of these oldest gentes
still remain the same in widely distant and long separated tribes. Wolf
and bear still are gentile names in a majority of all Indian tribes. And
the above named constitution is essentially applicable to all of them,
except that many did not reach the point of forming leagues of related
tribes.
But once the gens was given as a social unit, we also see how the whole
constitution of gentes, phratries and tribes developed with almost
unavoidable necessity--because naturally--from the gens. All three of
them are groups of differentiated consanguine relations. Each is
complete in itself, arranges its own local affairs and supplements the
other groups. And the cycle of functions performed by them includes the
aggregate of the public affairs of men in the lower stage of barbarism.
Wherever we find the gens as the social unit of a nation, we are
justified in searching for a tribal organization similar to the one
described above. And whenever sufficient material is at hand, as in
Greek and Roman history, there we shall not only find such an
organization, but we may also be assured that the comparison with the
American sex organizations will assist us in solving the most perplexing
doubts and riddles in places where the material forsakes us.
How wonderful this gentile constitution is in all its natural
simplicity! No soldiers, gendarmes and policemen, no nobility, kings,
regents, prefects or judges, no prisons, no lawsuits, and still affairs
run smoothly. All quarrels and disputes are settled by the entire
community involved in them, either the gens or the tribe or the various
gentes among themselves. Only in very rare cases the blood revenge is
threatened as an extreme measure. Our capital punishment is simply a
civilized form of it, afflicted with all the advantages and drawbacks of
civilization. Not a vestige of our cumbersome and intricate system of
administration is needed, although there are more public affairs to be
settled than nowadays: the communistic household is shared by a number
of families, the land belongs to the tribe, only the gardens are
temporarily assigned to the households. The parties involved in a
question settle it and in most cases the hundred-year-old traditions
have settled everything beforehand. There cannot be any poor and
destitute--the communistic households and the gentes know their duties
toward the aged, sick and disabled. All are free and equal--the women
included. There is no room yet for slaves, nor for the subjugation of
foreign tribes. When about 1651 the Iroquois had vanquished the Eries
and the "Neutral Nation," they offered to adopt them into the league on
equal terms. Only when the vanquished declined this offer they were
driven out of their territory.
What splendid men and women were produced by such a society! All the
white men who came into contact with unspoiled Indians admired the
personal dignity, straightforwardness, strength of character and bravery
of these barbarians.
We lately received proofs of such bravery in Africa. A few years ago the
Zulus, and some months ago the Nubians, both of which tribes still
retain the gentile organization, did what no European army can do. Armed
only with lances and spears, without any firearms, they advanced under a
hail of bullets from breechloaders up to the bayonets of the English
infantry--the best of the world for fighting in closed ranks--and threw
them into confusion more than once, yea, even forced them to retreat in
spite of the immense disparity of weapons, and in spite of the fact that
they have no military service and don't know anything about drill. How
enduring and able they are, is proved by the complaints of the English
who admit that a Kaffir can cover a longer distance in twenty-four hours
than a horse. The smallest muscle springs forth, hard and tough like a
whiplash, says an English painter.
Such was human society and its members, before the division into classes
had taken place. And a comparison of that social condition with the
condition of the overwhelming majority of present day society shows the
enormous chasm that separates our proletarian and small farmer from the
free gentile of old.
That is one side of the question. We must not overlook, however, that
this organization was doomed. It did not pass beyond the tribe. The
league of tribes marked the beginning of its downfall, as we shall see,
and as the attempts of the Iroquois at subjugating others showed.
Whatever went beyond the tribe, went outside of gentilism. Where no
direct peace treaty existed, there war reigned from tribe to tribe. And
this war was carried on with the particular cruelty that distinguishes
man from other animals, and that was modified later on simply by
self-interest.
The gentile constitution in its most flourishing time, such as we saw it
in America, presupposed a very undeveloped state of production, hence a
population thinly scattered over a wide area. Man was almost completely
dominated by nature, a strange and incomprehensible riddle to him. His
simple religious conceptions clearly reflect this. The tribe remained
the boundary line for man, as well in regard to himself as to strangers
outside. The gens, the tribe and their institutions were holy and
inviolate. They were a superior power instituted by nature, and the
feelings, thoughts and actions of the individual remained
unconditionally subject to them. Commanding as the people of this epoch
appear to us, nothing distinguishes one from another. They are still
attached, as Marx has it, to the navel string of the primordial
community.
The power of these natural and spontaneous communities had to be broken,
and it was. But it was done by influences that from the very beginning
bear the mark of degradation, of a downfall from the simple moral
grandeur of the old gentile society. The new system of classes is
inaugurated by the meanest impulses: vulgar covetousness, brutal lust,
sordid avarice, selfish robbery of common wealth. The old gentile
society without classes is undermined and brought to fall by the most
contemptible means: theft, violence, cunning, treason. And during all
the thousands of years of its existence, the new society has never been
anything else but the development of the small minority at the expense
of the exploited and oppressed majority. More than ever this is true at
present.