Although of primary importance in shaping the career of the Siouan tribes,
the marital institutions of the stock were not specially distinctive.
Marriage was usually effected by negotiation through parents or elders;
among some of the tribes the bride was purchased, while among others there
was an interchange of presents. Polygyny was common; in several of the
tribes the bride's sisters became subordinate wives of the husband. The
regulations concerning divorce and the punishment of infidelity were
somewhat variable among the different tribes, some of whom furnished
temporary wives to distinguished visitors. Generally there were sanctions
for marriage by elopement or individual choice. In every tribe, so far as
known, gentile exogamy prevailed--i.e., marriage in the gens was forbidden,
under pain of ostracism or still heavier penalty, while the gentes
intermarried among one another; in some cases intermarriage between
certain tribes was regarded with special favor. There seems to have been
no system of marriage by capture, though captive women were usually
espoused by the successful tribesmen, and girls were sometimes abducted.
In general it would appear that intergentile and intertribal marriage was
practiced and sanctioned by the sages, and that it tended toward harmony
and federation, and thus contributed much toward the increase and
diffusion of the great Siouan stock.
As set forth in some detail by Dorsey, the ordination of the Siouan tribes
extended beyond the hierarchic organization into families, subgentes,
gentes, tribes, and confederacies; there were also phratries, sometimes
(perhaps typically) arranged in pairs; there were societies or
associations established on social or fiducial bases; there was a general
arrangement or classification of each group on a military basis, as into
soldiers and two or more classes of noncombatants, etc.
Pages:
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48