Wiec Naath Nuer

Wiec Naath Nuer

TIME AND SPACE

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However, they have separate names for most of these peoples.We have remarked that Nuer feel Dinka to be nearer to themselves than other foreigners, and in this connexion we draw attention to the fact that Nuer show greater hostility towards, and more persistently attack, the Dinka, who are in every respect most akin to themselves, than any other foreign people.This is undoubtedly due, in some degree, to the ease with which they can pillage the vast Dinka herds. It may also, in part, be attributed to the fact that of all neighbouring areas Dinkaland alone opposes no serious oecological handicaps to a pastoral people. But it may be suggested further that the kind of war that exists between Nuer and Dinka, taking into consideration also the assimilation of captives and the intermittent social relations between the two peoples between raids, would seem to require recognition of cultural affinity and of like values.War between Dinka and Nuer is not merely a clash of interests, but is also a structural relationship between the two peoples, and such a relationship requires a certain acknowledgement on both sides that each to some extent partakes of the feelings and habits of the other. We are led by this reflection to note that political relations are, profoundly influenced by the degree of cultural differentiation that exists between the Nuer and their neighbours. The nearer people are to the Nuer in mode of liveli-hood, language, and customs, the more intimately the Nuer regard them, the more easily they enter into relations of hostility with them, and the more easily they fuse with them. Cultural differentiation is strongly influenced by oecological divergences, particularly by the degree to which neighbouring peoples are pastoral, which depends on their soils, water-supplies, insect life, and so forth. But it is also to a considerable extent independent of oecological circumstances, being autonomous and historical. The cultural similarity of Dinka and Nuer may beheld largely to determine their structural re lations; as, also,the relations between the Nuer and other peoples are largely determined by their increasing cultural dissimilarity. The cultural cleavage is least between Nuer and Dinka; it widensbetween Nuer and the Shilluk-speaking peoples; and is broadest between the Nuer and such folk as the Koma, Burun, and Bongo-Mittu peoples. Nuer make war against a people who have a culture like their own rather than among themselves or against peoples with cultures very different from their own. The relations between social structure and culture are obscure, butit may well be that had the Nuer not been able to expand at the expense of the Dinka, and to raid them, they would have been more antagonistic to people of their own breed and the structural changes which would have resulted would have led to greater cultural heterogeneity in Nuerland than at present exists. This may be an idle speculation, but we can at least say that the vicinity of a people like themselves who possess rich herds that can be plundered may be supposed to have had the effect of directing the aggressive impulses of Nuer away from their fellow-country men. The predatory tendencies, which Nuer share with other nomads, find an easy outlet against the Dinka, and this may account not only for the few wars between Nuer tribes but also, in consequence, be one of the explanations of the remarkable size of many Nuer tribes, for they could not maintain what unity they have were their sections raiding one another with the persistence with which they attack the Dinka.Nuer had little contact with the Shilluk,a buffer of Dinka dividing them in most places, and where they have a common border, warfare seems to have been restricted to incidents involving only frontier camps. The powerful Shilluk kingdom, well organized and comprising over a hundred thousand souls, could not have been raided with the same impunity as the Dinka tribes, but the characteristic reason Nuer give for not attacking them is otherwise: 'They have no cattle. The Nuer only raid people who possess cattle.. If they had cattle we would raid them and take their cattle, for they do not know how to fight as we fight.' There is no actual or mythological enmity between the two peoples.The Anuak, who also belong to the Shilluk-Luo group, border the Nuer to the south-east. Though they are almost entirely horticultural to-day, they possessed herds in the past and in Nuer opinion their country has better grazing than Shillukland. It was overrun by the Nuer over hof a century ago as far as the foothills of the Ethiopian scarp, but was quickly abandoned, probably because of tsetse, for the Anuak put up little resistance. Nuer continued to raid them up to thirty years ago, when they obtained rifles from Abyssinia and were better able to resist and even to take the offensive. In spite of two reverses they finally succeeded in penetrating Lou country, where they inflicted heavy casualties and captured many children and cattle, a feat which brought the Government down the Pibor, thereby closing hostilities. Many evidences show that at one time the Anuak extended far westward of their present distribution and were displaced from these sites, or assimilated, by the Nuer.The other peoples with whom Nuer come into contact may be mentioned very briefly as their interrelations have little political importance. Another south-eastern neighbour is the Beir (Murle) people. As far as I am aware the Nuer did not raid them often and those few who know something of them respect them as devoted herdsmen. To the north-east of Nuerland the Gaajak have for several decades had relations with the Galla of Ethiopia. These appear to have been peaceful and there was a certain amount of trade between the two peoples. Absence of friction may be attributed largely to the corridor of death that divides them, for when the Galla descend from their plateau they quickly succomb to malaria while any attempt on the part of the Nuer to move eastwards is defeated by the tsetse belt that runs along the foot-hills. The Gaajak raided the Burun and Koma (both often referred to vaguely as 'Burun') for captives, and they were too small in numbers and too unorganized to resist or retaliate. To the north-west the Jikany, Leek, and Bul tribes occasionally raided the Arabs and the communities of the Nuba Mountains; and, to judge from a statement by Jules Poncet, the'trouble over water and grazing in the dry season that occurs to-day between Nuer and Arabs has long occurred'.'The Arab slavers and ivory traders, who caused so much misery and destruction among the peoples of the Southern Sudan after the conquest of the Northern Sudan by Muhammad Ali in 1821, very little inconvenienced the Nuer.They sometimes pillaged riverside villages, but I know of no record of their having penetrated far inland, and it was only the more accessible sections of the Zeraf River tribes that appear to have suffered to any extent from their depredations. I do not believe that anywhere were the Nuer deeply affected by Arab contact .2 The Egyptian Government and, later, the Mahdist Government, which were supposed to be in control of the Sudan from 1821 to the end of the century, in no way administered the Nuer or exercised control over them from the riverside posts they established on the fringes of their country. The Nuer sometimes raided these posts and were sometimes raided from them,' but on the whole it may be said that they pursued their lives in disregard of them.This disregard continued after the reconquest of the Sudan by Anglo-Egyptian forces and the establishment of the new administration. The Nuer were the last important people to be brought under control and the administration of their country cannot be said to have been very effective till 1928, before which year government consisted of occasional patrols which only succeeded in alienating them further. The nature of the country rendered communications difficult and prevented the establishment of posts in Nuerland itself, and the Nuer showed no desire to make contact with thoseon its periphery. Little control was exercised and it was impossible to enforce decisions.2 A further difficulty was the absence of Nuer who had travelled in foreign parts and spoke Arabic, for their place was usually taken, as interpreters and in other capacities,by Dinka and Anuak, who were distrusted, and rightly so, by the Nuer against whom they lodged every kind of complaint.The truculence and aloofness displayed by the Nuer is conformable to their culture, their social organization, and their character.The self-sufficiency and simplicity of their culture and the fixation of their interests on their herds explain why they neither wanted nor were willing to accept European innovations and why they,'rejected peace from which they had everything to lose. Their political structure depended for its form and persistence on balanced antagonisms that could only be expressed in warfare against their neighbours if the structure were to be maintained. Recognition of fighting as a cardinal value, pride in past achievements, and a deep sense of their common equality and their superiority to other peoples, made it impossible for them to accept willingly domination, which they had hitherto never experienced. Had more been known about them a different policy might have been instituted earlier and with less In 1920 large-scale military operations, including bombing and machine-gunning of camps, were conducted against the Eastern jikany and caused much loss of life and destruction of property. There were further patrols from time to time, but the Nuer remained unsubdued. In 1927 the Nuong tribe killed their District Commissioner, while at the same time the Lou openly defied the Government and the Gaawar attacked Duk Faiyuil Police Post. From 1928 to T930 prolonged operations were conducted against the whole of the disturbed area and marked the end of serious fighting between the Nuer and the Government. Conquest was a severe blow to the Nuer, who had for so long raided their neighbours with impunity and whose country had generally remained intact.in our account of Nuer time-reckoning we noted that in one department of time their system of reckoning is, in a broad sense, a conceptualization, in terms of activities, or of physical changes that provide convenient points of reference for activities, of those phases of the oecological rhythm which have peculiar significance for them. We further noted that in another department of time it is a conceptualization of structural relations, time units being co-ordinate with units of structural space. We have given a brief description of these units of structural space in its political, or territorial, dimension and have drawn attention to the influence of oecology on distribution and hence on the values given to the distribution, the interrelation between which is the political system. This system is not, however, as simple as we have presented it, for values are not simple, and we now attempt to face some of the difficulties we have so far neglected. We start this attempt by asking what it is the Nuer mean when they speak of their cieng Values are embodied in words through which they influence behaviour. When a Nuer speaks of his cieng, his dhor, his gol, &c, he is conceptualizing his feelings of structural distance, identifying- himself with a local community, and, by so doing, cutting himself off from other communities of the same kind. An examination of the word cieng will teach us one of the most fundamental characteristics of Nuer local groups and, indeed, of all social groups: their structural relativity.What does a Nuer mean when he says, 'I am a man of such and such a cieng'? Cieng means 'home', but its precise significance varies with the situation in which it is spoken. If one meets an Englishman in Germany and asks him where his home is, he may reply that it is England. If one meets the same man in London and asks him the same question he will tell one that his home is in Oxfordshire, whereas if one meets him in that county he will tell one the name of the town or village in which he lives. If questioned in his town or village he will mention his particular street, and if questioned in his street he will indicate his house. So it is with the Nuer. A Nuer met outside Nuerland says that his home is cieng Naath, Nuerland. He may also refer to his, tribal country as his cieng, though the more usual expression for this is rol. If one asks him in his tribe what is his cieng, he will name his village or tribal section according to the context. Generally he will name either his tertiary tribal section or his village, but he may give his primary or secondary section. If asked in his village he will mention the name of his hamlet or indicate his homestead or the end of the village in which his homestead is situated. Hence if a man says 'Wa ciengda 'I am going home', outside his village he means that he is returning to it; if in his village he means that he is going to his hamlet; if in his hamlet he means that he is going to his homestead. Cieng thus means homestead, hamlet, village, and tribal sections of various dimensions.The variations in the meaning of the word cieng are not due to the inconsistencies of language, but to the relativity of the group-values to which it refers. I emphasize this character of structural distance at an early stage because an understanding of it is necessary to follow the account of various social groups which we are about to describe. Once it is understood, the apparent contradictions in our account will be seen to be contradictions in the structure itself, being, in fact, a quality of it. The argument is here introduced in its application to local communities, which are treated more fully in,the next chapter, and its application to lineages and age-sets is postponed to Chapters V and VI.A man is a member of a political group of any kind in virtue of his non-membership of other groups of the same kind. He sees them as groups and their members see him as a member of a group, and his relations with them are controlled by the structural distance between the groups concerned. But a man does not see himself as a member of that same group in so far as he is a member of a segment of it which stanoutside of and is opposed to other segments of it. Hence a man can be a member of a group and yet not a member of it. This is a fundamental principle of Nuer political structure. Thus a man is a member of his tribe in its relation to other tribes, but he is not a member of his tribe in the relation of his segment of it to other segments of the same kind. Likewise a man is a member of his tribal segment in its relation to other segments, but he is not a member of it in the relation of his village to other villages of the same sement. A characteristic of any political group is hence its nvariable tendency towards fission and the opposition of its segments, and another characteristic is its tendency towards fusion with other groups of its own i order in opposition to political segments larger than itself. Political values are thus always, structurally speaking, in conflict. One valattaches a man to his group and another to a segment of it in opposition to other segments of it, and the value which controls his action is a function of the social situation in which he finds himself. For a man sees himself as a member of a group only in opposition to other groups and he sees a member of another group as a member of a social unity however much it may be split into opposed seg- Therefore the diagram presented on p. 114 illustrates political structure in a very crude and formal way. It cannot very easily be pictured diagrammatically, for political relations are relative and dynamic. They are best stated as tendencies to conform to certain values in certain situations, and the valueis determined by the structural relationships of the persons whocompose the situation. Thus whether and on which side a man fights in a dispute depends on the structural relationship of the persons engaged in it and of his own relationship to each party.We need to refer to another important, principle of Nuer political structure: the smaller the local group the stronger the sentiment uniting its m ' embers. Tribal sentiment is weaker than the sentiment of one of its segments and ' the sentiment of a segment is weaker than the sentiment of a village which is part of it. Logically this might be supposed to be the case, for if unity,?"'within a group is a function of its opposition to groups of the same kind it might be surmised that the sentiment of unity within a group must be stronger than the sentiment of unity within a larger group that contains it. But it is also evident that the smaller the group the more the contacts between its members, the more varied are these contacts, and the more they are co-operative. In a big group like the tribe contacts between its members are infrequent and corporate action is limited to occasional military excursions. In a small group like the village not only are there daily residential contacts, often of a co-operative nature, but the members are united by close agnatic, cognatic, and affinal ties which can be expressed in reciprocal action. These become fewer and more distant the wider the group, and the cohesion of a political group is undoubtedly dependent on the number and strength of ties of a non-political kind.It must also be stated that political actualities are confused and conflicting. They are confused because.they are not always, even in a political context, in accord with political values, though they tend to conform to them, and because social ties of a different kind operate in the same field, sometimes strengthening them and sometimes running counter to them. They are conflicting because the values.that determine them are, owing to the relativity of political structure, themselves in conflict. Consistency of political actualities can only be seen when the dynamism and relativity of political structure are understood and the relation of political structure to other social systems is taken into consideration.
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THE NUER LINEAGE SYSTEM BY EVANS PRITCHARD

THE LINEAGE SYSTEM

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By adoption Dinka men are grafted on to the lineage of their captors. They trace their ascent up the lineage to its ancestor and they become a new point of its growth. The fusion is complete and final. The spirits of the lineage become their spirits, its ghosts become their ghosts, and its spear-name and honorific name become their symbols. Indeed it is almost impossible without a prolonged stay in a Nuer village or camp to discover who are and who are not of pure Nuer origin. I have for weeks considered men to be true Nuer, whereas they were descended from captured Dinka, for a man whose Dinka grand-father had been adopted into a Nuer lineage regards himself as being just as much a member of the lineage as the man whose grandfather adopted his grandsire.- and he is so regarded by other members of the lineage and by persons not of it. Thus,when a man gives his descent from E through D and C, and another man gives his descent from E through J and K, one naturally assumed that D and J were sons of E. There is no means of knowing that, in fact, J was a captured Dinka who was adopted into the lineage, unless so ' meone volunteers the information-a most unlikely happening in Nuerland. Moreover,it is impolite to. ask strangers whether their grandfathers were captured Dinka, and, even if they were of Dinka origin, they would not readily say so. One can, of course, always ask other people; but only those who are members of the same lineage are likely to be fully acquainted with the man's ancestry, and they,in all probability, will not tell one if he is of Dinka origin, for he is their agnatic kinsman as far as outsiders are concerned.A very large number of Dinka in all tribes have been incorporated by adoption into Nuer lineages. Since, as mentioned later, adopted Dinka and their descendants can marry into collateral lineages, it would not be accurate to say that they are adopted into clans. Probably most captured Dinka were adopted into Nuer lineages, but there are also many Dinka lineages descended from men who came of their own free will to settle in Nuerland, either to escape famine, largely caused by Nuer raiding, in their own country, to visit captured sisters, or to reoccupy the sites from which Nuer raids had ousted them. Such immigrants were unmolested and were permitted to settle or return to Dinkaland as they might choose. A Dinka who decided to settle became some Nuer's jaang, his Dinka, and rande, his man, and the Nuer would give him an ox and maybe a cow or two when he had given proof of his fidelity and attachment to his new home.I was told that he might even be given a daughter of the house in marriage without payment of bride-wealth if she were blind or lame and no Nuer would contemplate taking her as a bride. Often a widow lives in concubinage with such a Dinka, who thus obtains a 'wife' in the sense of cook, housekeeper, and mate; and even if the children she may bear him do not count as his descendants he can gain their affection. If a Dinka settles at the home of the husband of his sister, the husband may give him a cow or two in acknowledgement of affinity.There must also have been pockets of the original Dinka occupants of country overrun by the Nuer who submitted and gave up their language and habits in favour of those of the Nuer. At any rate, there are to-day in all tribes many small Dinka lineages, and villages are often called after them. Such lineages are numerically preponderant in the communities where I spent most of my time, Yakwac camp and Nyueny village. The way in which these lineages are woven into the lineage texture of the dominant clan of the tribe is discussed in the next two sections. Here we summarize points which have already emerged from our description of the position of Dinka in relation to Nuer. (i) Jaang, Dinka, has many meanings: any foreigners whom the Nuer habitually raid; Dinka living in Dinkaland and raided by Nuer; Dinka of unabsorbed pockets in Nuerland or on its confines; recent Dinka immigrants; certain clans which are said to be Dinka in origin, e.g. the GAATGANKIIR; members of small Dinka lineages which are Nuer -in every character except in origin descendants of adopted Dinka; adopted Dinka. One can only judge the meaning Nuer attach to the word by its context and the tone in which it is spoken. (2) It is only those Dinka who are regarded as members of a Nuer tribe who concern our present discussion. Their status is relative to the social situation in which the question of status arises, and cannot be n rigidly defined. (3) Nuer conquest has not led to a class or syr biotic system, but, by the custom of adoption, has absorbed the conquered Dinka into its kinship system, and through the kinship system has admitted them into its political structure on a basis of equality.A large number of Dinka who were not captured as children are not adopted into Nuer lineages, and Nuer strangers cannot be adopted into lineages of the dominant clan or into any other Nuer lineages. Nevertheless, members of all local communities, whilst they see themselves as distinct segments in relation to other local segments, express their relations to one another in terms of kinship. This is brought about by intermarriage.We mention the rules of exogamy as briefly as possible and only in so far as they have a direct bearing on the political system. Nuer generally marry within their tribe, though they sometimes marry women of other tribes, especially if they live near the border. Sometimes, also, a man marries in one tribe and then, taking his wife and family with him, goes to live in another tribe. In recent times there have been occasional marriages with the Ngok, and possibly with other Dinka tribes. There are no exogamous rules based on locality. They are determined by lineage and kinship values. A man may not marry into his clan and, a fortiori, into his lineage. In most clans a man may marry into his mother's clan, but not into her maximal lineage, though this rule is less exact. A man may not marry any woman to whom he is in any way closely related. A Dinka adopted into a lineage may not marry into that lineage, but may marry into collateral lineages of the same clan.The rules of exogamy have been cursorily described. Nevertheless we consider them important, for the values which chiefly regulate behaviour between one person and another in Nuer society are kinship values. Nuer rules of exogamy break down the exclusiveness of agnatic groups by compelling their members to marry outside them, and thereby to create new kinship ties. As the rules also forbid marriage between near cognates, a small local- 66-miriunity like a village rapidly becomes a network of kinship ties and its members are compelled to . find mates outside it. Any stranger who enters the village, if he is not already related to most of its members, rapidly enters into affinal relations with them and his children 'can be placed on a single genealogical chart showing lines of descent and affinity, and, since affinity is fundamentally a relationship through kinship, we may say that all members of a village or camp are united by kinship ties and, therefore, are generally unable to marry into it. Consequently they are forced to take spouses from neighbouring villages of their district. Normally a man marries a girl who lives within visiting distance of his village. Hence a network of kinship ties stretches over a district and links in diverse ways the members of distinct political groups.Looked at from the angle of a single village the circle of close kinship relations is limited to a small radius, and they tend to become fewer and more distant the nearer its periphery is approached. But the circumference of one such circle is intersected by other circles, so that there is no limit to the extension of a continuous series of kinship links. Exogamous rules, therefore, prevent the formation of autonomous agnatic groups and create extensive kinship ties within, and beyond, the tribal structure. Thus the kinship system bridges the gaps in political structure by a chain of links which unite members of opposed segments. They are like elastic bands which enable the political segments to fall apart and be in opposition and yet keep them together. This relation between kinship and political structure poses a set of complex problems. Here we wish to demonstrate only one point: the way in which dominant lineages serve as a political framework by the accretion of other lineages to them within local communities.We have seen how every local community is associated with a lineage and that the members of this lineage who live in the community are numerically swamped by members of other lineages. We have also seen how all members of the community are in some way or other related by kinship. What gives a pattern to this complicated criss-crossing of cognatic threads is their relation to, the dominant lineage of the community.The Nuer have a category of gaat nyiet, children of girls, which includes all persons who are in the relationship of sister's son and daughter's son to a lineage. As a whole lineage can be spoken of as gaat nyiet to another if there is one such female link between them anywhere in the lines of their descent,and as there must be such a link if they live in the same community, owing to the rules of exogamy, it follows that people Who live together are all gaatnyiet to one another. However, it is- in relation to the dominant lineage of a community that the concept is mainly employed and is politically important. When people are not members of this lineage it is stressed that they are gaat nyiet to it. Nuer of other clans can never more closely identify themselves with the dominant lineage, because, for ritual reasons, they must remain autonomous units, but politically they accrete themselves to it through this kinship category. Moreover, outside ritual situations, being gaal nyiet to a dominant lineage gives people complete equality with it,and their accretion to it is often expressed in terms of lineage structure, so that a man will often give his ascent to the woman of the dominant lineage who bore one of his ancestors, and thus graft himself, through her, on to their tree of descent; though this is more usually done by Dinka than by Nuer. It is, however, the common practice for children of strangers who have been brought up at the home of their maternal kinsmen, who are aristocrats, to regard themselves as members of their mother's lineage, except in ceremonial situations, and to consider its members, rather than their father's lineage, as their true kinsmen.Dinka who have not been adopted commonly trace their ascent to a female Nuer forebear and through her they graft themselves into a Nuer lineage and are accepted as members of it in ordinary social relations. Thus a Dinka often gives his ascent to the dominant lineage of his community through a woman, and sometimes through two or three female links, and though this is generally evident from female prefixes it cannot always be known. These Dinka individuals incorporate themselves into the structure of a Nuer lineage through their mothers, since they have no lineage structure of their own. This is different from the stressing of a female link (gaat nyiet) which unites a group of Nuer strangers or of Dinka to the dominant lineage of their tribal section and also from matrilineal modes of reckoning descent due to matrilocal conditions of residence, which may be temporary.Owing to exogamous rule lineages are thus linked by innumerable cognatic ties, so that hqwe r many lineages there may be in a local community their members are all related to one another by some kind of cognation and affinity. A lineage remains an exclusive agnatic group. only in-ritual-situati-ons. In other situations it is merged in the community, and cognation (mar) takes the place of lineage agnation (buth) as the value through which people living together express their relations to one another. The agnatic structure of the dominant lineage is not stressed in ordinary social relations, but only on a political plane where relations between territorial segments are concerned, for the assimilation of territorial segments to segments of the dominant lineage means that the interrelations of the one are expressed in terms of the other.In every small tribal segment there is a lineage of the dominant clan of the tribe associated with it, and the members of the segment are joined to this lineage by adoption, cognatic kinship, or kinship fictions, in such a way that one may speak of them as an accretion around a lineage nucleus. As these different nuclei are lineages of the same clan, or, as we shall see in the next section, assimilated to it, the structure of the dominant clan is to the political system like the anatomical structure to the system of an organism.We have seen how Dinka and strangers are linked to the framework of the dominant clan by adoption and cognation and how these links form an embracing kinship system which provides the non-political texture of the political system. Kinship values are the strongest sentiments and norms in Nuer society and all social interrelations tend to be expressed in a kinship idiom. Adoption and the assimilation of cognatic to agnatic ties are two ways in which community relations are translated into kinship relations: in which living together forces residential relations into a kinship pattern. A third way is by mythological creation of kinship fictions, and this way is appropriate to relations between dominant lineages and stranger and Dinka groups, living with them in the same tribal segments, which are too large and occupy too distinct a territory for incorporation by either of the other two methods. It is the way in which large pockets of strangers and Dinka are incorporated into the conceptual scheme of a tribe.It has frequently been emphasized that political relations are often expressed in speech as lineage relations, in the sense that one talks of a local community as though it were a lineage, thereby assimilating to a dominant lineage those who share the same community life with it; and that lineage relations are often expressed as political relations, in the sense that one talks of a lineage as though it were identical with the local community in which it is only a nucleus, thereby depriving the lineage of its unique agnatic status and giving it a general residential value. In conformity with this way of describing community interrelations, they are personified in myths and derived from personal relationships of a kinship kind.We do not propose to give a collection of Nuer myths. We have so far only mentioned one myth explaining group interrelations: that which tells why the Nuer raid the Dinka. There are very few myths of this general kind. Most relate to clans and lineages in their corporate territorialized form and explain their association with one another as tribes and tribal segments, particularly the relations between dominant lineages and large stranger lineages living with them. We are not always able to explain mythological relations by the present-day political system, but this can often be done, and where we fail to do it we attribute our inability to ignorance, especially to ignorance of tribal history.The two large Lou tribal sections, the jimac and the jaajoah which appear on the map on P. 56, but not on the clan tree of the JINACA, the dominant clan of the tribe, on p. 196, are divisions called after the JIMAc and JAAJOAH lineages. They are said to be gaat nyiet, children of daughters of the founder of the JINACA clan, and there is a myth accounting for this maternal link. Denac was said to have had, according to the Lou story, four sons, named Yin, Dak, Bal, and Bany, by one wife, and Nyang and two nameless brothers by a second wife. These wives are sometimes said to have been called Nyagun and Nyamor and the two primary sections of the tribe, Gun and Mor, to be named after them. Nyang's two brothers were eaten by an ogre. When, afterwards, the sons of Denac went fishing, the four sons of one mother went by themselves and Nyang by himself, for he would not accompany his half brothers, but pined for the sons of his mother. When he caught a fish someone would come and steal it from him, for he was all by himself and only a boy. When he came home he would not sit with the other boys facing his father, but sat apart with his back to him, and when his father asked him why he was troubled he replied that he was thinking of his brothers whom the ogre had eaten. His father said to him, 'Never mind, take your two sisters and let them be your brothers.' So when Nyang went fishing he was accompanied by his sisters Nyabil and Fadwai. Nyang is the founder of the GAALIEK lineage, Nyabil of the JIMAC lineage, and Fadwai of the JAAJOAH lineage. These lineages together form the kinship framework of the Mor primary section of the Lou tribe and the myth explains their association. This maternal link has not prevented intermarriage between the GAALIEx and the JIMAC. Apart from questions of ritual and exogamy the descendants of Nyabil and Fadwai are treated as though these daughters had been sons, and they possess a mythological patent which gives them equal status in the tribe with the diel. In tracing their agnatic ascent members of these lineages do not go further back than their ancestress. From her they continue to her father, Denac.In the Gaawar tribe there is an important JAXAR lineage which is mythologically attached to the GAAWAR, the aristocrats of the tribe, in the following manner. A man called Kar, or Jakar, descended from heaven by a rope that connected the sky with a tamarind tree, probably the tree in Lang country beneath which mankind is said to have been created. He was later followed by War, the founder of the GAAWAR clan, who was found sitting in the tree by Kar's sister who was gathering firewood accompanied by her dog. She returned to tell her brother that she had found a man whose head was covered in blood. Kar tried to persuade him to come to the village but he refused to do so. They then sacrificed an ox and roasted its flesh and the smell so attracted War, who was very greedy, that he climbed down the tree and entered the village. When he had eaten he wanted to return to heaven, but Kar cut the rope. Mr. B. A. Lewis has kindly furnished me with what he says is a less common version, found in the Gaawar tribe. War fell from heaven in a rainstorm and was discovered by a dog which belonged to Logh, but was with Kwec's wife when she was looking for wood in the forest and War was found. Kwec's wife took him home with her and a dispute arose between Kwec and Logh about the ownership of the foundling. Logh'claimed War on the ground that it was his dog which had discovered him, and Kwec claimed him because his wife had found him. Then Kar joined in the discussion, saying that War was his brother. This myth brings War and Kar and Logh into some kind of relationship to one another and is to be explained by the fact that the two main clans in the Gaawar tribe, next to the aristocratic clan of the GAAWAR, are the JAKAR and the JALOGH. The JALOGH are presumably the same clan as live to the south of Dok country where a small territory is named after them. Kwec was, doubtless, the founder of the KWEC lineage after whom a small territory, next to the Jalogh country, is named. We may surmise that, since both lineages are found in Gaawar country at the present day and in its present site to the east of the Nile, they also had close relations with the GAAWAR when all three clans lived in their homeland to the west of the Nile.The richest clan mythology is that of the GAATGANKIIR, and it clearly illustrates the mythological integration of lineages of different origins to the dominant lineage system in a political structure, and shows how territorial relations are given a kinship value.There are several versions of many of the incidents relating to Kir, the founder of the GAATGANKIIR clan, and we give an abridgement of one of these. A Dinka of the Ngok tribe, called Yul, saw a stalk of a gourd on a river bank and, having followed it a long way, arrived at a huge gourd. He cut this gourd open and out of it came Kir with various ritual objects. Yul's wife suckled the child as well as her own baby, Gying. When Kir grew up he turned out to be a witch and magician and the sons of Yul tried to kill him because his evil powers were destroying the cattle. Only Gying remained Kir's friend, and said to him, as he fled from Yul's home, that he would one day follow after him and join him.In his flight Kir came to the Nile where he saw a man, called Tik, in the river and asked him for help. Tik struck the waters of the Nile and cut them in two and Kir crossed over to the west bank. Kir told Tik that when he had found a place to settle in Tik was to come after him. Tik accompanied Kir till they met a man of the Wot tribe who took them to his home where the JIDIET, the dominant clan of the Wot, sacrificed a black ox so that the lethal power of witchcraft might leave Kir's eyes and enable him to look at people and cattle without killing them. Kir then dug a hole for himself in a termite-mound near a cattle camp of the GAAWAR, where he performed many strange feats. Eventually the GAAWAR offered sacrifices and persuaded him to leave the mound and took him to their camp.Kir was then given a wife, Nyakwini, who bore him Thiang before he killed her with his witchcraft. He then married Nyabor who bore him Kun. He likewise killed her. The people then gave him a lame woman, Duany, who bore him Jok. In Lou and Eastern Jikany versions the three wives were all daughters of Gee, the founder of the GAATGANGEEYA family of clans, and in versions to the west of the Nile the first two were GAAWAR and Duany a NYAPIR of the Bul tribe, but all accounts make Nyakwini and Nyabor more closely related to one another than either to Duany. After Duany had borne Jok she killed Kir with witchcraft, for she, also, was a witch. Later Thiang, her dead husband's eldest son, cohabited with her and begat Nyang.In all the variants of the Kir myth the parts played by Gying and Tik are stressed. Gying was suckled with him and afterwards joined him and lived with him as a brother. When Kir died his eldest sons Thiang and Kun possessed cattle, but the youngest son, Jok, and Gying had no cattle. Thiang wanted to prevent Gying from acquiring cattle, but Kun gave him some, so Thiang said that Kun and Gying were to live together. Tik had saved Kir's life and had gone to live with him. There is a further story of how Gying and Tik were threatened by an ogre and shared a hut together and became like brothers, so that the lineages descended from these two men do not intermarry.Without recording further details we may note how actual political relations are mythologically represented in the characters of these stories. The two largest segments of the Gaajak tribe which are named after nuclei of strangers are the Kong section, the stranger nucleus of which is a lineage descended from Tik, and the Dhilleak section, the stranger nucleus of which is a lineage descended from Gying, and these two sections live together as parts of the Reng primary section (see diagram on p. 140, and sketch-map on P. 58). The myth tells also how Jok and Nyang are sons of the same mother, Duany, Jok being begotten by Kir and Nyang by Thiang. This is a mythological representation of the structure of the Gaagwang tribe which has dominant lineage nuclei descended from both Nyang and Jok, and also of the political relations between the Gaagwang tribe and the Gaajok tribe, for these relations, especially to the west of the Nile, are of close alliance compared to the more distant relations between the Gaagwang tribe and the primary sections of the Gaajak tribe that also border them, the Thiang and the Reng. Thiang and Kun were begotten by Kir and borne by women who are generally represented as sisters, and the sections in which their descendants are dominant are the Thiang and Gaagwong primary sections of the Gaajak tribe, the third primary section of which, the Reng, has nuclei descended from Thiang, Gying, and Tik, whose relationships in the myth have already been noted. In every Nuer tribe there are similar stories which explain the relations between the aristocratic clan and large stranger lineages living with it. Other myths explain the relations between these stranger lineages. Thus the lineages living at Nyueny and in neighbouring villages in Leek country, JUAK, NGWOL, JIKUL, &c., are all mythologically related to one another and to the dominant clan of the Leek tribe. These myths also explain the ritual symbols and observances of the lineages mentioned in them. Actual interrelations of a political kind are thus explained and justified in mythological interrelations, and wherever, as far as we know, large lineages of different clans are politically associated there is a myth bringing their ancestors., into some social relationship. This is especially,the case between dominant lineages and stranger or Dinka lineages, and the mythological link gives them equality and fraternity in community life, while permitting ritual exclusiveness and intermarriage between them. Complete assimilation is impossible, for there must always be ritual distinction or the clan and lineage systems would collapse. Strangers have to be incorporated into the community of the dominant lineage and excluded from its agnatic; structure. By adoption, the recognition of the equivalence of cognatic and agnatic ties in community life, and by mythological relationships, all persons in a tribal segment have kinship relationships of some kind to one another and the segments themselves are given a kinship relationship to each other within the political system. Although the categories of diel, rul, and jaang create social differentiation, it is on a ritual and domestic, rather than on a political, plane and is only indicated in certain situations of social life.This is evident in the Nuer use of the three words denoting the three statuses. It is a common Nuer practice when addressing people and speaking publicly about them to use words which denote a closer relationship between them and the speaker than their actual relationship. This is commonly done with kinship terms and, also, in defining the status of a person in his tribe. Nuer do not emphasize that a man is a stranger or Dinka by alluding to him as such in ordinary social life, for it is in rare situations that his being other than an aristocrat is relevant: to some extent in payment of blood-cattle, in questions of exogamy, and at sacrifices and feasts. A stranger who has made his home with aristocrats is treated as a: social equal and regards himself a� such. People do not call him a rul, for he is a member of their community. They may even refer to him as a dil out of politeness. In the same way people do not refer to an adopted Dinka as jaang'; for he is by adoption a brother of aristocrats or of Nuer of other lineages. One would not ordinarily speak of unadopted Dinka residents as 'Jaang ", but as 'rul'. just as strangers tend to be linguistically assimilated to aristocrats, so Dinka tend to be assimilated to strangers, and people speak only of unconquered Dinka of Dinkaland by the contemptuous expression jaang'. Nuer do not make distinctions of status between people who live with them, share their fights, partake of their hospitality, and are members of their community against other communities. Community of living overrides differentiation of descent.We again emphasize that the designations 'aristocrat', 'stranger', and 'Dinka' in a Nuer tribe are relative terms, being defined by the relations of persons in the social structure in specific situations of social life. A man is a stranger, or Dinka, in reference to a few, mainly ritual, situations, but is not indicated as such on other occasi ons; and a man is a stranger or Dinka in relation to members of a social group, but is not considered by them to have a differentiated status in relation to another group. A stranger is a stranger to you, your stranger, but is one of you vis-a-vis other people. A Dinka is a Dinka to you, your Dinka, but he is your brother vis-a-vis other people. In political structure all members of a segment are essentially undifferentiated in its relation to other segments.How can it be explained that among a people so democratic in sentiment and so ready to express it in violence a clan is given superior status in each tribe? We believe that the facts we have recorded provide an answer in terms of tribal structure. Many Nuer tribes are large in area and population-some of them very large-and they are more than territorial expressions, for we have shown that they have a complex segmentary structure which the Nuer themselves see as a system. As there are no tribal chiefs and councils, or any other form of tribal government, we have to seek elsewhere for the organizing principle within the structure which gives it conceptual consistency and a certain measure of actual cohesion, and we find it in aristocratic status. In the absence of political. institutions providing central administration in a tribe and co-ordinating its segments,it is the system of lineages of its dominant clan which gives it structural distinctness and unity by the association of lineage values, within a common agnatic: structure, with the segments of a territorial system. In the absence of a chief or king, who might symbolize a tribe, its unity is expressed in the idiom of lineage and clan affiliation.In the Kir myth not only are the ancestors of important lineages, and, through them, the lineages and the territorial segments in which they are incorporated brought into relationship, but the ancestors of clans, and, through them, the clans and the tribes in which these clans are dominant, are linked together. Thus Kir, in various versions of the myth, is adopted by Gee, the founder of the GAATGANGEEKA family of clans; meets Wot, in whom the Wot tribe is personified; has relations with the GAAWAR; and so forth. The myth, thus, also mirrors intertribal relations and brings the whole of Nuerland into a single kinship structure, which we call the clan system as distinct from the lineage system of a clan.The clan is the farthest range to which agnatic kinship is traced when the marriage of two persons is in question, but some clans have, nevertheless, an agnatic relationship to other clans, though Nuer do not regard it quite in the same way as relationship between lineages of a clan. They give the impression, when speaking of the ancestor of a clan, that they regard him as an historical figure, clearly delineated against a background of tradition, while, when speaking of the ancestor of a family of clans, they seem to regard him as a vaguer figure obscured in the dimness of myth.We here note again that the dominant lineages in more than one tribe sometimes form part of the'same clan structure. Thus, the lineages dominant in the Gaajok, Gaajak, and Gaagwang tribes, to the east and to the west of the Nile, are all segments of the GAATGANKIIR Clan. Also the dominant lineages of the Rengyan tribe, to the west of the Nile, and the Lou tribe, to the east of the Zeraf, are part of the JINACA clan. This distribution is easily accounted for, because we know that till recently the Eastern GAATGANKIIR and the Eastern JINACA lineages lived with the other lineages of these clans in the jikany and Rengyan areas to the west of the Nile. There are also more general and mythological relationships betweenclans. In recounting these relationships Nuer personify the tribes and give them a kinship value by assimilating them to their dominant clans. Thus, they speak of Bor, Lang, Lou, Thiang, Lak, &c., as though they were persons and could have kinship relations between them like those between persons, and as though all the members of these tribes were of the same descent. By so doing they stress community relations and obscure clan differentiation in a political context.This habit often makes their statements appear confused, and even contradictory, but it accords with a strong tendency in social life, as

we have seen in discussing the various meanings of the word ecieng', to identify the lineage system and the political system in a specific set of relations.Many Nuer regard their ancestors Gee and Ghaak as the progenitors of all true Nuer, though one is given different classifications in different parts of Nuerland. Among the Lou it is said that all the tribes are descended from Gee, except the Jikany and Gaawar tribes. These two alone are differentiated because their proximity makes them significant for the Lou, whereas all the other tribes, which have no direct relations with the Lou, are vaguely classified as children of Gee. Among the Eastern Jikany all true Nuer tend to be classed as 'Gee' in contrast to 'Kir', the Jikany themselves. In the valley of the Zeraf and in Western Nuerland, where the tribes have a very much wider range of intertribal contacts, there is a wider range of differentiation. The Nuer tribes there fall into three classes: the Gee group, consisting of Bor, Lang, Rengyan, Bul, Wot, Ror, Thiang, and Lou, stretches in an unbroken line, from north-west to south-east, across the centre of Nuerland; the Ghaak group, consisting of Nuong, Dok, Jaloogh, Beegh, Gaankwac, and Rol, occupies the south-western part of Nuerland; and the Ril group, consisting of the Leek and Lak, occupies the lower reaches of the Zeraf and the Ghazal near their junction with the Nile. I have sometimes heard the Bul included in the Ril group. However, in Dok country and in adjacent tribal areas people further distinguish between the tribes elsewhere classed as sons of Ghaak and divide them into a Ghaak group, comprising Beegh, and Jaalogh, and a Gwea group, comprising Dok, Nuong, Gaankwac, and Rol.In these classifications we note a further exemplification of what we have often observed elsewhere about Nuer classifications: their segmentary tendency and their relativity.Whilst, for example, other Nuer see the Dok and the Beegh as Ghaak they only see themselves as an undivided Ghaak group in opposition to the Gee fraternity and otherwise see themselves

as parts of opposed segments, Gwea and Ghaak. It will be note that these grioups of tribes often represented as families of clans, occupy distinct sections of Nuerland. Before the period eastwards migration they ran from north to south, in three or four groups, to the west of the Nile. Territorial contiguity and a common clan structure, such as we find among the Jikany tribes, or close relationship within a clan system, such as we find among the Ghaak group of tribes, go together, and the values of the two systems may be assumed to interact. The segmentation of lineages within a tribe in relation to its political segmentation is thus repeated in the whole clan system of the Nuer, the segments of which are co-ordinated with the political segmentation of Nuerland.Those tribes which are adjacent to one another have a cornmon opposition to other groups of tribes and

this relation is reflected in the tendency for them to be represented, through their dominant lineages and clans, as closely related on a mythological and ritual plane.Gee and Ghaak and Gwea are represented as brothers, sons of a mythological ancestor, sometimes called Ghau, the World, and sometimes Ran, Man, whose father is said to be Kwoth, God. Ril is often described as one of their brothers as well, though he is sometimes represented to be a son of a daughter of Gee, called Kar.All sons of Gee have agnatic kinship (buth) which allows them to partake of one another's sacrifices. In these ritual situations only the true sons of Gee, the JINACA, the GAATHIANG, and JIDIET, and other clans descended from Gee, have buth interrelationship, but in other situations the tribes in which these clans have a dominant status are represented as brothers or first cousins. Thus Thiang is said to have been the eldest son of Gee, Nac (Rengyan and Lou) the second son, Ror and other tribes younger sons; and Rengyan (Nac) and Wot (Dit) are said to have been twins, as also Bor and Lang, sons of Meat.Some tribes stand outside this big family. The Jikany tribes have dominant lineages of Dinka origin, descended from Kir, who was found in a gourd by a man of the Ngok Dinka, but, as was earlier explained, they are mythologically related to the Gee group, because Gee is variously represented as the protector or father-in-law of Kir. The GAATGANXIIR have a buth relationship with some lineage system of the Ngok Dinka, and there fore, in an unprecise political sense, the.jikany and Ngok Dinka tribes have, by analogy, a fraternal relationship.It may safely be assumed that at one time they had close intertribal relations. The GAAWAR clan have also an independent origin, their ancestor having descended from heaven. However, a number of mythological links unite him to the founders of various clans which are dominant in tribes of the Ghaak group (see pp. 230-1), and the Gaawar tribe therefore belongs to this group. Although the Nile now separates it from the other members of the group it was at one time their most northern extension on the west bank. Owing to buth relationship between GAAWAR and other clans of the family of clans descended from Kwook, Gaawar are said to go with the people of the Fadang section of the Bor tribe and the Atwot people, who are said to have lived at one time between
the present Rengyan and Dok tribal areas.Through the recognition of agnatic: relationship between exogamous clans and of cognatic:and mythological, ties between clans not considered to be agnates, all the Nuer tribes are by assimilation of political to kinship values conceptualized as a single social system.A number of clans are not associated with tribes, but their lineages are included in this system by the affiliation of the clans to one or other of the large families of clans. Thus, the JIMEM, JIKUL, GAATLEAK, and JITHER are descended from Gee and belong to the Gee group; the JIKUL are mythologically attached to the Ril group and the JAKAR to the Ghaak group; and so on. The whole of the Nuer are brought into a single kinship or pseudo-kinship system and all the territorial segments of Nuerland are interconnected by that system.In our view the unusual degree of genealogical segmentation in the Nuer lineage system is to be understood in terms of tribal structure, which is, as we have seen, characterized by its tendency towards segmentation. The association of the lineage system with the tribal system means that as the tribe splits into segments so will the clan split into segments, and that the lines of cleavage will tend to coincide, for lineages are not corporate groups but are embodied in local communities through which they function structurally. just as a man is a member of a tribal segment opposed to other segments a, member of the tribe which embraces all these segments, so also a member of a lineage opposed to other lineages of the same he also a member of the clan which embraces all order and yet these lineages, and there is a definite correspondence between these two sets of affiliations, since the lineage is embodied in the segment and the clan in the tribe. Therefore, the distance in clan structure between two lineages of a dominant clan tends to the structural distance between the tribal segments with which they are associated. Hence the tribal system draws out and segments the dominant clans and gives them their characteristic lineage form. Evidence in support of this contention could be cited from any Nuer tribe; we propose to examine only a few typical examples.We have observed that in the Lou tribe the Gaatbal and Rumjok secondary sections form the primary section of Gun in opposition to the Mor primary section, and how the dominant lineages of the Gaatbal and the Rumjok sections are descended from one wife of Denac and the dominant lineage of the Mor section is descended from a different wife, so that Gaatbal and Rumjok are to one another in a relation analogous to that of full b.rothers and the Gun stand to the Mor in a relation analogous to that of halfbrothers.We have noted, likewise, how the dominant lineages of the Gaajak are descended from two closely related wives of Kir while the dominant lineages of the Gaajok and Gaagwang, which have a very close alliance, are descended from a third wife.The GAATGANKIIR lineages in their relation to the segmentary structure of the jikany tribes provide an excellent test of the hypothesis that lineage structure is twisted into the form of the political structure, for the same lineages are found at extremities of Nuerland where political conditions are not identical. Had I had more time in the jikany countries, or had I formulated the problem more clearly in the little time I had to spend there, I might have been in a position to state my conclusions more dogmatically.We will briefly analyse the lineage system of the GAATGANKIIR in its reiation to two of the Gaajak primary sections.Thiang was the eldest son of Kir. He had two wives Nyagaani and Baal. From these two wives spring the three main'lineages of cicng Thiang, the Thiang primary tribal section, TAR, LONY (or GEK), and KANG. What is said to have happened is shown in the diagram on p. 242. Tar, being the only son of his mother,has founded an independent lineage and tribal section, that which lives in the extreme south of Eastern Gaajak country.The other four lineages are all sprung from Nyagaani and are collectively known as cieng Nyagaani. At first her four sons stuck together, but later Lony's family increased and became more powerful than those of his brothers and tried to lord it over them, especially over Lem, the eldest. Kang, son of Lual, took the lead against Lony, and compelled him to migrate. Owing to the prominent part played by Kang, the lineages descended from Lem, Leng, and Lual are collectively known as cieng KANG in contrast to cieng LONY. These two lineages live to the extreme north of Eastern Gaaj ak country. I When the brothers are spoken about, as quarrelling, migrating, and so forth, it must be understood that the lineages and the local communities of which they form part are being personified and dramatized.We see in this diagram how the splitting and merging of lineages, determined by the logic of lineage structure, follows the lines of tribal fission and fusion. Thus the descendants of Lem, Leng, and Lual, who live together, are merged in opposition to the LONY, and the LONY, who live adjacent to them, are merged with them in opposition to the TAR. The diagram does not show us the lines of descent which have become completely merged in those recorded, The distribution of the three divisions of the Thiang primary section of the Gaajak tribe contrasts with the unbroken territory of the segments of primary sections elsewhere in Nuerland. I have not visited the area, and cannot explain this unusual distribution by historical events nor state its structural consequences. because such lines, having no localities specifically associated with community value, are not differentiated.them and therefore no lineage growth, That the diagram does not truly record historic but is a distortion of it, is further suggested by the fact that there five generations from the present day to Lem are, on an average, was the youngest of and Leng, Six to Lual, and seven to Lony, who the four brothers.The GAAGWO14G lineage, which is the nucleus of the Gaagwong section, is called after Gung, son of Kun,son of kir. The GAAGWONG maximal Lineage splits into several major lineages.To make illustration easier only those important among the Eastern jikany

figured in the diagram: CANY, WAU, and TAIYANr, (NyAyAN and NYAJAANI), the descendants of Buok, Wau, and Gee.The CANy major lineage split up, as shown in the diagram on p. 244 into a number of smaller lineages of three to four generations in depth. In this diagram the traditional representation of cleavage between sons of the same father but of different mothers is shown in the lines which spring from Diu through his three wives:Mankwoth, Thul, and Mankang. The descendants of Dup are normaUy referred to as cieng MANKWOTH because they live with them. Common residence has reacted on the lineage structure, so that the DUP lineage has become very largely merged in the MANKWOTH lineage. For this diagram I am indebted to the Government

files of Nasser District. I have no record of the divisions of the WAU lineage.In Western Nuerland wAu and CANY are politically unimportant lineages and are merged with cieng Taiyang, which is contrasted with cieng jueny, called after jueny, son of Teng, son of Gung, who founded a-lineage politically unimportant among the Eastern Jikany. The TAIYANG lineage has two branches calied after his wives Nyayan and Nyajaani. In Western Nuerland there is a third lineage springing from athird wife, Nyakoi.It is interesting to observe that jueny, whose line is politicaUy unimportant among the Eastern jikany, is there given as a son of Gee and merged in the TAIYANG line, while Duob is given as a son of Nyajaani and merged in her lineage.

THE NUER LINEAGE SYSTEM BY EVANS PRITCHARD

Here again we see how lineage structure is influenced by political relations.A wider and deeper analysis is required to P have put forward and of which we have given a few Out of many examples. It is, however, supported by evidence of a different kind. We found that it was always easier to obtain a -more complete record, and a longer linei of descent from members of dominant lineages in the larger tribes than in the smaller tribes, showing that . greater attention is paid to the lineage system in the larger tribes and that the clan structure is broadened and deepened to serve its structural function. Also, we found it easy to obtain from any adult member of an aristocratic lineage an account of the other maximal and major lineages of his clan and a long list of ancestors, some nine or ten at least, giving a consistent length from the founder of the clan; whereas we found that we could not elicit the same information from members of clans which have no tribal associations. They were often able to trace their descent back for only some four to six generations, the time depth they gave was seldom consistent, and they were usually unable to give a coherent account of the other lineages of their clan. We attribute this fact to the absence of systemization through association with tribal structures. A lineage does not stand in territorial opposition to other lineages of its cfan, but has with them only a vague ceremonial relationship, and this relationship may never be expressed in corporate action. Consequently there is generally a complete absence of any elaborate system of lineages like those of the dominant clans. There are many jimem clansmen and doubtless one could by

putting together their genealogies construct some sort of tree of descent from Mem, in which the agnatic relationship between various lineages could be indicated; but it would be very unlike the spontaneous statements that at once delineate the lineage system of large clans like the JINACA, associated with tribal territories.It is also very noticeable that Nuer knowledge of the lineage system of a dominant clan tends to be restricted to. those parts of the system that correspond to segments of their tribe. Thus the JINACA ges which are associated with segments of the Lou tribe are well known to Lou tribesmen, but they have no, or very little, knowledge of the JINACA lineages of the Rengyan tribe. Likewise I experienced much difficulty in obtaining from Gaajok and Gaajak tribesmen a clear account of the lineages of the GAATGANKIIR clan which form the dominant nucleus of the Gaagwang tribe, though they were well informed about the lineages of the same clan which are associated with segments of their own tribes.It follows from our account that, as we have suggested before, the lineage system of a clan can only to a very limited extent be considered a true record of descent. Not only does its time depth appear to be limited and fixed, but also the distance between collateral lineages appears to be determined by the political distance between the sections with which these lineages are associated, and it may be supposed that a lineage only persists as a distinct line of descent when it is significant politically. Ancestors above the founder of a minimal lineage are relevant FIG. 15. only as points of departure for denoting lines of Leather descent when these lines are rendered significant by flad. the political role of the lineage system. We have suggested that the depth of. lineages is a function of the range of counting agnation on an existential plane, and we now further suggest that the range of counting agnation is largely determined by its organizing role in political structure.

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Nuer consider that lineage cleavage arises from a fundamental cleavage in the family between gaatgwan, children of the father, and gaatman, children of the mother. Where there are two wives and each has sons, the lineage bifurcates from this point. A lineage bifurcation is a polygamous family writ large. Thok dwiel, lineage, means this; it is 'the entrance to the hut', the mother's hut. The tiny twigs we see in the gol, household, grow into the great branches of the lineages. It is for this reason that lineages are so often named after women, the mothers from whose wombs sprang the different lines of descent. As we understand the process, what happens is that certain lineage groups gain political importance and exclusiveness, becoming nuclei of tribal sections, and that only by so doing is their structural position stabilized and are the points of their bifurcation rendered fixed and permanent points of convergence in lineage structure.This explains how it is that in only a few out of a vast number of polygamous families is maternal descent structurally significant, and why the bifurcation occurs in the lineage where it occurs in the tribe.This tendency towards co-ordination of territorial segmentation and lineage segmentation can be seen in the various stages of territorial expansion between the household and the tribe., When brothers of an influential family live in different parts of a village and gather around them a cluster of relations and dependants, these hamlet-groups are named after them and they become the point at which the lineage is likely to bifurcate. Thus, if the brothers are called Bul and Nyang, people speak of the gol of Bul and the gol of Nyang, and if later the grandchildren of one of them move to a different village site the lineage will split into two branches. Such minimal lineages as those pictured in the diagrams on pages 196-7 occupy adjacent villages, or widely separated divisions of the same large straggling village, and make separate camps along the same stretch of river or adjacent camps around a small lake. The points of divergence of lineages from clan trees are thus related to the size and distribution of inhabited sites in a tribal area.The association of the tribal system with a clan may thus be supposed to influence the form of the lineage structure. We may further emphasize the morphological consistency between the two structures. There are always more villages than tertiary segments in a tribe and more tertiary segments than secondary segments, and so on, so that, since each territorial unit is associated with a lineage, the narrowing of such units from the multitude of villages to the single unit of the tribe must be eflected in the conceptual structure of the lineage system,there being a multitude of minimal lineages, fewer minor lineages, and so forth, till the single unit of the clan is reached. If this suggestion is accepted it is evident that the lineages are in number and structural position strictly limited and controlled by the system of, territorial 'segmentation. The two systems may thus be represented diagrammatically by the same figure, though the correspondence is not exact.

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