3. The Iroquois Gens¶
Core Argument¶
Morgan’s great discovery was that the kinship organisations of American Indians, designated by animal names, are essentially identical with the Greek genea and Roman gentes; the American form is the original, the Greek and Roman forms later and derivative. The gens is a common institution among all barbarians before civilisation. Morgan takes the Iroquois, especially the Seneca tribe, as the classic form of the original gens. In the Seneca tribe there are eight gentes named after animals. Among the Iroquois, mother right prevails, so descent is traced through the female line; a son belongs to his mother’s gens, not his father’s. The gens elects its sachem (peace chief) and war chief; both men and women vote. The sachem’s authority is paternal and moral, with no means of coercion. The gens can depose its sachem and war chief at will. The fundamental law of the gens is the prohibition of marriage within it. Property remains within the gens. Members owe each other help, protection, and blood revenge. The gens has its own names, can adopt strangers, has a common burial place, and holds a democratic council of all adult members with equal votes. Several gentes are united into a phratry (brotherhood), which has social, religious, and military functions. Several phratries make up a tribe, distinguished by its own territory, name, distinct dialect, right to install and depose sachems and war chiefs, and common religious conceptions and ceremonies.
The tribal council managed common affairs, composed of sachems and war chiefs who were genuinely representative as they could be deposed at any time. Deliberations were public, with all tribe members free to speak; women could express views through a chosen speaker. Among the Iroquois, decisions had to be unanimous. The council handled relations with other tribes—receiving embassies, declaring war, and making peace. War was generally conducted by volunteers organised by prominent warriors through war dances, without requiring council consent. Some tribes had a head chief with very slight powers, representing the first feeble attempt at executive authority.
Most American Indians did not advance beyond the tribe. The Iroquois formed the most developed federation, a perpetual league of five tribes on the basis of complete equality and independence in internal matters. Its organ was a federal council of fifty sachems, all equal, whose decisions were final and had to be unanimous. The confederacy had no chief executive officer but two principal war chiefs with equal powers. This organisation, without a state, presupposed extremely undeveloped production and sparse population. The gentile constitution was doomed; it did not go beyond the tribe, and outside the tribe was outside the law.