While we know our northern friends may not feel it, in the South, Spring is
here. So we thought we'd share a few of our gardening sites appropriate
for this time of the year. Along with gardening, there's grilling, and getting
ready to diet so that you can fit back into that bathing suit this summer!
Social organization. Society was
rather complex. In the days when the tribe was much larger there were
numerous gentes. There may be as many as 14 gentes yet in existence. These
are:
Trout
Sturgeon
Bass
Great Lynx or Fire Dragon
Sea
Fox
Wolf
Bear
Bear-potato
Elk
Swan
Grouse
Eagle
Thunder
It seems that at one time there
was a more rigid order of rank both socially and politically than at
present. For example, chiefs came from the Trout and Sturgeon gentes, and
war chiefs from the Fox gens; and there were certain relationships of
courtesy between one gens and another, as when one acted the role of
servants to another, seen especially on the occasion of a gens ceremony.
Marriage was restricted to men and women of different gentes, and was
generally attended with an exchange of presents between the families of
the pair. Woman as a rule was paid formal courtship before marriage. In
the case of death, a man might marry the sister of his deceased wife, or a
widow might become the wife of the brother of her dead husband. Polygamy
was practiced, but was not usual; it was a privilege that went with wealth
and social prestige. A child followed the gens of the father, but it
frequently happened that the mother was given the right to name; in that
case the child took a name peculiar to the gens of the mother but was yet
in the gens of the father. But for this practice the gens of an individual
could generally be known from the nature of the name. The name is
intimately connected with the gens; for example, a name meaning 'he that
moves on ahead flashing light' refers to lightning, and is a name peculiar
to the Thunder gens.
Besides the grouping into gentes, the tribe was further
divided into two great social groups or phratries:
Kishkoa and
Oshkash'.
The painting color of the first was white clay, and
that of the second was charcoal. A child entered into a group at birth,
sometimes the father, sometimes the mother determining which group. The
several groups engaged one another in all manner of contests, especially
in athletics. The Sauk never developed a soldier society with the same
degree of success as did the Foxes, but they did have a buffalo society;
it is said that the first was due to contact with the Sioux, and it is
reasonable to suppose that the second was due to influence also from the
Plains. There were a chief and a council. As stated, the chiefs came from
the Trout and Sturgeon gentes, and the council consisted of these, the
war-chiefs or heads of families, and all the warriors. Politically the
chief was little more than a figurehead, but socially he occupied first
place in the tribe. Not infrequently, however, by force of character and
by natural astuteness in the management of tribal affairs the chief might
exercise virtually autocratic power. Furthermore, his person was held
sacred, and for that reason he was given loyal homage.
