[Footnote: "Ancient Society" or "Researches in the Lines of Human
Progress from Savagery through Barbarism to Civilization." Henry
Holt & Co. 1877.]

The gentile organization opens to us one of the oldest and most
widely-prevalent institutions of mankind. It furnished the nearly
universal plan of government of ancient society, Asiatic, European,
African, American, and Australian. It was the instrumentality by
means of which society was organized and held together. Commencing
in savagery, and continuing through the three subperiods of barbarism,
it remained until the establishment of political society, which did
not occur until after civilization had Commenced. The Grecian gens,
phratry, and tribe, the Roman gens, curia, and tribe find their
analogues in the gens, phratry, and tribe of the American aborigines.
In like manner the Irish sept, the Scottish clan, the phratra of the
Albanians, and the Sanskrit ganas, without extending the comparison
further, are the same as the American Indian gens, which has usually
been called a clan. As far as our knowledge extends, this
organization runs through the entire ancient world upon all the
continents, and it was brought down to the historical period by such
tribes as attained to civilization. Nor is this all. Gentile society
wherever found is the same in structural organization and in
principles of action; but changing from lower to higher forms with
the progressive advancement of the people. These changes give the
history of development of the same original conceptions.



THE GENS.