ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on political aspects of traditional life. The scanty information obtainable on marriages of parents or grandparents of the senior surviving generation suggests that a considerable number were made within the village. The family, consisting of a man, his wife and their children, was the group in which children were reared and through which rights in land were acquired. Marriage was terminated by the death of either partner or by divorce. The children remained with the father or his clan, except when a misdemeanour on his part was held responsible for the divorce. According to legend the commonest reason why two or more clans combined in a single village was that they were linked by patrilineal descent. Women and children were excluded from the cult house at all times. The men’s cult centred on cult houses. Whereas land was owned by the clan, property of other kinds including magic was owned individually.
