ABSTRACT
Among the Ruanda people, Tutsi as well as Hutu, the social principle of descent was agnatic. Questions on the actual groupings founded on this principle and their functions elicit less unanimous and clear answers. The reason is that kinship groups have undoubtedly undergone a slow process of change in several respects during the Tutsi occupation of the country. Hutu and Tutsi recognized a patrilineal kin group (inzu) which included all who could actually trace their agnatic relationship through usually no more than four or five ascendent genealogical links to an ancestor recognized as the original ancestor of the group. Ego's sororal nephews and nieces and his paternal cross-cousins did not belong to his inzu. Ego's mother's agnates were not complete strangers to him. The cross-line relatives of Ego are people who are socially recognized as related to him although they do not belong either to his parents' descent groups or to the category of his relatives by affinity.
