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^WANTON] CHOCTAW SOCIAL AND CEREMONIAL LIFE 79
page 153. It may have been formed under Creek influence or
may have been a late sporadic growth, yet it is possible that it per-
petuates something more ancient.
Clans and Local Groups
There are only the faintest traces of groups with truly totemic
designations, the animal and plant names which occur seeming not
to have had a totemic connotation. The most important apparent
exception is furnished by Adam Hodgson, who traversed the terri-
tory of most of the large southeastern tribes on a missionary journey
in the year 1820. On the banks of the Yalobusha Kiver " he reached
the dwelling of a half-breed Choctaw, whose wife was a Chickasaw,
and whose hut was on the frontier of the two nations." This man,
who " spoke English very well," told him among other matters " that
there were tribes or families among the Indians, somewhat similar
to the Scottish clans ; such as, the Panther family, the Bird family,
the Raccoon family, the Wolf family : he belonged to the Raccoon
family, but his children to the family of his wife." All of these
totemic groups except the Wolf are known with certainty to have
been present among the Chickasaw, and the Wolf occurs in Morgan's
list. It is possible, therefore, that this Choctaw, on marrying into
the Chickasaw tribe, had been assigned a totemic group, or that some
northern Choctaw had adopted the Chickasaw system. Claiborne
states that six clans. Wind, Bear, Deer, Wolf, Panther, and Holly
Leaf, extended throughout the Choctaw, Cherokee, and Creek tribes,
but his information was evidently derived from the Creeks, it is
only partially true of the Cherokee, and otherwise not to be relied
upon.^^ Aside from these questionable statements there seems to
be nothing to warrant the assumption that totemic groups existed
among the Choctaw. There is every reason to believe that the
Crawfish people, the only division of any size bearing an animal
name, w^ere descended from the originally independent tribe of that
name (the Chokchiuma) living between the Choctaw and Chickasaw.
But even though there were no totemic iksa, it is quite possible
that there were nontotemic divisions corresponding to the Chickasaw
totemic clans and differentiated in some manner from the smaller
geographical bands. If there were such, the eight " gentes " enumer-
ated by Morgan on the authority of Cyrus Byington and the six
mentioned by the Rev. Alfred Wright would fall into this category.
The former are, in the moiety of the Beloved People, the Chu-fanik'-sii,
Is-ku-la'-ni, Chi'-to, and Shak-clmk'-la, and, in the moiety
of the Divided People, the Kush-ik'sii,^'' Law-ok'lu, Lu-lak Ik'-sii,
"> Claiborne, Miss., i, p. 493.
'• Cushman says that the full form of this Is " Kunsba-a-he " (ku''shak ahe), "reed-
potato." P. 297. He states that Apushmataha belonged to it.