Each one of the Blackfoot tribes is subdivided into gentes, a gens being a body of consanguineal kindred in the male line. It is noteworthy that the Blackfeet, although Algonquins, have this system of subdivision, and it may be that among them the gentes are of comparatively recent date. No special duties are assigned to any one gens, nor has any gens, so far as I know, any special "medicine" or "totem."
Below is a list of the gentes of each tribe.
_Tsin-ik-tsis'-tso-yiks_ Early Finished Eating.
_In-uhk!-so-yi-stam-iks_ Long Tail Lodge Poles.
_Ah-kai-yi-ko-ka'-kin-iks_ White Breasts.
_Sik-ut'-si-pum-aiks_ Black Patched Moccasins.
_Tsin-ik-sis'-tso-yiks_ Early Finished Eating.
_I-nuk-si'-kah-ko-pwa-iks_ Small Brittle Fat.
_Ni-tot'-si-ksis-stan-iks_ Kill Close By.
It will be readily seen from the translations of the above that each gens takes its name from some peculiarity or habit it is supposed to possess. It will also be noticed that each tribe has a few gentes common to one or both of the other tribes. This is caused by persons leaving their own tribe to live with another one, but, instead of uniting with some gens of the adopted tribe, they have preserved the name of their ancestral gens for themselves and their descendants.
The Blackfoot terms of relationship will be found interesting. The principal family names are as follows:--
My brother-in-law older than self _Nis-tum-o'._
My brother-in-law younger than self _Nis-tum-o'-kun._
As the members of a gens were all considered as relatives, however remote, there was a law prohibiting a man from marrying within his gens. Originally this law was strictly enforced, but like many of the ancient customs it is no longer observed. Lately, within the last forty or fifty years, it has become not uncommon for a man and his family, or even two or three families, on account of some quarrel or some personal dislike of the chief of their own gens, to leave it and join another band. Thus the gentes often received outsiders, who were not related by blood to the gens; and such people or their descendants could marry within the gens. Ancestry became no longer necessary to membership.
As a rule, before a young man could marry, he was required to have made some successful expeditions to war against the enemy, thereby proving himself a brave man, and at the same time acquiring a number of horses and other property, which would enable him to buy the woman of his choice, and afterwards to support her.