[APPENDIX B]
THE BA RONGA TERMS OF RELATIONSHIP
The hypothesis that the Australian terms of relationship, as they now exist, really denote status in customary law, may perhaps derive corroboration from the classificatory system as it appears among the Ba Ronga, near Delagoa Bay. Here the natives are rich, industrial, commercial, and polygamous to the full extent of their available capital. Polygamy, male kinship, and wife purchase, with elaborate laws of dowry and divorce, have modified and complicated the terms of relationship. They are described by an excellent authority, M. Henri Junod, a missionary.[1]
M. Junod has obviously never heard of the 'classificatory system' among other races, and his explanation of certain 'avoidances,' such as between the husband and his wife's brother, father, and mother, is probably incorrect (turning, as it does, on the laws of wife-price and divorce), though it appears now to be accepted by the Ba Ronga themselves. But what more concerns us is the nature of terms of relationship. These terms denote status in customary law, determined by sex and seniority. Among the Basuto, 'a man is otherwise related to his sister than to his brother; his children are related to their paternal otherwise than to their maternal uncles and aunts,' and to their cousins in the same style. Relative seniority, entailing relative social duties, is also expressed in the terms of relationship. The maternal aunt, senior to the mother, is 'grandmother.' The children of my father's brother and of my mother's sister, are my 'brothers' or 'sisters;' the children of my maternal uncle and paternal aunt are not my 'brothers' and 'sisters.' The children of a man's inferior wives call the chief wife 'grandmother,' and the other wives, not their mother, 'maternal aunts.'[2] The son of my wife's sister is my 'son,' because I may succeed to her husband on his death, and his father calls me 'brother.' The maternal uncle is the mere butt of his nephew, the uncle's wives are the nephew's potential wives: he is one of the heirs to them. This kind of uncle (maternal) is not one of the tribal 'fathers' of the nephew, but the paternal uncle is, and is treated with the utmost respect. In brief, each name for a 'relationship' is a name carrying certain social duties or privileges, dependent on sex and seniority.
We have no such customary laws, and need no such names—the names are the result and expression of the Basuto customary laws. Had we such ideas of duty and privilege, then they would be expressed in our terms of relationship, which would be numerous. My maternal uncle would have a name denoting the man with whose wife I may flirt. The wife of my brother-in-law is the woman whom I must treat with the most distant respect. If I am a woman, my father's sister's husband (my 'uncle by marriage') is a man whose wife I may become, and so forth endlessly. Consequently there is a wealth of terms of relationship, just because of the peculiarities of Ba Ronga customary law.
[1] Les Baronga, Attinger, Neufchâtel, 1898, pp. 82-87.
[2] Op. cit. pp. 487-489.