Since, however, the matchuni of a man include a much wider circle of relatives than the children of his mother’s own brother and father’s own sister, the number of marriages between matchuni is very much larger than this.
Nearly all the Teivali marriages are marriages between matchuni in this wider sense, while among the Tartharol there are also many other marriages of this kind.
One of the reasons why the orthodox marriage custom is not still more commonly followed is the existence of the practice called terersthi, to be considered later in this chapter. According to this practice wives are transferred from one man to another, and in this transference no attention appears to be paid to the kinship tie. The woman, or rather girl, originally married to a man may have been his matchuni, but the woman who finally becomes his wife by the working of the terersthi custom may not be and probably in most cases is not his matchuni. In many cases in the genealogies, the original infant marriage may have been forgotten, and the marriage recorded may be the result of the terersthi custom. If I had a complete record of all infant marriages, I have no doubt that the proportion of marriages between matchuni would have been larger. [[513]]
In some families marriages between matchuni in the near sense occur much more frequently than in others. Thus out of the forty matchuni marriages among the Tartharol, the husband or wife belonged to the Taradrol in fifteen cases, and in one large Taradr family, that of Parkeidi (21), six out of eight children married their matchuni in the near sense. It is perhaps significant in this connexion that the Taradrol have been comparatively little affected by outside influences. They are a clan which might be expected to keep up the orthodox Toda custom.
Another example of a family in which the orthodox marriage custom has been frequently followed is that of Table 52, where there may be found eight cases of the marriage of matchuni in the near sense, and several others where the matchuni relationship is more distant.
In some cases marriages have taken place between the children of matchuni. Thus the marriage of Uvolthli (15) with Sinmundeivi (20) among the Tartharol, and of Pangudr (66) with Nelbur (54) and Kanokh (56) with Sanmidz (63) among the Teivaliol, are all cases in which marriages have taken place between the children of two men who called one another matchuni. There may be other cases, but these examples are perhaps sufficient to show that these marriages may be held to take the place of the orthodox matchuni union.
While marriages between matchuni are the rule and marriages between the children of matchuni certainly not unlawful, we have seen that marriage with the child of a matchuni is prohibited. From our point of view, this means that while marriage with a first cousin is orthodox, marriage with a first cousin once removed is unlawful, while again it seems that marriage with a first cousin twice removed may be lawful. The more distant tie of kinship from our point of view is unlawful, while the nearer is commanded.
Marriage with a matchuni may often involve considerable disproportion of age. In one case at the present time a boy of about two years of age is married to a woman of about twenty. The woman, Nulnir (10), was still unmarried when she reached this age, so she was married to her matchuni, [[514]]Kagerikutan (25), the son of her mother’s brother. In this case the orthodox marriage was resorted to when the woman had failed to obtain a husband in any other way, although it involved marriage with a baby.
In another case, the marriage of Keitkarg (38) and Pötoveli (49), in which the woman is considerably older than her husband, the husband and wife are matchuni.
There is one ceremonial marriage in which the husband always stands in the relation of matchuni to the wife. This is in the performance of the pursütpimi ceremony at the funeral of a girl unmarried at the time of her death. The boy who is chosen to give the bow and arrow and to act as the husband is always, so far as I could discover, the matchuni of the dead girl.