Clan Law
The clans are a traditional part of society based on patterns of kinship. In ancient times the people identified with certain animal and other supernatural spirits to assist them in enduring a hardship. Upon doing so, individuals vowed to keep commitments associated with their particular being to remain in association from that point forward.
Over time, groups of people connected by descent became associated with particular animal spirits. They had duties as a clan related to the place of this spirit figure in their overall tribal religion. Various creation stories relate the hierarchy and symbolism of the various clans, and each clan represents essential qualities and responsibilities. These pertain to specific jobs or position held in the tribal ceremonial ground, as well as in the towns and at home. Each clan had a special talent, as well as a balance of weaknesses for various aspects of the spiritual world. The majority of Seminole people in the 21st century continue to identify with their clans.
Clan law and kinship are highly revered by the Seminole people, and are integral to their spiritual and ceremonial world. Clan law traditionally governs every aspect of tribal life, from the spiritual, to the governmental, to the social, including marriage rules.
The kinship systems is matrilineal; descent and inheritance are passed through the mother's lines. Children are born into their mother's clan and take their social status from that group. For example, if an individual’s mother is of the Wotkvlke or Raccoon Clan, and the father is of the Hvlpvtvlke or Alligator Clan, that individual would belong to the Raccoon Clan. However, this person would also be related to the Alligator Clan, as a son or daughter. (The Navajo, who have a similar system, say that a child is born "to" the mother's clan and "for" the father's clan.) All other Raccoon Clan people and Alligator Clan people are considered the child's relations. Depending on the generation, they would be referred to as aunts and uncles, if the age of a fellow clansman was relative to that of the mother and father, or brother and sister, if the age of the clansman was relative to that of the child.
In this system, Seminole adults must marry a person outside of the clans of their parents. This rule prevented close relatives from marrying. In keeping with the previous example of children of a marriage between persons of the Raccoon and Alligator clans, if a Raccoon Clan woman married a man of the Raccoon or Alligator clans, it would be as if, in European-American traditions, a woman married her brother, or according to age, a daughter married her father.
Historically, many marriages were arranged according to clan strength, or need for renewing life of a declining clan. For example, if the Bear Clan had responsibility to provide hereditary chiefs of a tribal town (atilwa), and there was a shortage of Bear Clan people in the town, its men would be encouraged to take a wife of the Bear Clan in another town. Her children would belong to the Bear Clan in her new town, and the males would be in the hereditary line for chiefs.
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