Native American

Chief Little Wound with his wife and son. (1899 Heyn Photo)

[2006] Nanyehi - Nancy Ward - The last of the Ghigua. My Cherokee (Nanyehi) Lineage by Mary Sutherland The Cherokee were a matriarch society, where the women were equal to the men. Clan kinship followed the mother's side of the family. The children grew up in the mother's house, and it was the duty of an uncle on the mother's side to teach the boys how to hunt, fish, and perform certain tribal duties. The women owned the houses and their furnishings. Marriages were carefully negotiated, but if a woman decided to divorce her spouse, she simply placed his belongings outside the house.... In the Cherokee society , your Clan was your family. Children belonged to the entire Clan, and when orphaned were simply taken into a different household. Marriages were often short term, and there was no punishment for divorce or adultery. Cherokee women were free to marry traders, surveyors, and soldiers, as well as their own tribesmen. Cherokee girls learned by example how to be warriors and healers.