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-corded eleven such names in Sakaltutan and nineteen in Elbashï.
In Sakaltutan, the division of the village into agnatic groups was recognised in another way. People talked of the great ones, büyükler . the senior members of the village. Once or twice, a group of great ones met ad hoc when some important village business came up - a self-selecting group. But it was also customary after a full wedding ceremony for the groom's side to feast the büyükler . I witnessed such a gathering three times, and once was party to drawing up the list of guests. This was done casually at the last moment, with the implicit assumption that everyone knew in any case what would happen and who would be invited. On each occasion about forty of the hundred village household heads were invited. Each time, a few people not entitled as `great ones' were invited, either to help with serving and hospitality, or because of a special tie to the host.

The büyükler are not heads of lineages, nor are they simply village elders. They are the senior members of segments of lineages. Whether or not a man would receive an invitation independently of a senior and important father's brother's son would depend less on the solidarity of the lineage to which they both belonged, than on his own personal seniority and importance. The invitation goes to the senior man, but he may delegate it to an agnate if he wishes. Household heads who have no agnates were invited in person, with the exception of one or two very poor and junior men. Thus, practically speaking, the guests at the feast represented agnatically the whole village.

In Elbashï a similar informal self-selected body of elders for important deliberations certainly exists. But in a larger less homogeneous community they do not constitute a more or less stable group of wedding guests.

Village lineages often inhabit clusters of houses. A successful household normally expands by building on rooms for married sons, and in due course the old house is divided by partitions; in the next generation the new households will seek to expand again. When the population is growing, this system leads to congestion, and people move away from the centre, sometimes breaking away from their close agnates. Sometimes the whole agnatic group will move to a new site, leaving more space between their houses, and the whole process starts again. The village thinks of lineages as belonging to certain parts of the

Some selected examples (please click on pictures to enlarge):