The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India,...

Both in Athens and Rome there was a division known as phratry or curia. This apparently consisted of a collection of gentes, γένη, or clans, and would correspond roughly to a Hindu subcaste. The evidence does not show, however, that it was endogamous. The bond which united the phratry or curia was precisely the same as that of the gens or clan and the city. It consisted also in a common meal, which was prepared on the altar, and was eaten with the recitation of prayers, a part being offered to the god, who was held to be present. At Athens on feast-days the members of the phratry assembled round their altar. A victim was sacrificed and its flesh cooked on the altar, and divided among the members of the phratry, great care being taken that no stranger should be present. A young Athenian was presented to the phratry by his father, who swore that the boy was his son. A victim was sacrificed and cooked on the altar in the presence of all the members of the phratry; if they were doubtful of the boy’s legitimacy, and hence wished to refuse him admittance, as they had the right to do, they refused to remove the flesh from the altar. If they did not do this, but divided and partook of the flesh with the candidate, he was finally and irrevocably admitted to the phratry.

The explanation of this custom, M. de Coulanges states, is that food prepared on an altar and eaten by a number of persons together, was believed to establish between them a sacred tie which endured through life.205 Even a slave was to a certain degree admitted into the family by the same tie of common eating of food. At Athens he was made to approach the hearth; he was purified by pouring water on his head, and ate some cakes and fruit with the members of the family. This ceremony was analogous to those of marriage and adoption. It signified that the new arrival, hitherto a stranger, was henceforth a member of the family and participated in the family worship.206