GILYAKS, a Palaeo-Asiatic people originally widespread throughout the Lower Amur and the north of Sakhalin. The clan forms a society based on common rights and marital duties. The men in one class, A, had to take wives from another class, B. The women in class A had to marry men—not from B but from a third class, C. Thus brother and sister mated into different clans. The classificatory system of relationship is developed on these lines : Common fire, community in the bear rites, common enemies, community in bloodmoney and common tabus bind the clans together. Shamanism and bear-worship existed. Death was due to evil spirits and the corpse was cremated, except in certain special cases.
See M. Czplicka, Aboriginal Siberia (1914)•