From lapse of time the Iroquois tribes have come to differ slightly in the number and in the names of their respective gentes, the largest number being eight, as follows:
| Senecas. | Cayugas: | Onondaqas. | Oneidas. | Mohawks. | Tuscarora. | |
| 1. | Wolf | Wolf | Wolf | Wolf | Wolf | Gray Wolf. |
| 2. | Bear. | Bear. | Bear. | Bear. | Bear. | Bear. |
| 3. | Turtle. | Turtle. | Turtle. | Turtle. | Turtle. | Great Turtle. |
| 4. | Beaver. | Beaver. | Beaver. | Beaver. | ||
| 5. | Deer. | Deer. | Deer. | Yellow Wolf. | ||
| 6. | Snipe. | Snipe. | Snipe. | Snipe. | ||
| 7. | Heron. | Eel. | Eel. | Eel. | ||
| 8. | Hawk. | Hawk. | Ball. | Little Turtle. |
These changes show that certain gentes in some of the tribes have become extinct through the vicissitudes of time, and that others have been formed by the segmentation of over-full gentes.
With a knowledge of the rights, privileges, and obligations of the members of a gens, its capabilities as the unit of a social and governmental system will be more fully understood, as well as the manner in which it entered into the higher organizations of the phratry, tribe, and confederacy.
The gens is individualized by the following rights, privileges, and obligations conferred and imposed upon its members, and which made up the jus gentilicium:
| I. | The right of electing its sachem and chiefs. |
| II. | The right of deposing its sachem and chiefs. |
| III. | The obligation not to marry in the gens. |
| IV. | Mutual rights of inheritance of the property of deceased members. |
| V. | Reciprocal obligations of help, defense, and redress of injuries |
| VI. | The right of bestowing names upon its members. |
| VII. | The right of adopting strangers into the gens. |
| VIII. | Common religious rites. |
| IX. | A common burial place. |
| X. | A council of the gens. |
These functions and attributes gave vitality as well as individuality to the organization, and protected the personal rights of its members.
