Daughters are the preferred heirs of the landed possessions of their father and their mother, and sons are only heirs presumptive. The crops harvested from a man's land are stored in his wife's house, along with the yield of her own land.
Personal property is divided among the children.
The attainment of puberty by girls is not always marked by prescribed behavior, inasmuch as marriage not infrequently occurs before that age. When an unmarried girl has her first period, here mother brings to the house either the paternal grandmother or a paternal aunt of the child. The older woman leads the girl to her home, where the child spends the day in vigorously grinding corn. The purpose of the practice is to insure ease of menstruation and to inculcate industrious habits. When a man has obtained a girl's promise to marry, and she has secured the acquiescence of her parents, he goes with her to her house, where the mother bids the girl serve him with food.