tribe

/traɪb/

/traɪb/

Other forms: tribes

A tribe is a traditional social group of people. Most tribes have existed much longer than existing states and countries.

Tribes follow rules and traditions that aren't connected to modern-day governments or mainstream societies. Indigenous people of North America lived (and many continue to live) in tribes, although the word itself is controversial — many of their members prefer the terms nation or ethnic group instead. Sometimes tribe is used to simply mean "family" or "clan," or even a large group: "A tribe of college students roamed the streets."

Definitions of tribe

1. noun

   a social division of (usually preliterate) people
   synonyms: folk

   types:

   phyle

   a tribe of ancient Athenians

   type of:

   social group

   people sharing some social relation
2. noun

   a federation (as of American Indians)
   synonyms: federation of tribes

   type of:

   nation

   a federation of tribes (especially Native American tribes)
3. noun

   group of people related by blood or marriage
   synonyms: clan, kin, kin group, kindred, kinship group

   types:

   mishpachah, mishpocha

   (Yiddish) the entire family network of relatives by blood or marriage (and sometimes close friends)

   family, family unit

   primary social group; parents and children

   folks

   your parents

   family tree, genealogy

   successive generations of kin

   totem

   a clan or tribe identified by their kinship to a common totemic object

   Tribes of Israel, Twelve Tribes of Israel

   twelve kin groups of ancient Israel each traditionally descended from one of the twelve sons of Jacob

   couple, match, mates

   a pair of people who live together

   man and wife, marriage, married couple

   two people who are married to each other

   ancestry, blood, blood line, bloodline, descent, line, line of descent, lineage, origin, parentage, pedigree, stemma, stock

   the lineage of an individual

   Lost Tribes

   the ten Tribes of Israel that were deported into captivity in Assyria around 720 BC (leaving only the tribes of Judah and Benjamin)

   type of:

   social group

   people sharing some social relation
4. noun

   (biology) a taxonomic category between a genus and a subfamily
   types:

   Bovini, tribe Bovini

   term not used technically; essentially coextensive with genus Bos

   Bambuseae, tribe Bambuseae

   bamboos

   type of:

   taxon, taxonomic category, taxonomic group

   animal or plant group having natural relations