Abstract
Across the central area of Ibo country, in the Eastern Region of Nigeria, is a thickly populated belt in which population growth has rarely resulted in the development of compact urban or quasi-urban centres, except under exceptional, generally modern, conditions. Typically, the population is spread so evenly throughout the palm-forest that it is difficult to believe that concentrations of over 1,000 persons per square mile are now quite commonplace. The population of Mba-Ise is 186,300 in only about 167 square miles, with a migrant population elsewhere of about 30,000. This type of settlement has put a special imprint on social organization in the area, and some of the interrelationships between lineage, territorial organization, and other kinds of groupings are indicated in this article.

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