Even the factors which are independent of personal control, age and lineage position, fit more or less into the overall scale. An old, poor, and shameless man will be thought little of, but treated with respect for his age. A young man who has no senior kin and who commands ample resources will be listened to and given respect, but his youth will limit his standing in the village. Between those roughly equal in other ways seniority is of great importance.
The existence of a very roughly agreed scale or rank in the village is clear from the seating arrangements in the guest rooms. The position nearest the fireplace or stove is that of greatest honour. When people assemble in guest rooms they arrange themselves roughly in order. It is polite to be self-effacing and men manoeuvre to force their approximate equals to take a place above them, so that the final order is roughly a result not of claims but of imposed public opinion. If a fairly highly regarded man enters a crowded guest room, someone near the fireplace will leap up and offer his seat, himself being immediately offered someone else's, and so on until everyone is seated again.
The guest room groups are fairly constant (p. 240) and thus the order is one among regular associates. People cannot make claims for themselves, but if they are afraid of being slighted in a given guest room then they avoid it. The mosque on the othr hand is a meeting place for all the village. In a mosque people stand in long parallel lines, precisely to symbolise the equality of all before God. Yet the senior men always stand in the front row and the place of honour is in the centre. In this context, age and a religious reputation count highly. Young men and boys stand at the back. But in the middle rows the egalitarian principle of Islam works, and in any case late-comers have to remain at the back, unless they are visitors to the village of particularly high rank, in which case they may be ushered silently forward. I was always left towards the back in the mosque as a very doubtful believer, whereas in other contexts I tended to be pressed to a position of honour.