Leading villagers did not want to be headmen; but they did want to be able to control the headman, and to entertain important guests. Thus one found that the headman was usually a young member of a substantial village household, or the nominee of the head of such a household. Without such support a young headman could not entertain. I knew a considerable number of headmen, and most of them fitted this pattern. In Sakaltutan there were three headmen during my field work. The first was the adopted son of Haci Osman (H) (p. 103); the second was the son of Zeynel (G) (p. 243); and the third belonged, by an accepted affiliation, to the lineage of Haci Omer (D), and used his guest room. His rival at the election, and others mentioned as possible candates in the village, all fitted into the same pattern. All were under forty.
The headman in Elbashï in 1951-52 was the youngest of four brothers who used a common guest room that formally belonged to the eldest. These four were the leaders of Ay lineage (p. 165), and also of one of the two village factions. All were comfortably off. The eldest ha had some experience as a building contractor, and the headman himself had had a share in a village lorry, and at the time had an interest in a hotel in Ankara, in common with a partner from a neighbouring village.
The headman in Sakaltutan never to my knowledge exercised authority except in so far as his neighbours recognised that he as headman had to take official responsibility. On one occasion a woman was struck with a piece of iron by a neighbour and kinsman. The headman was called but decided to do nothing. If a stranger arrived in the village the headman would automatically be sent for, or failing him, his deputy, to entertain the guest, though sometimes, if the guest was worth capturing, anyone with an adequate guest room might invite him in before the headman arrived on the scene.
The headman of Elbashï made rather more attempts to assert his authority. Near the harvest time the village shepherds came to him daily for instructions on pasturing their flocks, and he also supervised the activities of the field watchmen. I came across him, on one occasion, in the middle of an altercation with