The next layer of the cone represented the “inner circle of tribes”, i.e. such tribes as had joined with the leading tribe at an early moment.  The leading family of the leading tribe often took their wives from the leading families of the “inner tribes”, and these leaders served as advisors and councillors to the leader of the federation.  The next lower layer consisted of the “outer tribes”, i.e. tribes which had joined the federation only later, often under strong pressure; their number was always much larger than the number of the “inner tribes”, but their political influence was much weaker.  Every layer below that of the “outer tribes” was regarded as inferior and more or less “unfree”.  There was many a tribe which, as a tribe, had to serve a free tribe; and there were others who, as tribes, had to serve the whole federation.  In addition, there were individuals who had quit or had been forced to quit their tribe or their home and had joined the federation leader as his personal “bondsmen”; further, there were individual slaves and, finally, there were the large masses of agriculturists who had been conquered by the federation.  When such a federation was dissolved, by defeat or inner dissent, individual tribes or groups of tribes could join a new federation or could resume independent life.

Typically, such federations exhibited two tendencies.  In the case of the Hsiung-nu we indicated already previously that the leader of the federation repeatedly attempted to build up a kind of bureaucratic system, using his bondsmen as a nucleus.  A second tendency was to replace the original tribal leaders by members of the family of the federation leader.  If this initial step, usually first taken when “outer tribes” were incorporated, was successful, a reorganization was attempted:  instead of using tribal units in war, military units on the basis of “Groups of Hundred”, “Groups of Thousand”, etc., were created and the original tribes were dissolved into military regiments.  In the course of time, and especially at the time of the dissolution of a federation, these military units had gained social coherence and appeared to be tribes again; we are probably correct in assuming that all “tribes” which we find from this time on were already “secondary” tribes of this type.  A secondary tribe often took its name from its leader, but it could also revive an earlier “primary tribe” name.

The Toba represented a good example for this “cone” structure of pastoral society.  Also the Hsiung-nu of this time seem to have had a similar structure.  Incidentally, we will from now on call the Hsiung-nu “Huns” because Chinese sources begin to call them “Hu”, a term which also had a more general meaning (all non-Chinese in the north and west of China) as well as a more special meaning (non-Chinese in Central Asia and India).