In Hindu society, the term gotra (Sanskrit: गोत्र) means clan. It broadly refers to people who are descendants in an unbroken male line from a common male ancestor or patriline. Generally the gotra forms an exogamous unit, with the marriage within the same gotra being prohibited by custom, being regarded as incest. The name of the gotra can be used as a surname, but it is different from a surname and is strictly maintained because of its importance in marriages among Hindus, especially among the higher castes. Pāṇini defines "gotra" for grammatical purposes as apatyam pautraprabhrti gotram (IV. 1. 162), which means "the word gotra denotes the progeny (of a sage) beginning with the son's son." When a person says "I am Kashyapa-gotra," he means that he traces his descent from the ancient sage Kashyapa by unbroken male descent. Among non-Brahmins, the gotras generally do not go back to sages, except in case of some communities such as Rajputs.
According to the Brihadaranyaka Upanisad 2.2.6, Gautama and Bharadvāja, Viśvāmitra and Jamadagni, Vashishtha and Kaśhyapa and Shandilya are seven sages (also known as Saptarishi); the progeny of these seven sages is declared to be gotras. This enumeration of seven primary gotras seems to have been known to Pāṇini. The offspring (apatya) of these seven are gotras and others than these are called gotrâvayava.
Goran Trajkoski (Macedonian: Горан Трајкоски) (born 21 November 1963) is an eminent Macedonian musician. He rose to international prominence as a frontman of the group Anastasija which was featured on the soundtrack album for the Academy Award nominated movie Before the Rain directed by Milčo Mančevski. He started his musical career as a member of the punk rock band Afektiven naboj from Struga. After moving to Skopje he joined the punk band Saraceni led by Vladimir Petrovski Karter. Later he was a vocalist of the influential 1980s group Padot na Vizantija. After the reunion of the Macedonian cult band Mizar in the 2000s, Goran Trajkovski became its new frontman. He is also involved in solo projects, for instance as an author of electronic music under the pseudonym Gotra (Готра) as well as a composer for film soundtracks and theatre music.