PRIMAL LAW

Manifestly these ideas belong, as a whole, to 'a later myth-making age '—that is to an age later than the dateless period of the hypothetical anonymous groups. But, between that hypothetical period and the evolution of the idea of group kinship with animals and plants, and with all men of the same animal and plant stock names, there is time enough and to spare for the full evolution of Totemism.

Again, to a Darwinian, the enormous influence of 'accidents' in evolution ought not to be a matter hard of belief;without 'accidents' (in the Darwinian sense of the word), there would be no differentiation at all, and no evolution. The Darwinian 'accident' seems to mean a variation of unknown cause. But the giving of plant and animal group names is hardly an 'accident' of this kind. 'What else are you to call it?' the player asked, when questioned as to the origin of the words 'a yorker.' And by what names so handy and serviceable as plant and animal names were pristine men to call the neighbouring groups?

I have shown why place names were less handy, and how, in nomadic life, they were scarcely possible. Local names come in as Totemism goes out. Long nicknames, 'Boil-food-with-the-paunch-skin,' 'Take down their leggings,' 'Travel-with-very-light-baggage,' 'Shot-at-some-white-object' (Siouan nicknames ofgentes), are much less handy, much less easy to be signalled by gesture language, and are certainly much later than 'Emu,' 'Wolf,' 'Kangaroo,' 'Eagle,' 'Skunk,' and other totem names. If such totem names were, originally, the favourite form of nomenclature for hostile groups (like our 'Sick Vulture' for a famous scholar, or 'Talking Potato,' for Mr. J. W. Croker), I see not much of an 'accident' in the circumstance.

The totem names, then, came in upon a very early society: and myth, belief, custom, and rite, crystallised round them, and round the idea of blood kindred, which must be very early indeed.

My critic asks, 'Is blood kinship the true social basis, and Totemism only a veneer?' That question I have already answered. In my opinion mankind, in evolving prohibitions of marriage, first had their eyes on contiguity, that of 'hearth-mates.' Groups of hearth-mates were next distinguished by totem names. But these names could give no superstitious sanction to customary laws, till the idea of 'blood kinship' with, or descent from, or evolution out of, or other form of kinship with the totem was developed. At this period, the totem name roughly indicated ties of blood kinship. But the Australians, as we saw, have now reacheda clearer idea of what blood kinship is, and, by a bye-law, prohibit marriages of 'too near flesh,' in cases where, though the persons are akin by blood, totem law does not interfere. Totem law has had an educating influence in developing the objection to marriages between people contiguous as hearth-mates, into the objection to marriages between persons too near in blood kinship. Thus Totemism is not 'only a veneer.'

On the foundation of all these blended ideas, Totemism arose, a stately but fantastic structure, varying in shape under changing conditions, like an iceberg in summer seas. It is, indeed, 'a far cry' from anonymous human groups, and groups of plant or animal names, to Helen, the daughter of the swan, that was Zeus! But the pedigree is hardly disputable.

On the other hand, suppress the totem names, give the original groups such titles as the Sioux 'Take-down-their-leggings,' or 'Boil-meat-in-the-paunch-skin' (some names you must give them), and what is left? Suppose such names to have been those of pristine groups, and suppose them to be tending to exogamy. A 'Boil-meat-in-the-paunch-skin' man may not marry a 'Boil-meat-in-the-paunch-skin' girl; but must marry a 'Take-down-their-leggings' girl, or a 'shoot-in-the-woods' girl, or a 'Do-not-split-the-body-of-a-buffalo-with-a-knife-but-cut -it-up-as-they-please' girl! That is rather cumbrous: marriage rules on that basis are not readily conceivable.

And where is here the tabu sanction? Brother Wolf or Brother Emu is a thinkable, powerful, sacred kinsman, who will not have his tabu tampered with. But there is no sanctity in Do-not-split-the-body-of-a-buffalo-with-a-knife-but -cut-it-up-as-they-please!

Luckily we have here a case in point. My theory is that animal names being once given to the groups, the animal, in accordance with savage ideas, became a kinsman and protector. The animal or vegetable or other type, in each case, sanctioned various tabus, including exogamy. Had thename been another kind of nickname, as 'Boil-meat-in-the paunch-skin,' what was there to sanction the tabu? Or, if the group name was a local name, where was the sanction? Exogamy does persist where totem groups have become local, and are now known by the names of their places of settlement. But not always. Of an Australian tribe, the Gournditch Mara, we read that it consisted of fourlocaldivisions, water (mere?), swamp, mountain, and river. But there was no exogamous rule affecting marriage. A man of the group dwelling in the swamp might marry a woman of the same group. There was descent in the male line; wife-lending was highly condemned. The office of headman was hereditary in the male line, 'before any whites came into the country.' The benighted tribe was not devoid of superstition.

'They believed that there was a future good and bright place, to which those who were good went after death, and that there was a Man at that place who took care of the world and of all the people.' The place was called Mūmble-Mirring. The dark, bad place was Burreet Barrat. 'This belief they had before there was any white person in the country.'

As these statements are odious to most anthropologists, they cannot be true, and thus a slur is cast on all that we learn about the Gournditch Mara. But though a missionary (the Rev. Mr. Stähle) cannot, of course, be trustedhere, he had no professional motive for fictions about the marriage laws of the tribe. They had no ceremonies of initiation, no seasons of license, apparently no totems, and the merely local names of groups naturally carried no exogamous prohibition: conveyed no tabu sanction.[24]Had there never been any totem names, exogamy might never have arisen.

How my friendly critic is 'no nearer to the understanding of totem kinship as the basis of a social group,' if, for the sake of the argument, he grants 'the myth of descent from an animal to have arisen from a pre-existing name system,'I am at a loss to comprehend. Here are groups, Bear, Wolf, Trout, Racoon, firmly, though erroneously, believing that they are akin to these animals. Naturally they 'behave as such.' Each racoon has duties to other racoons, and to the actual racoons. He does not shoot a racoon if he can get anything else; he does not shoot a racoon sitting. He is brother to racoons of his own sex, and to sisters in the racoon of the other sex. He does not marry them. The belief in the racoon kinship is the basis of that social group—the man has other social groups of other kinds. Savages believe in their beliefs, to the extent of dying from fear after infringing a tabu in which they believe. Thus I would reply to the objections offered after a first glance at my conjecture.

A man has other social groups than his own totem group in certain regions. Totem groups among the Arunta, we have seen, work magic 'to secure the increase of the plant or animal which gives its name to the totem.' The Arunta have no myth as to the origin of these performances, styled Intichiuma.[25]This, as far as Australia is concerned, seems to be a peculiarity of the Arunta system alone, or all but alone, and, as we saw, it has even been suggested that these rites are the origin of Totemism. But such rites appear to be most firmly established and organised among societies which are passing out of Totemism. Such a society is that of the Omaha tribe of North America, where descent is reckoned in the male line.[26]Among the Omahas we find the Elk totem group with male kinship; they may not touch a male Elk, or eat its flesh: if they do, as in New Caledonia, they break out into sores. This kindred, with the Bears, 'worship the thunder' in spring. Their special business and duty is 'to stop the rain.' But, if they are a Weather Society, in this respect, that fact does not appear in their totem names, Elk and Bear.

Other Omahagentes, or 'subgentes,' are also totemic, and are named from that which they may not eat, as wild turkeys, wild geese, cranes, and blackbirds. The people of the black-bird totem actually do a little totem magic,againsttheir totem; they chew and spit out corn, to prevent the blackbirds from feeding on the crops.[27]The reptile group does not touch or eat reptiles, but, if worms injure the corn, they pound a few worms up into flour, make a soup thereof, and eat it (is this 'totem sacrifice'?), all for the good of the crops. The worm group does this magic (involving the eating of its totem) not for the benefit of worms (as among the Arunta) but to control the mischievous action of worms.

Now turning to Magical or Magico-Religious Societies among these Indians, we find a Wind Society,but it contains members of many totems, buffalo, eagle, hawk, and so on, plus 'The South wind people,' who, apparently, may be a totem group of that name, which, as among the Arunta, might work wind-magic.[28]But our authority, the late Mr. Dorsey, calls all the members of this Wind Magic Society 'Windgentes,' and surely this breeds much confusion. By agenshe usually means a totem kin with male descent (by 'clan,' he means a totem kin with female descent). Thus all 'windgentes' ought to be wind totem groups: only wind totem groups ought to be in the Wind Society, which is not the case: and all water gentes, or earth, or fire gentes ought to be of water, earth, or fire totems. But this, again, is not the case.

All sorts of totem kindreds enter into the earth, wind, fire, and water Magical Societies, or Magico-Religious Societies. They belong to them as members of any universities, or of certain selected universities, may belong to an University Club: or, again, may be Catholics, Anglicans, Brownists, or Presbyterians. These American Magical Societies, though composed of members of totem kindreds,are not, in themselves, totemic societies. Members of other totems serve in the societies which work magic for earth, wind, fire, and so on. Among the Arunta, on the other hand, the magic for each object is worked solely by the men who have that object for totem. To a certain extent, however, this rule is changing, and members of other totems may, at least, be present at each totem'sIntichiuma, or magical rites.[29]'In addition to the members of the totem' (water) 'other men are invited to come, though they will not be allowed to take any part in the actualIntichiumaceremony.' From presence, by invitation, to participation in the rites (as in the American Shamanistic Societies), is a step which may come to be taken, and thus the Arunta totem groups would become mere 'Shamanistic Societies.'

A most curious and interesting account of the Omaha Magical Societies is given by Miss Alice Fletcher, in her essay, already cited, on 'The Import of the Totem.' To obtain the 'personal totem' (manitu) a youth must first listen to his elders. They tell him 'to go forth to cry to Wa-kon-da. You shall not ask for any particular thing, whatever is good, that may Wa-kon-da give.'

Fiat voluntas tua!

'Four days and nights upon the hills the youth shall pray, crying, and, when he stops, shall wipe his tears with the palms of his hands, lift his wet hands to heaven, then lay them on the earth.'

To the ordinary mind, this describes such prayers as are the petitions of the Saints. But, in accordance with the views of the official school of American anthropology, it is averred that nothing of the kind is intended by the Omaha. 'There is no evidence that they did regard the power represented by that word (Wa-kon-da) as a supreme being, nor is there any intimation that they had ever conceived of a single great ruling spirit,' says Miss Fletcher (1897).

The prayer is evidence enough. Prayer is directed to a person, and whether he is envisaged as 'a spirit,' or not, is amere detail of metaphysical terminology. If Miss Fletcher is right, Wa-kon-da is a pantheistic conception, but as He, (or It) also listens to prayer, He (or It) is personal. We see rather an anthropomorphic conception of deity, passing towards pantheism, or to divinity no longer anthropomorphic, than a notion of impersonal force immanent in the universe, passing towards anthropomorphism—as in Miss Fletcher's theory. The idea of such a force, or cosmicrapport(the Maorimana), is, indeed, familiar to us in the speculations of the lower barbaric races. It does credit to their metaphysics, but,prima facie, seems likely to be later in evolution than the idea of an anthropomorphic Maker, like the Australian Baiame.

At all events, the Omaha appears to live, in prayer, on a high religious level, and it is open to the friends of religious borrowing, to say that he took his creed from Europeans. I am not certain that Miss Fletcher is indisposed to agree with me on this point of Red Indian unborrowed theism. In herIndian Song and Story,[30]she gives Pawnee songs, 'hitherto sealed from the knowledge of the white race.' Here is one:

Lift thine eyes! 'Tis the gods who come near,Bringing thee joy, release from all pain.Sending sorrow and sighingFar from the child, Ti-ra-wa makes fain.Ah, you look, you know who comes,Claiming you his, and bidding you rise,Blithely smiling and happy,Child of Ti-ra-wa, Lord of the Skies!

Ti-ra-wa is Hau-ars, 'a contraction of the word meaning father.' The song is used to still children who cry at a religious ceremony.

However it be, the Omaha prays to Wa-kon-da, not for 'any particular thing,' but for whatever, in the gift of Wa-kon-da, is good, and mainly for a manitu ('personal totem'). The Omaha also believe in telepathy. 'Thought and will can be projected to help a friend.' A magical society exists,to concentrate and direct this expenditure of energy, and the process is strengthened by such things as the neophyte beholds in vision, after prayer to Wa-kon-da. He sent an answer to prayer, a feather of a bird, a tuft of a beast's hair, a crystal, a black stone, representing the species, or element of nature, which was to be the neophyte's 'personal totem,' ormanitu. If it were thunder, the man could control the elements; if it were an eagle, he had an eagle eye for the future; if it were a bear (or a badger), he was not so gifted.

Now, according to Miss Fletcher, the Bear Magical Society is composed of men, who, after prayer, have seen the bear in dream or vision; those who saw representatives 'of thunder or water beings' form the Society which deals with the weather. 'The membership came from every kinship group' (totem kin) 'in the tribe.' Thus the Magical Societies are composed of men of any totem, and, the less purely totemic the tribe, the stronger is the Magical Society.

The totem kins now, among the Omaha, have descent in the male line. All this is 'late,' and 'late' is the totem priesthood held by 'hereditary chiefs of thegens.' Miss Fletcher regards the totem of the 'gens,' with the beliefs crystallised around it, as an ingenious 'expedient,' with a social 'purpose!' the totem of each kindred having been inherited from the vision andmanituof some ancestral chief. We need not again point out that, even now, among the Omaha, advanced as they are,manitusare not hereditable, and that Miss Fletcher's system cannot account for Totemism in tribes which reckon descent on the spindle side. Miss Fletcher justly remarks that the real totem, 'the gentile totem,' 'gave no immediate hold upon the supernatural, as did the individual totem' (manitu) 'to its possessor. It served solely as a mark of kinship, and its connection with the supernatural was manifest only in its punishment of the violation of tabu.'

In brief, the real totem, and the individualmanitu, with its magical societies, are two things totally apart, and apart we must keep them, in our studies of early society. Not to do so is to make the topic incomprehensible.

In other books, especially inMyth, Ritual, and Religion, andCustom and Myth, I have examined apparent survivals of Totemism, in ancient Greece, ancient Egypt, and other civilised countries. Of these the most notable are the Greek myths of descent of families from animals, explained as the temporary vehicles of Zeus or Apollo: and the worship of special animals by each of the Nomes of Egypt. Other arguments I have offered, especially in the case of Apollo and the Shrew Mouse. I remain of the opinion that many of the Greek mythical and religious phenomena noted, are most probably to be explained as survivals of a totemic past. Of course Totemism is only one element in animal worship, and the Corn Spirit, disguised as almost any animal you please, may be one of the other elements. But, as far as I have studied the subject, I agree with Mr. Tylor in his 'protest against the manner in which totems have been placed almost at the foundation of religion. Totemism ... has been exaggerated out of proportion to its real theological magnitude.... The rise and growth of ideas of deity, a branch of knowledge requiring the largest range of information and the greatest care in inference, cannot, I hold, be judged on the basis of a section of theology of secondary importance—namely, animal worship—much less of a special section of that—namely, the association of a species of animals (and of a vast variety of other things) 'with a clan of men which results in Totemism. A theoretical structure has been raised quite too wide and high for such a foundation.'[31]The totem god himself I regard as only the hypothesis by which certain barbaric races account to themselves for the survivals of Totemism among them. The so-called 'totem sacrament' is not 'god-eating,' but a piece of magic, used in ceremonies designed to foster—or to vex and annoy—the totem. As Mr. Tylor writes, 'till the totem sacrament is vouched forby some more real proof, it had better fall out of speculative theology.'

That the ancestors of the Aryan-speaking peoples passed through the 'stone age' of culture, few will deny. That they also passed through the totemic stage as regards marriage law is, however, a problem perhaps not to be solved. For reasons unknown, the 'white' races (not to speak of Egyptians, Babylonians, Chinese, and Japanese) have a peculiar aptitude for civilisation, are peculiarly accessible to ideas. It might therefore be argued that conceivably they were readily accessible to the idea of blood kinship. The maternal affection, in a race whose children (unlike the offspring of the lower animals) are so long in attaining maturity, cannot but suggest the idea of blood kinship. Among totemic peoples it seems that this idea was originally defined by the totem name, a definition at once too wide and too narrow. It is not physically unthinkable that our own ancestors may have been more acutely intelligent, and, if so, why should not they simply forbid unions between persons too near akin in blood? We have found no such moral or instinctive reason among totemic peoples who were, apparently, led to exogamy, first by non-moral causes, or causes in which the moral element was not explicit, and then, by aid of corollaries from rules thus based, came to forbid marriages of 'too near flesh.' Without the training of totemic institutions, it is hard to see how the Aryan-speaking peoples (however naturally gifted from the first) arrived at the same conception of incest. It seems absurd to suppose that black men and red men arrived at the idea of incest, and at the laws which prohibit it, by the devious and unpromising path of Totemism, while white men reached the same point in some other way. Yet if it has appeared difficult to find traces of Totemism among the Melanesians, much more difficult mustit be to prove that races with so long a civilised history as, for example, the Greeks, were once under totemic institutions.

I have already indicated my inclination to believe that Totemism has left its traces, in Greece, in the myths of descent from bulls, bears, swans, dogs, ants, and so forth, and in certain peculiar aspects of animal worship. It is usual for scholars to explain these facts away, as things borrowed by early Greeks from some other race. But 'the receiver is as bad as the thief,' and if Greeks were capable of accepting totemic ideas, they were capable of evolving totemic institutions. We are not to invent an ideal 'Aryan,' and then to explain all his traces of savagery as borrowings by him from some unknown prior race. There is no reason at all for supposing that the peoples who speak languages called, for convenience, 'Aryan,' were better bred than any other peoples at the beginning.

It would greatly add to the force of the presumptions in favour of an 'Aryan' totemic past, if we could point to apparent survivals not only in myth and early art, but in actual institutions. Now there are Greek institutions, in Attica, the 'deme,' thegenos, and thephratria, which may be interpreted, rightly or wrongly, as survivals of Totemism. We have seen that gens (equivalent to the Greek γένος) and that phratria (Φρατρία) are used, by certain students, to designate the totem kin, and the two 'primary exogamous divisions' (sayDilbiandKupathin) of Australia and North America. To use gens thus is misleading, especially as 'totem kin' is adequate and unambiguous. But we have here employed 'phratria' to designate the 'primary exogamous division,' because no better word is handy, while we do not maintain that the Attic phratria is a survival of the institution usual in Australia.

Messrs. Fison and Howitt, in an instructive paper, have offered, as a provisional hypothesis, the theory that the Attic deme (alocalassociation) may have arisen from the kind oflocaltribe (orhorde) in Australia, while the Attic phratriesand γένη (associations depending onbirthandkinship) were survivals of the 'primary exogamous divisions' and totem kins.[32]The present writer had made similar suggestions long ago.[33]Concerning the γένος and Φρατρία we know but little: inevitably, for we have seen that, even in Australia, still more in Melanesia,localnames andlocalcommunities are beginning to encroach on and usurp the authority of the totem kin, and other associations based on common blood, real or reputed. Infinitely more must this have been the case in Greece. If savage phratries and totem kins once existed in Attica, they must have been nearly obliterated long before the historical period. At most they would only survive in connection with ritual and religion. Again, our definitions of γένος and Φρατρία are derived from late grammarians and lexicographers. Thus our means of knowledge are limited and darkling.

Messrs. Howitt and Fison start from the horde, or tribe, the horde meaning the largest local Australian community, composed of subtribes, if we are not merely to say 'tribe,' and leave 'horde' out of the question. The members of the horde or tribe are, as we know, of many various totems, but of only two 'primary exogamous divisions' or phratries. Into these the members are born, mostly taking the mother's phratry and totem. As a rule, both father and mother belong to the tribe, but if a woman does come in out of an alien tribe, her children, though deriving totem and phratry names through her, are of their father's local tribe. An alien woman may be assigned, by the elder men, to this or that totem: or to the totem corresponding to that which she had in her own local tribe. The children of male aliens follow the totem of their mother, a member of the tribe.

In Attica, too, was alocalcommunity, the deme—thus Thucydides was a Halimusian by deme. The historical demes were organised by Cleisthenes, on a local basis. Some of them bore the names of the γένη which occupied them, and oftenthe names were derived from plants. Either these plants were characteristic of the localities, or conceivably the γένη had old totemic plant names, like the plum and other vegetable totems of the Australians. All about the local demes, the members of the phratriæ were scattered, like members of various totem names among the Australian local tribes. An alien could belong to a local deme, but not to a Φρατρία. His children, if by marriage with a free woman, were reckoned in her father's Φρατρία male descent prevailing, of course, in Attica. In Australia the tribes-woman's children by an alien would usually go to her totem and 'primary exogamous division.' The child of an alien woman, in Attica, even if the father was high born, could not be admitted to a Φρατρία: which certainly looks like a survival of the archaic reckoning by female descent. To try to insert an alien child in a deme was a civil, in a Φρατρία was a religious offence.[34]The ancient court of the Areopagus had to do with these offences against customary religion. Messrs. Fison and Howitt draw a parallel between the Areopagus and the Great Council of the Dieri tribe, whose headman was inspired by 'the great spirit Kuchi,' of whom one would like to know more.

An Attic boy was presented to his Φρατρία at once; full membership of the local deme came with adolescence, and after military training and service. As we know, a series of initiations, and instruction 'as to the existence of a great spirit,' with a probation of a year, are to be passed before the Australian lad is allowed to marry and attend the assembly of his local tribe. Better examples of initiation, and of a retreat in the hills in company with an adult, and instructor, are to be found in Sparta than in Athens. But the Australian 'and Attic analogies are pretty close. On the most important point there is no analogy. There were plenty of Φρατρίαι, of 'phratries' each Australian tribe has only two. Again, these two are exogamous: that is their mainraison d'être. We have not a glimpse of exogamy in the Φρατρία of Attica.

The γένος, we may agree, I think, with Messrs. Fison and Howitt, was, originally, like the totem kin, an association of persons supposed to be related by ties of blood. The grammarian Pollux says 'they who belonged to the γένος were styled γεννῆται' (men of the γένος, and 'men of the same milk'), 'not that they were related γένει, but they were so called from their union (or assemblage—ἐκ δὲ τῆς συνόδον).' What is meant by γένει μὲν οὐ προσήκοντες 'not genealogically related'? I conceive Pollux to mean that the members of the γένος were not all of traceable or recognised degrees of kinship. Thus a Cameron, if asked whether he is related to another Cameron, may say, and not so long ago would have said, 'he is not my relation, but my clansman.' Messrs. Fison and Howitt take much the same view. By 'relations,' Pollux meant 'such as parents, sons, brothers, and those before them, and their progeny,' that is, from grandfathers and granduncles to grandsons and great-nephews. This might be the notion of relationship in the time of Pollux, the second century of our era, but, as Messrs. Fison and Howitt justly remark, Attic ideas of kinship before the συνοικισμὸς ascribed to Theseus would be much more extensive, as in Scotland and Britanny. The humblest Stewart, Douglas, Ruthven, or Hamilton would call himself 'the King's poor cousin.' But the Greeks of our second century were more modern, more like the English.

Yet the very words γένος andgensindicate the idea of blood relationship, just as 'clan' does. The γένη had common sacra, and a common place of burial. They were clans, but we have no proof that they were ever exogamous or totemic. However, the myths and rituals of Greece certainly yield facts of which a totemic past seems the most plausible explanation. Mr. Jevons writes, 'we find fragments of the system' (Totemism), 'one here and another there, which, if only they had not been scattered, but had been found together, would have made a living whole. Thus we have families whose names indicate that they were originally totem clans,e.g.there were Cynadæ at Athens, as therewas a Dog clan among the Mohicans; but we have no evidence to show that the dog was sacred to the Cynadæ.... On the other hand, storks were revered by the Thessalians, but there is nothing to show that there was a stork clan in Thessaly.'[35]Wolves were buried solemnly in Attica, where there was a wolf hero, and lobsters were buried in Seriphos, like the gazelle in Arabia. But we have no evidence of a wolf kin in Attica, though we have in Italy (the Hirpi) nor of a lobster kin in Seriphos. (For other traces, fairly numerous, I may refer to myCustom and Myth, andMyth, Ritual, and Religion, while deprecating the idea that all worship or reverence of animals is of totemistic origin.)

It will probably be admitted that, if Greeks (or ancient dwellers on Greek soil) were at some remote period totemistic, and next, by reckoning descent in the male line, became attached to localities, then something like demes, phratries, and γένη might very naturally be evolved. And many traces in ritual, myth, and custom do point to Totemism in the remote past. Indeed, it is remarkable that we should still be able to point to so many apparent relics of institutions already almost obliterated among the Melanesians.

On the whole, I regard it as more probable than not, that, in the education of mankind, Totemism has played a part everywhere; a beneficent part. But this is only a private opinion: one believes in it as one believes in telepathy, without asserting that the evidence is of constraining value.

[1]Mr. Haddon agrees on this point.

[2]Codrington,The Melanesians, chaps, iii. iv.

[3]Op. cit.p. 21.

[4]Op. cit.p. 22.

[5]Ibid.p. 26.

[6]Op. cit.p. 32.

[7]Tylor,J. A. I., August, November. 1898, p. 147.

[8]Op. cit.p. 33.

[9]Ibid.p. 40.

[10]Ibid.p. 22.

[11]Dr. Codrington's exact words are 'Thebutois in all probability a form of the custom which prevails in Ulawa,' and the banana story follows.

[12]Op. cit.pp. 33, 59-68.

[13]Ibid.pp. 36-37.

[14]Ibid.p. 50.

[15]Op. cit.pp. 124-130.

[16]Danks,J. A. I.xviii. 3, 281-282.

[17]Ibid.pp. 131-132.

[18]Codrington,op. cit.pp. 154-156.

[19]Golden Bough, iii. 416-417.

[20]Mrs. Langloh Parker writes, concerning the Euahlayi Baiame-worshipping tribe of New South Wales: 'A person has often a second or individual totem of his name, not hereditary, and given him by thewirreenuns' (medicine men), 'called hisyunbeai, any hurt to which injures him, and which he may never eat—his hereditary totem he may. He is supposed to be able, if he be a greatwirreenun, to take the form of hisyunbeai, which will also give him assistance in time of trouble or danger, is a sort ofalter ego, as it were.' In this tribe theyunbeai(nyarong, nagual,manitu) is of more importance to the individual than his hereditary totem, which, however, by Baiame's law, regulates marriage, as elsewhere (Folk-Lore, x. 491, 492). The tribe studied by Mrs. Langloh Parker speaks a dialect (Euahlayi) akin to the Kamilaroi, but the Kamilaroi of Mr. Ridley are seated three or four hundred miles away.

[21]Roth, Ethnological Studies, 71-90. Dr. Roth gives the signs for the animals, but does not say that they are used for signalling totem names; indeed, he says nothing about totems.

[22]Origin of Civilisation, p. 183.

[23]Kamilaroi and Kurnai, p. 165. In his edition of 1902, Lord Avebury does not reply to these arguments.

[24]Kamilaroi and Kurnai, pp. 274-278.

[25]Spencer and Gillen, ch. vi.

[26]Dorsey, 'Omaha Sociology,'Bureau of Ethnology, 1881-1882, p. 225.

[27]Dorsey, 'Omaha Sociology,'Bureau of Ethnology, 1881-1882, pp. 238-239.

[28]Dorsey, 'Siouan Cults,'Bureau of Ethnology, 1889-1890 (1894), p. 537.

[29]Spencer and Gillen, pp. 169, 191.

[30]Nutt, 1900, pp. 108-112.

[31]J. A. I., August, November, 1898, p. 144.

[32]J.A.I.xiv. 142, 181.

[33]Politics of Aristotle, Bolland and Lang, 1876; 'Family' in Encyclopædia Britannica.

[34]Dem.Centra Neæram17.

[35]Introduction to the History of Religion, pp. 125-126.

Mr. Darwin on the primitive relations of the sexes.—Primitive man monogamous or polygamous.—His jealousy.—Expulsion of young males.— The author's inferences as to the evolution of Primal Law.—A customary Rule of Conduct evolved.—Traces surviving in savage life.—The customs of Avoidance.—Custom of Exogamy arose in the animal stage.—Brother and Sister Avoidance.—The author's own observation of this custom in New Caledonia.—Strangeness of such a custom among houseless nomads in Australia—Rapid decay under European influences.

'Man, as I have attempted to show, is certainly descended from some Apelike Creature. We may, indeed, conclude, from what we know of the jealousy of all Male Quadrupeds, armed as many of them are with special weapons for battling with their rivals, that promiscuous intercourse in a state of Nature is extremely improbable. Therefore, looking far enough back in the Stream of Time, and judging from the Social habits of Man as he now exists, the most probable view is that he aboriginally lived in small communities, each with a single wife, or, if powerful, with several, whom he jealously guarded against all other Men. Or he may not have been a social animal[1]and yet have lived with several wives like the Gorilla—for all the natives agree that but one adult male is seen in a band; when the young male grows up, a contest takes place for the mastery, and the strongest, by killing ordriving out the others, establishes himself as head of the Community.

'Younger males, being thus expelled and wandering about, would, when at last successful in finding a partner, prevent too close interbreeding within the limits of the same family.'[2]

Mr. Darwin, in the foregoing sentences, affirms the improbability of Promiscuity in the Sexual Relations of Man during the Animal Stage, and, incidentally, the Unity of the Human Race in its origin. Both theories are contested. The following thesis, however, on the Genesis of Primal Law in Human Marriage, treats of aconjecturalseries of events in the Ascent of Man, events which involve a state of the inter-sexual relationships amidst our primitive ancestors identical with that portrayed in theDescent of Man. My essay includes further, as regards the continued evolution of society, the development of a theory, based on my 'Primal Law,' which, if correct, would seem also to confirm Mr. Darwin's ideas as to Unity of Origin.

I am content, for my part, to hope that my hypothesis, however novel some of its conclusions, is in its general tenor in accord with the views of so great a naturalist as Mr. Darwin. His exposition of the probable relations, within the family group, of the male and female prototypes of mankind, and more especially of the antagonistic attitude, inter se, of the older and younger males, is indeed literally prophetic of the Primal Law, whose existence I surmise. This law is the inevitable corollary of Mr. Darwin's statement, if Man was ever to emerge from the Brute. My theory, in fact, viewed as to its genesis, is simply evolved from a consideration of the potential results of the attitude of such creatures as our ancestors then were, when subjected to the effects of those changes of environment, which alone, to my deeming, could have fixed modifications towards the human type. Mr. Darwin's premises, indeed, as to the Early Social economy of our Race in the animal stage, inevitablyentail, if progress was to be made, the evolution of law in regulation of Marriage relationship, having regard to the fierce sexual jealousy of the males, on the one hand, and on the other to the patent truth that in the peaceful aggregation of our ancestors alone lay the germ of Society.

This would above all be the case if, reasoning by analogy, we provisionally accept, as the probable nearest approach to man's direct ancestors, the actual Anthropoids. These, such as the Gorilla, are undoubtedly amongst the most unsocial of animals as regards the attitude of the adult malesinter se. From the very difficulty of the problem of the congregation of such creatures in friendly unison within the group, we may infer that, in its solution, there will be found the key to the whole question of the Ascent from Brute to Man. In that ascent, Habit, the parent of Law, must have been conquered, and modified into the direction of novel Custom, a shock to the older economy of life. Again, the new rule of conduct, necessarily inchoate (considering the presumed feeble intellectuality of the creatures concerned, animals more or less brutish) must yet be of facile interpretation to its subjects, though, as befitsHomo alalus, it must have been quite mute in operation. The new Rule of Conduct would not be expressed in terms of speech, a function,ex hypothesinot yet evolved. The rule, as it was to my mind, I here propose to attempt to unfold as the 'Primal Law;' hoping to show that therein lay the beginning of law and order, and that, whilst itself arising in a natural manner, in its incidental creation of a first standard of a possible right and wrong, it laid, so to speak, one of the foundations of that moral sense, which has seemed to place so wide a space between man and other creatures.

The prior existence of this law, in the semi-brutish stage of our physical and ethical evolution, might have been deductively evolved, even if no traces of it had remained to our day. It will be, however, my endeavour to point out that evidence of its existence (abundant as it appears to me) is to be found in certain obscure customs which are common tomost actual savage races. The customs of so-called 'avoidance' between near relations will have the principal interest for us, although primitive marriage and inheritance will be found of corroborative value. Survivals and myths can be shown to point to the undeniable occurrence of this 'Primal Law' in the earlier life-history of the non-civilised peoples. The myths, however, may be merely early guesses about the unknown past of the race.

Amongst marriage customs that which has given rise to most discussion as regards its origin is 'Exogamy' or marriage outside the family group, or outside the limit of the totem name. My general argument, as will be seen, places me in antagonism with all theories yet advanced on the subject. But Mr. Lang, inCustom and Myth, 1884 (p. 258), hazards, as his own impression, a conception of this matter which I will note—namely, that 'Exogamy, may be connected with some early idea of which we have lost touch,' and he adds, 'If we only knew the origin of the prohibition to marry within thefamily[3]all would be plain sailing.' However utterly beyond human ken, in these our latter days, any truthful image of so remote a past may seem to be, it is yet precisely this hypothetic early idea which I hope to be able to expose. (If I am correct, we shall find that it was connected with the sexual relations of primitive man,whilst in the animal stage, and especially with the mutual marital rights of the males within a group.) Such idea in travail, hastened and sharpened by needs of environment, created issues which necessarily gave birth to a 'Primal Law' prohibitory of marriage between certain members of a family or local group, and thus, in natural sequence, led toforcedconnubial unionbeyondits circle the family, or local group—that is, led to Exogamy. But if such was in reality the original order of succession in the growth of custom, it becomes evident that Exogamy as ahabit(not as an expressed law) must have been of primordial evolution. Thus (incontra-distinction to generally received opinion and to Mr. McLennan's theory in particular) Exogamy must have been a cause rather than an effect in relation to its ordinary concomitants, i.e. Female Infanticide as a custom, Polyandry as a fixed institution, and Totemism as connected with exogamous groups, within which marriage was forbidden. As thus my new hypothesis finds itself in opposition to those of recognised authorities, it is evident that it will require to account for all the facts if it is to hold its ground.

However convinced the author may be by the array of seemingly confirmatory details in favour of his hypothesis, it is possible that from their paucity they may yet to others seem to constitute but a feeble line of defensive proof. But if the theory shall prove in itself to have merit, this defect (arising, as I believe, from lack of general anthropological knowledge on my part, for I dwell 'far from books') will quickly be remedied, for a hundred other details in favour of my view will be at once perceived by more experienced students. Should my hypothesis really furnish the clue to the problem of the prohibition to marry within the family name, or totem name, all the rest will doubtless become 'plain sailing' in competent hands.

In any case before my conjecture is definitely laid aside as erroneous, it may, let us hope, be considered desirable to await fuller evidence as to the extent of the operation, in actual savage life, of that particular custom of 'Avoidance' which I consider, in its inception, and as the earliest law, to have been a 'vera causa' of widest operation in primitive social evolution. 'Avoidance' is, however, to-day, a mere faint image of a remote past, and its genetic significance has utterly faded from among even those people who yet, with strange conservatism, still blindly yield an everyday obedience to it, in form at least. Belonging to a class of savage habits presenting features so extraordinary, 'Avoidance between brother and sister' has ever been a puzzle to inquirers. This Avoidance is only the most obscure of all the numerous cases of the strange habit, but it is also that which, up to thepresent, seems least to have attracted the notice of anthropologists. In this class of custom, the Avoidance of which most frequent mention has been made in literature, is avoidance between mother-in-law and son-in-law, whereas that between brother and sister is to my knowledge but rarely mentioned.[4]And yet, as far as my own experience goes (and it extends over more than a quarter of a century among primitive peoples in the South Seas), Avoidance of brother and sister is not only as common as, but infinitely more strict and severe in action than, the Avoidance of 'Mothers-in-law.' It is indeed probable that the very severity of observance has led to its being so little noticed. For by the action of this law, a brother and a sister, after childhood, are kept so far apart from one another, that only those who have actually lived long amidst natives can be expected to have had a chance of being aware of the restraints to intercourse between them. Even then it would be from some such casual occurrence as the accidental rencontre of the two, placing them thus in sudden and unavoidable proximity to each other, which would lead to an observation, by an European, of their extraordinary attitude and behaviour under such circumstances.

My own attention was primarily only drawn to this matter by noting the grave scandal and excitement caused in a native community by the momentary isolation, in a canoe, of a brother and sister. The affair became so very serious for the brother that he disappeared from the tribe for over a year. Indeed, the rigorous severity of this particular law in daily action is almost incredible. In New Caledonia, for instance, all intercourse between a brother and sister by speech or sign is absolutely prohibited from a very early age. Whilst the girl will remain in the paternal home, the boy, at the age of seven or eight (when not, as is usual, adopted by the maternal uncle), only comes there for his meals, partaken again solely with the other males.[5]He dwells until marriedin the large general bachelors' hut, set apart for youths in all villages. Even after marriage, if brother and sister have to communicate with each other on family matters, such communication must be made through the intermediary of a third person, nor can the sister enter the brother's hut even after his marriage, despite the presence of her sister-in-law therein. If the two should unexpectedly meet in some narrow path, the girl will throw herself face downwards into the nearest bush, whilst the boy will pass without turning his head, and as if unaware of her presence.

They cannot mention each other's names, and if the sister's name is mentioned publicly before the brother, he will show much embarrassment, and if it is repeated he will retire precipitately. She can eat nothing he has carried or cooked. Whilst, then, such propinquity as is implied in the mutual habitation of the same hut by these two would be scandalously impossible, it is not uncommon to find a mother-in-law and son-in-law, whilst in Avoidance, living under the same roof. It is obvious that in the latter case each detail of 'Avoidance' in act or speech would be easily remarked by Europeans, whereas no chance of such observation between the adult brother and sister could possibly arise, they being kept, as we see, so utterly apart. It is to be noted, however, that the seemingly instinctive natural affection between two so nearly related is not quenched by these strange restraints. They remain interested in each other's welfare, and in cases of sickness, for instance, keep themselves informed of each other's condition through third persons. So great, however, is the depth in action (on these lines) of the feeling of avoidance in this matter, that I am convinced that the infanticide of twins, which only takes place in New Caledonia when the children are of different sexes, arises from the idea of a too close propinquity in the womb. Further evidence as to the very widespread existence of this custom in the South Seas I will leave to a later stage, only noting here that I have been astonished to find, in answer to inquiries, that it is well recognised amongst the aborigines, of Australia.

[Mr. Atkinson has left a blank space for an expected communication from the late Mr. Curr. On 'Avoidance' in Australia, between brother and sister, Messrs Spencer and Gillen write: 'A curious custom exists with regard to the mutual behaviour of elder and younger sisters and their brothers. A man may speak freely to his elder sisters in blood, but those who are tribalUngaraitchamust only be spoken to at a considerable distance. To younger sisters, blood and tribal, he may not speak, or, at least, only at such a distance that the features are indistinguishable.... We cannot discover any explanation of this restriction in regard to the younger sister; it can hardly be supposed that it has anything to do with the dread of anything like incest, else why is there not as strong a restriction in the case of the elder sisters?[6]

Now the occurrence of this particular habit amidst a race of nomad hunters, forced by the exigencies of the chase to wander about in isolated groups, composed for the most part of single families, and where the separation of the sexes cannot possibly be arranged, as with the hut and village dwelling Caledonians, is a most remarkable fact. When we take into consideration the disturbing effects of such an avoidance in the internal economy of such a family circle, the significance of the circumstance is great as regards our general argument. It becomes, indeed, evident that the fundamental cause of the custom involving this daily and hourly dislocation of domestic life, must lie very deep in savage society. If, however, our theory as to the idea which dominated the inception of this strange habit shall turn out to be correct, then it will be seen that no surprise need be felt, if the genesis of this rule should prove to be in the animal stage, that traces of the superstructure should exist to our day. Now that attention will perhaps be more closely drawn to this, till recently the least observed of the cases of Avoidance, I feel sure that proof of its existence will be found in abundance in the present orpast of all primitive peoples.[7]In view of its unexpectedly wide dissemination in Australia, hope may be felt that research will find it as a working factor in many peoples where its presence has been least expected, and not only in Australasia. It is possible that a stricter examination of the inner life of lower races in Africa and Asia will allow a perfectly legitimate inference that they are still under the influence of its effect, although the custom itself may be no longer in actual force. It is also possible, as I have said, that Survivals and Myths may point conclusively to its having had its day amongst the highest nations, with whom all traditions of it have been lost before the dawn of history. [Rather the reverse is the case; see the marriage of Zeus and Hera, brother and sister, and of the Incas, &c.—A. L.]

In many cases philological evidence based on the derivation of the root syllable of the word 'sister, a word which in the tongues of peoples still obedient to this law is from a root implying 'Avoidance,' may afford affirmative proof, as circumstantial as unexpected, that this custom was once as universal as my theory would require.'[8]If difficulty is felt in the acceptation of an hypothesis of such wide significance, simply based on an obscure lower custom so little noted in anthropological literature as to permit doubts of its existence, I can only repeat that a cognisance of the traits of this particular habit of avoidance and its effect as a factor in savage life demands such conditions of residence and chances of observation, as can fall to the lot of few. I may add that it is one of the very first customs to disappear after contact with whites, especially missionaries, being, as it is, in such extreme divergence with the economy of the European family, in regard to the mutual attitude of brother and sister.

It is more than a quarter of a century since the author had his attention first drawn to the practice. The evolution ofthe idea of its possible identity with the Primal Law has led to a continued and close observation; he is thus able to certify as to its rapid disappearance. Brother and sister avoidance was at that time, thirty years ago, quite universal in New Caledonia; now in many places it is unknown, even as a tradition, among the younger aborigines. In view of the probability of a similar oblivion among other peoples, the immediate collection of evidence is urgent, and further delay seems dangerous and even culpable.

Thus, however much to the present advantage of the theory as regards the custom it would have been to cull larger proofs from that vast field of literature only to be procured in older lands, it has seemed desirable to make this thesis public without further delay. As we have said, if the theory is correct, wider students will bring forward cogent facts in further proof from existing knowledge, whilst continued research should afford evidence so complete of the widespread existence of the custom in the present and past of the human race, as to render my speculation as to its origin less seemingly illegitimate.[9]

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