The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life Part 9

They imply that all the things thus cla.s.sed in a single clan or a single phratry are closely related both to each other and to the thing serving as the totem of this clan or phratry. When an Australian of the Port Mackay tribe says that the sun, snakes, etc., are of the Yungaroo phratry, he does not mean merely to apply a common, but none the less a purely conventional, nomenclature to these different things; the word has an objective signification for him. He believes that "alligators really _are_ Yungaroo and that kangaroos are Wootaroo. The sun _is_ Yungaroo, the moon Wootaroo, and so on for the constellations, trees, plants, etc."[453] An internal bond attaches them to the group in which they are placed; they are regular members of it. It is said that they belong to the group,[454] just exactly as the individual men make a part of it; consequently, the same sort of a relation unites them to these latter. Men regard the things in their clan as their relatives or a.s.sociates; they call them their friends and think that they are made out of the same flesh as themselves.[455] Therefore, between the two there are elective affinities and quite special relations of agreement.

Things and people have a common name, and in a certain way they naturally understand each other and harmonize with one another. For example, when a Wakelbura of the Mallera phratry is buried, the scaffold upon which the body is exposed "must be made of the wood of some tree belonging to the Mallera phratry."[456] The same is true for the branches that cover the corpse. If the deceased is of the Banbe cla.s.s, a Banbe tree must be used. In this same tribe, a magician can use in his art only those things which belong to his own phratry;[457] since the others are strangers to him, he does not know how to make them obey him.

Thus a bond of mystic sympathy unites each individual to those beings, whether living or not, which are a.s.sociated with him; the result of this is a belief in the possibility of deducing what he will do or what he has done from what they are doing. Among these same Wakelbura, when a man dreams that he has killed an animal belonging to a certain social division, he expects to meet a man of this same division the next day.[458] Inversely, the things attributed to a clan or phratry cannot be used against the members of this clan or phratry. Among the Wotjobaluk, each phratry has its own special trees. Now in hunting an animal of the Gurogity phratry, only arms whose wood is taken from trees of the other phratry may be used, and _vice versa_; otherwise the hunter is sure to miss his aim.[459] The native is convinced that the arrow would turn of itself and refuse, so to speak, to hit a kindred and friendly animal.

Thus the men of the clan and the things which are cla.s.sified in it form by their union a solid system, all of whose parts are united and vibrate sympathetically. This organization, which at first may have appeared to us as purely logical, is at the same time moral. A single principle animates it and makes its unity: this is the totem. Just as a man who belongs to the Crow clan has within him something of this animal, so the rain, since it is of the same clan and belongs to the same totem, is also necessarily considered as being "the same thing as a crow"; for the same reason, the moon is a black c.o.c.katoo, the sun a white c.o.c.katoo, every black-nut tree a pelican, etc. All the beings arranged in a single clan, whether men, animals, plants or inanimate objects, are merely forms of the totemic being. This is the meaning of the formula which we have just cited and this is what makes the two really of the same species: all are really of the same flesh in the sense that all partake of the nature of the totemic animal. Also, the qualifiers given them are those given to the totem.[460] The Wotjobaluk give the name _Mir_ both to the totem and to the things cla.s.sed with it.[461] It is true that among the Arunta, where visible traces of cla.s.sification still exist, as we shall see, different words designate the totem and the other beings placed with it; however, the name given to these latter bears witness to the close relations which unite them to the totemic animal. It is said that they are its _intimates_, its _a.s.sociates_, its _friends_; it is believed that they are inseparable from it.[462] So there is a feeling that these are very closely related things.

But we also know that the totemic animal is a sacred being. All the things that are cla.s.sified in the clan of which it is the emblem have this same character, because in one sense, they are animals of the same species, just as the man is. They, too, are sacred, and the cla.s.sifications which locate them in relation to the other things of the universe, by that very act give them a place in the religious world. For this reason, the animals or plants among these may not be eaten freely by the human members of the clan. Thus in the Mount Gambier tribe, the men whose totem is a certain non-poisonous snake must not merely refrain from eating the flesh of this snake; that of seals, eels, etc., is also forbidden to them.[463] If, driven by necessity, they do eat some of it, they must at least attenuate the sacrilege by expiatory rites, just as if they had eaten the totem itself.[464] Among the Euahlayi, where it is permitted to use the totem, but not to abuse it, the same rule is applied to the other members of the clan.[465] Among the Arunta, the interdictions protecting the totemic animal extend over the a.s.sociated animals;[466] and in any case, particular attention must be given to these latter.[467] The sentiments inspired by the two are identical.[468]

But the fact that the things thus attached to the totem are not of a different nature from it, and consequently have a religious character, is best proved by the fact that on certain occasions they fulfil the same functions. They are accessory or secondary totems, or, according to an expression now consecrated by usage, they are sub-totems.[469] It is constantly happening in the clans that under the influence of various sympathies, particular affinities are forming, smaller groups and more limited a.s.sociations arise, which tend to lead a relatively autonomous life and to form a new subdivision like a sub-clan within the larger one. In order to distinguish and individualize itself, this sub-clan needs a special totem or, consequently, a sub-totem.[470] Now the totems of these secondary groups are chosen from among the things cla.s.sified under the princ.i.p.al totem. So they are always almost totems and the slightest circ.u.mstance is enough to make them actually so. There is a latent totemic nature in them, which shows itself as soon as conditions permit it or demand it. It thus happens that a single individual has two totems, a princ.i.p.al totem common to the whole clan and a sub-totem which is special to the sub-clan of which he is a member. This is something a.n.a.logous to the _nomen_ and _cognomen_ of the Romans.[471]

Sometimes we see a sub-clan emanc.i.p.ate itself completely and become an autonomous group and an independent clan; then, the sub-totem, on its side, becomes a regular totem. One tribe where this process of segmentation has been pushed to the limit, so to speak, is the Arunta.

The information contained in the first book of Spencer and Gillen showed that there were some sixty totems among the Arunta;[472] but the recent researches of Strehlow have shown the number to be much larger. He counted no less than 442.[473] Spencer and Gillen did not exaggerate at all when they said, "In fact, there is scarcely an object, animate or inanimate, to be found in the country occupied by the natives which does not give its name to some totemic group."[474] Now this mult.i.tude of totems, whose number is prodigious when compared to the population, is due to the fact that under special circ.u.mstances, the original clans have divided and sub-divided infinitely; consequently nearly all the sub-totems have pa.s.sed to the stage of totems.

This has been definitely proved by the observations of Strehlow. Spencer and Gillen cited only certain isolated cases of a.s.sociated totems.[475]

Strehlow has shown that this is in reality an absolutely general organization. He has been able to draw up a table where nearly all the totems of the Arunta are cla.s.sified according to this principle: all are attached, either as a.s.sociates or as auxiliaries, to some sixty princ.i.p.al totems.[476] The first are believed to be in the service of the second.[477] This state of dependence is very probably the echo of a time when the "allies" of to-day were only sub-totems, and consequently when the tribe contained only a small number of clans subdivided into sub-clans. Numerous survivals confirm this hypothesis.

It frequently happens that two groups thus a.s.sociated have the same totemic emblem: now this unity of emblem is explicable only if the two groups were at first only one.[478] The relation of the two clans is also shown by the part and the interest that each one takes in the rites of the other. The two cults are still only imperfectly separated; this is very probably because they were at first completely intermingled.[479] Tradition explains the bonds which unite them by imagining that formerly the two clans occupied neighbouring places.[480]

In other cases, the myth says expressly that one of them was derived from the other. It is related that at first the a.s.sociated animal belonged to the species still serving as princ.i.p.al totem; it differentiated itself at a later period. Thus the chantunga birds, which are a.s.sociated with the witchetly grub to-day, were witchetly grubs in fabulous times, who later transformed themselves into birds. Two species which are now attached to the honey-ant were formerly honey-ants, etc.[481] This transformation of a sub-totem into a totem goes on by imperceptible degrees, so that in certain cases the situation is undecided, and it is hard to say whether one is dealing with a princ.i.p.al totem or a secondary one.[482] As Howitt says in regard to the Wotjobaluk, there are sub-totems which are totems in formation.[483]

Thus the different things cla.s.sified in a clan const.i.tute, as it were, so many nuclei around which new totemic cults are able to form. This is the best proof of the religious sentiments which they inspire. If they did not have a sacred character, they could not be promoted so easily to the same dignity as the things which are sacred before all others, the regular totems.

So the field of religious things extends well beyond the limits within which it seemed to be confined at first. It embraces not only the totemic animals and the human members of the clan; but since no known thing exists that is not cla.s.sified in a clan and under a totem, there is likewise nothing which does not receive to some degree something of a religious character. When, in the religions which later come into being, the G.o.ds properly so-called appear, each of them will be set over a special category of natural phenomena, this one over the sea, that one over the air, another over the harvest or over fruits, etc., and each of these provinces of nature will be believed to draw what life there is in it from the G.o.d upon whom it depends. This division of nature among the different divinities const.i.tutes the conception which these religions give us of the universe. Now so long as humanity has not pa.s.sed the phase of totemism, the different totems of the tribe fulfil exactly the same functions that will later fall upon the divine personalities. In the Mount Gambier tribe, which we have taken as our princ.i.p.al example, there are ten clans; consequently the entire world is divided into ten cla.s.ses, or rather into ten families, each of which has a special totem as its basis. It is from this basis that the things cla.s.sed in the clan get all their reality, for they are thought of as variant forms of the totemic being; to return to our example, the rain, thunder, lightning, clouds, hail and winter are regarded as different sorts of crows. When brought together, these ten families of things make up a complete and systematic representation of the world; and this representation is religious, for religious notions furnish its basis. Far from being limited to one or two categories of beings, the domain of totemic religion extends to the final limits of the known universe. Just like the Greek religion, it puts the divine everywhere; the celebrated formula [Greek: panta plere theon] (everything is full of the G.o.ds), might equally well serve it as motto.

However, if totemism is to be represented thus, the notion of it which has long been held must be modified on one essential point. Until the discoveries of recent years, it was made to consist entirely in the cult of one particular totem, and it was defined as the religion of the clan.

From this point of view, each tribe seemed to have as many totemic religions, each independent of the others, as it had different clans.

This conception was also in harmony with the idea currently held of the clan; in fact, this was regarded as an autonomous society,[484] more or less closed to other similar societies, or having only external and superficial relations with these latter. But the reality is more complex. Undoubtedly, the cult of each totem has its home in the corresponding clan; it is there, and only there, that it is celebrated; it is members of the clan who have charge of it; it is through them that it is transmitted from one generation to another, along with the beliefs which are its basis. But it is also true that the different totemic cults thus practised within a single tribe do not have a parallel development, though remaining ignorant of each other, as if each of them const.i.tuted a complete and self-sufficing religion. On the contrary, they mutually imply each other; they are only the parts of a single whole, the elements of a single religion. The men of one clan never regard the beliefs of neighbouring clans with that indifference, scepticism or hostility which one religion ordinarily inspires for another which is foreign to it; they partake of these beliefs themselves. The Crow people are also convinced that the Snake people have a mythical serpent as ancestor, and that they owe special virtues and marvellous powers to this origin. And have we not seen that at least in certain conditions, a man may eat a totem that is not his own only after he has observed certain ritual formalities? Especially, he must demand the permission of the men of this totem, if any are present. So for him also, this food is not entirely profane; he also admits that there are intimate affinities between the members of a clan of which he is not a member and the animal whose name they bear. Also, this community of belief is sometimes shown in the cult. If in theory the rites concerning a totem can be performed only by the men of this totem, nevertheless representatives of different clans frequently a.s.sist at them. It sometimes happens that their part is not simply that of spectators; it is true that they do not officiate, but they decorate the officiants and prepare the service. They themselves have an interest in its being celebrated; therefore, in certain tribes, it is they who invite the qualified clan to proceed with the ceremonies.[485] There is even a whole cycle of rites which must take place in the presence of the a.s.sembled tribe: these are the totemic ceremonies of initiation.[486]

Finally, the totemic organization, such as we have just described it, must obviously be the result of some sort of an indistinct understanding between all the members of the tribe. It is impossible that each clan should have made its beliefs in an absolutely independent manner; it is absolutely necessary that the cults of the different totems should be in some way adjusted to each other, since they complete one another exactly. In fact, we have seen that normally a single totem is not repeated twice in the same tribe, and that the whole universe is divided up among the totems thus const.i.tuted in such a way that the same object is not found in two different clans. So methodical a division could never have been made without an agreement, tacit or planned, in which the whole tribe partic.i.p.ated. So the group of beliefs which thus arise are partially (but only partially) a tribal affair.[487]

To sum up, then, in order to form an adequate idea of totemism, we must not confine ourselves within the limits of the clan, but must consider the tribe as a whole. It is true that the particular cult of each clan enjoys a very great autonomy; we can now see that it is within the clan that the active ferment of the religious life takes place. But it is also true that these cults fit into each other and the totemic religion is a complex system formed by their union, just as Greek polytheism was made by the union of all the particular cults addressed to the different divinities. We have just shown that, thus understood, totemism also has it cosmology.

CHAPTER IV

TOTEMIC BELIEFS--_end_

_The Individual Totem and the s.e.xual Totem_

Up to the present, we have studied totemism only as a public inst.i.tution: the only totems of which we have spoken are common to a clan, a phratry or, in a sense, to a tribe;[488] an individual has a part in them only as a member of a group. But we know that there is no religion which does not have an individual aspect. This general observation is applicable to totemism. In addition to the impersonal and collective totems which hold the first place, there are others which are peculiar to each individual, which express his personality, and whose cult he celebrates in private.

I

In certain Australian tribes, and in the majority of the Indian tribes of North America,[489] each individual personally sustains relations with some determined object, which are comparable to those which each clan sustains with its totem. This is sometimes an inanimate being or an artificial object; but it is generally an animal. In certain cases, a special part of the organism, such as the head, the feet or the liver, fulfils this office.[490]

The name of the thing also serves as the name of the individual. It is his personal name, his forename, which is added to that of the collective totem, as the _praenomen_ of the Romans was to the _nomen gentilicium_. It is true that this fact is not reported except in a certain number of societies,[491] but it is probably general. In fact, we shall presently show that there is an ident.i.ty of nature between the individual and the thing; now an ident.i.ty of nature implies one of name.

Being given in the course of especially important religious ceremonies, this forename has a sacred character. It is not p.r.o.nounced in the ordinary circ.u.mstances of profane life. It even happens that the word designating this object in the ordinary language must be modified to a greater or less extent if it is to serve in this particular case.[492]

This is because the terms of the usual language are excluded from the religious life.

In certain American tribes, at least, this name is reinforced by an emblem belonging to each individual and representing, under various forms, the thing designated by the name. For example, each Mandan wears the skin of the animal of which he is the namesake.[493] If it is a bird, he decorates himself with its feathers.[494] The Hurons and Algonquins tattoo their bodies with its image.[495] It is represented on their arms.[496] Among the north-western tribes, the individual emblem, just like the collective emblem of the clan, is carved or engraved on the utensils, houses,[497] etc.; it serves as a mark of ownership.[498]

Frequently the two coats-of-arms are combined together, which partially explains the great diversity of aspects presented by the totemic escutcheons among these peoples.[499]

Between the individual and his animal namesake there exist the very closest bonds. The man partic.i.p.ates in the nature of the animal; he has its good qualities as well as its faults. For example, a man having the eagle as his coat-of-arms is believed to possess the gift of seeing into the future; if he is named after a bear, they say that he is apt to be wounded in combat, for the bear is heavy and slow and easily caught;[500] if the animal is despised, the man is the object of the same sentiment.[501] The relationship of the two is even so close that it is believed that in certain circ.u.mstances, especially in case of danger, the man can take the form of the animal.[502] Inversely, the animal is regarded as a double of the man, as his _alter ego_.[503] The a.s.sociation of the two is so close that their destinies are frequently thought to be bound up together: nothing can happen to one without the other's feeling a reaction.[504] If the animal dies, the life of the man is menaced. Thus it comes to be a very general rule that one should not kill the animal, nor eat its flesh. This interdiction, which, when concerning the totem of the clan, allows of all sorts of attenuations and modifications, is now much more formal and absolute.[505]

On its side, the animal protects the man and serves him as a sort of patron. It informs him of possible dangers and of the way of escaping them;[506] they say that it is his friend.[507] Since it frequently happens to possess marvellous powers, it communicates them to its human a.s.sociate, who believes in them, even under the proof of bullets, arrows, and blows of every sort.[508] This confidence of an individual in the efficacy of his protector is so great that he braves the greatest dangers and accomplishes the most disconcerting feats with an intrepid serenity: faith gives him the necessary courage and strength.[509]

However, the relations of a man with his patron are not purely and simply those of dependence. He, on his side, is able to act upon the animal. He gives it orders; he has influence over it. A Kurnai having the shark as ally and friend believes that he can disperse the sharks who menace a boat, by means of a charm.[510] In other cases, the relations thus contracted are believed to confer upon the man a special apt.i.tude for hunting the animal with success.[511]

The very nature of these relations seems clearly to imply that the being to which each individual is thus a.s.sociated is only an individual itself, and not a species. A man does not have a species as his _alter ego_. In fact, there are cases where it is certainly a certain determined tree, rock or stone that fulfils this function.[512] It must be thus every time that it is an animal, and that the existences of the animal and the man are believed to be connected. A man could not be united so closely to a whole species, for there is not a day nor, so to speak, an instant when the species does not lose some one of its members. Yet the primitive has a certain incapacity for thinking of the individual apart from the species; the bonds uniting him to the one readily extend to the other; he confounds the two in the same sentiment.

Thus the entire species becomes sacred for him.[513]

This protector is naturally given different names in different societies: _nagual_ among the Indians of Mexico,[514] _manitou_ among the Algonquins and _okki_ among the Hurons,[515] _snam_ among certain Salish,[516] _sulia_ among others,[517] _budjan_ among the Yuin,[518]

_yunbeai_ among the Euahlayi,[519] etc. Owing to the importance of these beliefs and practices among the Indians of North America, some have proposed creating a word _nagualism_ or _manitouism_ to designate them.[520] But in giving them a special and distinctive name, we run the risk of misunderstanding their relations with the rest of totemism. In fact, the same principle is applied in the one case to the clan and in the other to the individual. In both cases we find the same belief that there are vital connections between the things and the men, and that the former are endowed with special powers, of which their human allies may also enjoy the advantage. We also find the same custom of giving the man the name of the thing with which he is a.s.sociated and of adding an emblem to this name. The totem is the patron of the clan, just as the patron of the individual is his personal totem. So it is important that our terminology should make the relationship of the two systems apparent; that is why we, with Frazer, shall give the name _individual totemism_ to the cult rendered by each individual to his patron. A further justification of this expression is found in the fact that in certain cases the primitive himself uses the same word to designate the totem of the clan and the animal protector of the individual.[521] If Tylor and Powell have rejected this term and demanded different ones for these two sorts of religious inst.i.tutions, it is because the collective totem is, in their opinion, only a name or label, having no religious character.[522] But we, on the contrary, know that it is a sacred thing, and even more so than the protecting animal. Moreover, the continuation of our study will show how these two varieties of totemism are inseparable from each other.[523]

Yet, howsoever close the kinship between these two inst.i.tutions may be, there are important differences between them. While the clan believes that it is the offspring of the animal or plant serving it as totem, the individual does not believe that he has any relationship of descent with his personal totem. It is a friend, an a.s.sociate, a protector; but it is not a relative. He takes advantage of the virtues it is believed to possess; but he is not of the same blood. In the second place, the members of a clan allow neighbouring clans to eat of the animal whose name they bear collectively, under the simple condition that the necessary formalities shall be observed. But, on the contrary, the individual respects the species to which his personal totem belongs and also protects it against strangers, at least in those parts where the destiny of the man is held to be bound up with that of the animal.

But the chief difference between these two sorts of totems is in the manner in which they are acquired.

The collective totem is a part of the civil status of each individual: it is generally hereditary; in any case, it is birth which designates it, and the wish of men counts for nothing. Sometimes the child has the totem of his mother (Kamilaroi, Dieri, Urabunna, etc.); sometimes that of his father (Narrinyeri, Warramunga, etc.); sometimes the one predominating in the locality where his mother conceived (Arunta, Loritja). But, on the contrary, the individual totem is acquired by a deliberate act:[524] a whole series of ritual operations are necessary to determine it. The method generally employed by the Indians of North America is as follows. About the time of p.u.b.erty, as the time for initiation approaches, the young man withdraws into a distant place, for example, into a forest. There, during a period varying from a few days to several years, he submits himself to all sorts of exhausting and unnatural exercises. He fasts, mortifies himself and inflicts various mutilations upon himself. Now he wanders about, uttering violent cries and veritable howls; now he lies extended, motionless and lamenting, upon the ground. Sometimes he dances, prays and invokes his ordinary divinities. At last, he thus gets himself into an extreme state of super-excitation, verging on delirium. When he has reached this paroxysm, his representations readily take on the character of hallucinations. "When," says Heckewelder, "a boy is on the eve of being initiated, he is submitted to an alternating regime of fasts and medical treatment; he abstains from all food and takes the most powerful and repugnant drugs: at times, he drinks intoxicating concoctions until his mind really wanders. Then he has, or thinks he has, visions and extraordinary dreams to which he was of course predisposed by all this training. He imagines himself flying through the air, advancing under the ground, jumping from one mountain-top to another across the valleys, and fighting and conquering giants and monsters."[525] If in these circ.u.mstances he sees, or, as amounts to the same thing, he thinks he sees, while dreaming or while awake, an animal appearing to him in an att.i.tude seeming to show friendly intentions, then he imagines that he has discovered the patron he awaited.[526]

Yet this procedure is rarely employed in Australia.[527] On this continent, the personal totem seems to be imposed by a third party, either at birth[528] or at the moment of initiation.[529] Generally it is a relative who takes this part, or else a personage invested with special powers, such as an old man or a magician. Sometimes divination is used for this purpose. For example, on Charlotte Bay, Cape Bedford or the Proserpine River, the grandmother or some other old woman takes a little piece of umbilical cord to which the placenta is still attached and whirls it about quite violently. Meanwhile the other old women propose different names. That one is adopted which happens to be p.r.o.nounced just at the moment when the cord breaks.[530] Among the Yarrai-kanna of Cape York, after a tooth has been knocked out of the young initiate, they give him a little water to rinse his mouth and ask him to spit in a bucket full of water. The old men carefully examine the clot formed by the blood and saliva thus spit out, and the natural object whose shape it resembles becomes the personal totem of the young man.[531] In other cases, the totem is transmitted from one individual to another, for example from father to son, or uncle to nephew.[532]

This method is also used in America. In a case reported by Hill Tout, the operator was a shaman,[533] who wished to transmit his totem to his nephew. "The uncle took the symbol of his _snam_ (his personal totem), which in this case was a dried bird's skin, and bade his nephew breathe upon it. He then blew upon it also himself, uttered some mystic words and the dried skin seemed to Paul (the nephew) to become a living bird, which flew about them a moment or two and then finally disappeared.

Paul was then instructed by his uncle to procure that day a bird's skin of the same kind as his uncle's and wear it on his person. This he did, and that night he had a dream, in which the _snam_ appeared to him in the shape of a human being, disclosed to him its mystic name by which it might be summoned, and promised him protection."[534]

Not only is the individual totem acquired and not given, but ordinarily the acquisition of one is not obligatory. In the first place, there are a mult.i.tude of tribes in Australia where the custom seems to be absolutely unknown.[535] Also, even where it does exist, it is frequently optional. Thus among the Euahlayi, while all the magicians have individual totems from which they get their powers, there are a great number of laymen who have none at all. It is a favour given by the magician, but which he reserves for his friends, his favourites and those who aspire to becoming his colleagues.[536] Likewise, among certain Salish, persons desiring to excel especially either in fighting or in hunting, or aspirants to the position of shaman, are the only ones who provide themselves with protectors of this sort.[537] So among certain peoples, at least, the individual totem seems to be considered an advantage and convenient thing rather than a necessity. It is a good thing to have, but a man can do without one. Inversely, a man need not limit himself to a single totem; if he wishes to be more fully protected, nothing hinders his seeking and acquiring several,[538] and if the one he has fulfils its part badly, he can change it.[539]

But while it is more optional and free, individual totemism contains within it a force of resistance never attained by the totemism of the clan. One of the chief informers of Hill Tout was a baptized Salish; however, though he had sincerely abandoned the faith of his fathers, and though he had become a model catechist, still his faith in the efficacy of the personal totems remained unshaken.[540] Similarly, though no visible traces of collective totemism remain in civilized countries, the idea that there is a connection between each individual and some animal, plant or other object, is at the bottom of many customs still observable in many European countries.[541]

II

Between collective totemism and individual totemism there is an intermediate form partaking of the characteristics of each: this is s.e.xual totemism. It is found only in Australia and in a small number of tribes. It is mentioned especially in Victoria and New South Wales.[542]

Mathews, it is true, claims to have observed it in all the parts of Australia that he has visited, but he gives no precise facts to support this affirmation.[543]

Among these different peoples, all the men of the tribe on the one hand, and all the women on the other, to whatever special clan they may belong, form, as it were, two distinct and even antagonistic societies.

Now each of these two s.e.xual corporations believes that it is united by mystical bonds to a determined animal. Among the Kurnai, all the men think they are brothers, as it were, of the emu-wren (Yeer[)u]ng), all the women, that they are as sisters of the linnet (Djeetg[)u]n); all the men are Yeer[)u]ng and all the women are Djeetg[)u]n. Among the Wotjobaluk and the Wurunjerri, it is the bat and the _nightjar_ (a species of screech-owl) respectively who take this role. In other tribes, the woodp.e.c.k.e.r is subst.i.tuted for the _nightjar_. Each s.e.x regards the animal to which it is thus related as a sort of protector which must be treated with the greatest regard; it is also forbidden to kill and eat it.[544]

Thus this protecting animal plays the same part in relation to the s.e.xual society that the totem of the clan plays to this latter group. So the expression s.e.xual totemism, which we borrow from Frazer,[545] is justified. This new sort of totem resembles that of the clan particularly in that it, too, is collective; it belongs to all the people of one s.e.x indiscriminately. It also resembles this form in that it implies a relationship of descent and consanguinity between the animal patron and the corresponding s.e.x: among the Kurnai, all the men are believed to be descended from Yeer[)u]ng and all the women from Djeetg[)u]n.[546] The first observer to point out this curious inst.i.tution described it, in 1834, in the following terms: "Tilmun, a little bird the size of a thrush (it is a sort of woodp.e.c.k.e.r), is supposed by the women to be the first maker of women. These birds are held in veneration by the women only."[547] So it was a great ancestor.

But in other ways, this same totem resembles the individual totem. In fact, it is believed that each member of a s.e.xual group is personally united to a determined individual of the corresponding animal species.

The two lives are so closely a.s.sociated that the death of the animal brings about that of the man. "The life of a bat," say the Wotjobaluk, "is the life of a man."[548] That is why each s.e.x not only respects its own totem, but forces the members of the other to do so as well. Every violation of this interdiction gives rise to actual b.l.o.o.d.y battles between the men and the women.[549]

Finally, the really original feature of these totems is that they are, in a sense, a sort of tribal totems. In fact, they result from men's representing the tribe as descended as a whole from one couple of mythical beings. Such a belief seems to demonstrate clearly that the tribal sentiment has acquired sufficient force to resist, at least to a considerable extent, the particularism of the clans. In regard to the distinct origins a.s.signed to men and to women, it must be said that its cause is to be sought in the separate conditions in which the men and the women live.[550]

It would be interesting to know how the s.e.xual totems are related to the totems of the clans, according to the theory of the Australians, what relations there were between the two ancestors thus placed at the commencement of the tribe, and from which one each special clan is believed to be descended. But the ethnographical data at our present disposal do not allow us to resolve these questions. Moreover, however natural and even necessary it may appear to us, it is very possible that the natives never raised it. They do not feel the need of co-ordinating and systematizing their beliefs as strongly as we do.[551]

CHAPTER V