The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 09 of 12)

C. M. Pleyte, “Ethnographische Beschrijving der Kei-eilanden,” Tijdschrift van het Nederlandsch Aardrijkskundig Genootschap, Tweede Serie, x. (1893) pp. 834 sq. A briefer account of the custom had previously been given by J. G. F. Riedel (De sluik- en kroesharige rassen tusschen Selebes en Papua, The Hague, 1886, p. 239).

321

J. T. Nieuwenhuisen en H. C. B. von Rosenberg, “Verslag omtrent het eiland Nias,” Verhandelingen van het Bataviaasch Genootschap van Kunsten en Wetenschapen, xxx. (Batavia, 1863) pp. 116 sq.; H. von Rosenberg, Der Malayische Archipel (Leipsic, 1878), pp. 174 sq. Compare L. N. H. A. Chatelin, “Godsdienst en Bijgeloof der Niassers,” Tijdschrift voor Indische Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde, xxvi. (1880) p. 139; E. Modigliani, Un Viaggio a Nías (Milan, 1890), pp. 195, 382. The Dyaks also drive the devil at the point of the sword from a house where there is sickness. See C. Hupe, “Korte verhandeling over de godsdienst, zeden, enz. der Dajakkers,” Tijdschrift voor Neérlands Indië, 1846, dl. iii. p. 149.

322

Fr. Kramer, “Der Götzendienst der Niasser,” Tijdschrift voor Indische Taal- Land- en Volkenkunde, xxxiii. (1890) pp. 486-488.

323

Herodotus, i. 172.

324

G. C. Wheeler, “Sketch of the Totemism and Religion of the People of the Islands in the Bougainville Straits (Western Solomon Islands),” Archiv für Religionswissenschaft, xv. (1912) pp. 49, 51 sq.

325

C. J. F. S. Forbes, British Burma (London, 1878), p. 233; Shway Yoe, The Burman, his Life and Notions (London, 1882), i. 282, ii. 105 sqq.; A. Bastian, Die Völker des östlichen Asien, ii. 98; Max and Bertha Ferrars, Burma (London, 1900), p. 128.

326

(Sir) J. George Scott and J. P. Hardiman, Gazetteer of Upper Burma and the Shan States, Part ii. vol. i. (Rangoon, 1901) p. 440.

327

T. H. Lewin, Wild Tribes of South-Eastern India (London, 1870), p. 226.

328

J. J. M. de Groot, The Religious System of China, vi. (Leyden, 1910) pp. 981 sqq.; id., The Religion of the Chinese (New York, 1910), pp. 40 sqq.

329

This description is taken from a newspaper-cutting, which was sent to me from the west of Scotland in October 1890, but without the name or date of the paper. The account, which is headed “Exorcism of the Pest Demon in Japan,” purports to be derived from a series of notes on medical customs of the Japanese, which were contributed by Dr. C. H. H. Hall, of the U.S. Navy, to the Sei-I Kwai Medical Journal. Compare Lafcadio Hearn, Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan (London, 1894), i. 147.

330

Masanao Koike, “Zwei Jahren in Korea,” Internationales Archiv für Ethnographie, iv. (1891) p. 10; Mrs. Bishop, Korea and her Neighbours (London, 1898), ii. 240.

331

Lettres édifiantes et curieuses, Nouvelle Édition (Paris, 1780-1783), xvi. 206. It will be noticed that in this and the preceding case the principle of expulsion is applied for the benefit of an individual, not of a whole community. Yet the method of procedure in both is so similar to that adopted in the cases under consideration that I have allowed myself to cite them.

332

G. Zündel, “Land und Volk der Eweer auf der Sclavenküste in Westafrika,” Zeitschrift der Gesellschaft für Erdkunde zu Berlin, xii. (1877) pp. 414 sq.

333

H. Hecquard, Reise an die Küste und in das Innere von West-Afrika (Leipsic, 1854), p. 43.

334

Dr. A. Plehn, “Beobachtungen in Kamerun, über die Anschauungen und Gebräuche einiger Negerstämme,” Zeitschrift für Ethnologie, xxxvi. (1904) pp. 717 sq.

335

Ph. Paulitschke, Ethnographie Nordost-Afrikas: die materielle Cultur der Danâkil, Galla und Somâl (Berlin, 1893), p. 177.

336

F. Gabriel Sagard, Le Grand Voyage du Pays des Hurons, pp. 279 sqq. (195 sq. of the reprint, Paris, Libraire Tross, 1865). Compare Relations des Jésuites, 1639, pp. 88-92 (Canadian reprint, Quebec, 1858), from which it appears that each man demanded the subject of his dream in the form of a riddle, which the hearers tried to solve. The custom of asking riddles at certain seasons or on certain special occasions is curious and has not yet, so far as I know, been explained. Perhaps enigmas were originally circumlocutions adopted at times when for certain reasons the speaker was forbidden the use of direct terms. They appear to be especially employed in the neighbourhood of a dead body. Thus in Bolang Mongondo (Celebes) riddles may never be asked except when there is a corpse in the village. See N. P. Wilken en J. A. Schwarz, “Allerlei over het land en volk van Bolaäng Mongondou,” Mededeelingen van wege het Nederlandsche Zendelinggenootschap, xi. (1867) p. 357. In the Aru archipelago, while a corpse is uncoffined, the watchers propound riddles to each other, or rather they think of things which the others have to guess. See J. G. F. Riedel, De sluik- en kroesharige rassen tusschen Selebes en Papua, pp. 267 sq. In Brittany after a burial, when the rest have gone to partake of the funeral banquet, old men remain behind in the graveyard, and having seated themselves on mallows, ask each other riddles. See A. de Nore, Coutumes, Mythes et Traditions des Provinces de France (Paris and Lyons, 1846), p. 199. Among the Akamba of British East Africa boys and girls at circumcision have to interpret certain pictographs cut on sticks: these pictographs are called “riddles.” See C. W. Hobley, Ethnology of A-Kamba and other East African Tribes (Cambridge, 1910), pp. 71 sq. In Vedic times the priests proposed enigmas to each other at the great sacrifice of a horse. See The Satapatha Brahmana, translated by J. Eggeling, Part v. (Oxford, 1900), pp. 314-316 (Sacred Books of the East, vol. xliv.); H. Oldenberg, Die Religion des Veda (Berlin, 1894), p. 475. Compare O. Schrader, Reallexikon der indogermanischen Altertumskunde (Strasburg, 1901), pp. 647 sq. Among Turkish tribes of Central Asia girls publicly propound riddles to their wooers, who are punished if they cannot read them. See H. Vambery, Das Türkenvolk (Leipsic, 1885), pp. 232 sq. Among the Alfoors of Central Celebes riddles may only be asked during the season when the fields are being tilled and the crops are growing. People meeting together at this time occupy themselves with asking riddles and telling stories. As soon as some one has found the answer to a riddle, they all cry out, “Make our rice to grow, make fat ears to grow both in the valleys and on the heights.” But during the months which elapse between harvest and the preparation of new land for tillage the propounding of enigmas is strictly forbidden. The writer who reports the custom conjectures that the cry “Make our rice to grow” is addressed to the souls of the ancestors. See A. C. Kruijt, “Een en ander aangaande het geestelijk en maatschappelijk leven van den Poso-Alfoer,” Mededeelingen van wege het Nederlandsche Zendelinggenootschap, xxxix. (1895) pp. 142 sq. Amongst the Toboongkoo of Central Celebes riddles are propounded at harvest and by watchers over a corpse. See A. C. Kruijt, “Eenige ethnografische aanteekeningen omtrent de Toboengkoe en de Tomori,” Mededeelingen van wege het Nederlandsche Zendelinggenootschap, xliv. (1900) pp. 223, 228.

337

A. d'Orbigny, Voyage dans l'Amérique Méridionale, ii. (Paris and Strasburg, 1839-1843) p. 190.

338

Pedro Lozano, Description Chorographica del Terreno, Rios, Arboles, y Animales de las dilatadissimas Provincias del Gran Chaco, Gualamba, etc. (Cordova, 1733) p. 100.

339

H. H. Bancroft, Natives Races of the Pacific States (London, 1875-1876), i. 589 note 259, quoting Arlegui, Chrón. de Zacatecas, pp. 152-3, 182.

340

Bertram S. Carey and H. N. Tuck, The Chin Hills, i. (Rangoon, 1896) p. 198.

341

Rev. W. Ridley, in J. D. Lang's Queensland (London, 1861), p. 441. Compare Rev. W. Ridley, Kamilaroi (Sydney, 1875), p. 149.

342

Report of the International Polar Expedition to Point Barrow, Alaska (Washington, 1885), pp. 42 sq. It is said that in Thule, where the sun disappeared below the horizon for forty days every winter, the greatest festival of the year was held when the luminary reappeared. “It seems to me,” says Procopius, who records the fact, “that though the same thing happens every year, these islanders are very much afraid lest the sun should fail them altogether.” See Procopius, De bello Gothico, ii. 15.

343

Fr. Boas, “The Eskimo,” Proceedings and Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada for 1887, vol. v. (Montreal, 1888) sect. ii. 36 sq.; id., “The Central Eskimo,” Sixth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology (Washington, 1888), pp. 603 sq. Elsewhere, however, the writer mentions a different explanation of the custom of harpooning Sedna. He says: “Sedna feels kindly towards the people if they have succeeded in cutting her. If there is no blood on the knife, it is an ill omen. As to the reason why Sedna must be cut, the people say that it is an old custom, and that it makes her feel better, that it is the same as giving a thirsty person drink.” See Fr. Boas, “The Eskimo of Baffin Land and Hudson Bay,” Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, xv. (New York, 1901) p. 139. However, this explanation may well be an afterthought devised to throw light on an old custom of which the original meaning had been forgotten.

344

W. Jochelson, The Koryak (Leyden and New York, 1908), p. 88 (The Jesup North Pacific Expedition, vol. vi., Memoir of the American Museum of Natural History).

345

Above, p. 121.

346

Relations des Jésuites, 1656, pp. 26-28 (Canadian reprint, Quebec, 1858); J. F. Lafitau, Mœurs des Sauvages Ameriquains (Paris, 1724), i. 367-369; Charlevoix, Histoire de la Nouvelle France, vi. 82 sqq.; Timothy Dwight, Travels in New England and New York (London, 1823), iv. 201 sq.; L. H. Morgan, League of the Iroquois (Rochester, 1851), pp. 207 sqq.; Mrs. E. A. Smith, “Myths of the Iroquois,” Second Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology (Washington, 1883), pp. 112 sqq.; Horatio Hale, “Iroquois Sacrifice of the White Dog,” American Antiquarian, vii. (1885) pp. 7 sqq.; W. M. Beauchamp, “Iroquois White Dog Feast,” ibid. pp. 235 sqq. “They had one day in the year which might be called the Festival of Fools; for in fact they pretended to be mad, rushing from hut to hut, so that if they ill-treated any one or carried off anything, they would say next day, ‘I was mad; I had not my senses about me.’ And the others would accept this explanation and exact no vengeance” (L. Hennepin, Description de la Louisiane, Paris, 1683, pp. 71 sq.).

347

J. H. Payne, quoted in “Observations on the Creek and Cherokee Indians, by W. Bartram, 1789, with prefatory and supplementary notes by E. G. Squier,” Transactions of the American Ethnological Society, vol. iii. Part i. (1853) p. 78.

348

C. Gay, “Fragment d'un voyage dans le Chili et au Cusco patrie des anciens Incas,” Bulletin de la Société de Géographie (Paris), ii. Série, xix. (1843) pp. 29 sq.

349

Garcilasso de la Vega, Royal Commentaries of the Yncas, translated by (Sir) Clements R. Markham (Hakluyt Society, London, 1869-1871), Part i. bk. vii. ch. 6, vol. ii. pp. 228 sqq.; Molina, “Fables and Rites of the Yncas,” in Rites and Laws of the Yncas (Hakluyt Society, 1873), pp. 20 sqq.; J. de Acosta, History of the Indies, bk. v. ch. 28, vol. ii. pp. 375 sq. (Hakluyt Society, London, 1880). The accounts of Garcilasso and Molina are somewhat discrepant, but this may be explained by the statement of the latter that “in one year they added, and in another they reduced the number of ceremonies, according to circumstances.” Molina places the festival in August, Garcilasso and Acosta in September. According to Garcilasso there were only four runners in Cuzco; according to Molina there were four hundred. Acosta's account is very brief. In the description given in the text features have been borrowed from all three accounts, where these seemed consistent with each other.

350

W. Bosman, “Description of the Coast of Guinea,” in J. Pinkerton's Voyages and Travels, xvi. (London, 1814) p. 402; Pierre Bouche, La Côte des Esclaves (Paris, 1885), p. 395.

351

Rev. J. Leighton Wilson, Western Africa (London, 1856), p. 217.

352

Narrative of Captain James Fawckner's Travels on the Coast of Benin, West Africa (London, 1837), pp. 102 sq.

353

“Extracts from Diary of the late Rev. John Martin, Wesleyan Missionary in West Africa, 1843-1848,” Man, xii. (1912) pp. 138 sq. Compare Major A. J. N. Tremearne, The Tailed Head-hunters of Nigeria (London, 1912), pp. 202 sq.

354

S. Crowther and J. C. Taylor, The Gospel on the Banks of the Niger (London, 1859), p. 320.

355

Mansfield Parkyns, Life in Abyssinia, Second Edition (London, 1868), pp. 285 sq.

356

George Brown, D.D., Melanesians and Polynesian (London, 1910), pp. 413 sq.