Social Origins and Primal Law

My own guess admits the possibility of this cause of giving plant and animal names to groups, among other causes. But I doubt if this was a common cause. In Australia, everything that can be eaten is eaten by all the natives of a given area, each kindred having only a tendency to spare its own totem, while certain other tabus on foods exist. In this condition of affairs, very few groups could have a notable special variety of food, except in the case of certain fruits, grass-seeds, and insects. For these articles the season is almost as brief as the season of the mayfly or the grannom. 'When fruits is in, cats is out,' as the pieman said to the young lady. During the rest of the year, all the groups in a large area will be living on the same large variety of reptiles, roots, animals such as rats and lizards, birds and so forth. It does not seem probable that, except as between Sea and Bush parts of a tribe, there could be much specialisation in matters of diet, during the greater part of the year. Therefore, I do not think that the derivation of totem names from special articles of food can ever have been common. But local knowledge is necessary on this point. Are the totem groups of Australia settled on lands peculiarly notable for the plants and animals whose names they bear? If so, that circumstance may account for the totem names of each group, and – granting that the origin of the names is long ago forgotten, and that native speculation has explained the names by myths – the rest is easy.

It will appear, when we come to my conjecture, that it varies from Mr. Haddon's only on one point. We both begin with plant and animal names given to the various groups, from without. We then suppose (or, at least, I suppose) the origin of the names to be forgotten, and a connection to be established between the groups and their name-giving objects, a connection which is explained by myths, while belief in these gives rise to corresponding behaviour: respect for the totem, and for his human kinsfolk. The only difference is that my theory suggests several sources of the names: while Mr. Haddon offers only one source, special articles of food and barter. Kindreds, to be sure, are now named, not from what they eat (scores of things), but from the one thing which (as a kindred) they do not eat. But this, when once the myths of kinship with the totem arose, might be a later development, arising out of the myth. In essentials, my conjecture appears to be in harmony with Mr. Haddon's – the two, of course, were independently evolved.

On one point I perceive no difficulty, and no difference. It has been suggested that Mr. Haddon 'commences with the commencement,' whereas, in the hypothetical early age which we both contemplate, people had scarcely a sufficient command of language to invent nicknames. Why more command of language is needed for the application of nicknames than of names, I do not perceive. In Mr. Haddon's theory, as in mine, names already existed, names of plants and animals. In both of our hypotheses those names were transferred to human groups; in my conjecture for a variety of reasons, in his, solely from connection with special articles of food, eaten and bartered, by each group. I am not convinced that, so early, the relations between groups would admit of frequent barter: nor, as has been said, am I certain that many groups could have a very special article of food, in an age prior to cultivation. But, granting all that to Mr. Haddon, no more command of language is needed by my theory than by his. Each conjecture postulates the existence of names of plants and animals, and the transference of the names to human groups. If gesture language was prior to spoken language, in each case gesture names could be employed, as, in North America, totem names are to this day expressed in gesture language. In my own opinion, man was as human as he is to-day, when totem names arose, and as articulate. But, if he was not, gesture-language would suffice.

I shall illustrate my theory from folk-lore practice. We might do the same for Mr. Haddon's. We talk of 'the Muffin man,' the man who sells muffins. We style one person 'The English Opium-Eater,' another 'The Oyster-Eater,' another 'The Irish Whiskey Drinker.' Here are the nicknames derived from the dealing in, or special consumption of, articles of food.

Many others occur in my folk-lore and savage lists of nicknames. They all imply at least as much command of language, as the names, ultimately totem names, given, for various reasons, in my theory. Thus Mr. Haddon and myself do not seem to me to differ on this point: his theory goes no further back in culture than mine does: nay, he assumes that barter was a regular institution, which implies a state of peace, almost a state of co-operation.

AN OBJECTION TO ALL THE THEORIES ENUMERATED

Not one of the theories here summarised, except the Dieri and Woeworung myth, explains why members of the various totem kins are exogamous, may not marry other members of the name. Suppose you do get your totem name from that of a distinguished male ancestor, why may you not marry another descendant? If because the common name, say Emu, is taken to indicate some sort of blood-relationship, why may you not marry a blood relation, even if there be no traceable kinship between you and her? A Douglas may marry a Douglas, a Smith may marry a Smith; but an Emu is often capitally punished if he marries an Emu. Suppose you get your totem name from the beast for which you do magic. Why may you not marry a person who bears the name of the same beast, and whose male kindred do magic for it? Because it is sacrosanct to you and her? But you are actually breeding it for the food-market. The answer must be that you may not marry a person who bears your own totem name, and is in the same branch of the Co-operative Magical Stores, because her beast and yours are in the same phratry, and phratry mates may not intermarry. But why may they not marry? The reply will probably be, because the legislator divided the previously undivided commune into two intermarrying exogamous phratries. But that theory we have shown to be untenable. Thus not one of the extant hypotheses of the origin of Totemism explains why totem kins are exogamous, unless Mr. Haddon supposes that the totem names, once given from without, came to be explained by myths asserting the sacred character and tribal kindred of the totem. Mr. Haddon has not said anything about a previous exogamous tendency in each of the groups which, by his scheme, received totem names from without. By my hypothesis, these groups had already a strongly exogamous tendency, which later was hall-marked and sanctioned by the totem, with its myths and tabus. This advantage of explaining the exogamous attribute of the totem, my scheme possesses, and its rivals lack.

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

Let us concentrate, now, our attention on the character of the genuine totem, the totem of the group or kin. It is not adopted by the savages on a dream-warning; each man or woman for himself or herself: nor is it chosen for each child at birth, nor by a diviner, like the nagual, bush-soul, nyarong of Sarawak, or the secret animal friend of each individual Australian. A savage inherits his group totem name. The name of any plant or animal which he may adopt for himself, or have assigned to him as a personal name, by his parents, or, so to speak, god-parents, is not his totem. My meaning is, I repeat, that my conjecture is only concerned with hereditary kin-totems and hereditary totem names of kindreds. No others enter into my conjecture as to origin. What some call 'personal totems,' adopted by the individual, or selected by others for him after his birth, such as the Calabar 'bush-soul,' the Sarawak nyarong, the Central American nagual, the Banks Island tamaniu, and the analogous special animal of the Australian tribesman (observed chiefly, as far as I know, by Mr. Howitt222 and Mrs. Langloh Parker), do not here concern me. They are not hereditary group names.

THE AUTHOR'S OWN CONJECTURE

I now approach my own conjecture as to the origins of the genuine, hereditary, exogamous Totemism of groups of kin, real or imagined. Totemism as we know it, especially in some tribes of North America and in Australia, has certainly, as a necessary condition, that state of mind in which man regards all the things in the world as very much on a level in personality; the beasts being even more powerful than himself. Were it not so, the totem myths about human descent from beasts and plants: about friendly beasts, beasts who may marry men, and about metamorphoses, could not have been invented and believed, even to whatever extent myths are believed. We may say that such beliefs are real, where they regulate conduct. So far, there is probably no difference of opinion, among anthropologists.

THE CONNECTION BETWEEN GROUPS AND TOTEMS

In all theories, the real problem is, how did the early groups get their totem names? The names, once accepted and stereotyped, implied a connection between each kindred, and the animal, plant, or other thing in nature whose name the kindred bore. Round the mystery of this connection the savage mind would play freely, and would invent the explanatory myths of descent from, and kinship with, or other friendly relations with, the name-giving objects. A measure of respect for the objects would be established: they might not be killed or eaten, except under necessity: magic might be worked by human Emus, Kangaroos, Plum-trees, and Grubs for their propagation, as among the Arunta and other tribes; or against them, to bar their ravaging of the crops, as among the Sioux. As a man should not spear a real Emu, if the Emu was his totem, so he does not, for reasons to be adduced, marry or have an amour with a woman who is also of the Emu blood. That is part of the tabu, resulting from the circumstances presently to be explained.

All these things, given the savage stage of thought, would inevitably follow from the recognised but mysterious connection between men and the plants and animals from which they were named. All such connections, to the savage, are blood-relationships, and such relationship involves the duties which are recognised and performed. But how did the early groups come to be named after the plants and animals; the name suggesting the idea of connection, and the idea of connection involving the duties of the totemist to his totem, and of the totem to the totemist?

NO 'DISEASE OF LANGUAGE'

The names, I repeat, requiring and receiving mythical explanations, and the explanations necessarily suggesting conduct to match, are the causes of Totemism. This theory is not a form of the philological doctrine, nomina numina. This is no case of disease of language, in Mr. Max Müller's sense of the words. A man is called a Cat, all of his kin are Cats. The language is not diseased, but the man has to invent some reason for the name common to his kin. It is not even a case of Folk Etymology, as when a myth is invented to explain the meaning of the name of a place, or person, or thing. Thus the Loch of Duddingston, near Edinburgh, is explained by the myth that Queen Mary, as a child, used to play at 'dudding' (or skipping) stones across the water: 'making ducks and drakes.' Or again, marmalade is derived from Marie malade. Queen Mary, as a child, was seasick in crossing to France, and asked for confiture of oranges; hence Marie malade– 'marmalade.' In both cases, the name to be explained is perverted. There is no real 'stone' in Duddingston – 'Duddings' town,' the ton or tun of the Duddings; while 'marmalade' is a late form of 'marmalet,' a word older than Queen Mary's day.

An example of a folk etymology bordering on Totemism is the supposed descent of Clan Chattan, and of the House of Sutherland, from the Wild Cat of their heraldic crests. Now Clan Chattan is named, not from the cat, but from Gilla Catain, 'the servant of Saint Catan,' a common sort of Celtic personal name, as in Gilchrist.223 The Sutherland cat-crest is, apparently, derived from Catness, or Caithness. That name, again, is mythically derived from Cat, one of the Seven Sons of Cruithne who gave their names to the seven Pictish provinces, as Fib to Fife, and so on. These Seven Sons of Cruithne, like Ion and Dorus in Greece (Ionians, Dorians), are mere mythical 'eponymoi' or name-giving-heroes, invented to explain the names of certain districts. In Totemism this is not so. Not fancied names, like Duddingstone, or Marmalade, are, in Totemism, explained by popular etymologies. Emu, Kangaroo, Wolf, Bear, Raven, are real, not perverted names, the question is, why are these names borne by groups of human beings? Answers are: given in all the numerous savage myths, whether of a divine ordinance (Dieri, Woeworung) or of descent and kinship, of intermarriage with beasts, or of adventures with beasts, or of a woman giving birth to beasts, or of evolution out of bestial types, and all these myths suggest mutual duties between men and their totems, as between men and their human kinsfolk. It will be seen that here no disease of language is involved, not even a volks-etymologie (a vera causa of myth).

If it could be shown by philologists that many totem names originally meant something other than they now do, and that they were misunderstood, and supposed to be names of plants and animals, then 'disease of language' would be present. Thus λύκος and ἅρκτος have really been regarded, as meaning, each of them 'the bright one,' and the Wolf Hero of Athens, and the Bear of the Arcadians, have been explained away, as results of 'disease of language.' But nobody will apply that obsolete theory to the vast menagerie of savage totem names.

HYPOTHETICAL EARLY GROUPS BEFORE TOTEMISM

But, discarding this old philological hypothesis, how did the pristine groups get their totem names? We ought first to return to our conjecture as to what these pristine groups were like. They must have varied in various environments. Where the sea, or a large lake, yields an abundant food-supply, men are likely to have assembled in considerable numbers, as 'kitchen middens' show, at favourable stations. In great woods and jungles the conditions of food-supply are not the same as in wide steppes and prairies, especially in the uniform and arid plateaus of Central Australia. Rivers, like seas and lakes, are favourable to settlement; steppes make nomadism inevitable, before the rise of agriculture. But, if the earliest groups were mutually hostile, strongly resenting any encroachment on their region of food-supply, the groups would necessarily be small, as in Mr. Darwin's theory of small pristine groups, the male, with his females, daughters, and male sons not adult.224 A bay, or inlet, or a good set of pools and streams, would be appropriated and watchfully guarded by a group, just as every area of Central Australia has its recognised native owners, who wander about it, feeding on grubs, lizards, snakes, rats, frogs, grass-seeds, roots, emus, kangaroos, and opossums.

The pristine groups, we may be allowed to conjecture, were small. If they were not, the hypotheses which I venture to present are of no value, while that of Mr. Atkinson shares their doom. Mr. McLennan, as far as one can conjecture from the fragments of his speculations, regarded the earliest groups as at least so large, and so bereft of women, that polyandry was the general rule. Mr. Darwin, on the other hand, began with Polygyny and Monogamy, 'jealousy determining the first stage.'225 This meant that there was a jealous old sire, who kept the women to himself, as in Mr. Atkinson's theory. As we can scarcely expect to reach certainty on this essential point, anthropology becomes (like history in the opinion of a character in Silas Marner) 'a process of ingenious guessing.' But, embarking on conjecture, I venture to suggest that the problem of the commissariat must have kept the pristine groups very small.226

They 'lived on the country,' and the country was untilled. They subsisted on the natural supplies, and the more backward their material culture, the sooner would they eat the country bare, as far as its resources were within their means of attainment. One can hardly conceive that such human beings herded in large hordes, rather they would wander in small 'family' groups. These would be mutually hostile, or at least jealous: they could scarcely yet have established a modus vivendi, and coalesced into the friendly aggregate of a local tribe, such as Arunta, Dieri, Urabunna, and so on. Such tribes have now their common councils and mysteries lasting for months among the Arunta. We cannot predicate such friendly union of groups in a tribe, for the small and jealous knots of really early men; watchfully resenting intrusion on their favourite bays, pools, and hunting of browsing grounds. As to marriage relations, it is not improbable that 'sexual solidarity' (as Mr. Crawley calls it), the separation of the sexes – the little boys accompanying the men, the little girls accompanying the women – and perhaps that 'sexual tabu,' coupled with the jealousy of male heads of groups, may already have led to prohibition of marriage within the group, and to raids for women upon hostile groups. The smaller the group, the more easily would sexual jealousy prohibit the lads from dealings with the lasses of their own group. There might thus, in different degrees, arise a tendency towards exogamy, and specially against son and mother, or father's mates, and brother and sister marriage. The thing would not yet be a sin, forbidden by a superstition, but still, the tendency might (as we have already said) run strong against marriage within each little group.

HOW THE GROUPS GOT NAMES

Up to this point we may conceive that the groups were anonymous. Each group would probably speak of itself as 'the Men' (according to a well-recognised custom among the tribes of to-day; for instance, the Gournditch-mara of Australia, mara meaning 'men'; Kurnai and Narinyeri, also mean 'the men'), while it would know neighbouring groups as 'the others,' or 'the wild blacks.' But this arrangement manifestly lacks distinctness. Even 'the others down there' is too like the vague manner in which the Mulligan indicated his place of residence. Each group will need a special name for each of its unfriendly neighbours.

These names, as likely as not, or more likely than not, will be animal or plant names, given for various reasons, perhaps, among others from fancied resemblances. It may be objected that an individual may bear a resemblance to this or that animal, but that a group cannot. But it is a peculiarity of human nature, to think that strangers (of another school eleven, say) are all very like each other, and if one of them reminds us of an Emu or a Kangaroo, all of them will. Moreover the name may be based on some real or fancied group trait of character, good or bad, which also marks this or that type of animal, such as cunning, cruelty, cowardice, strength, and so forth, and animal names may even be laudatory. We have also to reckon with the kinds of animals, plants, trees, useful flints, and other objects which may be more prevalent in the area occupied by each group; and with specialities in the food of each group's area, as in Mr. Haddon's theory. Thus there are plenty of reasons for the giving of plant and animal names, which, I suggest, were imposed on each group from without.

It is true that local names would serve the turn, if they were in use. But the 'hill-men,' 'the river-men,' 'the bush-men,' 'the men of the thorn country,' 'the rock-men,' are at once too scanty and too general. Many groups might fall collectively under each such local name. Again, it is as society moves away from Totemism, towards male kinship, and settled abodes, that local names are given to human groups, as in Melanesia, or even to individuals, as in the case of the Arunta, and the Gournditcha Mara. Among the Arunta a child is 'of' the place where he or she was born, like our de and von.227 The piquancy of plant and animal names for groups probably hostile must also be considered. We are dealing with a stage of society far behind that of Mincopies, or Punans of Borneo, or Australians, and in imagining that the groups were, as a rule, hostile, we may or may not be making a false assumption. We are presuming that the jealousy of the elder males drove the younger males out of the group, or at least compelled them to bring in females from other groups, which would mean war. We are also assuming jealousy of all encroachments on feeding grounds. These are the premises, which cannot be demonstrated, but only put in for the sake of argument. In any case no more hostility than our and the French villages have for each other is enough to provide the giving of animal sobriquets.

As to hostility, Mr. Atkinson, in New Caledonia, had a set of labourers brought in from a distant island. Among them was a young boy, who, being employed as cook, had a good deal of popularity with his mates. He went home for a holiday, with a few men from his own island. He was put down at their little harbour, only a few miles from that of his tribe, and was instantly killed and eaten.

In 'Notice sur la Nouvelle-Calédonie' (1900) this ferocious hostility between near neighbouring groups is corroborated. It is certain death for the crew of a canoe to be driven into a harbour, however near their own, which is not their own. This is among the islanders not under the French. Count von Pfeil remarks on the violent hostility between Kanakas and others near adjacent.228

On this point of unfriendly sobriquets I may quote MM. Gaidoz and Sébillot.229

'In all ages men love to speak ill of their neighbour: to blazon him, in the old phrase of a time when our speech was less prudish, and more gay. Pleasantries are exchanged not only between man and man, but between village and village. Sometimes in one expressive word, the defect, or the quality (usually the defect), the dominant and apparently hereditary trait of the people of a race or a province is stated … in a kind of verbal caricature… Les hommes se sont donc blazonnés de tout le temps?

De tout le temps! MM. Gaidoz and Sébillot were not thinking of the origin of totem names, but their theory applies 'to all ages,' even the most primitive. Among French village sobriquets I note, at a hasty glance,

and villages named as eaters of:

Old Ewes

Onions

Crows.

We shall see that many Sioux groups, many English villages are blazoned, as in Mr. Haddon's theory, by the names of the things which they eat: or are accused of eating.

Thus, among very early men, the names by which the groups knew their neighbours would be names given from without. To call them 'nicknames,' is to invite the objection that nicknames are essentially derisive, and that groups so low could not yet use the language of derision. I see no reason why early articulate-speaking men (or even men whose language is gesture language) should be so modern as to lack all sense of humour, all delight in derision. But the names need not have been derisive. If these people had the present savage belief in the wakan, or mystic power of animals, the names may even have been laudatory. I ask for no more than names conferred from without, call them nicknames, sobriquets, or what you like.

We are acquainted with no race that is just entered on Totemism, unless we agree with Mr. Hill Tout that Totemism is nascent among the Salish tribe, who live in village communities. Consequently we cannot prove that early hostile groups would name each other after plants and animals. I am only able to demonstrate that, alike in English and French folk-lore, and among American tribes who reckon by the male line, who are agricultural and settled, the villages or groups are named, from without, after plants and animals, and after what they are supposed to be specially apt to use as articles of food, and also by nick-names – often derisive. What I present is, not proof that the primal groups named each other after plants and animals, but proof that among our rustics, by congruity of fancy, such names are given, with other names exactly analogous to those now used among settled savages moving away from Totemism.