Introduction to the History of Religions Part 49

[804] Teit, _Thompson River Indians_, p. 95.

[805] Swanton, _Tlingit Myths_, and _Jesup North Pacific Expedition_, v, 231; Boas, _The Kwakiutl_, pp. 323, 336 f.

[806] Seligmann, _The Melanesians of British New Guinea_, p.

679; in the Louisiade group belief in direct descent is said to exist (p. 743).

[807] Cf. the remarks of Boas in the Introduction to Teit's _Thompson River Indians_.

[808] On the other hand, the Kurnai, who are not totemic, refrain, apparently, from eating their s.e.x-patrons.

[809] This report was made in 1841, before the natives had come in contact with the whites.

[810] In the Banks Islands the restrictions of eating relate to the patrons of individual persons; see _Journal of the Royal Anthropological Inst.i.tute_, x.x.xix, 165 f.

[811] Rivers, _The Todas_, Index, s.v. _Food, restriction on_.

[812] Cf. Matthews, _Navaho Legends_, p. 239, note 169; Franciscan Fathers, _Ethnologic Dictionary_ p. 507.

[813] Teit, _Thompson River Indians_, p. 77.

[814] Cf. A. M. Tozzer, _Comparative Study of the Mayas and the Lacandones_ (of Yucatan), and the literature given in articles "America, South" and "Brazil" in Hastings, _Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics_.

[815] J. W. Fewkes is of opinion that the great Snake dance (an economic function) was formerly conducted by the Snake clan (_Sixteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology_, p. 304).

[816] The choice of the object is determined by local conditions that are not known to us. Sometimes, probably, the object is the one most important for the welfare of the community; sometimes it may have come from accident. See below, -- 554 ff.

[817] The artificial objects that are regarded, in a few cases, as totems are probably of late origin, the product of reflection, and thus differing from the old totems, which arise in an unreflective time. However, the artificial totems are doubtless sometimes looked on as powerful; in some cases they may be little more than badges.

[818] This is Frazer's definition (in his _Totemism_ p. 1), supplemented by the words "not wors.h.i.+ped." Cf., on the whole subject, Tylor, in _Journal of the Anthropological Inst.i.tute_, xxviii, 144; F. Boas, in _American Journal of Psychology_, xxi; A. A. Goldenweiser, "Totemism," in _Journal of American Folklore_, xxiii (1910).

[819] For a preciser definition of totemism see below, -- 520.

[820] The details are given in Frazer's _Totemism and Exogamy_.

[821] Certain Arunta traditions appear to point to a time when the totem was freely eaten. The bird-mates of the clans may be regarded as secondary totems--perhaps a survival from a time when a clan might have more than one totem.

[822] Spencer and Gillen, _Northern Tribes of Central Australia_, pp. 173, 318.

[823] The clan-names may formerly have been totemic, but data for the decision of this point are lacking.

[824] So Frazer, _Totemism and Exogamy_, iv, 173.

[825] Cf. H. Webster, _Primitive Secret Societies_, pp. 1, 121 ff.; Crawley, _The Mystic Rose_, pp. 41 f., 45, 350, 454 ff.; Westermarck, _Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas_, ii, 28 ff.; Hobhouse, _Morals in Evolution_, i, 183 ff., 188 ff.

[826] C. G. Seligmann, _The Melanesians of British New Guinea_, chaps. x.x.xv, 1.

[827] Such a belief is said to exist in the Aru archipelago (Papuan) west of New Guinea. There the family, and not the clan, is the social unit; every family has its badge or crest.

[828] Melanesia is here taken to include the Bismarck Archipelago (New Britain, New Ireland, and adjacent islands) and the islands lying to the eastward as far as the 180th meridian of longitude, though in this area there is in some places Polynesian influence.

[829] So Reverend George Brown, _Melanesians and Polynesians_, p. 28.

[830] This usage is reported for Florida Island.

[831] On the question whether these G.o.ds are a development out of totem animals see below, -- 577.

[832] On the relation of this idea to Frazer's theory of "conceptional totemism" see below, -- 548.

[833] It might then seem that the deity was originally the animal; see below, -- 577.

[834] As to the significance of this fact cf. below, -- 529 ff.

[835] W. H. Furness, 3d, _The Island of Stone-Money_.

[836] On the large theistic material of the Pelews see Frazer, _Adonis Attis Osiris_, pp. 386, 428 ff., with references to J. Kubary, "Die Religion der Pelauer" (in A.

Bastian's _Allerlei aus Volks- und Menschenkunde_).

[837] Cf. below, -- 577.

[838] Exogamy is said to exist in the atoll Lua Niua, in the Lord Howe group; the population is described as Polynesian (Brown, _Melanesians and Polynesians_, p. 414 ff.); Dr.

Brown thinks it probable that exogamous cla.s.ses formerly existed in Samoa, to which place the Lua Niua people, he holds, are ultimately to be traced.

[839] Certain septs (among the Telugus and others) are named from inanimate (some times artificial) objects.

[840] The usages mentioned in article "Burma" in Hastings, _Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics_, iii, 24, do not necessarily show totemism.

[841] The Iroquois stock occupied an immense territory, partly in Canada, partly in the region now including the states of New York, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, and the Carolinas.

[842] Cf. Gatschet, _Migration Legend of the Creeks_, p. 24 ff.

[843] The Wyandots, who were allied to the Iroquois, dwelt in the district north of Lake Ontario.

[844] The Algonkins formerly ranged over a large territory extending along the Atlantic coast as far south as North Carolina and reaching westward to the Mississippi.

[845] It was from the Ojibwas that our word 'totem' was taken.

[846] A similar role, somewhat vague, is a.s.signed to two supernatural beings in Australia (Spencer and Gillen, _Native Tribes of Central Australia_, p. 388; cf. p. 246).

[847] Gatschet, _Migration Legend of the Creeks_, p. 177 ff.

It was expiatory, and was accompanied by a moral reconstruction of society, a new beginning, with old scores wiped out. Cf. the Cherokee Green Corn dance (see article "Cherokees" in Hastings, _Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics_).

[848] Dorsey, _The Skidi p.a.w.nee_, p. xviii. The p.a.w.nee had a fairly well-developed pantheon, and a civil government based on rank (chiefs, warriors, priests, magicians). They lived in endogamous villages; in every village there was a sacred bundle, and all the people of the village were considered to be descendants of the original owner of the bundle.

[849] Will and Spinden, _The Mandans_ (_Papers of the Peabody Museum of American Archaeology and Ethnology_, Harvard University, vol. iii, 1906), p. 129 ff.

[850] J. W. Fewkes, _The Winter Solstice Ceremony at Walpi_ (reprint from _The American Anthropologist_, vol. xi, 1898), with bibliography.

[851] Fewkes, _Journal of American Ethnology and Archaeology_, iv, and _Journal of American Folklore_, iv.