II
The second part of our problem must now be faced: whenever there is a certain number of families aggregated (permanently or temporarily), what are the features of their social contact in daily life? What are their dwellings? Do they belong to several families or only to one? Are there any rules of camping, or do they camp quite promiscuously? And if there are any customary rules, of what status are they the expression? Besides the answers to these questions, we shall find also that there are rules for occupying the huts, for eating, etc. In general, all our questions will tend to elucidate whether there is a quite unlimited, promiscuous social contact among the members of an aggregate, or whether there are facts pointing to the isolation and separation of the individual families. Undoubtedly there is a difference between aggregation which is merely temporary and that which is permanent; we shall try to find traces of this difference indicated in the statements. These latter are not very rich in information. The facts themselves seemed perhaps to the majority of our informants much too commonplace and unimportant. But we owe to some of the deeper and more conscientious observers highly interesting details in this connection. More especially this remark applies to Howitt and some of his correspondents. We begin with these statements.
Statements.—We have a clear and detailed description of the mode in which a camp was disposed amongst the Kurnai as well as of the mode in which a hut was inhabited in this tribe.[461] As a rule each hut was inhabited by a man and his wife. Even if some families[462] were closely related,[463] a certain distance was kept between their camps, which increased as the consanguinity diminished.[464] A man's parents could occasionally sleep with him and his wife in the same hut. But his sister-in-law or his brother would not sleep in the same hut.[465] We see, therefore, that each married couple occupied a separate hut, and that even near relatives would not be admitted, especially if sexual jealousy were possible. In the hut "custom regulates the position of the individual. The husband and wife would sleep on the left-hand side of the fire, the latter behind it, and close behind her the children; nearest to them the little boy, if any, next to him the little girl";[466] bigger children camped separately. We shall find this statement confirmed by another set of facts. Similar rules and customs applied as well to the Maneroo aborigines of New South Wales (Murring)[467] as to the Wurunjerri[468] of East Victoria.
Amongst the Gournditsh-Mara Tribe (Lake Condah, West Victoria) "each family camped by itself." During the meals "each wife was ... obliged to sit beside her own husband," and not "near any other man unless her husband sat between them."[469] It is a statement pointing to isolation of females from sex jealousy. We shall meet in the future with a few statements referring to the way in which meals are taken.
Customs pointing to the isolation of families, on the ground of sex jealousy are referred to by Curr.[470] "A woman never sat in a mia-mia (hut) in which there was a man, save her husband; she never conversed nor exchanged words with any man except in the absence of her husband and in reply to some necessary question," and only from a distance. Women had "no communication with persons of the opposite sex except little boys." From the paternal hut, where they lived, "their brothers of eight or ten years of age were excluded at night." And again, "among the Bangerang and other tribes I have known, each married couple had their own mia-mia, or hut."[471] These statements are quite clear. They coincide with the majority of our information. What is important and will interest us further in detail is the fact that boys at the age of about ten were excluded from the paternal hut. Females were given away about the same age, so that we may say that only small children remained with their parents. "The bachelors had one (hut) in common."[472]
Describing the laying of a camp Curr says—
"As they arrived they formed their camps, each family having a fire of its own some half-dozen yards from its neighbour's."[473]
From Dawson's description of the aboriginal habitations,[474] we get a good glimpse into their mode of dwelling. Dawson says they have either a permanent or temporary habitation, and describes both. The former wuurn is bigger, and may accommodate about a dozen persons. But it serves only for the use of one family. "When several families live together each builds its wuurn, facing one central fire." But even the family, if the children are grown up, does not live in one party; "the wuurn is partitioned off into compartments. One of these is appropriated to the parents and children, one to the young unmarried women and widows, and one to the bachelors and widowers." Here we see that husband and wife sleep also quite apart, with their small children. Grown-up but unmarried male or female children have compartments of their own. And if they were married they must have had their own separate camp. The isolation seems to have been amongst these tribes much less accentuated than amongst the East Victorians, for instance. Although separated, grown-up children lived in the same habitation, and even the wuurns of separate families were situated round a common fire, so that it "appears to be one dwelling." In their temporary huts the isolation is more pronounced. "While travelling or occupying temporary habitations each of these parties (parent, male and female children) must erect separate wuurns." Moreover each family must camp separately. A certain communism of living is expressed also by the common cooking,[475] although each family has its basket in which it cooks food.[476]
Eyre's information about the Lower Murray River blacks agrees to a certain degree with Dawson's statements. "Sometimes each married man will have a hut for himself, his wives and family, including, perhaps, occasionally his mother or some other near relative. At other times, large long huts are constructed, in which from five to ten families reside, each having their own separate fire."[477] Of course, here the communism is much greater, although the separation of the fire circles is still kept. These natives, as well as the tribes described by Dawson, were in better economic conditions, and therefore able to adopt sedentary life; they were also more skilful in the building of huts. The general type of a hut was a rude shelter of boughs only affording protection against rain.[478]
Brough Smyth affirms also perfect order and method in the arrangement of a camp. "The aborigines do not herd together promiscuously." If the whole tribe is present the natives are divided into groups each composed of about six dwellings. "Each mia-mia (hut) is five or six yards distant from its neighbours." If there are several "tribes" (groups), each camps in a separate place, in a position marking whence it came. Each hut has its separate fire (in opposition to Dawson's statement).[479]
Complete isolation and strict camp rules are stated by J. Moore-Davis. "Married men each with his family occupying the centre" of the camp.[480]
A statement quite contrary to nearly all others is given by Beveridge. He speaks of "the promiscuous manner they have of huddling together in their loondthals."[481] We need not, however, take this statement very seriously, as it is given in immediate connection with another doubtful one, viz. of absolute, even incestuous, sexual promiscuity.[482] Perhaps the observations were made on natives who were quite corrupted by contact with white men. At any rate this statement is directly opposed to all we know about these two features of Australian aborigines in their natural state of life. We may therefore discard them as unreliable.[483]
Collins writes: "In their huts and in their caves they lie down indiscriminately mixed, men, women and children together."[484] This statement is not quite clear, as we do not know whether these "men, women and children" form one family, or are related, or whether there is a great number of them, etc. It is also opposed to what we learnt from Howitt and many others of the customary order observed in occupying a hut. Besides, Collins had under his immediate observation blacks hanging round the town of Port Phillip, demoralized and degenerate; their females seem to have been already addicted to prostitution.[485] They were no longer in their primitive state; and all observations, especially relating to their mode of living, which changes immediately with the conditions of life, must be accepted with caution. I do not consider this statement any more reliable than that of Beveridge which I discarded. From other passages where he speaks of the small inland huts "affording shelter to only one miserable tenant,"[486] and the larger huts on the sea-coast, "large enough to hold six or eight persons," we might infer that there was room only for one family in each hut. Here also we read that the coastal tribes, which probably had a better food supply and led a more sedentary life, had larger and better-built huts.
We read concerning the Turra tribe of South Australia[487]: "In camping, the place of the parents is to the right-hand side of their son's camp; the brother to the left side; sister-in-law to the right side or near his father's. In the camp the husband sleeps at the right hand of the fire, his wife behind him, and her young children behind her." This, less detailed than Howitt's statement, corroborates it to the full. We see that each camp is occupied exclusively by a married couple and their small children; and that inside the hut as well as in the configuration of the camp there is a strict customary order. It is important to notice that these statements, reporting strict camp rules and referring to tribes scattered over a great area (Victoria, New South Wales and South Australia) are given by very reliable authorities, and that Howitt at least gathered them by collecting information about the ancient customs of the Kurnai and Murring from old natives; using, therefore, the only correct method. They refer, therefore, to old customs, which probably were no longer observed in the tribes spoilt and demoralized by contact with settlers. Much weight is to be ascribed, therefore, in this matter to the information of Howitt and his correspondents.
Schürmann states shortly: "Each family occupies a separate hut; and, if there be any unmarried men, they sleep apart in a hut of their own."[488]
Henderson says about the New South Wales natives, "Each family has its own gunya and fire."[489]
George Barrington observes that among the Port Jackson natives each hut was occupied by one family.[490]
When the families who formed a "tribe" (= local group?) meet "each family has its own fire and provides its own substance."[491] In the description of his travels Dawson tells us that when the native party was joined by a stranger with his wife the latter did not approach the other men, but slept alone by herself at a small fire.[492] This points to the fact that a married woman normally never slept in the immediate neighbourhood of any other man but her own husband.
Spencer and Gillen affirm, again, the complete isolation of families who, according to them,[493] normally roam scattered on the territory of the local group. "Each family, consisting of a man and one or more wives and children, occupies always a mia-mia, which is merely a lean-to of shrubs, so placed as to shield the occupants from the prevailing wind." This statement is perfectly clear, and we may fit it into the general picture we drew from all the other evidence.
Among the natives of Central Australia (probably of the Arunta nation) a married woman "may speak to any but the young men."[494] Thus she is practically excluded from any intercourse with them.
Among the natives of Moreton Bay the conjugal relation is maintained by them "with great decency and propriety, every family having its separate hut and fire."[495]
A very clear and concise statement is given on this point by the Rev. J. Mathew, referring to the Kabi and Wakka tribes. "The family, consisting of husband and wife, or wives, with their children, constituted a distinct social unit. They occupied the same gunya (dwelling), they ate together, they travelled together."[496] After having described the construction of the hut he adds: "This sufficed for a family. The dwellings were placed a little distance apart, facing in the same direction, and each had its own small fire in front."[497]
Roth says about the tribes of North-West Central Queensland: "The husband sleeps in the same gundi as his wives."[498] The way of taking meals is not quite uniform among all tribes observed by this writer. At Cape Bedford "members of one family take their meals together, except the single young men (above puberty), who dine apart." In another tribe (Tully River) "each family dines by itself." On the contrary, "on the Bloomfield River men, boys and girls (up to four or five years of age) dine together; all the other females ... mess apart."[499] Among the natives of Koombana Bay, "in the family, the man, women and children dined together."[500] There are three kinds of huts among the North Queensland tribes: the simple shelter of boughs; a hut built somewhat more carefully against rain; and a hut built for protection against cold, this hut, being of course, the most elaborate.[501] From the description of these huts we may infer that they were occupied each by one family only.
The isolation of families caused by the jealousy of the husband is plainly stated by Grey: "He cannot, from the roving nature of their mode of life, surround his wives with the walls of a seraglio, but custom and etiquette have drawn about them barriers nearly as impassable. When a certain number of families are collected together, they encamp at a common spot, and each family has a separate hut or perhaps two. At these huts sleep the father of the family, his wives, the female children who have not yet joined their husbands, very young boys[502] and occasionally female relatives; but no males over ten years of age may sleep in family huts. They have got their own separate encampment."[503] If any strangers are present with their wives, they sleep in their own huts, placed amongst the married people. If they are unmarried or without wives "they sleep at the fire of the young men."[504] "Under no circumstances is a strange native allowed to approach the fire of a married man."[505] Their huts being so scattered over a rather large area, their conversation is held by means of a loud chant.[506] It must be remembered that Grey asserts in several places the great and vigilant jealousy of the natives.[507]
Bishop Salvado, who speaks also of the great jealousy of the males and the fidelity exacted from the females,[508] gives us the following account of their mode of camping: "Lorsqu'une famille se dispose à dormir, les garçons qui ont passé l'âge de sept ans dorment seuls, autour du feu commun, les plus petits avec le père, et les enfants à la mamelle, aussi bien que les filles, quel que soit leur âge, avec la mère. Les femmes jouissent du droit d'ancienneté, la première dort plus près du mari, ainsi de suite."[509] Another passage[510] testifies also that they roam in single families; the reason alleged is easier food supply.
We read in Browne that one hut holds only two or three persons.[511]
The general inference to be drawn from these twenty-four statements is, roughly speaking, that the general features of native camp arrangements were orderliness, fixed rules, isolation of families, settled and restricted social contact, and by no means social communism and unregulated social promiscuity.
Five instances give strict rules which obtain in arranging camps. These were probably much more widespread than might be supposed from these few instances. But, as mentioned above, these camp rules would probably fall into abeyance at once when the natives came in contact with civilization. It was only by attentive inquiries that Howitt extracted them from the natives. Besides these we read in fifteen statements that each family camped separately. So that twenty of twenty-four statements assert that there was in this respect complete isolation of the families. Sexual motives played undoubtedly an important part in this isolation. We are told so expressly in several places (Curr, Grey, Salvado, J. D. Lang). In the case of even friendly strangers a certain amount of mistrust—of evil magic as well as of actual bad intentions—may have operated. There are indications of it in statements of Br. Smyth and Grey. But in the detailed examples given by Howitt, where all the camping families are closely related and usually consist of more than one generation (father and sons, etc.), we can hardly conceive that either of the above-mentioned motives would come into play. At any rate this regulated camp order shows how important this question was in the native social life and how strong the idea must have been that each family had its own place apart from the others, and the more remotely related people were, the less intimate contact would be.
The aborigines possess different kinds of huts. Of interest for us is the fact that the majority of them are made to hold only one family. Fourteen statements assert it explicitly or implicitly. In three instances we are told of the existence of larger huts (Eyre, Dawson, Collins). In two of them the separation of families is maintained in spite of the larger dwellings. Only Collins' information is doubtful in this respect.
Within these huts the family camped according to fixed rules. We have five instances given by Howitt and his correspondents, and Bishop Salvado. These rules show clearly that each hut, each fire-place, was reserved for one family, and that this status had its customary form and sanction. There were three instances of separation during meals (Gournditsh-Mara, some of the North-West Central Queensland tribes, and the Kabi and Wakka). In three statements we are told that both sexes separated during meals (Curr, Angas, Roth). What Curr tells us of the marked social separation of families is remarkable; especially in respect to the isolation of the women.[512]
Two statements were rather in contradiction with our general results: Beveridge's statement of promiscuous huddling and Collins' vague information. We stated our reasons for not giving them much weight, and they cannot outweigh the sum-total of reliable information which is fairly unanimous on this point. It is also in general agreement with the information we gathered on sexual matters as well as with our conclusion as to territorial distribution, and it corroborates our results on both these points. For on the one hand it was found that in normal life there exists individuality of sexual relations; on the other hand the usual scattered mode of living would correspond to a fairly complete isolation in cases of tribal assembly.
Our last considerations have clearly demonstrated how the individuality of the family unit shows itself in the aboriginal mode of living. A single family is normally in contact with a few other families only; sometimes it roams alone over its own area. But even when there are several families living together, the camp rules keep them apart from each other in nearly every function of daily life. The children, who live in intimate contact with their parents in the same hut, must necessarily set them apart from all their (the children's) other relatives. We must assume, therefore, that the individuality of the relation of each child to its actual parents is deeply impressed by all the circumstances of daily life on the child's mind. This assumption is in accord with the information we can gather on this point. But before we begin to look it through, let us discuss the theoretical side of the kinship (or relationship) problem.
CHAPTER VI
DISCUSSION OF KINSHIP
I
Theoretical Analysis of this Concept
It is undoubtedly one of the most valuable discoveries arrived at by modern sociological science that each institution varies in accordance with the social environment in which it is found. A given institution or social form (like the family, the state, the nation, the church) appears under various forms in different societies, and among peoples with a very low culture only rudiments thereof may be expected. This point of view, applied to marriage and the family, has led some writers to the assumption of forms as much opposed to those usual in our societies, as promiscuity and group marriage is opposed to individual marriage and the family. Nevertheless, although the variability and multiplicity of forms of marriage and family were acknowledged, the concepts applied to them were still the old ones, directly borrowed from our own society and formed upon the facts found amongst ourselves. In particular the sociologically untrained ethnographers comprehended the phenomena of kinship only under our own social concepts, judged them according to our own moral standard, and described them with words the meaning of which ought to have been defined when applied to a new case; nevertheless these terms have been nearly always used by ethnographers in the same sense in which we use them amongst ourselves, i. e. as expressing ideas of community of blood through procreation.[513] That this is quite erroneous will be shown below. How far the idea of kinship changes from society to society, what are its essential invariable features, and what are the variable elements—these are the problems that must be set forth.
The inadequacy of our ideas of kinship as applied to lower societies has been often felt by those ethnographers who wished to enter deeper into the problems of kinship among a given people. They have found the greatest difficulty in conveying to a European reader the meaning of different terms of relationship. While warning the reader to put aside our (the modern European) ideas of kinship, they have hardly succeeded in giving any definite and clear concept instead. The reasons for this failure are simple: our ideas of kinship are defined by certain facts which are not to be found in the given primitive society. In order to define kinship so as to fit the latter, the author ought to bring forward a series of facts, playing a part analogous in the given society to that played by the essential defining elements amongst us. But it is by no means easy to know among which facts to look for such analogous, defining elements. And here again arises the necessity of a general definition of kinship, one which would afford indications in what direction to search for social facts giving a right idea of kinship in any given society. Such a general definition would be like an algebraic formula, having its constant and its variable terms; if for the latter special data be inserted (in this instance the special conditions proper to the given society), the special value for any given case is obtained (namely the special concept of kinship proper to the given society). And it should also be indicated within what range the variables should be taken; in other words, in what facts the elements which specifically determine kinship in the given society must be looked for. The practical value of such a general definition of kinship is obvious. On the one hand it indicates the constant elements in kinship common to all societies; on the other hand it indicates the general character of the variable elements, and the way in which they must be looked for and worked into the general formula.
By the word kinship, roughly speaking, is denoted a series of family relationships (those of parents to children, brothers to sisters, etc.), all of which consist of a set of extremely complex phenomena. They are made up of the most heterogeneous elements: physiological (birth, procreation, suckling, etc.), social (community of living, of interests, social norms, etc.), and psychological (different ways in which these relations are conceived, different moral ideas, and different types of feelings). Special care must be taken to select in all these elements the essential ones, as an omission would be just as fatal for the investigations as an overburdening with secondary elements. Moreover, it would be specially valuable to look at all these heterogeneous determining elements from the same point of view, and view them all under one and the same aspect. Leaving on one side the purely physiological problem of kinship,[514] it appears necessary to give a sociological view of kinship, i. e. to show the social bearing of physiological facts as well as of psychological elements. But it appears also necessary to view the whole of the phenomena of kinship from the psychological point of view; that is, to show how the sociological and physiological facts of kinship are reflected in the "collective mind" of the given society.
Besides for other reasons (adduced below) this appears necessary, because one of the most important scientific uses that has been made of the different human systems of kinship is one that presupposes a certain definite meaning, as given to the terms of kinship in very low societies. In Morgan's deductions a very important part is played by the assumption that kinship is always understood in terms of consanguinity; in particular that it was understood thus by primitive man; that in all (even the lowest) societies all ideas of kinship were essentially based upon the community of blood, established in the case of the mother by her share in bearing, in that of the father by his part in procreation. Only by assuming that these facts were known to the lowest, prehistoric savages, could Morgan draw inferences from systems of kinship terms about the forms of sexual intercourse. If, on the other hand, the relation between sexual intercourse and birth escaped the knowledge of primitive men, they could not have based their idea of kinship upon community of blood between father and offspring; hence there could be no connection between forms of sexual intercourse and forms of kinship as conceived by primitive man. Whether there could be connection between marriage, defined sociologically, and kinship is another and more complicated problem. In any case Morgan uses throughout his book the word consanguinity, and he defines it as the tie of common blood arising from the sexual act. In other words he sets forth the problem in a simplified and incorrect form. The question how kinship may be conceived in a given society, especially in a low one, naturally presents itself as a very important point of investigation.
As in the following pages there will be question more or less exclusively of the individual relation between parents and children, the present discussion may be fittingly restricted to the individual parental kinship in Australia. In the second part of this chapter facts giving some insight into the aboriginal collective ideas of kinship are set forth; and in the following chapter other different facts will be brought forward in order to complete the definition of individual parental kinship. But in accordance with what has been just said, it is needful to have some guiding principle in collecting this material, and this will now be looked for. This discussion, being only concerned with the Australian facts, does not pretend to be complete, but perhaps if the results are worked out so as to suit our modern European concept of kinship as well as the Australian one, it might, should it be correct, be applicable also to other societies.[515] Let us now proceed to give the general definition of kinship and in the first place to indicate which are its constant, uniform factors found in all societies.
Amongst the heterogeneous factors which together make up parental kinship, the physiological facts appear to be the most constant, for the natural process of procreation is in all human societies the same. But the social consequences of this process vary very widely according to other variable elements, as will appear clearly below in our discussion of consanguinity. Part of them only, together with some social elements, may be taken as the uniform, constant basis of kinship, such as must serve for the first point of departure in an attempt to discuss more in detail the kinship in any society. It appears probable that this basis is given by the existence of a group formed by a woman, her husband, and the children whom she has borne, suckled and reared. The existence of such a group will be considered as the necessary and sufficient condition for individual parental kinship. Where such a group exists we are justified in affirming that individual parental kinship exists, although it is not yet completely defined thereby; further facts must be adduced in order to complete the definition. Those further facts are precisely the variable terms in the general formula of kinship; it remains still to indicate their general character. But a few words must be first said about the constant factors of kinship just mentioned.
They consist in the existence of the individual family group as determined by individual marriage and by individual motherhood. Individual motherhood means that the same woman who gave birth to a child stands to it in a special close relation in its later life also: she suckles it and rears it, and she is bound to him or her by the manifold ties resulting from the community of life and community of interests. This woman is bound on the other hand to a man by individual marriage; and thereby her children are bound to him also; and the mother, her husband, and her children form the social unit called the individual family. The existence of such a unit is to be established by showing its different social functions, and the different ways in which its solidarity and individuality are marked in a given society. It is clear that the position of the father is in this way first established socially only, as the husband of the children's mother. Nevertheless it must be borne in mind that thus his relation to the children is clearly marked; and that this is only a preliminary, so to say formal, determination of fatherhood, which in all societies appears to be much more materially defined by other factors, discussed hereafter.
The existence of the individual family as a social unit, based upon the physiological facts of maternity, the social factor of marriage and other social factors, are thus chosen as the basis upon which we may proceed to analyze more in detail the individual parental relation. Whether this basis exists in all human societies and forms what was called above the constant, invariable elements of parental kinship, may remain an open question. This could only be answered correctly a posteriori, on the basis of a series of special researches in many societies. The existence of individual motherhood, as this word is defined here, seems to obtain in the majority of human societies (or even in all of them). Nevertheless, as pointed out above,[516] even this point cannot be treated as self-evident. This applies in still higher degree to individual marriage, which has often been denied as regards many societies.[517] In this place we have mainly to keep before our eyes the Australian society and our own society, the latter of which affords, so to say, the heuristic principle, the clue to the understanding of the former. As far as those two societies are concerned, our choice appears to be the right one, and the social-physiological basis mentioned above contains the essential common elements of kinship in both societies.
The existence of individual marriage and its legal, sexual and psychological aspects have been discussed and established in the preceding chapters, as far as Australia is concerned. A discussion on individual motherhood will be given below. The existence of the individual family group in Australia, based upon individual marriage and upon individual motherhood, is the subject of the remaining chapters of this study. So that the existence of this physiological and social basis of kinship may be taken as granted.
Bearing now in mind that what will be said hereafter applies in the first place to Australia, it may be said that in the physiological and social basis of kinship adopted above, the minimum of conditions necessary for the application of the idea of individual kinship was enumerated. But this minimum is not sufficient to determine this idea completely in any given society. By studying only the social facts which determine the individuality of family life within the society, we should not exhaust all the features and essential aspects of parental kinship in any society. The existence of the individual family merely indicates unambiguously that individual parental kinship exists in the given society. For this social unit having a deep analogy with our own individual family, the relation between the members of both these social units must also have some deep resemblance. But to exaggerate this resemblance would be as erroneous as to deny it. Besides the features common both to our parental kinship and to that of the Australian, there are also those which differentiate these two relationships. They must be sought for in the differences in the social conditions, which may even modify the physiological basis of kinship, as for instance when physical fatherhood is in one society established beyond doubt by exclusive sexual appropriation, while in the other there can be no question of it, owing to sexual communism. The variations in the general social conditions obviously also affect the purely sociological side of kinship. To point this out clearly, it is enough to mention that each relation is subject to the normative influences of the society in the midst of which it exists, and these norms and their sanction vary with the general social structure.
The variable elements in parental kinship must be also looked for in the different elements of the collective mind, connected with the parental relationship; in other words, in the different collective ideas and feelings which have parental kinship for their centre. Moreover, as mentioned above, there are reasons why the knowledge of the collective idea of kinship is sociologically important. It may be emphasized here that we should cripple and curtail our knowledge if we arbitrarily abstained from inquiring what influence the collective knowledge as to procreation, consanguinity, affinity, etc., may have upon the social aspect of the relation in question.
The same thing may be said of another domain of collective mentality: that is, of the feelings involved in parental kinship. The type of feelings underlying this relationship may vary with the society, in the same way as these feelings vary with each individual case in any given society. And as these feelings essentially determine the character of parental kinship in any given society, it appears that the discussion of this point cannot be omitted. Thus into the general formula of kinship there must enter also the psychological elements: collective ideas, expressing in a given society what is kinship, what are its legal, moral and customary aspects; and the collective feelings prevailing in a given society. From the interaction of these psychological elements with different variable social elements arise the more special, peculiar factors which define kinship in any given society. In other words, the variable elements in the general formula of kinship are seen to arise chiefly from the collective psychological interpretation and valuation of some of the physiological and social facts underlying parental kinship.
To sum up, it may be said that parental kinship is the personal tie obtaining between members of the parental group or individual family, and like all other personalties it must be further determined in each society by the characteristic collective feelings and collective ideas which in the given society give it its specific meaning.[518] This is that general formula of kinship which will yield us what we have demanded of it—that is, an indication of the facts for which to look in any given society. As the facts referred to in the first part of the above definition (the establishment of the existence of the family unit) are dealt with in the remaining chapters, it is necessary to discuss only the second part of the definition.
The influence upon kinship of the beliefs and ideas as to procreation appears quite plainly upon an analysis of the concept of consanguinity, and to this we may devote a few words.
Parental kinship is in our society conceived invariably and exclusively in terms of consanguinity,[519] or, speaking more explicitly, parental kinship is conceived as established by the tie of common blood, resulting from birth (maternal kinship) or procreation (paternal kinship). Of course the mere physiological fact does not establish kinship in its full extent, with all its personal, emotional, social and legal aspects. It is only when the physiological facts of procreation or birth are sanctioned by society, in other words when they are consummated in legal marriage, that the children are full kinsmen of both their parents. Society takes all facts which are of vital importance for itself under its own supervision; and consequently the important facts of propagation are subject to the control of society, which regulates them by a series of religious, legal, customary and conventional norms, all of which are also necessary conditions and essential features of full parental kinship. But this sanction once granted, the tie of common blood is conceived as the main source of all mutual duties and moral and legal obligations; and from this also outflow the feelings of love, attachment, reverence, and so forth, which are in our society the essential features of parental kinship. Once a man knows that a child, which he considered his own, is in reality not begotten by him, undoubtedly all his feelings for this child are affected, and, under certain conditions, its legal position may be modified. The two conditions for full parental kinship in our society are (1) that the child be the real physiological offspring of both presumed parents; (2) that it be legally begotten or its birth legalized.
In our society the line of distinction between physiological consanguinity and social consanguinity is quite clear; the one is a mere physiological fact,[520] the other the social acknowledgment of this fact and all its consequences, subject to certain norms, laid down by society.
There are two separate sets of circumstances in which we may speak of consanguinity: (1) the existence of social institutions, which allow us to trace the physiological blood ties (e. g. monogamy or harem institutions), in which case we can speak of the existence of physiological consanguinity as obtaining between the members of the individual family. (2) The existence of a social acknowledgment of the facts of procreation as creating ties of individual personal kinship, in which case we may speak of social consanguinity. If neither of these conditions are fulfilled, then it would be quite meaningless to speak of consanguinity.[521]
Now let us see whether these conditions are to be found in all human societies. That both are found in the majority of the more highly developed societies appears beyond doubt. But this seems not to be the case in the lower societies. Even a superficial glance at them is sufficient to prove it. Whereas, in some of the lowest peoples known conjugal fidelity seems to be the rule,[522] and consequently the physiological tie of blood between children and both their parents is secured, in other societies of low culture the sexual laxity is so great that there is no possibility at all of tracing the descent of a child from any individual man.[523] This applies in the first place to the majority of the Australian tribes, as is shown in the chapter on sexual matters. In consequence, it may be said that in many low societies, and especially in some of the Australian tribes, there is no possibility of speaking of physiological consanguinity as regards the father.
How does the case stand with the social importance attributed to the facts of procreation? Here the variation seems to be still greater. This can be very well exemplified by the Australian material. Over the greater part of the continent the father's share in procreation is not known. There cannot be any social acknowledgment of it. Consanguinity in its social sense does not exist. In some tribes of South-East Australia, on the other hand, the mother's share in procreation is under-rated; the father is considered to be the only consanguineous relative; the child is the father's offspring only, the mother being merely its nurse. Here the consanguineous relation between mother and child is considerably reduced in social importance, and consanguinity as it appears to the social mind is purely paternal. It may be said, therefore, that paternal kinship in the Centre and the North of the continent and maternal kinship in the South-Eastern tribes cannot be called consanguinity (in the social sense of this word), although in both cases very close kinship exists, as will appear from a detailed discussion hereafter.
These examples show clearly that it would be incorrect to treat physiological consanguinity as a constant and indispensable constituent of parental kinship.
Besides these Australian examples[524] there may be adduced many cases from other societies in which the ties of blood play no part in the collective ideas of kinship. The Naudowessies have the curious idea that their offspring are indebted to their father for their souls, the invisible part of their essence, and to the mother for their corporeal and visible part.[525] Here the father's part in procreation was probably known, but the interpretation thereof was not the correct physiological one, but one that created, so to say, a spiritual connection as the bond of paternal kinship, whereas maternal kinship was conceived in terms of consanguinity. On the other hand, "according to Kafir ideas a child descends chiefly, though not exclusively, from the father"[526]—a belief analogous to that of the South-East Australians. The same belief was held in several higher societies (Egyptians, Hindoos, Greeks).[527] Dargun has made a list of peoples among whom the (social) father of the children is quite indifferent as to whether they are really begotten by him.[528] Among the Todas, where the determination of paternity is quite out of the question, owing to their polyandry, fatherhood is determined only by the performance of a conventional ceremony (the rite of pursütpimi, or handing over to the pregnant woman a miniature bow and arrow). This constitutes fatherhood; the man who has performed this ceremony is the (social) father of the child, even if it were certain that he had not begotten it.[529] Another interesting case was discovered by Dr. Rivers amongst the Banks Islanders. There fatherhood is determined by the fact of paying the midwife.
But the most noteworthy cases in regard to the present subject are those where fatherhood in its social sense is not consanguineous owing to the ignorance of the physiological laws of reproduction (a state of things mentioned already as obtaining in Central Australia). This ignorance is of general sociological importance, because there are well-founded reasons for believing that it was once universal amongst primitive mankind, as may be held to be proved by Mr. E. S. Hartland in his thorough treatise on Primitive Paternity. For the detailed argument the reader must be referred to this fundamental work.[530] Mr. Sidney Hartland has besides drawn sociological conclusions from those facts in their bearing upon paternal kinship. In Chapter IV of the first volume he gives numerous examples of peoples among whom there is no tie of consanguinity between father and son.[531]
To ascertain the influence of physiological ties of blood on this relation in a given society it is needful to know the way in which they present themselves to the aboriginal mind. That is, we must know the collective ideas of a given society on the facts of procreation. Do they know, or do they not know, the father's part in procreation? But this is not sufficient. Even if they know a certain physiological fact, they may not acknowledge its bearing upon kinship, they may attach no importance to its social aspect. So it is with the fact of physiological maternity in the South-East Australian tribes and with paternity in the cases quoted by Dargun. And it happens very often that in peoples where the causal connection between copulation and pregnancy is well known, fatherhood is by no means determined by its physiological aspect. Not only the collective knowledge of the physiological facts, but also the collective attitude towards them, must therefore be taken into consideration.[532] In short, it may be said that physiological consanguinity has no direct bearing upon social facts.
To define consanguinity in its social meaning, the collective ideas held by a given society on the facts of procreation must be considered. Consanguinity, therefore, is the set of relations involved by the collective ideas under which the facts of procreation are viewed in a given society. And it must be borne in mind that these ideas express not only the purely theoretical views of the social mind on the facts of procreation; they also involve different emotional elements, and especially the social importance given to these facts by society. Consanguinity (as a sociological concept) is therefore not the physiological bond of common blood; it is the social acknowledgment and interpretation of it.
It may be said, therefore, that consanguinity is not always considered as the essence of kinship. If now we wish to determine what are the common features of the different ideas which in different societies define kinship, the only answer is that the said ideas affirm in one way or another a very close, intimate tie between offspring and parents. These ideas may refer kinship to physiological facts (consanguinity as found in the major part of human societies); or they may base kinship on the performance of a quite conventional ceremony (Todas, Banks Islanders); or they may affirm a very close tie between parent and child, on the base of some religious or magic belief (spiritual tie, transmission of soul: the Naudoweissies and some Australian tribes, as will be seen below). It is evident, therefore, that the general idea of kinship cannot be construed in terms of any of these special sets of ideas. The essential features that must be claimed for these ideas (i. e. those ranged in the class of kinship ideas) are: (1) that they must refer to the relation between child and father or mother;[533] and (2) that they must affirm an intimate bond of union of some kind between the parties involved. As may be easily conceived, it will be difficult in very low societies to get hold of these ideas, that is, to obtain the exact answer to the question, "What is kinship?" It is now impossible even to measure exactly the difficulty of getting a precise answer to this question, as ethnographers have never paid special attention to this point. Nevertheless, in Australia we shall be able to get at least some glimpses, which are of the highest theoretical interest. And even the negative result—that the idea of consanguinity must be considered wanting in the majority of Australian tribes—is of considerable theoretical value.
Besides the general question, "What is considered as the source of parental (maternal and paternal) kinship?" we may ask questions about the various other ideas connected with kinship. Here come in the legal, moral, and customary ideas, by which society exercises its normative power in reference to the said relation. Some of these are expressed in different social functions.[534] Others may be reached by the study of beliefs, traditions, customs and other forms of folk-lore. The well-known customs of the couvade are one of the typical functions of the father, in which there is an expression of a deep connection of a magical kind between the father and his offspring. Whatever explanation of these customs may be given,[535] it cannot be denied that they are based upon the idea of a very intimate tie between the two individuals involved, and that this tie is conceived as being of a mystical character.
There is also a series of social rules which regulate the social position of the offspring according to that of its parents. This group of rules might appropriately be called descent in the social sense of this word.[536] In the Australian societies, e. g. the membership of different social groups—as the local group, the totemic clan, the phratry, the class—is determined by the membership of one of the parents of the given individual. And many authors speak of tribes with paternal and maternal descent. It must be borne in mind, nevertheless, that in order to use the word descent in a definite sense it is always necessary to add what social group is meant. For it is possible that membership in the local group is determined by the father, membership of the phratry by the mother, and membership in the clan by neither of them. The facts of descent do not seem to play a very important rôle and are not suitable to be chosen as the most important feature of kinship. The facts of inheritance also have not very much influence upon kinship (compare below, [pp. 290], [291]).
As it is easy to see, looking at our own ideas on parental kinship, all the normative ideas, whether religious, moral or legal, are in close connection with the central, basic idea, i. e. in the case of our society, the idea of consanguinity. And these normative ideas are brought by the collective mind into causal connection with the central idea of community of blood.[537] It would be the ideal of sociological research as regards our present subject if we could bring in any given society all the normative ideas into such a causal dependence upon the central idea, and explain how they are conceived by the collective mind as the outgrowth of this root idea; thus showing how all the legal, moral and customary aspects converge on the fundamental concept of kinship. Unhappily, in low societies the imperfection of ethnographic material would frustrate any attempt at such an enterprise. In Australia our knowledge of these aspects—moral, legal and customary—is very scanty. Although they are all undoubtedly in quite a rudimentary state, careful investigation would possibly disclose many points of extreme interest.
One other problem must be discussed here more in detail, owing to its great theoretical importance, viz. the legal aspect of parental kinship. We have defined above the meaning of the word legal.[538] In connection with what has been said, we may affirm that the legal is only one of the many aspects of kinship; that legal ideas, as far as known for any given society, must be taken into account when defining kinship, but that the latter cannot possibly be reduced to its legal aspect only. And it is still more incorrect[539] to represent physiological consanguinity and legal power over the child as two mutually exclusive sets of facts beyond which there can be no determination of parental kinship. We find the opinion expressed by many authors, especially with regard to Australia, that where-ever the tie binding parent and child was not constituted by the acknowledgment of consanguinity, that there always it was based on legal principles such as potestas, authority, Machtstellung, or other similar ones.
The incorrectness of taking only these two alternatives is shown by the three following considerations: (1) Such a view overlooks the facts discussed below, which show that there is actual kinship based on ideas neither physiological nor legal. (2) This way of interpreting facts operates with very indeterminate concepts, for we nowhere find any explanation of how to take the general term legal in connection with a given aboriginal society, and still less are we told how such legal concepts as potestas, paternal authority, etc., are to be applied to a given aboriginal society. (3) If a definition of law or legal be given, it would plainly be seen that it is quite erroneous to consider any of these concepts as defining parental kinship. This is quite clear if we use the definition of legal given above, [p. 11]. But even allowing a broad margin for the variations which may result from a varying definition of legal, it may be safely stated that in whatever way we might try to define this word, our definition must always involve factors of social pressure, stress and authority. In other words, the relation between two individuals may be considered legal only when we imply that it is wholly and exclusively determined by the outward regulating control of the society and by a potential direct action of it. And in the case we are speaking of—that is, the relation between parent and child in low societies—there can be hardly any question of this. As will appear in the Australian case, this relation is left quite to itself, and it is regulated by the spontaneous emotional attitude of the father towards his child. No factor of any outer pressure or constraint enters into it, at least we are not informed of any such by the ethnographical evidence extant. The collection and analysis of the statements on this point given below[540] will show that there cannot be any question of potestas, authority, proprietorship, or anything of the kind. Neither social pressure nor economic interest bind the parents to their children, nor does any motive of this kind enter into this relation.
As this subject is very important, some examples of the mode of reasoning just now criticized are set out here. These passages are quoted from works of very distinguished writers to show that the mistakes result from serious defects in sociological knowledge, and not from any accidental causes. And they are taken from passages which either refer exclusively to the Australian aboriginal society, or are exemplified by Australian facts.
Mr. Thomas, at the end of a passage in which he discusses the relation between the concepts of kinship and consanguinity says that in Australia "some relation will almost certainly be found to exist between the father and child; but it by no means follows that it arises from any idea of consanguinity." So far we perfectly agree with the reasoning of the author. But when Mr. Thomas adds, "In other communities potestas[541] and not consanguinity[541] is held to determine the relations of the husband of a woman to her offspring; and it is a matter for careful inquiry how far the same holds good in Australia, when the fact of fatherhood is in some cases asserted to be unrecognized by the natives,"[542] we see that he falls into the error of acknowledging only two possibilities: potestas or consanguinity. It is true that he speaks of consanguinity as being modified by native ideas, and that thus a social element is introduced into the physiological concept of consanguinity. But we are still left to guess how this social element is to be understood. And as pointed out above, the relation between father and child in the tribes in question cannot be considered as based upon consanguinity or community of blood, whatever meaning we give to these words. Erroneous in any case is the opposition of kinship and potestas, as if these two concepts were of the same order, and could be considered as two equivalent categories excluding each other. Whereas, as we saw, these two concepts are of quite different order and cannot be treated as excluding or replacing each other. Kinship is a very complicated social fact, very complex in its sociological and psychological aspects. Potestas is a legal category, expressing a set of attributes and rights of the father over his children. Potestas (or any analogous legal factor) may be a constituent element of kinship in certain societies. It cannot possibly replace kinship entirely.
A similar unsatisfactory reasoning, it appears to me, is to be found contained in a passage of the small but clearly and deeply thought out work of the eminent sociologist, the late Prof. Dargun. He stipulates as the most important postulate of studies in family organization the discrimination between authority and consanguinity: "Strenges Auseinanderhalten der Gewaltverhältnisse von den Verwandtschaftsverhältnissen."[543] And he defines Verwandtschaft as a purely physiological fact: "die letztere, (Verwandtschaft) ist durch das natürliche Blutband gegeben."[544] This is obviously an incorrect definition for sociological use.[545] Equally unsatisfactory is the definition given of the Gewalt (potestas): Gewalt vom natürlichen Blutband unabhängig kann "auf sehr verschiedene historische Wurzeln zurückführen."[546] This definition is both negative and ambiguous, excluding elements of consanguinity from potestas and assigning to the latter "various historic roots." We might, therefore, expect to find everything in this idea, but on the other hand such a definition lacks precision and does not give either the direction in which to look for the determining factors, or any criterion for our recognition of the existence of personal kinship ties. Now our definition of kinship responds to both these requirements when applied to the Australian facts. Moreover we find in these phrases of Dargun the alternative condemned above between authority and consanguinity, the latter used here in the crude physiological sense. It may be noted that in some passages of the book in question there are hints pointing to the fact that the author felt the necessity of a psychological definition of paternal kinship. So when he says, speaking of the Australians: "Vollkommenste Vaterherrschaft, ja selbst ausgesprochene Vaterliebe—gehen mit ebenso unbedingter Verwandtschaft—und Stammeszugehörigkeit in mütterlicher Linie, Hand in Hand,"[547] we see that here the author speaks of paternal love and states that this is what determines the relation of father and child in Australia. When he speaks afterwards of the father as: "Beschützer und Fürsorger"[548] of his children, we see that he mentions purely personal factors of the relation of father to child, such as we lay stress upon in speaking of community of life and of interests. But still the author seems to be entangled in his alternative between consanguinity and potestas. So we read: "Wo zwischen dem Vater und seinen Kindern ein wirkliches Verwandtschaftsverhältniss bestehet, dort muss auf die faktische Zeugung durch den Hausvater entscheidendes Gewicht gelegt werden, und umgekehrt überall wo Gleichgültigkeit gegen dieses Zeugungsverhältniss an den Tag tritt, ist das Gewaltverhältniss des Vaters, noch nicht zur Blutsverwandtschaft herangereift."[549] In this phrase there is a complete oversight of the various actual ways in which an intimate relation between father and child may be established, and which have nothing to do either with consanguinity or with patria potestas.
In the new work of Prof. Frazer there are also some pages touching on this point. Although he distinguishes well between the physiological and social consanguinity,[550] still in another place he says, speaking of the Central Tribes: "Denying as they do explicitly that the child is begotten by the father, they can only regard him as the consort, and in a sense as the owner of the mother, and, therefore, as the owner of her progeny, just as a man who owns a cow owns also the calf she brings forth. In short, it seems probable that a man's children were viewed as his property long before they were recognized as his offspring." It is impossible to agree with this opinion. The word "property" can in no strict sense be applied to the relation between father and child in Australia. Besides the author does not even clearly indicate in what sense he uses the word; and this word appears here only as a metaphor. Moreover, it is obvious that this opinion implies opposition between consanguinity and the legal category of "proprietorship," and contrasts the words "property" and "offspring."
In fact, as we hinted above, and as we shall have opportunity of discussing below[551] in connection with the evidence, there is little ground for speaking of authority, patria potestas, "ownership" or any similar attributes of the father as regards his children in Australia. It must not be forgotten that these words are nearly meaningless as long as they have not a legal sense. According to the definition of legal we should say that two people stand to each other in a purely legal relation when certain norms are laid down and actively sanctioned by society, which requires a definite mutual behaviour and attitude on the part of each. It was pointed out above that in Australia we have data allowing us to speak of the legal aspect of social institutions and relations;[552] it appears improbable, though, that there could be found any purely legal relation. At any rate, nothing of that sort determines or forms the substance of the relation between father and child in Australia. If a father should kill or abandon his child, he would, for all we know, be left quite undisturbed. Nobody compels him to provide for its subsistence, to protect it and care for it.[553] There are spontaneous elements that bind him to it. And these spontaneous elements (to discover them will be our task) determine his relation to his child. Undoubtedly this kinship relation presents some legal features, such as, for instance, his right to dispose of his daughter in marriage (a right which in some tribes is reported to belong to the mother or mother's brother). But we know very little about it.[554] At any rate, there are only a few occasions on which the relation in question involves any possibility of social intervention.[555]
Nobody ever doubts, as far as I can see, the fact that all personal ties between two individuals consist not only of ideas, but also of feelings, and that they are influenced no less by the feelings the two individuals mutually inspire than by the ideas they form of each other. To ascertain, e. g., if there be friendship between two people, one seeks to know their feelings towards each other, as well as what they think about each other. The relation between a parent and a child is in our society chiefly determined by their mutual feelings. And in a case where these feelings are absent, this relationship—in spite of all legal, moral, and other factors which tend to maintain its form—is deeply affected. It may be taken for granted that the sentimental side most essentially determines in a given society any kind of personal relationship. And in the same society the character of a given personal relation—be it parental kinship or anything else—varies with the intensity of the feeling and is essentially defined by the latter. It may be accepted also, that in different societies the types of feelings corresponding to given personal relations may vary according to the society, and may define in each one this given relation in its most essential character. In other words, the concept of collective feelings can be applied as well as the concept of collective ideas.[556] By this is to be understood certain types of feeling, which being dependent on corresponding collective ideas possess the same essential character as the latter: they exist in a certain society, and are transmitted from generation to generation; they impose themselves on the individual mind, and possess the character of necessity; they are deeply connected with certain social institutions; in fact they stand to them in the relation of functional dependence (in the mathematical sense). So, for instance, it is clear that in the hypothetical primitive promiscuous society, in which ex hypothesi there would be no individual relationship, the feelings of affection for the individual offspring could not exist. We could only speak of the "collective feeling" of group affection. So it seems to me that the relation of parents to children cannot be treated with any approach to completeness without seriously taking into account its emotional character.
But even if the foremost importance of emotional elements and the possibility of treating them as collective feelings were granted, there is another objection to be met. Granted that these elements are actually quite essential in determining family relations, it might be objected that they are too shapeless and indeterminate in themselves to be of any practical use in scientific research, especially if our theories have to be based upon ethnographic observations in which the more tangible and the more unambiguous the facts chosen, the less the risk of being misled. Now, are not feelings of the most indeterminate character, the most misleading, and the most difficult to ascertain? In fact, the theory of feelings and emotions seems to be the least developed in individual as well as in social psychology. Especially it might be suggested that to pursue the investigation on double lines is useless; feelings always find adequate expression in ideas, in fact crystallize in them.[557] Without trying to give a general answer to these objections, they may be met as regards the special case under discussion. In Australia, as a matter of fact, they do not hold good. For our knowledge of the sentimental side of parental kinship is much better and much more determinate than our knowledge of any other aspect of this relation.
It may be here indicated why our knowledge on this point may be considered as a well-founded one. As stated below ([pp. 249], [250]) the agreement between the statements as to parental feelings is quite an exceptional one. Comparing it with the usual discrepancy between the reports of different observers on many other points, which would appear much less liable to any subjectivity, this complete agreement and the relative exactness of our information is highly remarkable.[558] It should be noted that on this point there is no extrinsic reason, or secondary motive, that would make us suspect an artificial cause of agreement. The point in question forms no part of any theory; it affects no moral or racial susceptibilities. And there was no special reason why so many observers should pay attention to it, and why they all should state the same thing: viz. extreme love and fondness towards the children on the part of the parents. This agreement shows that the facts which the ethnographers had under observation were so expressive of the underlying psychology, and they struck the writers so strongly that they simply felt compelled to notice them. And observing closely the facts through which those feelings of paternal affection found their expression, it becomes evident that these feelings are not so indeterminate as might a priori be supposed; that, on the contrary, they find quite an unequivocal expression in a series of facts. Let us look more closely at these facts.
In the first place consider the facts of daily life[559]—the behaviour of parents towards children in all the cases where the latter want help or merit punishment. We read that on all such occasions both parents exhibit great kindness and extreme leniency. The children are carefully looked after by the father as well as by the mother; and they are very seldom punished. In one place it is even stated that the father is more lenient than the mother. Now is it not in agreement with all our every-day experiences that in such facts and features of daily life prominent and characteristic feelings find their adequate expression? And is the accordance of opinion among all our Australian informants on this point not a proof that they were able to judge with great certainty from these facts concerning the underlying feelings?—that these outer signs were unmistakable expressions of the inner facts? Undoubtedly our information is too little detailed, and particulars referring to treatment of children and other features of the aboriginal daily life in this connection would be of the highest value. But considering that the attention of the observers was never specially drawn to these questions by any theoretical writer, and comparing our information on this point with other parts of our evidence, it must be acknowledged that it is exceptionally good. And this reliability is doubtless in the first place due to the fact that the subject of observation was clear, unambiguous and well determined.
We are, moreover, in possession of a few reports of actual occurrences in which the great love displayed by the parents for their children is shown in its full strength and under the stress of special circumstances. In a battle that took place between some aborigines and settlers, the former were put to flight. They had to cross a river, but in doing so they left a child behind them. It was seized by a Maori who was at the station, and it was shown to the blacks standing on the other bank of the river. The father of the child recognized it at once. He seemed almost frantic, held out his arms eagerly towards the child, making at the same time signs for it to be given to him. The Maori pretended to be willing to give it and made signs to the black to cross the river again. And the black swam across the river to rescue his child. Thus he did not hesitate to risk his life in order to save his child; in the end he was treacherously murdered by the Maori.[560] Another touching story is told by Rob. Dawson concerning a mother's grief after the loss of her son. He says that the woman was utterly transformed by the blow. "Before the catastrophe she was a remarkably fine woman, being tall and athletic beyond any other in the settlement; now, she was a truly wretched and forlorn spectacle, apparently wasted down by watching and sorrow. I have seen this poor creature often since our first meeting, at their different camps near us, and she has still the same wretched appearance."[561] These tales show that parental feelings could be as deep and pathetic among the Australian blacks as in any cultured society. We read another story in Howitt,[562] who tells us that when he was living one day in his camp in the Dieri country the father of a lad, who was visiting Howitt's camp the day before, came in a state of utmost alarm and terror. The lad, his son, was missing, and they could not find him. The father was terrified and, suspecting that the white men had concealed the lad and might carry him away, he looked through Howitt's luggage. It may be noted that this occurred among the Dieri, where it is said that individual paternity does not obtain. Nevertheless it was not a group of fathers that came worrying and striving to find the boy; neither was it a group of fathers that risked their lives for the child, nor a group of mothers that was grieving to death for their child. In the few anecdotes reported below with the other statements we see also how strongly paternal affection is marked. So in the story of the old man quite infatuated with his son and disconsolate after his death, and in the story of another man eager to rescue his boy, and the old man in Curr's story, who allowed his boy to do anything he liked.[563]
Such stories and anecdotes could be easily multiplied from the ethnographical material extant. They all corroborate our proposition, viz. that the sentimental side of the parental relation expresses itself quite clearly and tangibly in ever so many facts of different order, and that it would be easy for a well-informed observer to give a fairly exact account of the feelings in terms of facts. These facts, as said above, are in the first place the facts of daily life, which are quite unmistakable in their meaning and easily expressed in an accurate manner. The proof of it is that we have now relatively abundant data, although no methodical research was devoted to these facts. Then there are different occasions on which the limit of affection, the maximum and minimum of their range in a given society, is established. Such are the foregoing stories. I think we can safely conclude that the emotional side is on the one hand quite essential, and important enough to take the first place in our considerations.[564] On the other hand it can be accurately described in terms of objective data for the purpose of being chosen as the chief characteristic of the parental relation. It must be added that not a single other side or aspect of this relation appears to fulfil these conditions in the same degree. As will subsequently appear, our knowledge about the aboriginal ideas on parental relationship are not so ample by far as our knowledge about their feelings in that connection.
The foregoing discussion has been mainly concerned with the collective ideas which define parental kinship, and the different sets of social facts in which these ideas find their expression have been enumerated. It also dealt with collective feelings, and the different facts in which these are to be looked for were surveyed. We must now emphasize the fact that just as we may say that the different ideas determining kinship converge towards one central concept, or rather flow out of one common central idea of kinship, so there is also an intimate connection between the ideas determining kinship and the feelings bound up with it. This becomes obvious if our own social conditions be considered. As mentioned above, a father in our society loves his child in a great measure because he knows that it is his own offspring. In societies in which the idea of consanguinity (in the social sense) does not exist, such a connection between feelings of paternal love and knowledge of a physiological procreation would be impossible. And it would be of the highest sociological interest to trace what form such connections assume. An attempt at such a study would be possible in our own society and in other higher societies, although there would be serious difficulties enough. But there would hardly be sufficient material to attempt it in any lower society, and there is absolutely no possibility of doing this for Australia.
A brief summary of the foregoing argument may now be given. It was stated at the beginning that parental kinship corresponds to a very complex and manifold set of phenomena; moreover in various societies this relationship is determined by various elements. The problem is to find in all this complexity the structural features, the really essential facts, the knowledge of which in any given society would enable us to give a scientifically valid description of kinship. In other words, the problem is to give a general formula defining kinship, which would state its constant elements and give heed to the essential varying elements therein; that formula being on the one hand not too narrow for application to the various human societies, it would be on the other hand not too vague to afford quite definite results when applied to any special case. A final solution of this problem cannot be arrived at a priori, but only by way of induction, after the facts in the different human societies have been studied. And in order to attempt such a preliminary study of the Australian facts, the foregoing remarks have been given; they aim at a general definition of the kind just described in the form of a tentative or preliminary sketch. Consequently in the first place the attempt was made to ascertain what could be taken as the constant elements in individual parental kinship. What appeared to be nearly universal in this connection is the fact that infants and small children are always specially attached, and stand in a specific close relation to a man and a woman.[565] The woman is invariably their own mother, who gave them birth; the man is the woman's husband. The existence of this group, which may be called the individual family, is the basis upon which kinship may be determined; it is the condition under which it is possible to speak of individual parental kinship in any given society.
But it was shown that the knowledge of these facts is not sufficient to yield a precise idea of maternal and paternal kinship, and that many of its manifold aspects of foremost sociological interest would remain unknown if the inquiry were broken off at this point. These latter aspects depend upon factors which are by no means constant in all societies, but have a very wide range of variation depending on the general social conditions. A discussion of the concept of consanguinity has shown that the variations go so far as to affect the main question of paternal kinship: "Who is the father (in the social sense) of a child, and how is he determined?"
In order to indicate in which direction the varying general conditions of society must be investigated so as to yield all that is essential for the sociological knowledge of kinship, it was found most convenient to range the facts in two main lines of inquiry: (1) The different sets of facts which express the central collective idea of what fatherhood is; and the various other collective ideas—legal, customary, moral—of a normative character referring to the relation in question. The social facts in which these ideas must be looked for are: Beliefs, traditions, customs referring to the relation in question (as for instance the couvade type), and functions of kindred such as legal duties and obligations between parent and child. (2) The facts in which the expression of the collective feelings characteristic of the relation in question is to be found. The facts of daily life, as well as the dramatic expression of feelings, come in here. The emotional character of the parental kinship relation is of the highest importance in determining the social feature of this relation, and for the comprehension of its social working.
These points of view will be applied hereafter to the discussion of the Australian parental kinship. But in order to illustrate here their theoretical bearing, a short discussion will be given of some of the ways in which the concept of kinship has been applied to low societies by sociologists. Morgan's way of dealing with the meaning of kinship must be first mentioned.[566] He assumes without further discussion that kinship was conceived always and in all societies, even the lowest ones, in terms of consanguinity.[567] Our discussion of consanguinity shows how great a mistake it was on the part of Morgan to impute to the primitive mind a whole series of ideas which absolutely and necessarily must have been foreign to it. As was said above, primitive mankind was certainly wholly ignorant of the process of procreation, and the relation of the sexes cannot possibly have been the source of kinship ideas. How great a part this assumption plays in Morgan's deductions it is easy to perceive.[568] And he was led to it by omitting to discuss and analyze the concept of kinship, and by applying to low societies our own social concept of it.
J. F. MacLennan uses also the kinship concept as identical with that of blood relationship.[569] But it must be emphatically stated that MacLennan recognizes both the importance of feelings in relation to kinship[570] and the fact that consanguinity was not known to primitive man,[571] although he unfortunately does not develop these two important ideas.
The same use of the concept of kinship (Verwandtschaft) was pointed out above as a mistake of Dargun's. The ideas on kinship of Prof. Frazer and Mr. Thomas were also dealt with above, where it was found that they were not adapted to the complexity of the facts.
Mr. Sidney Hartland rightly sees that kinship is not necessarily identical with consanguinity in our sense. But he wrongly restricts kinship to a specific kind of ideas about community of blood. "Though kinship, however, is not equivalent to blood relationship in our sense of the term, it is founded on the idea of common blood which all within the kin possess, and to which all outside the kin are strangers. A feeling of solidarity runs through the entire kin, so that it may be said without hyperbole that the kin is regarded as one entire life, one body whereof each unit is more than metaphorically a member, a limb. The same blood runs through them all, and 'the blood is the life.'"[572] This definition, illustrated as it is by many examples, is one more instance showing that the idea underlying kinship may be different from the idea of consanguinity in our sense, i. e. consanguinity of blood through procreation. But the affirmation that kinship is always based on some idea of common blood, seems to be not in accord with the facts. Moreover this passage, which is the only one designed to define kinship, is quite inadequate to the importance of the subject, especially in a treatise devoted to primitive paternity, and the result is that in this admirable work the purely sociological side presents some obscurities. The following remark: "Kindred with the father is first and foremost juridical—a social convention"[573] is also incorrect in the light of the foregoing discussion of the legal aspect of kinship.
Dr. Rivers defines: "Kin and Kinship.—These terms should be limited to the relationship ... which can be demonstrated genealogically." This is quite a formalistic definition and does not at all meet the full facts of the case. Moreover it seems that in this way we define the unknown by what is still more indeterminate. For to draw up a genealogy we must first know who are the individuals between whom the line of descent is to be drawn; in other words we must know how fatherhood is defined in a given society. Among the Todas, Dr. Rivers had to ascertain in what way the father of a given child is determined, before he could proceed to draw up the genealogies.[574] In any case the problem of kinship requires in the actual state of things not only a purely formal definition, but a detailed analysis. Much more important as regards the present problem is the way in which Dr. Rivers has described the kinship of the Torres Straits Islanders.[575] In introducing the study of the functions of kin he points to a series of important facts which determine some social aspect of kinship and afford an insight into some of the collective ideas concerning this relation. It must be borne in mind, however, that the set of functions described by Dr. Rivers gives us only a partial knowledge of the social aspect of kinship. The every-day functions corresponding to treatment, behaviour, feeding and so forth, which characterize the intimate or home aspect of the kinship relation, ought not to be omitted. They correspond, according to our analysis, to feelings which make an essential part of the relation in question. The social functions of kin collected by Dr. Rivers, expressing certain duties and privileges of the kinsmen involved, correspond to certain customary norms. A complete collection of all legal norms and all moral rules would be an essential addition. That such moral rules do exist among the Torres Straits Islanders appears certain from the precepts given at initiation to youths.[576]
Messrs. Fison and Howitt in their treatise on Australian kinship[577] do not give anywhere a clear definition of the concept in question. The only place where something like definition is given is page 121, where kinship is said to be "membership in the same tribal division," and where there is an acknowledgment that beyond "kinship" there still lies "personal relationship" between the parent and child. This is true, but this is only the first distinction upon which the actual discussion of the problem ought to be based. That the want of such a discussion is a serious defect in the book is obvious.
The important distinction between kinship (parenté) and consanguinity, which is one of the chief results of the foregoing pages, has been made already by Prof. Durkheim.[578] Nevertheless the exclusive stress that M. Durkheim lays upon the legal aspect of kinship would not seem adapted to the complexity of the facts. "La parenté est essentiellement constitué par des obligations juridiques et morales que la société impose à certains individus." This is not enough. There are certain ideas which affirm a strong bond between parent and child, and undoubtedly these ideas, although neither of legal nor moral character, exercise a strong influence on the relation in question. Possibly the difference could be reduced to the broader sense in which Prof. Durkheim uses the words legal and moral; as his remarks are necessarily short, being contained in a review, it is difficult exactly to ascertain their sense. We have tried to show that, especially in reference to low societies, both these terms must be used with caution, and that a definite sense must be given to them. Besides, I do not share Prof. Durkheim's view that by substituting the word "kinship" for the word "consanguinity" all Morgan's deductions could be rectified.[579] The constitution of the family is something quite different from and much more complicated than the sexual aspect of marriage, and it cannot be at once seen whether the nomenclature of kinship (systems of kinship terms) could be shown to be rooted in the former with the same ease as it can be shown in the latter case. This would require a special study.
M. A. van Gennep also clearly establishes the distinction between parenté sociale and parenté physique.[580] According to our terminology the latter would correspond to physiological consanguinity, while the former would be identical with what we called parental kinship. We see that this distinction is quite in agreement with our theory. Only we called social consanguinity a special case of kinship, where the collective ideas on procreation play the essential rôle. Obviously these ideas may be more or less physiologically correct or erroneous. But where they are completely absent (as in Australia) we prefer not to use the suggestive term consanguinity, and to distinguish these cases from the former we use the term kinship. M. A. van Gennep remarks further that the Central Australians do not know the real cause of procreation in spite of some illusory appearances (we shall deal with this question in detail below and solve it quite in agreement with the author in question); he shows the wide extension of this negative belief in the Australian continent, and speaking of the South Australian tribes, points out that the most important aspect is that they prove the independence of kinship and consanguinity.[581]
The same distinction between consanguinity and kinship is also made by Prof. Westermarck in his discussion of the classificatory system of relationship, and Prof. Westermarck has already brought the important objection against Morgan, viz. that the latter has "given no evidence for the truth of his assumption that the classificatory system" is a system of blood ties,[582] an objection which has appeared also to us as fundamental. Unfortunately, Prof. Westermarck has not given any exhaustive discussion of the concept of kinship.
Finally, I wish to mention a passage by Sir Laurence Gomme, which contains suggestive remarks nearly identical with some views set forth in this chapter. "It is of no use translating a native term as 'father,' if father did not mean to the savage what it means to us. It might mean something so very different. With us fatherhood connotes a definite individual with all sorts of social, economical and political associations, but what does it mean to the savage? It may mean physical fatherhood and nothing more, and physical fatherhood may be a fact of the veriest insignificance. It may mean social fatherhood ... and thus becomes" (in some cases), "much more than we can understand by the term father."[583]
It may also be pointed out for the sake of completeness that in the great majority of human societies parental kinship assumes the form of consanguinity; the ideas that underlie kinship are generally gathered round the facts of procreation. These facts are connected with such deep and powerful instincts and feelings that in the majority of cases they naturally shape and influence the ideas of maternity and paternity. But the few exceptions to this rule which we meet with in very primitive societies are of the highest theoretical interest, both from the evolutionist's and psychologist's point of view. The final remark I would like to make here is on the well-known fact that physiological maternity is much more easily ascertainable than physiological paternity. Paternal kinship, therefore, will much more frequently differ from what we called consanguinity than maternal kinship. But some of the Australian examples and our previous general considerations should make us cautious in laying down a priori any assertion of the purely physiological character of maternity.
II
Some Examples of Kinship Ideas suggested by the Australian Folk-lore
The foregoing remarks on kinship, and the sketch of a general definition of kinship given above, of course bear upon the whole of the present investigations, since parental kinship being one of the relationships involved in the individual family, all that refers to this latter unit relates more or less immediately to parental kinship. In the other chapters we attempt to discuss the existence of the individual family, and of those of its features which appear to be universal, and which have, therefore, been adopted as the basis of parental kinship. The general features of the Australian individual family are given in the concluding chapter, and a comparison of the results presented there with the foregoing general definition of kinship[584] will be sufficient to satisfy the first point of this definition, i. e. to prove the existence of individual parental kinship in Australia and to describe its constant elements. In the following chapter ([Chap. VII.]) attention will be paid to the functions of kin, which correspond to the collective feelings of parents to children. Here we shall discuss the data taken from Australian folk-lore, which bear upon the parental kinship, and shall thus satisfy that part of our definition in which it was laid down that the ideas of kinship must be investigated.
The survey may commence with the Central tribes, the folk-lore of which we know best, owing to the excellent information given by Messrs. Spencer and Gillen, subsequently confirmed in its main lines by the joint publication of Herr Strehlow and Frhr. von Leonhardi. In these works we possess a very detailed description of the aboriginal views on conception and birth, which are connected with their totemic beliefs. These views will not be reproduced here in extenso, and the reader is referred to the sources and the special works.[585] The reader is therefore, supposed to be acquainted with the aboriginal views on conception, and only the ideas which in these theories refer directly to our subject, i. e. those underlying parental kinship, will be dealt with here.
Roughly speaking it may be said that these totemic beliefs and theories of conception prevent the aboriginal mind from forming the idea of physiological paternity and even probably weaken the social importance of maternity. For the only cause of pregnancy is that a "spirit-child" entered the body of a woman. "The natives one and all in these tribes believe that the child is the direct result of the entrance into the mother of an ancestral spirit individual. They have no idea of procreation as being directly associated with sexual intercourse, and firmly believe that children can be born without this taking place. There are, for example, in the Arunta country certain stones which are supposed to be charged with spirit children, who can, by magic, be made to enter the bodies of women, or will do so on their own accord."[586] Accordingly no tie of blood can be supposed to exist between the father and his child; there is no room for any ideas of physiological paternity; in other words, using our terminology, social consanguinity between father and child does not exist.[587] This is the most general conclusion that can be drawn from the beliefs quoted. But in connection with this question there are still some details, some controversial points into which we must enter in order to dissipate any doubts as to the correctness of our general conclusions just mentioned, as well as of some subsequent reasonings.
(1) There seems to be some incertitude as to the complete absence among the natives of any knowledge regarding the physiology of procreation. We read in Strehlow,[588] "Übrigens wissen die alten Männer, wie mir versichert wurde, dass die cohabitatio als Grund der Kinderkonzeption anzusehen sei, sagen aber davon den jüngeren Männern und Frauen nichts." This phrase might evoke some doubts as to whether we should attribute so much importance to the alleged ignorance.[589] But according to subsequent information in the same publication,[590] we must not attach to this phrase too much weight. Possibly the knowledge of the old men comes from alien sources; at any rate we see from the explanation given below by Frhr. von Leonhardi that this phrase does not rest on any concrete facts, or any well-founded information. From the point of view of collective ideas it must always be remembered that it is in the social institutions of a given people and in the whole of their beliefs that we must look for the foundation and confirmation of a given creed. It would be a superfluous digression to point out how deeply the totemic theory of conception is connected with all the other beliefs and the whole social life of the Australian aborigines—as this has been done by so many students of the subject, and pre-eminently by Prof. Frazer in his recent work on Totemism and Exogamy. Some doubts might also arise from the fact that the natives apparently know the real process of propagation in the case of the animals. There is undoubtedly some difficulty here; and additional information on this point would be most valuable. Nevertheless the case is not quite hopeless: if we assume that this correct physiological knowledge is of a relatively late origin, it is quite natural that it would arise first in relation to the animal world, because the ideas about man, being the most important and elaborate, would be the most conservative. Anyhow this point requires further elucidation.[591]
(2) We must insist upon another point, which might at first sight cast some shadow of suspicion even on the foregoing one. We read in Spencer and Gillen[592] that sexual intercourse "prepares the mother for the reception and birth also of an already formed spirit-child who inhabits one of the local totem centres." And this belief of "preparation," although at first denied by Strehlow,[593] was substantiated by him after a more careful investigation and emphatically affirmed.[594] Although there might seem to be at first sight some room for doubt, whether this belief does not create some connection between copulation and pregnancy, and so a bridge for the formation of ideas of paternity, a moment's reflection dissipates these doubts. For in this belief there is absolutely nothing that would point to any individual male as the father of the child. We do not know whether, according to the native beliefs, there must be this preparation for each incarnation, or whether it means only that a female cannot conceive without being deflorated. Considering the emphasis with which, according to Spencer and Gillen, the natives deny any causal connection between copulation and birth, the second supposition seems to be the more probable. But even if the first supposition were the right one, it does not imply any knowledge that a given man has contributed to the body or soul of the child. The latter, already formed (although diminutive in form) enters the womb of a woman. We see therefore that our general conclusion of [page 209] is by no means contradicted by this detail in the aboriginal beliefs.
(3) In the third place I would like to deal with the question whether the totemic beliefs concerning conception contain the idea of any reincarnation of ancestors, as this point will be subsequently of importance to us. And on this important question there is controversy too. Spencer and Gillen emphatically state: "In the whole of this wide area, the belief that every living member of the tribe is the reincarnation of a spirit ancestor is universal. This belief is just as firmly held by the Urabunna people, who count descent in the female line, as in the Arunta and Warramunga, who count descent in the male line."[595]
On the other hand, the belief in reincarnation is expressly and explicitly denied by Strehlow and Leonhardi: "Den Glauben an eine immer wiederkehrende Reincarnation dieses altjirangamitjina (= alcheringa of Spencer and Gillen), den Spencer and Gillen gefunden haben wollen, hat Herr Strehlow nicht feststellen können."[596] In another passage of the same work the expression of Spencer and Gillen, "in every tribe without exception there exists a firm belief in the reincarnation of ancestors," is simply designated as misleading ("irreführend") by the editor (Frhr. v. Leonhardi).[597]
We seem here to be again at a loss. For behind the mere assertions of both parties there is a considerable amount of fact which seems to corroborate each of them. Spencer and Gillen do not give us bare statements. Such concrete and detailed accounts of beliefs as those quoted below[598] are very cogent. We see by them that Spencer and Gillen's assertion concerning the existence of reincarnation is the general expression of a series of positive facts; as there cannot be any doubt as to the authenticity of the latter, the general assertion of our authors is convincing! But if we inquire more precisely into the nature of this reincarnation we find certain "contradictions" and "inconsistencies" in these beliefs, and we can quite safely agree with Frhr. von Leonhardi that if we "take the expression exactly to the letter"[599] we are compelled to deny the existence of any ideas of reincarnation. The only objection is that any attempt to give "strict" or "exact" sense to aboriginal ideas is completely misplaced. The aborigines are not able to think exactly, and their beliefs do not possess any "exact meaning." And if an attempt be made to interpret them in this way, we shall always fail to understand them and to trace their social bearing. We must accept those beliefs as they stand in their quaint concreteness, full of contradictions and inconsistencies, and endeavour to mould our ideas upon the given folkloristic material, of which an adequate knowledge is indispensable for sociological purposes and gives us a very deep insight into the mechanism of different social groups. So, for instance, the aboriginal beliefs of reincarnation will be found to be of some importance as regards the idea of kinship.
But let us return to our analysis of this aboriginal idea of reincarnation. To define the word exactly the expression of Baron Leonhardi may be accepted; reincarnation means "that the given totemic ancestor himself continually undergoes rebirth." In other words the belief in reincarnation logically defined consists in a strict identification of a given man with a given ancestor. From this it is obvious that one would look in vain for such a belief amongst the Australian savages, who do not know anything of logic, and can neither affirm identity nor perceive contradictions.[600] Instead of identifying two things, they feel only a strong but mystical bond of union between them. In this sense the new-born child is obviously a reincarnation of a given ancestor. For it is "identical" with the spirit-child or ratapa of which it is the incarnation, and this again is "identical" with a given Alcheringa: obviously using the word "identity" in the sense indicated above, i. e. that there is some mystical tie between the Alcheringa and the spirit-child which has emanated from him or her.[601] That this tie exists, we know from the data,[602] from those given by Strehlow as well as from those of Spencer and Gillen.[603] And consequently it may be said that the Central Australians regard each man as the reincarnation of a given ancestor; this being, of course, understood with the restriction here laid down. Thus, any doubt as to this point—namely that all human beings are reincarnations of Alcheringa ancestors—may easily be set at rest.
There still remains, however, the question, much more important to us, whether there be amongst these tribes the belief in the reincarnation of human ancestors. Strehlow's information seems absolutely to deny any idea of repeated reincarnation;[604] a man after death goes to the ltjarilkna-ala, where after a certain time his ghost undergoes perfect and final destruction.[605] A man who has lived his life never returns. I confess that to assume amongst savages the existence of such a neatly defined and categorically-formulated belief in absolute destruction or annihilation seems to me rather suspicious; and there is perhaps some misunderstanding of a rather theoretical character on the part of the Rev. C. Strehlow. Moreover, we are informed by this latter author that besides this belief in annihilation there are ideas according to which the souls of "good" men go to heaven to Altjira,[606] and the souls of the "bad" people are eaten up by the atna ntjkantja.[607] Consequently not all souls perish after death, and reincarnation is from this standpoint not impossible. And even if there were some belief as to this annihilation, it might perfectly well be connected by the natives with the ideas of reincarnation. The primitive mind, as has often been urged, does not perceive contradictions. It is not to negative instances that we must look for an answer, but always to positive ones: if we do find indications of a belief, we are then sure that it exists, even if it were in contradiction with ever so many others. If we do not find it, we can say nothing, and especially we are not justified in proving its absence by showing that it stands in contradiction with any of the beliefs ascertained.
Now Spencer and Gillen adduce in several places concrete instances of beliefs which prove beyond doubt that the idea of the reincarnation of human beings actually exists in the Central tribes. As this point is of some importance in our present study, these instances must be brought forward. One of them is the belief that infants, who either die or are killed, soon undergo reincarnation. Such a belief exists among the Arunta,[608] among the Kaitish and Unmatjera.[609] And again, in another place, such a belief is reported to exist in all the tribes examined by Messrs. Spencer and Gillen.[610] That this belief is deeply rooted is shown by the fact that it serves as an excuse for the practice of infanticide; for the natives believe that the same child will soon undergo rebirth from the same mother. It might, nevertheless, be objected that here rebirth is undergone only by persons who died in infancy; and that this has little connection with the reincarnation of ancestors dead long ago. But, first, this belief is the proof of the existence of reincarnation ideas in general, and moreover there are better instances still. There has been found amongst the Urabunna the belief that a person at each reincarnation changes sex, class and totem.[611] The same belief in the alternation of sexes at each successive reincarnation is held amongst the Warramunga.[612] The knowledge of these concrete and detailed beliefs enables us to affirm without hesitation that the general idea of the reincarnation of human beings exists among the Central Australian tribes.[613] A mere assertion on the part of our informants might leave some doubts; but if they adduce these beliefs in detail, the doubts can be only as to their trustworthiness; and this is out of the question in the present case. There are yet other facts confirming the assumption we are dealing with. Messrs. Spencer and Gillen give a detailed account of the wanderings and doings of the ghost after death.[614] They say expressly that the ghost after a time goes to a certain place, where it awaits reincarnation. A similar belief in a land where the souls of the dead await reincarnation has been found in the Adelaide tribes.[615] So that, dividing the problem of reincarnation into two questions—Is there among the Central Australians (1) a belief in a reincarnation of the Alcheringa ancestors? (2) a belief in the reincarnation of human ancestors?—both must be answered in the affirmative.
To sum up our somewhat extensive discussion of the totemic beliefs of conception, we may say that the collective ideas of the Central and North Central Australian[616] aborigines ignore expressly and explicitly any connection of blood between a father and his child, and probably greatly reduce the importance of the maternal blood tie; that even allowing for the greatest amount of physiological knowledge amongst these aborigines, there cannot be any question of paternal consanguinity. We have seen further that in all these Central and North Central tribes (and possibly in many others too) there is an idea of reincarnation, not only of the Alcheringa, but also of the human ancestors; the word reincarnation being used in the sense indicated above, [page 214].
So far the results regarding parental, and especially paternal, kinship are purely negative; there is between father and child no consanguinity.[617] But is there no kinship? According to the theory of kinship sketched above, individual parental kinship must be accepted as existing in the Central no less than in all the other Australian tribes, for the reasons already specified. And, as was said above, and will be discussed again, it is even possible on the basis of the evidence extant to give an account of the emotional character of this relation. The greatest difficulty is to know what idea the aborigines themselves form concerning it; in other words, how is fatherhood determined in the collective psychology of the natives? Some indications at least of what we look for may be found.
If we examine the different items of the folk-lore, traditions, beliefs and customs of the Arunta, we can at first sight hardly discover any ideas that bear upon our subject. Fortunately, in the case of some of the Northern tribes, we are in possession of information which appears highly suggestive in regard to our problem. The Gnanji and Umbaia tribes of the Northern territory share the belief in totemic conception with all the more Southern tribes. But amongst them the child is always of the same totem as its father, wherever conception may have taken place. These tribes have a theory to reconcile these two beliefs that apparently are incompatible, viz. descent of totem in paternal line and birth by incarnation of a spirit-child.[618] They believe that spirits of the husband's totem follow the wife wherever the married couple may go, and that one of these spirit individuals enters the woman's body whenever it pleases; no spirit-child of any other totem could enter her. The infant is therefore always of the husband's totem, and it is the reincarnation of this individual spirit which has chosen to follow the man and his wife on their wanderings. In this belief there are, undoubtedly, contained ideas of a strong tie of sympathy, affinity or kinship between the father and his future child. In the first place the spirit-child, which undergoes reincarnation, belongs to the totem of the husband; but that does not as yet create any individual relation between the father and the child, although it constitutes a bond of totemic kinship between them.
Nevertheless it must be remembered that the individual spirit-child, which sometimes has even to follow the married couple on their wanderings, chooses its mother on account of her husband and not in all probability on her own; for it is not of her totem, and it is improbable that the natives assume ties of preference between two beings of different clans, if there are at hand two members of the same clan—the father and the reincarnated child. Now this act of choosing, this special preference of a certain woman on account of her husband, clearly points to a very close tie between father and child. Unfortunately, the writers who report the beliefs in question have not investigated the side we have discussed, and as all hypothetical inferences are dangerous in sociology, we must consider this belief to be highly suggestive but nothing more. Nevertheless, setting one against another the two facts—the social existence of a close tie between father and child on the one hand (as we can affirm it on the ground of the emotional character of this relationship), and the existence of a belief that the reincarnated spirit-child is of the father's totem, and is, so to say, attached to him in his roaming life—it is difficult not to suspect some inner connection between them. Now, if our supposition is right, and if this belief has its social influence in defining fatherhood, it may be said that in the Gnanji and Umbaia tribes the essence of fatherhood is seen in the fact that a given man has determined a given spirit-child to take up its abode in his wife's body, and that the close tie of kinship lies in this mutual affinity or attraction exercised by the man on the spirit-child. This is hypothetical, but we may note another statement of Spencer and Gillen's which appears to bear upon our subject and corroborates our first hypothetical assumption.
We read that in the three coastal tribes of the Northern territory—Binbinga, Anula and Mara—the natives are very clear upon the point that the spirit-children know which are the right lubra for them respectively to enter, and each one deliberately chooses his or her own mother.[619] Now descent in these tribes is strictly paternal both as regards totems and classes.[620] This means that the father determines the class and totem of his child. We must assume, therefore, that the spirit-child chooses its mother chiefly in regard to her husband, i. e. its future father. It may, therefore, be once more repeated here that such an act of preference involves the idea of a very close tie between the spirit-child and the father; whether this idea is a real kinship idea, that is, whether it has its positive influence upon the different functions of the relationship in question, is not mentioned by our informants, and it would be quite vain to speculate upon the subject. But again, putting the two items—i. e. the belief in question and the existence of a close tie of kinship—side by side, it is difficult to deny that a connection between them appears very probable.
A similar social part appears also to be played by the most general belief connected with the question of birth—the belief in reincarnation. The question whether these beliefs may be assumed in the Arunta has been discussed at length, and an affirmative conclusion has been arrived at. Moreover, it has been seen that this belief appears to be almost universal in Australia, and that it is reported by many writers. There seems to be some reason for assuming that this belief may possibly have some bearing on the aboriginal ideas of kinship. As the child is an incarnation not only of a spirit individual, and consequently of an Alcheringa ancestor, but also in the majority of cases of a series of human ancestors, it comes into this world with an already formed personality, and it stands in a definite relation to an Alcheringa ancestor; to a Nanja place and to a given Churinga; it has its place in a totemic group and in a class. We may, therefore, reasonably assume that among other attributes the child brings its individual kinship, derived from some vague ideas about a former life, with it into the world. In other words, the child is probably supposed already at its birth to stand in a definite kinship relation (dating from a mutual previous existence) towards its individual parents. In fact, if the child comes into the world as a member of other social groups, it may be taken as very probable that it comes as the individual kinsman of its father and mother. Father, mother and child have already lived in the past; they may already have stood in a very close relationship; perhaps they have even been members of the same individual family.
This supposition may appear at first sight highly hypothetical; plausible perhaps, but nothing more; yet there are other facts which in considerable measure support it. There is the belief that the spirit part of a child which is killed, or dies in infancy, comes to life again by and by, and undergoes incarnation in the same woman.[621] In this belief we see that the ties of individual kinship, once established, do not give way after death, and that they determine the rebirth of the child. This belief may be a special case of a more general one, viz. that rebirth in all cases is determined by ties of individual kinship established in a former life. There is yet another series of beliefs leading more directly to the same conclusion. I mean the well-known fact that white men were considered to be returned dead relatives, and treated accordingly. We know that there were several cases in which the life of a man was saved by this belief. The best known is the case of Buckley, a run-away convict, who lived about thirty years among the natives. He was treated with the greatest kindness and tenderness by his "relatives."[622] The same tokens of affection are related to have been shown to a settler in the vicinity of Perth by his "parents," who merely to see him would travel more than sixty leagues through a country which was in parts dangerous.[623] In another place we are informed that a white convict identified with a dead relative was presented with a piece of land which "belonged to him by right." Similar statements are numerous.[624] In order to establish the relevancy of these facts to our problem, it may be remarked that the most important features of the beliefs in question are (1) that white men are identified with a given dead individual, (2) that they get then ipso facto a definite place in the tribe, in the local group, and—what is most important as regards the present question—in the individual family. The belief that people after death become white may account for the identification of white men with the dead. But the fact that in ever so many cases a white man was identified with a certain individual, and became thereby entitled to a social position, implies some additional beliefs. One of these beliefs is the idea of rebirth or reincarnation that we have established above in another way. The other collective idea, which must be assumed in order to explain the ease and readiness with which feelings of affection as well as worldly goods were bestowed upon these alleged relatives, is that in the ordinary form in which dead men return to this life, i. e. in reincarnation by birth, each individual brings with him, or her, full social position, including individual relationship. And this is the point at issue in the present discussion. The fact that white men were recognized as dead relatives compels us to assume that children—who were considered as reborn men—were also accepted as relatives. If the natives had not their mind turned that way, if they were not used to identify every new member of their society with some ancestor of their own, could they do it so easily in the case of white men, who were so different from them, and could not present any striking physical similarity? Of course this inference is not a cogent one. But putting side by side all the facts we have gathered: the belief in reincarnation of the dead; the easy recognition of dead relatives in white men; and the promptitude with which, in some cases, the latter were given their places in society, their hunting-grounds, their parents, relatives, and so on—all this allows us to affirm with a high degree of probability that a new-born child was looked upon as a reincarnated member of the tribe, and that an intimate kinship between him and his parents was considered to be established on the ground of kinship in a previous life. Is not the parental affection which was bestowed on some of the white men one of the most astonishing traits in the evidence in question? Of course white men were considered to be immediate reincarnations, or rather a return of the dead in ghost condition; whereas rebirth was a much longer process, and was, perhaps, considered as reincarnation of a long-dead ancestor. Consequently the ties of kinship between a white man and his "relatives" were the repetition of an actual relation which had already existed for the native in his life. Whereas if a reborn child is considered, as we here assume, to be a "previous" kinsman, this kinship is based upon a relation obtaining in some former existence. But it may be urged that if we deal with aboriginal collective psychology no very clear ideas can be expected. The only thing that we assumed here was that the ideas of rebirth, combined with some other specific Australian beliefs, suggest very strongly that children might have been both held, and felt to be, kindred, on the ground that they come with some sort of ready-made personality; and on the ground that, as E. S. Hartland argues, rebirth is the result of some spontaneous action of the creature to be reborn. I think that if we ask for the source of the widespread belief in white men being returned ghosts, and especially for the readiness and ease with which they were accepted into the family and into the tribe—we must presuppose some beliefs and institutions to account for it, and the explanation proposed above seems to me very plausible.[625] But the best example of the ideas of kinship of the magic order is to be found among the tribes studied and described by W. E. Roth.
Before we proceed to the North Queensland tribes, there may be mentioned some customs of the couvade type, referring to the Central tribes. These customs, as has been said above, express an intimate connection of a mystic character between father and child. They also involve a considerable amount of paternal affection and care for the welfare of the offspring, as they expose the father to various inconveniences, privations and hardships for the benefit of the child. Thus we read that among the Central tribes the father has to observe certain taboos and restrictions during the pregnancy of his wife, otherwise she would have a difficult confinement.[626] This only shows a connection between the behaviour of the man and the act of birth. But we read in another place that the non-observance of certain hunting taboos by the man during the pregnancy of his wife would have baleful consequences for the offspring.[627] We are informed, also, of a few functions of parental kin expressed in different customs which accentuate the intimacy of this relation. Thus the mother plays some part in the initiation ceremonies,[628] as well as in mourning and funerals. Concerning the important social functions of the father, I may quote what Mr. R. H. Mathews writes about the Central tribes: "The privilege of working incantations, making rain, performing initiatory ceremonies, and other important functions, descends from the men of the tribe to the sons."[629] Moreover all the ceremonies in common with totems "are likewise handed down through the men."[630] We see from this that many important social functions descend from father to son. Messrs. Spencer and Gillen report that the position of the Alatunja is hereditary amongst the Arunta.[631] And similarly the position of the headman is hereditary amongst the Northern tribes.[632] All these facts serve on the one hand socially to define individual kinship, and on the other to show that there exist certain ideas of a mystic bond between father and child. How far these ideas, as expressed in the customs of the couvade type, harmonize with the ideas dealt with above, it is quite impossible to know. It may be said that in both respects we have hints showing the existence of ideas on kinship, but that we can by no means go beyond mere supposition when we try to reconstruct these ideas and to find some mutual connection. Let us now pass to the other tribes.
The belief in a supernatural cause of pregnancy is spread not only all over the Central and North Central area, i. e. among all the tribes included in the researches of Spencer and Gillen.[633] The same ignorance of physiological fatherhood is found in the whole of the Northern territory, in Queensland, and probably in West Australia. We read that among the tribes of the North-West territory of South Australia (Port Darwin and Daly River) "conception is not regarded as a direct result of cohabitation."[634] And we read in Dr. Frazer's new work: "The view is shared by all the tribes of Central and Northern Australia. In point of fact, I am informed by the Bishop of North Queensland (Dr. Frodsham) that the opinion is held by all the tribes with which he is acquainted both in North Queensland and in Central Australia, including the Arunta; not only are the natives in their savage states ignorant of the true cause of conception, but they do not readily believe it even after their admission into mission stations, and their incredulity has to be reckoned with in the efforts of the clergy to introduce a higher standard of sexual morality among them."[635] This is a very strong proof of the depth of these beliefs, and of the absolute ignorance of the natives on this point.[636] In the South-Eastern region this belief is to be found as far as the Northern part of New South Wales. We have statements of Mrs. Parker[637] which, although not very clear, seem at least to imply a great amount of magical beliefs as to procreation, if not complete ignorance of the physiological part borne by the father. With regard to the Western tribes, Mrs. Bates writes in a letter to Mr. Lang[638]: "They did not believe that procreation had anything to do with conception."
That in spite of this absence of any kind of consanguinity, especially in the father's case, there exists in the Queensland tribes an individual kinship relation between both parents and their children, is clear from the statements collected on [page 245], and from the conclusion on [page 249], to which the reader may be referred, as well as to the theoretical conclusion on [page 198]. Looking at the rich and interesting collection of folk-lore of these tribes given by Mr. W. E. Roth, it will be possible to find the way in which fatherhood is determined by the animistic ideas of the aborigines. As just said, among the North-West Central Queensland tribes, the causal nexus between conception and copulation is not known. We read in Roth that, according to aboriginal ideas, there are several ways in which a child may enter a woman's body: it may be inserted into her in a dream; she may be told by a man that she will be pregnant and so on. But in whatever mode the child has come, "the recognized husband accepts it as his own without demur."[639] This phrase seems to point to the fact that a man has certain ways of recognizing a child as his own, and ideas under which he conceives this tie.
In fact we read that man possesses several "souls" or vital principles. One of them, ngai, leaves the body soon after death; if the deceased was a male his ngai "passes into his children, both boys and girls equally." The ngai of a female goes to her sister or passes away. Nobody has a ngai before his father dies, but receives his father's ngai after the latter's death.[640] This is an important connection, which by itself might very well serve to establish the most intimate tie of kinship. The child is supposed to be its father's spirit's heir. It shares in his most personal and individual element. Is this spiritual communion not something quite as strong and deep as any community of blood?
In another tribe of this area there is a similar belief concerning the choi (another "soul"). The aborigines of Pennefather River believe that babies are made out of swamp mud and then inserted into the wombs of women by a being called Anjea. Now it is particularly important for us to note that Anjea animates the baby with a piece of its father's spirit if it is a boy, and with a piece of its father's sister's spirit if it is a girl. For each new baby Anjea provides a new piece of spirit. But he does not take these pieces from the spirit of the living father or his sister. He has a special source from which to take it; he takes it from the father's or father's sister's afterbirth. When a child is born a portion of its spirit stays in its afterbirth. Hence the grandmother takes the afterbirth and buries it in the sand, and marks the place by thrusting sticks into the ground. So when Anjea comes along and sees it, he knows where to look for the father's (or father's sister's) spirit, which he wants in order to animate the new baby. And in this way all babies are animated by a spiritual part of their father or paternal aunts.[641]
Both these examples illustrate perfectly well the general definition of kinship ideas we have given above. Here the relation between father and child is established in the native ideas by a purely spiritual connection. But obviously this connection is a very important one. The deep tie between a man and his child is here explicitly indicated and not inferred by us, as in the foregoing cases, in which we could only state that the beliefs and facts point to such a tie. In the present case the father's spirit is the material from which the child's soul is to be built up. It is not his bodily germ that procreates the child, but his spiritual germ. What does it matter that the mother gives birth to the child? The latter is animated by the father's (or father's sister's) spirit, and this spiritual connection is of course as strong a bond of kinship as can possibly be imagined.
There is in the second of these examples a complication produced by the fact that a female child is not animated by her father's, but by her father's sister's, spirit. But this complication is more apparent than real. We must always remember that the aborigines do not think in clearly defined ideas, and that there is always a question rather of some broad emotional connection than of a tie logically apprehended. And here the connection between the female children and their father is broadly marked by the spiritual tie between his sister and the children. It may be said that "spiritual propagation" follows the male line exclusively, for all children are animated by a spirit taken from their father or his sister.
We have still a few examples to quote where there appears to be involved a tie between father and child established on other grounds than the sexual act. In some of the North Queensland tribes (Cairns district) "the acceptance of food from a man by a woman was not merely regarded as a marriage ceremony, but as the actual cause of conception."[642] A similar belief obtains among the Larrekiya and Wogait of Port Darwin. "The old men say that there is an evil spirit who takes babies from a big fire and places them in the wombs of women, who must then give birth to them. When in the ordinary course of events a man is out hunting and kills game or gathers vegetable food, he gives it to his wife, who must eat it, believing that the food will cause her to conceive and bring forth a child. When the child is born, it may on no account partake of the particular food which produced conception until it has got its first teeth."[643] In these cases we might look also for some material from which the ideas of individual paternity might have been evolved, but this is a supposition merely, which obviously is much less well founded than our inferences referring to the Central and North Central tribes.
Let us turn to another portion of the continent, to the South-Eastern tribes, where the natives have to a certain extent inverse ideas on procreation. They seem to know that conception is due to copulation. But they exaggerate the father's part. The children are begotten "by him exclusively; the mother receives only the germ and nurtures it; the aborigines ... never for a moment feel any doubt ... that the children originate solely from the male parent, and only owe their infantine nurture to their mother."[644] This theory is not a logical and consistent one, but none of the aboriginal views possess these qualities! But this theory of procreation is quite clear and categorical in acknowledging exclusively what seems to the native mind important for the formation of consanguineous ties in the act of procreation. Let us adduce the examples in detail, as they are very instructive. The Wirdajuri nation[645] believe that the child "emanates from the father solely, being only nurtured by its mother." There is a strong tie of kinship between the child and the father; the latter nevertheless has not the right to dispose of his daughter in marriage; that is done by the mother and the mother's brother. We see here that curiously enough strong paternal consanguinity coincides with weakening of the patria potestas (provided the information be accurate on both points). For disposal of the daughter is one of the chief features of a parent's authority over the child. Among the Wolgal the child belongs to the father, and he only "gives it to his wife to take care of for him."[646] This is probably an interpretation of the facts of procreation. In this tribe the father disposes of his daughter; in fact "he could do what he liked" with her on the ground of his exclusive right to the child. Here, apparently, the ideas on kinship enhance the paternal authority. A strong proof of this unilateral paternal consanguinity is given yet more in detail in the case of the Kulin tribes. There, according to a native expression, "the child comes from the man, the woman only takes care of it."[647] And when once an old man wished to emphasize his right and authority over his son he said: "Listen to me! I am here, and there you stand with my body."[648] This is clearly a claim to kinship on the basis of consanguinity. It is interesting to note that in the examples just quoted this consanguineous kinship seems to give some claims to authority. Analogously amongst the Yuin the child belonged to his father "because his wife merely takes care of his children for him."[649]
Withal this information leaves us in the dark about the detailed working of these ideas. Especially we are not quite clear whether the assertions of "being of the same body," of "belonging to him," etc., do actually refer to the act of procreation, whether they form an interpretation of this act, or whether they have quite a different basis; although it seems from the expressions quoted above that the first alternative is the right one. On the other hand, when we read that the mother only nurtures the child, that she merely takes care of it and so on, does it mean that the aboriginal mind decrees or interprets that during pregnancy the mother is a kind of nurse only, that she is the soil in which the father has deposited the seed? And as the relation between the plant and the seed is closer than that between the plant and the soil, so the relation between father and child is nearer than that between mother and child? All this is left to hypothesis, strongly supported by the statements, but unfortunately not affirmed by them in a clear and unambiguous way. We are not at all sure whether all these ideas, instead of being theories of the act of impregnation, have not some mystic, legendary basis like the beliefs of the Queenslander dealt with above.
A survey of different points of Australian folk-lore has been made in order to find some kinship ideas corresponding to the definition given on [page 183]. From all the results obtained, the most certain and best founded one is the negative fact that the majority of the Australian tribes are wholly ignorant of the physiological process of procreation. This result, although at first sight a negative one, leads, when viewed in the proper light, to sociological conclusions of some importance. In regard to the discussion on consanguinity (given [pp. 176] sqq.), it follows from this fact that we cannot speak of paternal consanguinity among these tribes in the social sense of this word,[650] and that the individual tie of kinship, which does nevertheless exist between father and child, must be conceived of by the natives in some different way. This conclusion is also very important, for it obviously tears asunder the intimate connection between the sexual side of marriage and kinship, a connection that has often been assumed hitherto. The lack of sexual exclusiveness found in Australia does not affect the structure of the individual family, of which kinship is the index. Waiving the question whether this holds good for primitive mankind in general, it may be assumed as quite a final result for the majority of Australian tribes.
The positive ideas of kinship enumerated in this survey fulfil the two conditions set up on [page 183]; they refer to the individual relation between father and child,[651] and they affirm a close tie between the two. But in order to prove that such ideas are sociologically relevant ideas of kinship, it must yet be shown that they possess some social functions; that is to say, that they play an essential part in the collective formulation of the various norms regulating individual parental kinship. Now it was not possible to find any data on this point, so this gap remains unfilled, and therefore the results arrived at here must be considered as incomplete. It was necessary to introduce the conjectural assumption that all the facts known which give sociological evidence of individual parental kinship stand in close connection with the beliefs in question. Nevertheless, this assumption is neither arbitrary nor scientifically barren, as far as I see. It may first be remarked that the complete absence in our ethnographic information of any attempt to connect the data of folk-lore and the facts of sociology is not astonishing at all, as it is the consequence of one of the shortcomings in social science at the present day. This lack is due to reasons connected with the ethnographer and not with the material. The intimate relation which must exist between social beliefs and social functions was quite a sufficient justification for the introduction of this assumption. Moreover, this assumption, although hypothetical, lies quite within the limits of verification. A conjectural assumption referring to facts which lie necessarily outside the reach of observation, incurs much more the risk of scientific barrenness. But this cannot be the case with new points of view, the enunciation of which imposes itself as an inevitable logical inference, and which, being capable of verification, may serve as a fertile working hypothesis.