Practically universal is the existence of a grouping of individuals under the names of plants, animals or various objects; these are termed totems and the human groups are termed totem clans. The members of a totem clan commonly believe themselves to be actually descended from or related to their totem, and all members of a clan, whatever tribe they may belong to, are regarded as brethren, who have mutual duties, prohibitions and privileges. Thus a member of a totem clan must help and never injure any fellow member. "Speaking generally it may be said that every totemic group has certain ceremonies associated with it and that these refer to old totemic ancestors. In all tribes they form part of a secret ritual in which only the initiated may take part. In most tribes a certain number are shown to the youths during the early stages of initiation, but at a later period he sees many more[987]."
In several tribes, and probably it was very general, certain magical ceremonies were performed to render the totem abundant or efficacious. The sex patron ("sex totem"), when the women have one animal, such as the owlet night-jar associated with them, and the men another, such as the bat; and the guardian genius (mis-called "individual totem"), acquired by dreaming of some animal, are of rare occurrence.
The Family.
The individual family has been shown by Malinowski[988] to be "a unit playing an important part in the social life of the natives and well defined by a number of moral, customary and legal norms; it is further determined by the sexual division of labour, the aboriginal mode of living, and especially by the intimate relation between the parents and children. The individual relation between husband and wife (marriage) is rooted in the unity of the family ... and in the well-defined, though not always exclusive, sexual right the husband acquires over his wife." All sexual licence is regulated by and subject to strict rules. The Pirrauru custom, by which individuals are allocated accessory spouses, "proves that the relationship involved does not possess the character of marriage. For it completely differs from marriage in nearly all the essential points by which marriage in Australia is defined. And above all the Pirrauru relation does not seem to involve the facts of family life in its true sense" (p. 298).
Kinship.
A. R. Brown[989] asserts that so far as our information goes, the only method of regulating marriage is by means of the relationship system. In every tribe there is a law to the effect that a man may only marry women who stand to him in a certain relationship, and there is no evidence that there is any other method of regulating marriage. The so-called class rule by which a man of a special division or group is required to marry a woman of another division is merely the law of relationship stated in a less exact form. It is the fact that a man may only marry a relative of a certain kind that necessitates the marrying into a particular relationship division. The rule of totemic exogamy, according to A. R. Brown, is equally seen to have no existence apart from the relationship rule. Where a totemic group is a clan and consists of relations all of one line of descent, a man is prohibited from marrying a woman of his own group by the ordinary rule of relationship. On the other hand, where the totemic group is not a clan, but is a local group (as in the Burduna tribe) or a cult society (as in the Arunta tribe) there is no rule prohibiting a man from marrying a woman of the same totemic group as himself. The so-called rule of local exogamy in some tribes (perhaps in all) is merely a result of the fact that the local group is a clan, i.e. a group of persons related in one line of descent only. Only two methods of regulating marriage are known to exist in the greater part of Australia[990]: Type I. A man marries the daughter of one of the men he denotes by the same term as his mother's brother. Type II. A man marries a woman who is the daughter's daughter of some man whom he denotes by the same term as his mother's mother's brother. In either case he may not marry any other kind of relative. The existence of two phratries or moieties or four named divisions ("classes") in a tribe conveys no information whatever as to the marriage rule of the tribe. The term "class" and "sub-class," according to A. R. Brown, had better be discarded as writers use them to denote several totally distinct kinds of divisions.
Property and Trade.
The tribe has collecting and hunting rights over an area with recognised limits, smaller communities down to the family unit having similar rights within the tribal boundaries. In some cases a tribe which had no stone suitable for making stone implements within its own boundaries was allowed to send tribal messengers to a quarry to procure what was needed without molestation, though Howitt speaks of family ownership of quarries[991]. Implements are personal property. An extensive system of intertribal communication and exchange is carried on, apparently by recognised middlemen, and tribes meet on certain occasions at established trade centres for a regulated barter.
Magic and Religion.
Beneficent and malevolent magic are universally practised and totemism possesses a religious besides a social aspect. An emotional relation often exists between the members of a totem clan and their totem, and the latter are believed at times to warn or protect their human kinsmen. It may be noted that the widely spread and elaborate ceremonies designed to render the totem prolific or to ensure its abundance, though performed solely by members of the totem clan concerned, are less for their own benefit than for that of the community[992]. Owing perhaps to the difficulty of distinguishing between the purely social and the religious institutions of primitive peoples great diversity of opinion prevails even amongst the best observers regarding the religious views of the Australian aborigines. The existence of a "tribal All-Father" is perhaps most clearly emphasised by A. W. Howitt[993], who finds this belief widespread in the whole of Victoria and New South Wales, up to the eastern boundaries of the tribes of the Darling River. Amongst those of New South Wales are the Euahlayi, whom K. Langloh Parker describes[994] as having a more advanced theology and a more developed worship (including prayers, pp. 79-80) than any other Australian tribe. These now eat their hereditary totem without scruple—a sure sign that the totemic system is dying out, although still outwardly in full force. Amongst the Arunta, Kaitish, and the other Central and Northern tribes studied by Spencer and Gillen, totemism still survives, and totems are even assigned to the mysterious Iruntarinia entities, vague and invisible incarnations of the ghosts of ancestors who lived in the Alcheringa time, the dim remote past at the beginning of everything. These are far more powerful than living men, because their spirit part is associated with the so-called churinga, consisting of stones, pieces of wood or any other objects which are deemed sacred as possessing a kind of mana which makes the yams and grass to grow, enables a man to capture game, and so forth. "That the churinga are simply objects endowed with mana is the happy suggestion of Sidney Hartland[995] whose explanation has dispelled the dense fog of mystification hitherto enveloping the strange beliefs and observances of these Central and Northern tribes[996]." N. W. Thomas[997] reviews the whole question of Australian religion, and after describing Twanjiraka, Malbanga and Ulthaana, of the Arunta, Baiame or Byamee, famous in anthropological controversy[998], Daramulun of the Yuin, Mungan-ngaua (our father) of the Kurnai, Nurrundere of the Narrinyeri, Bunjil or Pundjel, often called Mamingorak (our father) of Victoria, and others, he concludes "These are by no means the only gods known to Australian tribes; on the contrary it can hardly be definitely asserted that there is or was any tribe which had not some such belief[999]."