The Secret of the Totem

by Andrew Lang

We go on to show in detail how Arunta totems alone ceased to be exogamous, and to demonstrate that the more northern tribes have never been, and never can have been, in the present Arunta condition. Among the Arunta, in the classes, none of them his own, into which alone a man may marry, there are plenty of women of his own totem. Thus, in marrying a woman of his totem, but not of his set of classes, a man does not break the law of Arunta exogamy. Now how does it happen that a totem may be in both sets of exogamous classes among the Arunta alone of mankind? Was this always the case from the beginning?

It is, naturally, our opinion that among the Arunta, as everywhere else, matters were originally, or not much later, so arranged that the same totem never appeared in both phratries, or, afterwards, when phratries were lost, in both opposed sets of two or four exogamous matrimonial classes. The only objection to this theory is that the Arunta themselves believe it, and mention the circumstance in their myths. These myths cannot be historical reminiscences of the "Dream-Time," which never existed. But even a myth may deviate into truth, especially as the Arunta must know that in other tribes the same totem never occurs in both phratries, and are clever enough to see that their method needs explanation as being an exception to general rule; and that, even now, "the great majority of any one totem belong to one moiety of the tribe." So they say that originally all Witchetty Grubs, for instance, were in the Bulthara-Panunga moiety (as most Grubs still are to this day), while all Emus were in the opposite exogamous moiety (Purula-Kumura). But, say Messrs. Spencer and Gillen, "owing to the system according to which totem names are" (now) "acquired, it is always possible for a man to be, say, a Purula or a Kumura, and yet a Witchetty; or, on the other hand, a Bulthara or a Panunga, and yet an Emu."[12] The present system of acquiring totem names has transferred the totems into both exogamous moieties, and so has made it possible to marry within the totem name.

This suggests that, in native opinion or conjecture, Arunta totems, like all others, were once exogamous; no totem ever occurred originally in both exogamous moieties. It also indicates that, in the opinion of Messrs. Spencer and Gillen, they only ceased to be exogamous when the present method of acquiring totem names, an unique method, was introduced. Happily, to prove the historical worthlessness of Arunta legendary myth, the tribe has a contradictory legend. The same totem, according to this fable, occurred in both exogamous moieties, even in the mythic Dream-Time (Alcheringa); by this fable the natives explain (what needs explaining) how the same totem does occur in both exogamous moieties to-day, and so is not exogamous.[13]

This is nonsense, just as the other contradictory myth was conjecture. Messrs. Spencer and Gillen have themselves explained why the same totem may now occur in both moieties, and so be non-exogamous. The unique phenomenon is due to the actual and unique method of acquiring totem names.[14] Thus the modern method is not primitive. These passages are very instructive.

The Arunta have been so long in the relatively advanced state of local totemism that their myths do not look behind it. A group, whether stationary or migratory, in the myths of the Dream-Time (the Alcheringa) always consists of persons of the same totem, with occasional visitors of other totems. The myths, we repeat, reflect the present state of local totem groups back on the past.

The myths allege (here the isolated superstition comes in) that the mythical ancestors of the Alcheringa died, or "went into the ground" at certain now haunted spots, marked by rocks or trees, which may be called "mortuary local totem-centres"—in native speech, Oknanikilla[15] Trees or rocks arose to mark the spot where the ancestors, all of one totem in each case, went into the ground. These trees or rocks are called Nanja. Thereabouts the dying ancestors deposited possessions peculiar to Aruntadom, their stone amulets, or churinga nanja, with what are now read as totemic incised marks. Their spirits, all of one totem in each case, haunt the Nanja rock or tree, and are especially attached to these stone amulets,[16] called churinga nanja. The spirits discarnate await a chance of entering into women, and being reborn. When a child comes to the birth, the mother, whatever her own or her husband's totem may be, names the spot where she supposes that she conceived the child, and the child's Nanja tree or rock is that in the Oknanikilla, or mortuary local totem-centre nearest to the place where the child was conceived. Its male kin hunt for the churinga, or stone amulet, there deposited by the dying Alcheringa ancestor; if they find it, it becomes the child's churinga, for he is merely the ancestor spirit reborn. He (or she) "comes into his own"; his Nanja tree or rock, his churinga nanja, and his original totem, which may be, and often is, neither that of his father or mother.

Thus inheriting his own old Nanja tree and churinga, and totem, the child is not necessarily of his father's or mothers but is of his own old original totem, say Grub, or Hakea Flower, or Kangaroo, or Frog. His totem is thus not inherited, we repeat, as elsewhere, from either parent, but is derived, by the accident of his place of conception, from the local totem, from the totemic ghosts (all of one totem) haunting the particular mortuary totem centre, or Oknanikilla, where he was conceived. His totem may thus be in both of the exogamous moieties, and for that reason alone is not exogamous. To take an example. A woman, by totem Cat, has a husband by totem Iguana. She conceives a child, and believes that she conceived it in a certain district. The local totem of that district is the Grub, Grub ghosts haunt the region; the child, therefore, is a Grub. He inherits his exogamous class, say Bukhara, from his father, and he must marry a woman of Class Kumara. But she may also be a Grub, for her totem, like his, has been acquired (like his, not by inheritance, but) by the accident that her mother conceived her in a Grub district. Thus, and thus only, are totems not exogamous among the Arunta. They are not inherited from either parent.

It is probable that, after male descent came in, the Arunta and Kaitish at first inherited their totems from their fathers, as among all other tribes with male descent. This appears to be proved by the fact that they still do inherit, from their fathers, totemic rites, and the power of doing totemic mummeries for their fathers' totems, even when, by the accident of their places of conception, they do not inherit their fathers' totems. When they did inherit the paternal totem, they were, doubtless, totemically exogamous, like all other tribes with either male or female descent.

One simple argument upsets the claim of Arunta totems to be primitive. In no tribe with female descent can a district have its local totem, as among the Arunta. A district can only have a local totem if the majority of the living people, and of the haunting ghosts of the dead, are of one totem only. But this (setting aside the occasional results of an isolated Urabunna superstition) can only occur under male reckoning of descent, which confessedly is not primitive. In a region where reckoning in the female line exists a woman could not say, "I conceived my child in Grub district, the country of totem Grub"—for such a country there is not and cannot be. Consequently, among the Urabunna as everywhere with reckoning of descent in the female line, every child is of its mother's totem.

Let us examine other tribes who, like the Arunta, have the theory of reincarnation, but whose totems are, as elsewhere, exogamous, unlike those of the Arunta. The Urabunna have female descent, and their myth about the origin of totemic ancestors approximates to that of the Arunta, but, unlike the Arunta fable, does not produce, or account for, non-exogamy in totems. Things began, say the Urabunna, by the appearance of a few creatures half human, half bestial or vegetable. They had miraculous powers, and dropped spirits which tenanted lizards, snakes, and so on, all over the district. These spirits later became incarnated in human beings of the Lizard, Snake, or other totem, and are constantly being reincarnated. The two Urabunna phratries were originally a green and a brown snake: the Green Snake said to the Brown Snake, "I am Kirarawa, you are Matthurie"—the phratry names. It does not appear that these names now mean Green Snake and Brown Snake, though they may once have had these significations. The spirits left about by these snakes, like all the other such spirits (mai aurli) keep on being incarnated, and, when incarnated, the children bear the totem name of their mothers in each case. A Green Snake woman is entered by a spirit, which she bears as a Green Snake child. The accident of the locality in which the child was conceived does not affect his totem, so Urabunna totems remain in their own proper phratries, and therefore, by phratry law, are exogamous, as everywhere, except among the Arunta.[17]