[70] Ellis, Ew̔e-speaking Peoples, p. 268.
[71] Winterbottom, Native Africans in the Neighbourhood of Sierra Leone, i. 211.
[72] Wilson, Western Africa, p. 392 sq.
[73] Felkin, ‘Notes on the For Tribe of Central Africa,’ in Proceed. Roy. Soc. Edinburgh, xiii. 224 sq.
[74] Monrad, Bidrag til en Skildring af Guinea-Kysten, p. 37 (Negroes of Accra). Granville and Roth, in Jour. Anthr. Inst. xxviii. 109 (Jekris). Kingsley, Travels in West Africa, p. 460 (Calabar tribes). Caillié, op. cit. i. 352 (Mandingoes). Stuhlmann, op. cit. pp. 789, 801 (Latuka). Casati, Ten Years in Equatoria, i. 186. Chanler, Through Jungle and Desert, p. 246 (Embe). New, Life, Wanderings, and Labours in Eastern Africa, p. 101 (Wanika). Johnston, Kilima-njaro Expedition, p. 419 (Masai). Arnot, Garenganze, p. 78, note. Lichtenstein, op. cit. i. 265; Alberti, op. cit. p. 118; Shooter, op. cit. p. 98 (Kafirs). Schinz, Deutsch-Südwest-Afrika, p. 82 (Hottentots).
Not only old age, but superiority of age, gives a certain amount of power.
The Australian natives have a well-regulated order of precedence and authority. “When the individual reaches the full development of puberty, he or she undergoes a ceremony which entitles him or her on its successful completion to a certain social rank or status in the community. As life progresses, other and higher ranks are progressively attainable for each sex, until the highest and most honourable grade, that enjoyed by an old man, or an old woman, is reached.”[75] All North American Indians “hold that superior age gives authority; and every person is taught from childhood to obey his superiors and to rule over his inferiors. The superiors are those of greater age; the inferiors, those who are younger.”[76] The same influence of age makes itself felt in the relations between elder and younger brothers and sisters.[77] Navaho myths indicate that “even among twins, the younger must defer to the elder.”[78] The eldest brother comes next to the father in authority, and, in case of his death, succeeds him as the head of the family. The Aleuts described by Father Veniaminof maintained that “if one had no father he should respect his oldest brother and serve him as he would a father.”[79] Among the Kalmucks “the elder brother is the despot of the younger ones, and is even allowed to punish them.”[80] In Madagascar so great respect is paid to seniority “that if two slaves who are brothers are going a journey, any burden must be carried by the younger one, so far at least as his strength will allow.”[81] In Tonga custom decrees “that all persons shall be in the service of their older and superior relations, if those relations think proper to employ them”; and every chief shows the greatest regard for his eldest sister.[82] Among the Hottentots “the highest oath a man could take and still takes, was to swear by his eldest sister, and if he should abuse this name, the sister will walk into his flock and take his finest cows and sheep, and no law could prevent her from doing so.”[83] Among the Point Barrow Eskimo, again, “seniority gives precedence when there are several women in one hut, and the sway of the elder in the direction of everything connected with her duties seems never disputed.”[84]
[75] Roth, op. cit. p. 169. Cf. ibid. p. 65 sq.; Eyre, Journals of Expeditions of Discovery into Central Australia, ii. 315.
[76] Powell, ‘Sociology,’ in American Anthropologist, N. S. i. 700. Cf. Idem, in Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethn. iii. p. lviii.
[77] Nachtigal, Sahara und Sudan, i. 450 (Tedâ). Chavanne, Die Sahara, p. 396 (Arabs of the Sahara). Paulitschke, op. cit. p. 192 (Gallas). von Haxthausen, Transcaucasia, p. 415 (Ossetes). Bach, ‘Die Wotjaken,’ in Acta Societatis Scientiarum Fennicæ, xii. 489 (Votyaks). Sumner, in Jour. Anthr. Inst. xxxi. 75 (Jakuts). Batchelor, Ainu and their Folk-Lore, p. 254.