On Lake Victoria Nyanza the Baganda fishermen use a long stout line which is supported on the surface of the water by wooden floats, while short lines with baited hooks attached to them depend from it at frequent intervals. The place where the fisherman makes his line, whether in his hut or his garden, is tabooed. People may not step over his cords or tools, and he himself has to observe a number of restrictions. He may not go near his wife or any other woman. He eats alone, works alone, sleeps alone. He may not wash, except in the lake. He may not eat salt or meat or butter. He may not smear any fat on his body. When the line is ready he goes to the god, asks his blessing on it, and offers him a pot of beer. In return he receives from [pg 195] the deity a stick or bit of wood to fasten to the line, and also some medicine of herbs to smoke and blow over the water in order that the fish may come to the line and be caught. Then he carries the line to the lake. If in going thither he should stumble over a stone or a tree-root, he takes it with him, and he does the same with any grass-seeds that may stick to his clothes. These stones, roots, and seeds he puts on the line, believing that just as he stumbled over them and they stuck to him, so the fish will also stumble over them and stick to the line. The taboo lasts till he has caught his first fish. If his wife has kept the taboo, he eats the fish with her; but if she has broken it, she may not partake of the fish. After that if he wishes to go in to his wife, he must take his line out of the water and place it in a tree or some other place of safety; he is then free to be with her. But so long as the line is in the water, he must keep apart from women, or the fish would at once leave the shore. Any breach of this taboo renders the line useless to him. He must sell it and make a new one and offer an expiatory offering to the god.[640] Again, in Uganda the fisherman offers fish to his canoe, believing that if he neglected to make this offering more than twice, his net would catch nothing. The fish thus offered to the canoe is eaten by the fishermen. But if at the time of emptying the traps there is any man in the canoe who has committed adultery, eaten flesh or salt, or rubbed his body with butter or fat, that man is not allowed to partake of the fish offered to the canoe. And if the sinner has not confessed his fault to the priest and been purified, the catch will be small. When the adulterer has confessed his sin, the priest calls the husband of the guilty woman and tells him of her crime. Her paramour has to wear a sign to shew that he is doing penance, and he makes a feast for the injured husband, which the latter is obliged to accept in token of reconciliation. After that the husband may not punish either of the erring couple; the sin is atoned for and they are able to catch fish again.[641] Among the Bangala of the Upper Congo, [pg 196] while fishermen are making their traps, they must observe strict continence, and the restriction lasts until the traps have caught fish and the fish have been eaten. Similarly Bangala hunters may have no sexual intercourse from the time they made their traps till they have caught game and eaten it; it is believed that any hunter who broke this rule of chastity would have bad luck in the chase.[642]
Taboos observed by hunters in Nias.
In the island of Nias the hunters sometimes dig pits, cover them lightly over with twigs, grass, and leaves, and then drive the game into them. While they are engaged in digging the pits, they have to observe a number of taboos. They may not spit, or the game would turn back in disgust from the pits. They may not laugh, or the sides of the pit would fall in. They may eat no salt, prepare no fodder for swine, and in the pit they may not scratch themselves, for if they did, the earth would be loosened and would collapse. And the night after digging the pit they may have no intercourse with a woman, or all their labour would be in vain.[643]
The practice of continence by fishers and hunters seems to be based on a notion that incontinence offends the fish and the animals.
This practice of observing strict chastity as a condition of success in hunting and fishing is very common among rude races; and the instances of it which have been cited render it probable that the rule is always based on a superstition rather than on a consideration of the temporary weakness which a breach of the custom may entail on the hunter or fisherman. In general it appears to be supposed that the evil effect of incontinence is not so much that it weakens him, as that, for some reason or other, it offends the animals, who in consequence will not suffer themselves to be caught. In the Motumotu tribe of New Guinea a man will not see his wife the night before he starts on a great fishing or hunting expedition; if he did, he would have no luck. In the Motu tribe he is regarded as holy that night, and in the morning no one may speak to him or call out his name.[644] In German East Africa elephant hunters must refrain from women for several days before they set out [pg 197] for the chase.[645] We have seen that in the same region a wife's infidelity during the hunter's absence is believed to give the elephant power over him so as to kill or wound him.[646] As this belief is clearly a superstition, based on sympathetic magic, so doubtless is the practice of chastity before the hunt. The pygmies of the great African forest are also reported to observe strict continence the night before an important hunt. It is said that at this time they propitiate their ancestors by rubbing their skulls, which they keep in boxes, with palm oil and with water in which the ashes of the bark and leaves of a certain tree (moduma) have been mixed.[647]
Chastity observed by American Indians before hunting.
The Huichol Indians of Mexico think that only the pure of heart should hunt the deer. The deer would never enter a snare put up by a man in love; it would only look at it, snort “Pooh, pooh,” and go back the way it came. Good luck in love means bad luck in deer-hunting. But even those who have been abstinent must invoke the aid of the fire to burn the last taint or blemish out of them. So the night before they set out for the chase they gather round the fire and pray aloud, all trying to get as near as they can to the flaming god, and turning every side of their bodies to his blessed influence. They hold out their open hands to it, warm the palms, spit on them, and then rub them quickly over their joints, legs, and shoulders, as the shamans do in curing a sick man, in order that their limbs and sinews may be as strong as their hearts are pure for the task of the morrow.[648] A Carrier Indian of British Columbia used to separate from his wife for a full month before he set traps for bears, and during this time he might not drink from the same vessel as his wife, but had to use a special cup made of birch bark. The neglect of these precautions would cause the game to escape after it had been snared. But when he was about to snare martens, the period of continence was cut down to ten days.[649] The Sia, [pg 198] a tribe of Pueblo Indians, observe chastity for four days before a hunt as well as the whole time that it lasts, even if the game be only rabbits.[650] Among the Tsetsaut Indians of British Columbia hunters who desire to secure good luck fast and wash their bodies with ginger-root for three or four days, and do not touch a woman for two or three months.[651] A Shuswap Indian, who intends to go out hunting must also keep away from his wife, or he would have no luck.[652] Among the Thompson Indians the grisly-bear hunter must abstain from sexual intercourse for some time before he went forth to hunt. These Indians believe that bears always hear what is said of them. Hence a man who intends to go bear-hunting must be very careful what he says about the beasts or about his preparations for killing them, or they will get wind of it and keep out of his way.[653] In the same tribe of Indians some trappers and hunters, who were very particular, would not eat with other people when they were engaged, or about to be engaged, in hunting or trapping; neither would they eat food cooked by any woman, unless she were old. They drank cold water in which mountain juniper or wild rhubarb had been soaked, using a cup of their own, which no one else might touch. Hunters seldom combed their hair when they were on an expedition, but waited to do so till their return.[654] The reason for this last rule is certainly not that at such seasons they have no time to attend to their persons; the custom is probably based on that superstitious objection to touch the heads of tabooed persons of which some examples have already been given, and of which more will be adduced shortly.
Taboos observed by Hidatsa Indians at catching eagles.
In the late autumn or early winter a few families of the Hidatsa Indians seek some quiet spot in the forest and pitch their camp there to catch eagles. After setting up their [pg 199] tents they build a small medicine-lodge, where the ceremonies supposed to be indispensable for trapping the eagles are performed. No woman may enter it. The traps are set on high places among the neighbouring hills. When some of the men wish to take part in the trapping, they fast and then go by day to the medicine-lodge. There they continue without food until about midnight, when they partake of a little nourishment and fall asleep. They get up just before dawn, or when the morning-star has risen, and go to their traps. There they sit all day without food or drink, watching for their prey, and struggling, it may be, from time to time with a captive eagle, for they always take the birds alive. They return to the camp at sunset. As they approach, every one rushes into his tent; for the hunter may neither see nor be seen by any of his fellow-hunters until he enters the medicine-lodge. They spend the night in the lodge, and about midnight eat and drink for the first time since the previous midnight; then they lie down to sleep, only to rise again before dawn and repair anew to the traps. If any one of them has caught nothing during the day, he may not sleep at night, but must spend his time in loud lamentation and prayer. This routine has to be observed by each hunter for four days and four nights, after which he returns to his own tent, hungry, thirsty, and tired, and follows his ordinary pursuits till he feels able to go again to the eagle-traps. During the four days of the trapping he sees none of his family, and speaks to none of his friends except those who are engaged in the trapping at the same time. They believe that if any hunter fails to perform all these rites, the captive eagle will get one of his claws loose and tear his captor's hands. There are men in the tribe who have had their hands crippled for life in that way.[655] It is obvious that the severe fasting coupled with the short sleep, or even the total sleeplessness, of these eagle-hunters can only impair their physical vigour and so far tend to incapacitate them for capturing the eagles. The motive of their behaviour in [pg 200] these respects is purely superstitious, not rational, and so, we may safely conclude, is the custom which simultaneously cuts them off from all intercourse with their wives and families.
Miscellaneous examples of chastity practised from superstitious motives.