Sometimes savages, though they will not utter their own names, do not object to other people's doing so.
In this last case no scruple seems to be felt about communicating a man's name to strangers, and no ill effects appear to be dreaded as a consequence of divulging it; harm is only done when a name is spoken by its owner. Why is this? and why in particular should a man be thought to [pg 327] stunt his growth by uttering his own name? We may conjecture that to savages who act and think thus a person's name only seems to be a part of himself when it is uttered with his own breath; uttered by the breath of others it has no vital connexion with him, and no harm can come to him through it. Whereas, so these primitive philosophers may have argued, when a man lets his own name pass his lips, he is parting with a living piece of himself, and if he persists in so reckless a course he must certainly end by dissipating his energy and shattering his constitution. Many a broken-down debauchee, many a feeble frame wasted with disease, may have been pointed out by these simple moralists to their awe-struck disciples as a fearful example of the fate that must sooner or later overtake the profligate who indulges immoderately in the seductive habit of mentioning his own name.
Men who will not mention their own names will yet invite other people to do so for them.
However we may explain it, the fact is certain that many a savage evinces the strongest reluctance to pronounce his own name, while at the same time he makes no objection at all to other people pronouncing it, and will even invite them to do so for him in order to satisfy the curiosity of an inquisitive stranger. Thus in some parts of Madagascar it is fàdy or taboo for a person to tell his own name, but a slave or attendant will answer for him.[1226] “Chatting with an old Sakalava while the men were packing up, we happened to ask him his name; whereupon he politely requested us to ask one of his servants standing by. On expressing our astonishment that he should have forgotten this, he told us that it was fàdy (tabooed) for one of his tribe to pronounce his own name. We found this was perfectly true in that district, but it is not the case with the Sakalava a few days farther down the river.”[1227] The same curious inconsistency, as it may seem to us, is recorded of some tribes of American Indians. Thus we are told that “the name of an American Indian is a sacred thing, not to be divulged by the owner himself without due consideration. One may ask a warrior [pg 328] of any tribe to give his name, and the question will be met with either a point-blank refusal or the more diplomatic evasion that he cannot understand what is wanted of him. The moment a friend approaches, the warrior first interrogated will whisper what is wanted, and the friend can tell the name, receiving a reciprocation of the courtesy from the other.”[1228] This general statement applies, for example, to the Indian tribes of British Columbia, as to whom it is said that “one of their strangest prejudices, which appears to pervade all tribes alike, is a dislike to telling their names—thus you never get a man's right name from himself; but they will tell each other's names without hesitation.”[1229] Though it is considered very rude for a stranger to ask an Apache his name, and the Apache will never mention it himself, he will allow his friend at his side to mention it for him.[1230] The Abipones of South America thought it a sin in a man to utter his own name, but they would tell each other's names freely; when Father Dobrizhoffer asked a stranger Indian his name, the man would nudge his neighbour with his elbow as a sign that his companion should answer the question.[1231] Some of the Malemut Esquimaux of Bering Strait dislike very much to pronounce their own names; if a man be asked his name he will appear confused and will generally turn to a bystander, and request him to mention it for him.[1232] In the whole of the East Indian Archipelago the etiquette is the same. As a general rule no one will utter his own name. To enquire, “What is your name?” is a very indelicate question in native society. When in the course of administrative or judicial business a native is asked his name, instead of replying he will look at his comrade to indicate that he is to answer for him, or he will say straight out, “Ask him.” The superstition is current all over the East Indies without exception,[1233] and it is found also among the [pg 329] Motu and Motumotu tribes of British New Guinea,[1234] the Papuans of Finsch Haven in German New Guinea,[1235] the Nufoors of Dutch New Guinea,[1236] and the Melanesians of the Bismarck Archipelago.[1237] Among many tribes of South Africa men and women never mention their names if they can get any one else to do it for them, but they do not absolutely refuse when it cannot be avoided.[1238] No Warua will tell his name, but he does not object to being addressed by it.[1239] Among the Masai, “when a man is called or spoken to, he is addressed by his father's name, and his own name is only used when speaking to his mother. It is considered unlucky for a man to be addressed by name. The methods employed in finding out what an individual is called seem apt to lead to confusion. If a man is asked his name, he replies by giving that of his father, and to arrive at his own [pg 330] name it is necessary to ask a third person, or to ask him what is the name of his mother. There is no objection to another person mentioning his name even in his presence.”[1240] We are told that the Wanyamwesi almost always address each other as “Mate” or “Friend,” and a man sometimes quite forgets his own name and has to be reminded of it by another.[1241] The writer who makes this statement was probably unaware of the reluctance of many savages to utter their own names, and hence he mistook that reluctance for forgetfulness. In Uganda no one will mention his totem. If it is necessary that it should be known, he will ask a bystander to mention it for him.[1242] The Ba-Lua in the Congo region are unwilling to pronounce the name of their tribe; if they are pressed on the subject, they will call on some foreigner to give the required information.[1243]
Sometimes the prohibition to mention personal names is not permanent but temporary and contingent.
Sometimes the embargo laid on personal names is not permanent; it is conditional on circumstances, and when these change it ceases to operate. Thus when the Nandi men are away on a foray, nobody at home may pronounce the names of the absent warriors; they must be referred to as birds. Should a child so far forget itself as to mention one of the distant ones by name, the mother would rebuke it, saying, “Don't talk of the birds who are in the heavens.”[1244] Among the Bangala of the Upper Congo, while a man is fishing and when he returns with his catch, his proper name is in abeyance and nobody may mention it. Whatever the fisherman's real name may be, he is called mwele without distinction. The reason is that the river is full of spirits, who, if they heard the fisherman's real name, might so work against him that he would catch little or nothing. Even when he has caught his fish and landed with them, the buyer must still not address him by his proper name, but must only call him mwele; for even then, if the spirits were to [pg 331] hear his proper name, they would either bear it in mind and serve him out another day, or they might so mar the fish he had caught that he would get very little for them. Hence the fisherman can extract heavy damages from anybody who mentions his name, or can compel the thoughtless speaker to relieve him of the fish at a good price so as to restore his luck.[1245] When the Sulka of New Britain are near the territory of their enemies the Gaktei, they take care not to mention them by their proper name, believing that were they to do so, their foes would attack and slay them. Hence in these circumstances they speak of the Gaktei as o lapsiek, that is, “the rotten tree-trunks,” and they imagine that by calling them that they make the limbs of their dreaded enemies ponderous and clumsy like logs.[1246] This example illustrates the extremely materialistic view which these savages take of the nature of words; they suppose that the mere utterance of an expression signifying clumsiness will homoeopathically affect with clumsiness the limbs of their distant foemen. Another illustration of this curious misconception is furnished by a Caffre superstition that the character of a young thief can be reformed by shouting his name over a boiling kettle of medicated water, then clapping a lid on the kettle and leaving the name to steep in the water for several days. It is not in the least necessary that the thief should be aware of the use that is being made of his name behind his back; the moral reformation will be effected without his knowledge.[1247]
In order to avoid the use of people's own names, parents are sometimes named after their children, uncles and aunts after their nephews and nieces, and so forth. The common custom of naming parents after their children seems to arise from a reluctance to mention the real names of persons addressed or directly referred to.
When it is deemed necessary that a man's real name should be kept secret, it is often customary, as we have seen, to call him by a surname or nickname. As distinguished from the real or primary names, these secondary names are apparently held to be no part of the man himself, so that they may be freely used and divulged to everybody without endangering his safety thereby. Sometimes in order to avoid the use of his own name a man will be called after his child. Thus we are informed that “the Gippsland [pg 332] blacks objected strongly to let any one outside the tribe know their names, lest their enemies, learning them, should make them vehicles of incantation, and so charm their lives away. As children were not thought to have enemies, they used to speak of a man as ‘the father, uncle, or cousin of So-and-so,’ naming a child; but on all occasions abstained from mentioning the name of a grown-up person.”[1248] Similarly among the Nufoors of Dutch New Guinea, grown-up persons who are related by marriage may not mention each other's names, but it is lawful to mention the names of children; hence in order to designate a person whose name they may not pronounce they will speak of him or her as the father or mother of So-and-so.[1249] The Alfoors of Poso, in Celebes, will not pronounce their own names. Among them, accordingly, if you wish to ascertain a person's name, you ought not to ask the man himself, but should enquire of others. But if this is impossible, for example, when there is no one else near, you should ask him his child's name, and then address him as the “Father of So-and-so.” Nay, these Alfoors are shy of uttering the names even of children; so when a boy or girl has a nephew or niece, he or she is addressed as “Uncle of So-and-so,” or “Aunt of So-and-so.”[1250] In pure Malay society, we are told, a man is never asked his name, and the custom of naming parents after their children is adopted only as a means of avoiding the use of the parents' own names. The writer who makes this statement adds in confirmation of it that childless persons are named after their younger brothers.[1251] Among the land Dyaks of northern Borneo children as they grow up are called, according to their sex, the father or mother of a child of their father's or mother's younger brother, or sister,[1252] that is, [pg 333] they are called the father or mother of what we should call their first cousin. The Caffres used to think it discourteous to call a bride by her own name, so they would call her “the Mother of So-and-so,” even when she was only betrothed, far less a wife and a mother.[1253] Among the Kukis and Zemis or Kacha Nagas of Assam parents drop their own names after the birth of a child and are named Father and Mother of So-and-so. Childless couples go by the names of “the childless father,” “the childless mother,” “the father of no child,” “the mother of no child.”[1254] A Zulu woman may not utter her husband's name; if she speaks to or of him she says, “Father of So-and-so,” mentioning the name of one of his children.[1255] A Hindoo woman will not name her husband. If she has to refer to him she will designate him as the father of her child or by some other periphrasis.[1256] The widespread custom of naming a father after his child has sometimes been supposed to spring from a desire on the father's part to assert his paternity, apparently as a means of obtaining those rights over his children which had previously, under a system of mother-kin, been possessed by the mother.[1257] But this explanation does not account for the parallel custom of naming the mother after her child, which seems commonly to co-exist with the practice of naming the father after the child. Still less, if possible, does it apply to the customs of calling childless couples the father and mother of children which do not exist, of naming people after their younger brothers, and of [pg 334] designating children as the uncles and aunts of So-and-so, or as the fathers and mothers of their first cousins. But all these practices are explained in a simple and natural way if we suppose that they originate in a reluctance to utter the real names of persons addressed or directly referred to. That reluctance is probably based partly on a fear of attracting the notice of evil spirits, partly on a dread of revealing the name to sorcerers, who would thereby obtain a handle for injuring the owner of the name.[1258]