FIRE AS AN AGENT IN HUMAN CULTURE 173 



injury is received he is adjudged innocent; if he falls into the fire he 

 is adjudged guilty."^* 



The custom of war, or, describing it in terms of folklore, the cere- 

 monial of war, is an old social practice. It had strongly at first and 

 more obscurely to the present the idea of ordeal, practically a divin- 

 atory rite in which a decision should be to the side having the favor of 

 the gods. Battle cries often declared this idea. The ordeals of single 

 combat and gladiatorial combats are striking instances. Even games 

 had the ordeal feature. 



PURIFICATION 



Among the customs which show the confidence of man in the 

 supernatural properties of fire, purification by its means stands out 

 prominently. The customs are the outcome of rude generalizations 

 on the mysterious behavior of fire, its properties and effects, and the 

 knowledge gained by experience. 



Sia Indian hunters make the following invocation to fire: "Coyote 

 spoke to the fire, saying 'we desire many rabbits but we do not wish 

 to go far!' Before hunting the hunters passed their rabbit sticks 

 through the flames."*® 



A similar smoke purification or incantation occurs in Burma, where 

 the people and party and guns were passed through smoke before 

 the hunt.»° 



A Bornean fire ceremony at the close of a Katingan funeral is 

 described by Lumholtz : "I was about to leave when the people began 

 to behave in a boisterous manner. Men caught firebrands and beat 

 with them about the feet of the others. Some cut mats in pieces, 

 ignited them, and struck with those. A woman came running out of 

 the house with a piece of burning mat and beat me about my feet 

 and ankles (my trousers and shoes were supposed to be white), and 

 then went after others, all in good humor and laughingly. She next 

 exchanged firebrands with a man, and both struck at each other 

 repeatedly. This same custom is used at funerals with the Ot-Danums 

 on the Samba, and the explanation given in both tribes is that the 

 mourners want to forget their grief." "^ More hkely the ceremony 

 is for purification. 



In Tartary Abel Remusat observed "a Tartar custom by which all 

 newcomers at court, be they princes or envoys, and all presents they 

 brought with them, were obliged to pass between two big fires; by 

 so doing all evil influences or ill luck which they bore with them 

 were driven away." ®^ 



••J. W. Powell. Wyandot Government, 1st. Ann. Rept., Bur. Amer. Ethnol., 1879-80, p. 87. 

 ••Mrs. M. C. Stevenson. The Sia, 11 Ann. Kept., Bur. Amer. Ethnol, 1894, p. 65. 

 ••C. P. Wolley. Big Game Shooting, voL l,p. 269, London, 1894. 

 •' Carl Lumholtz. Through Central Borneo, vol. 2, New York, 1920, p. 320. 



•• Abel Remusat. Hist, des relations politiques primus, Chretiens avec les Empereurs Mongol, in 

 Mem. Acad. Insc. et Belles Lottres, New York, 1920, pp. 361-378. 



