684 ECCLESIASTICAL INSTITUTIONS. 



is in other cases traceable to misinterpretation of names. 

 We read of the Amos of Japan that &quot; their highest eulogy 

 on a man is to compare him to a bear. Thus Shinondi said 

 of Benri the chief He is as strong as a bear/ and the old Fate 

 praising Pipichari called him The young bear. &quot; Here the 

 transition from comparison to metaphor illustrates the origin 

 of animal names. And then on finding that the Amos 

 worship the bear, though they kill it, and that after killing it 

 at the bear-festival they shout in chorus &quot;We kill you, 

 bear ! come back soon into an Aino,&quot; we see how identifi 

 cation of the bear with an ancestral Aino, and consequent 

 propitiation of the bear, may arise. Hence when we read 

 &quot; that the ancestor of the Mongol royal house was a wolf,&quot; 

 and that the family name was Wolf; and when we remember 

 the multitudinous cases of animal -names borne by North 

 American Indians, with the associated totem-system; this 

 cause of identification of ancestors with animals, and conse 

 quent sacredness of the animals, becomes sufficiently obvious. 

 Even without going beyond our own country we find signifi 

 cant evidence. In early days there was a tradition that Earl 

 Siward of Northurnbria had a grandfather who was a bear in 

 a Norwegian forest ; and &quot; the bear who was the ancestor of 

 Siward and Ulf had also, it would seem, known ursine 

 descendants.&quot; Now Siward was distinguished by &quot;his 

 gigantic stature, his vast strength and personal prowess;&quot; 

 and hence we may reasonably conclude that, as in the case 

 of the Amos above given, the supposed ursine descent had 

 arisen from misinterpretation of a metaphor applied to a 

 similarly powerful progenitor. In yet other cases, 



sacredness of certain animals results from the idea that 

 deceased men have migrated into them. Some Dyaks refuse 

 to eat venison in consequence of a belief that their ancestors 

 &quot; take the form of deer after death ;&quot; and among the Esquimaux 

 &quot; the Angekok announces to the mourners into what animal 

 the soul of the departed has passed.&quot; Thus there are several 

 ways in which respect for, and sometimes worship of, an 



