314 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 175 



EsehafoJogy of suicide. — The fate of a suicide's ghost was the same 

 as that of other persons. The souls of ordinary stillborn children and 

 of ordinary infants, who died before they were old enough to have 

 their chins tattooed, went into a rathole (Devereux 1937 a), while the 

 souls of twins returned to heaven or to the land of the dead (Dev- 

 ereux, 1941.) The soul of the willing victim of a witch first joined 

 the witch's other victims in a special place ; then, when the witch was 

 killed, the victim's soul accompanied him to the land of the dead and — 

 instead of joining his own deceased relatives — lived in the witch's camp 

 (Devereux, 1937 c). All other suicides proceeded, like ordinary per- 

 sons, to the land of the dead where, before being metamorphosed into 

 something else, they relived their earthly life, including even their 

 death by suicide (Devereux, 1937 a). The ghosts of suicides did not 

 differ from other ghosts, were not believed to be especially dangerous 

 and, with one exception, were not thought to make special efforts to in- 

 duce others to commit suicide. The one — rather dubious — exception is 

 the victim of witchcraft, whom the witch temporarily segi'egated in 

 a "place of his own." This captive ghost, or dead soul, (voluntarily ? ) 

 haunted the witch *'" by cohabiting with him in dream until, overcome 

 by longing for his ghostly captives, the witch provoked someone into 

 killing him (Devereux, 1937 c, and pt. 7, pp. 387-426) . 



The failure of the Mohave to discriminate against suicides and the 

 absence of a special eschatology of suicide suggest that suicide may 

 have been fairly common in aboriginal times. Had it been something 

 exceptional, the I\Iohave, who have very elaborate and imaginative 

 ideas about death and the fate of the soul, would certainly have evolved 

 a special eschatology for those who died in so dramatic a manner. 



SUICIDE AND CULTURAL CHANGE 



Due to the lack of reliable early data on Mohave suicide, and also 

 because of the Mohave taboo on the names of the dead, it is nearly im- 

 possible to form an opinion about the frequency of suicide in aborigi- 

 nal times and to contrast it with the frequency of suicide during the 

 last 75 or 100 years. 



Mohave 'beliefs concerning changes. — It was possible to point out, in 

 the section on the relationship between ethnic personality and suicide, 

 that just as the Mohave tend to idealize the stoical strength of char- 

 acter which they impute to their forebears, so they idealize also condi- 

 tions prevailing in aboriginal times. Hence, in view of their disap- 

 proval of suicide, it is almost unavoidable that they should feel 

 convinced that it was rarer in aboriginal times than it is at present. 



•» Compare the haunting of people by their dead relatives, which causes them to contract 

 ghost diseases (pt 4, pp. 128-180) and note that the favorite victims of a witch are his 

 own relatives. 



