MCGEE] DE8IGXS MARK BLOOD-CARRIERS 169* 



blood counts as uothing in the establishment and maintenance of the 

 clan organization. Thus the females alone are the blood-nirriers of 

 the clans; they alone require ready and certain identification in order 

 that their institutional theory and practice maybe maintained; and 

 hence they alone need to become bearers of the sacred blood-standards. 

 The warriors belong to the tribe, and are distinguished by luxuriantly 

 flowing hair, by the up stepping movement from which the people 

 derive their appellation, by their unique archery attitude, and by their 

 dark skin-color; the boys count for little until they enter the warrior 

 class; but on the females devolves the duty of defining and maintain- 

 ing the several streams of blood on which the rigidly guarded tribal 

 integrity depends.' Undoubtedly the blood-markings play an impor- 

 tant role in courtshii) and marriage, but too little is known of the 

 esoteric life of the tribe to permit this role to be traced. 



In brief, the Seri face-painting would seem to be essentially zoose- 

 matic, or symbolic of zoic tutelaries, and to signify subspecific (or sub- 

 varietal) characteristics maintained by the clan organization and kept 

 prominent by the militant habit of the tribe; at the same time it is 

 noteworthy that the purely symbolic motive is accompanied by a 

 nascent decorative tendency, displayed by the individual refinement of 

 form and color in the symbol proper to each of the groups. 



DECORATION IN GENERAL 



Aside from the face-painting there is a conspicuous dearth of decora- 

 tion or tangible symbolism among the Seri. 



Tlie symbolic or decorative modification of the physique would seem 

 to be limited to two classes of mutilations, of which one was observed 

 at Costa Eica in 189-1 while the other is apparently obsolete. The 

 observed corporeal modification is the absence of medial superior 

 incisors of the females, in consequence of forcible removal at a period 

 not definitely ascertained. The interpreter at Costa Rica was uncom- 

 municative on the subject; Don Pascual opined that the mutilation 

 formed part of an elaborate puberty ceremonial, and this opinion would 

 seem to be corroborated by the condition of the cranium of an imma- 

 ture female examined by Dr Hrdlicka; but since the half dozen adult 

 maidens at the rancho in 1894 were free from the mutilation while all the 

 wives bore its gruesome trace, it would seem more probable that the 

 custom is connected with marriage. Whatever the period of the inflic- 

 tion, Mashem's guarded expressions seemed to indicate that it was 

 a mark of physical inferiority; and this suggestion, interpreted in 

 the light of the Seri use of teeth as weapons of offense and defense, 

 would seem to indicate that the mutilation is at once the badge of cor- 

 poreal inferiority and a means of maintaining the physical superiority 

 of the males — of course in that theoretically fiducial but actually force- 

 ful way characteristic of primitive culture. 



' The essentially zoooralic nature of Seri law and custom is set forth postea, p. 294. 



