564 
NATORE 
[OcToBER 2, 1902 
system these were real totems although of a peculiar kind. 
They were called yazy, or ‘flesh,’ or xgirabiil, or mir, just as 
were the totems proper. The only difference was that the Bat 
was the brother ofall the men, while any one totem was the brother 
only of the men who bore it as their totem. . . . It is evident 
that the institution of the ‘man’s brother’ and the ‘ woman’s 
sister? as totems is very widespread throughout Australia. I 
have traced it over an extent of about a thousand miles 
and in tribes having marked differences in language 
and in social organisation. It seems to be very persistent 
and enduring, for it remained among the Kurnai in full force 
after the ordinary social organisation in class divisions and totems 
had become extinct.” Mr. Howitt speaks of these as ‘‘ abnormal 
totems,” and Dr. Frazer (‘‘ Totemism,” p. 51; ‘‘ The Golden 
Bough,” iii. p. 416) calls them ‘‘sex totems.”’ As it appears 
most desirable to distinguish between this cult, which is con- 
fined to Australia, and true totemism, I propose, in default of a 
distinctive native term, to call these reverenced animals ‘‘ animal 
brethren.” Although the natives do not appear to distinguish 
nominally between these animal brethren and ordinary totems, 
it does not follow they are to be considered as the same. I am 
calling attention to an analogous confusion of terms in the totem- 
ism of Torres Straits. 
I must now pass on to a further consideration of true totem- 
ism as understood by Tylor, Frazer, Lang, Hartland, Jevons, 
Durkheim and others, as it is impossible within the limits of an 
Address to give an account of all the varieties of pseudo- 
totemism. 
. 
A Suggestion concerning the Origin of Totemzsm. 
I take this opportunity to hazard a suggestion for a possible 
origin of one aspect of totemism. Primitive human groups, 
judging from analogy, could never have been large, and the 
individuals comprising each group must have been closely re- 
lated. In favourable areas each group would have a tendency to 
occupy a restricted range owing to the disagreeable results which 
arose from encroaching on the territory over which another 
group wandered. Thus it would inevitably come about that a 
certain animal or plant, or group of animals or plants, would be 
more abundant in the territory of one group than in that of 
another. To take a clear example, the shore-folk and the river- 
folk would live mainly on different food from each other and 
both would have other specialities than fell to the lot of the 
jungle-folk. The groups that lived on the seashore would 
doubtless have some natural vegetable products to supplement 
their animal diet, but the supply would probably be limited alike 
in quantity and variety. Even they would scarcely have unlimited 
range of a shore line, and there would be one group of shore- 
folk that had a speciality in crabs, another would have shell- 
beds, while a third would own sandy shores which were fre- 
quented by turtle. A similar natural grouping would occur 
among the jungle-folk ; sago flourishes in swampy land, certain 
animals frequent grassy plains, others inhabit the dense scrub, 
bamboos grow in one locality, various kinds of fruit trees thrive 
best in different soils; the coastal plains, the foot hills, the 
mountains, each has its characteristic flora and fauna. There is 
thus no difficulty in accounting for numerous small human 
groups each of which would be largely dependent upon a dis- 
tinctive food supply the superfluity of which could be bartered 1 
for the superfluities of other groups. These specialities were 
not confined to food alone ; for example, the shore-folk would 
exchange the shells they collected for the feathers obtained from 
the jungle-folk. 
It may be objected that in the great prairies and steppes of 
America, Eurasia and Australia the natural products are very 
uniform ; but these areas are not thickly populated, and in most 
cases they probably were only inhabited when the pressure of 
population in the localities with more varied features forced 
migration into the open. Certainly these were never the primi- 
tive homes of man, 
Ina recent paper read before the Folklore Society, Mr. Andrew 
Lang put forward the hypothesis that while each primitive human 
group called itself ‘‘ the men,” theynamed the surrounding groups 
from the names of animals or plants, and hence arose totemism. 
The idea that there was an intimate connection between the 
group and the object from which they were nicknamed would 
soon be developed, and myths of origin would spring up to ac- 
1 It may be objected that the idea of barter is by no means primitive; but 
as I believe that sociability was a fundamental characteristic of primitive 
man I can see no reason why it should not have occurred quite early in a 
rudimentary sort of way. 
NO. 1718, VOL. 66] 
count for the name. Mr. Lang’s theory, still unpublished, 
regards totem names as given from without for a variety of 
reasons, amongst which, I understand, he includes my own 
suggestion. His conjecture is based on the similar names, or 
sobriquets, of villages in the folklore, or d/ason populatre, of 
France and England, which, again, is almost identical with the 
extant names of Red Indian totem kindred now counting descent 
in the male line. Similar phenomena occur in Melanesia 
with female kin. Mr. Lang is rather indifferent to the causes 
of the name-giving so long as the name-giving comes from with- 
out and applies to groups, not to individuals. 
To return to my suggestion. Among the shore-folk the group 
that lived mainly on crabs and occasionally traded in crabs 
might well be spoken ofas the ‘‘ crab-men ” by all the groups 
with whom they came in direct or indirect contact. The same 
would hold good for the group that dealt in clams or in turtle, 
and reciprocally there might be sago-men, bamboo-men, and so 
forth. It is obvious that men who persistently collected or 
hunted a particular group of animals would understand the 
habits of those animals better than other people, and a personal 
regard for these animals would naturally arise. Thus from the 
very beginning there would be a distinct relationship between a 
group of individuals anda group of animals or plants, a relation- 
ship that primitively was based, not on even the most elementary 
of psychic concepts, but on the most deeply seated and urgent of 
human claims, hunger. 
There is scarcely any need to point out that the association of 
human groups with fearsome animals would arise by analogy 
very early. Hence tiger-men and crocodile-men would restrain 
the ravages of those beasts (Dr. Frazer, Fortnightly Review, 
1899, p. 835, describes this as the negative or remedial side of 
totemic magic); but I take it this was not as primitive as the 
nutritive alliances. The relation between groups of men and 
the elements has a purely economic basis; for example, rain is 
rarely required for itself, but as a means for the increase of 
vegetable food ; similarly the fisherman wants a wind to enable 
him to get to and from his fishing grounds. 
The next phase is reached when man arrived at elementary 
metaphysical conceptions and endeavoured by sympathetic or 
symbolic magic to increase his food supply. Naturally the food 
or product that each group would endeavour to multiply would 
be the speciality or specialities of that group, and for this prac- 
tice we now have demonstrative evidence. Though this may be 
an early phase of totemism, I do not consider it the earliest ; it 
can scarcely be the origin of totemism, but it doubtless helped 
to establish and organise the system. 
The essential difference between the view advocated by Dr. 
Frazer (/oc. cit., 1899, p. 835) and that here suggested is 
that according to him totemism ‘‘is primarily an organised and 
cooperative system of magic designed to secure for the members 
of the community, on the one hand, a plentiful supply of all 
the commodities of which they stand in need, and, on the other 
hand, immunity from all the perils and dangers to which man is 
exposed in his struggle with nature. Each totem group, on this 
theory, was charged with the superintendence and control of 
some department of nature from which it took its name, and 
with which it sought, as far as possible, to identify itself.” 
Whereas I suggest that the association between a group of men 
and a species of animals or plants was the natural result of local 
causes, and that departments of nature were not ‘‘assigned to a 
particular group” of men. I think it is scarcely probable 
‘that in very ancient times communities of men should have 
organised themselves more or less deliberately for the purpose 
of attaining objects so natural by means that seemed to them 
so simple and easy.” I suspect that if there was any deliberate 
organisation it was in order to regulate already existing practices. 
To us it might appear that these magical practices could be un- 
dertaken by anyone, but this does not seem to have been an 
early conception. As far as we can penetrate the mind of exist- 
ing backward man, there is a definite acknowledgment of the 
limit of his own powers. The members of one group can per- 
form a certain number of actions; there are others that they 
cannot undertake. One group of men, for example, may ensure 
the abundance of a certain kind of animal, but another will have 
power over the rain, An interesting example of this limitation 
is afforded at Port Moresby, in British New Guinea, where the 
Motu immigrants have to buy fine weather for their trading 
voyages from the sorcerers of the indigenous agricultural 
Koitapu (J. Chalmers, ‘‘ Pioneering in New Guinea,” 1887, 
p- 14). 
ate 
