Rest Days; A Sociological Study 23 



pherical poison which extends its defihng influence far and wide. 

 Hence we have at least one motive for the very common practice 

 of destroying the house and personal property of the deceased.'* 

 Hence arise the taboos of the corpse, of persons who have any- 

 thing to do with the corpse, of the relatives of the deceased, and 

 of the mourners generally. An obvious application of these ideas 

 requires that all activity should be abandoned by the survivors for 

 a period following a death ; and where the social consciousness 

 is strong, the notion of abstinence at so critical a season may be 

 extended to the entire community. 



5. TABOOED DAYS FOLLOWING A DEATH 



The illustrations of these death taboos are so numerous and are 

 found so widely among primitive peoples that it is permissible to 

 disregard the confines of special geographical or cultural areas 

 and make a general survey of the phenomena. 



In Samoa the death of a chief of high rank was an occasion 

 for suspending all work in the settlement.^' The Sea Dayaks of 

 Borneo taboo their village after a death, remaining at home and 

 abstaining from outdoor occupations, for seven days in the case 

 of a male, three days for a female, and one for an infant. This 

 iilit is confined to the relatives of the deceased and does not 

 affect the community at large. During the nlit music and jollity 

 are forbidden, ornaments and bright dresses laid aside, and deep 

 mourning assumed." Among the Land Dayaks the death of a 

 man tabooed the entire village for a day.'^ In Timor, when a 



■* See further my article. " The Influence of Superstition on the Evo- 

 lution of Property Rights." Publications of the American Sociological 

 Society, 1909, iv. 159 sq. 



''George Turner, Nineteen Years in Polynesia, London, 1861, p. 229; 

 idem, Samoa, London, 1884, p. 146. 



° H. L. Roth, in Journal of the Anthropological Institute, 1892, xxi. 122. 

 Cf. Nyuak. in Anthrofos, 1906, i. 413: "On a death occurring in the vil- 

 lage it is tabooed to work on the farm ; at busy times, for three days ; at 

 other times, for seven days." 



' Spenser St. John, in Transactions of the Ethnological Society, 1863. 

 n. s., ii. 236; idem. Life in the Forests of the Far East, London, 1863. i. 

 163. 



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