NOMADS OF THE LONG BOW — HOLMBERG 



33 



the reptile, I noticed that it was particularly fat, 

 and since I had no oil with which to keep my 

 arms greased I decided to fry down some snake 

 fat for this purpose. Also, since I had never had 

 the opportunity, I decided to taste some of the 

 meat. I made a point of frying a large steak in 

 front of the Indians so that they coidd readily 

 observe everything that was going on, and after 

 this was done I sat down in a hammock and ate 

 it in full view of the chief, who had not only 

 warned me not to eat it but who, I am sure, 

 expected me to drop dead at any moment. 

 Fortunately, no ill effects resulted. On the 

 following day I ate some more, but though I 

 tried my best, I was unable to get a single Indian 

 to try a piece of the meat. Some days later I 

 had occasion to bake some corn mufhns, and since 

 I had no lard at the time I decided to make them 

 with snake grease. After they were done the 

 chief came around, and I offered him one. He 

 began contentedly to munch it. After he had 

 eaten about half, I could not resist the tempta- 

 tion to tell him that the muffins contained snake 

 fat, whereupon he immediately jumped out of 

 the hammock, put his finger down his throat, 

 and threw up every bit of the mufFm he had eaten. 

 For weeks afterward he reminded me of the trick 

 I had played upon him and was skeptical of eating 

 any food that I offered him until he was certain 

 that the snake fat was gone. 



On the second occasion, my Bolivian companion, 

 Silva, killed an anaconda of about 20 feet in 

 length. Conditions for introducing snake meat 

 at the time were favorable since little game had 

 been secured for several days. But even under 

 these circumstances, although I myself again set 

 the example, I was unable to convince my Indian 

 companions to try it. They showed no compunc- 

 tion, however, about either hunting or eating the 

 buzzards which fed on the carcass of the snake, 

 and for several days thereafter buzzard became 

 a prominent part of then* diet. 



Apart from snake meat, bats, and a few poison- 

 ous insects there are few things the Indians refrain 

 from eating. Although not constituting a promi- 

 nent part of the diet, such things as head lice, 

 wood ticks, and grubs are swallowed without 

 compunction. 



Theoretically, a man is not supposed to eat the 

 flesh of an animal which he kills himself. If a 

 hunter violates this taboo, it is believed that the 



animal which he has eaten \vill not return to be 

 hunted by him again. Continued breaches of 

 this taboo are consequently supposed to be 

 followed automatically by the sanction of ill-luck 

 in hunting. This rule may formerly have been an 

 effective mechanism by means of which to force 

 reciprocity in the matter of game distribution, but 

 if so, it has certainly lost its function today, for 

 the disparity between the rule and its practice is 

 very great indeed. Few hunters pay any atten- 

 tion to the rule at all, and when they do it is only 

 with respect to larger animals, such as the tapir 

 and the harpy eagle, that arc rarely bagged any- 

 way. In the case of smaller animals, such as coati 

 and monkeys, I never saw hunters show any 

 reluctance to eating those that they had killed 

 themselves. Embiita, one of my older informants, 

 told me that when he was a boy he never used to 

 eat any of the game that he killed, but that nowa- 

 days the custom had changed and that it was no 

 longer possible to expect meat from someone else 

 who hunted it. It thus seems that through a 

 gradual process of change hunters have discovered 

 that eating their own game does not necessarily 

 result in poorer luck in hunting but, rather, in 

 greater satisfaction to the hunger drive. The 

 reinforcing experience of eating one's own game 

 has thus caused a partial break-down in an old 

 tribal custom. 



The few food taboos that do prevail among the 

 Siriono have ahnost exclusive reference to the ani- 

 mal world. Agricultural products and wild foods 

 collected from the forest are never taboo ; they can 

 be eaten on aU occasions, by all age groups, and by 

 both sexes. Free of all food taboos, including cer- 

 tain kinds of meat which are forbidden to others, 

 are the aged, that is, those who have passed child- 

 bearing age or possess grown children. Since the 

 Siriono do not practice fasting of any kind, even 

 ceremonially, the aged can thus eat anything at 

 any time. 



There are, in fact, certain meat foods that are 

 supposed to be eaten only by the aged. These 

 include the harpy eagle, the anteater, the owl 

 monkey, and the howler monkey. Since the aged 

 usually get only the left-overs of other food, the 

 society thus seems to have provided for them in 

 some way by reserving these animals exclusively 

 for their use. Under conditions of need, however, 

 I have frequently seen them eaten by people 

 who were not supposed to eat them; only when 



