THE CHANGE OF CLASS AMONG THE NEW GENERATION
We have hitherto, for the sake of lucidity, spoken chiefly of _two_
‘primary classes’ (‘phratries’), such as the Kirarawa and Matthurie of
the Urabunna. But among the Arunta, and many other tribes, there are
four or even eight such ‘classes.’ The reader may refer to the extract
from Mr. Mathews’s description (p. 39).
_Each of these classes roughly corresponds to a different generation of
the tribe_. But, with female descent, each child belongs to the class
to which its mother does not belong. The classes, that is, alter with
each generation. What is the cause of this curious rule? One generation
is A, its children are B, its grandchildren are A again.
Here we meet the explanation of Herr Cunow, which may as well be given
in summary.
THE SYSTEM OF HERR CUNOW
The theory of Herr Cunow[1] is in the first place opposed to the
systems of all who regard the ‘phratries’ as divisions made in
an original group, or horde, for purposes of exogamy. I have not
observed that any of our writers have noticed the book of Herr
Cunow. In his opinion, as was said earlier, authors err in confusing
‘phratries’ with ‘classes:’ ‘a phratry is not a class, and a class is
not a phratry; these two sorts of bodies have been developed out of
different antecedents, and have different tendencies. The two “primary
divisions,” say Kroki and Kumite, are phratries, but are not classes in
the same sense as the Ippai and Kumbo, Murri and Kubbi classes of the
Kamilaroi’ (p. 24).
Herr Cunow regards the ‘classes’ as in origin earlier[2] than the
divisions of totem kin, or the ‘phratry’ divisions, and thinks that
the ‘classes’ were originally non-intermarrying divisions based on
seniority. They were devised or developed, not to prevent marriage
between near kin, but between persons of different generations,
or rather degrees of seniority. This is proved, he thinks, by the
etymology of some of the names of the classes (about which we need
much fuller information). Thus the word _Kubbi_ (Kamilaroi), already
cited as a class name, is derived, he says, from _Kubbura_, ‘young,
new,’ and originally designates a youth who has passed the initiatory
ceremonies. Ridley’s vocabulary of the Kamilaroi tongue is the source
for this fact. Kumbo, another class name, is the _Kombia_ or _Kumbia_,
of the tribes on the Lower Murray river, and means ‘great,’ that is,
‘old.’ On the Lower Darling, the word is _gumboka_, _Kumbuka_; compare
_Kumba_, _Kumbera_, ‘old woman,’ _Kumbeja_, ‘father.’ ‘Great’ and
‘old,’ ‘little’ and ‘young,’ are equivalent in sense. _Bonda_, a class
name of the Kabi, means ‘new’ or ‘young,’ and the class-name Darawang,
or Tarawang, is the Kabi word _darami_, ‘little,’ or ‘young.’ Obu, a
class name, is the Queensland _jabu, jobu, jabbo bobu_, ‘father.’
Thus the class names, Herr Cunow holds, originally indicate divisions
of youth and age in the ‘horde,’ by which term Herr Cunow understands a
local set of from forty to sixty people, a local aggregate of several
such ‘hordes’ being a ‘tribe’ (pp. 25-28). The fact of Australian
attention to degrees of seniority is demonstrated by the stages of
initiation, and by the various dues, of food gifts and so on, paid by
the juniors to the seniors of the tribe: by the food which persons
of different status in seniority may eat, and so forth. Indeed Dr.
Roth has regarded the ‘classes’ as originally evolved to regulate the
distribution of the food supply, and such regulations would, I think,
be elements among other regulations of matrimonial and other rights,
dependent on seniority. ‘What a man may eat at one stage is at another
stage forbidden, and _vice versa_.’[3]
The ‘horde,’ then, in Herr Cunow’s opinion, was primarily divided into
non-intermarrying persons of three stages of seniority. This is the
original organisation, that of totem kindreds being later, in Herr
Cunow’s theory, which is not ours (pp. 36, 37). The word ‘father’ does
not, in the Australian dialects, at first, signify what we mean by the
word, but merely ‘senior;’ and ‘mother’ is a term of the same meaning.
‘Father’ and ‘mother’ with all of their seniority are ‘the big ones;’
children are ‘the little ones.’ These terms become ‘class’ names.
An example is taken from Mr. Bridgman, superintendent of the tribes
at Port Mackay. These have two ‘phratries,’ _Yungaru_ and _Wutaru_
(totemic names), and four ‘classes,’ _Gurgela, Bembia, Wungo_, and
_Kubaru_.[4] The terms for family relations are not understood in our
sense. Mr. Bridgman had a name and status in the tribe. His name was
_Gunurra_; his phratry was _Yungaru_, his class was _Bembia_, and his
children, if he had any, were _Wutaru_ (by phratry), _Kubaru_ (by
class). If a girl came by, and Mr. Bridgman asked who she was, and if
she was Kubaruan, he was told ‘she is your daughter.’ This ‘daughter’
is a young woman of the class to which Mr. Bridgman’s daughters, if he
had any, would belong.
Herr Cunow’s theory, then, starts from the ‘horde,’ divided into not
intermarrying degrees of seniority. That such hordes, not separate
family groups, were the initial stage of society, he is persuaded.[5]
He rejects Morgan’s theory of communal marriage.[6] Next, he thinks,
arose objections to brother and sister and other near akin marriages
(_why_ we are not told), and a man would thus be driven to seek a wife
out of his own horde. Why was this? Herr Cunow merely refers to the
Dieri tradition already cited; evils followed on kindred marriages,
and were perceived and, by divine decree, were reformed.[7] That such
evils did arise and were perceived, and being perceived were reformed,
by very low savages, is to the highest degree improbable. However it
came about (we suggest by dint of reflection on the totem and phratry
restrictions), there is _now_ an objection to intermarriage between
persons ‘of the same flesh.’ How this arose does not seem to be a
question that Herr Cunow chooses to dogmatise upon.
The horde now developes itself into a group of kin, of which the
members regard each other as ‘too nearly related by blood,’ to
intermarry. ‘As a mark of these groups of kin they later take different
beast or plant names, usually from such species as exist in their
districts. No reverence would originally be paid to the totem animal;’
the Narrinyeri eat it without scruple,[8] like any other; the totem
name is originally a name of a _genossenschaft_; a comradeship, the
Narrinyeri word for totem, ‘Ngaitje,’ is equivalent to ‘friend.’
All this is rather vague. Why did groups of comrades or of recognised
kin take plant and animal names? Why did they forbid intermarriage?
What was the origin of the objection to marriage between blood kindred?
It does not arise out of ‘moral ideas,’ nor out of ‘wife-capture,’[9]
and Herr Cunow speaks neither of ‘sexual taboo,’ nor of ‘sexual
jealousy,’ while the theory of ‘personal totems’ become hereditary, or
of magical co-operation in totem breeding, is not mentioned; indeed,
when Herr Cunow wrote (1894), the magical theory was unborn. The
hordes merely developed into groups of comrades or of kin, as such not
intermarrying among themselves, and marking themselves for no assigned
reason, with plant or animal names: reverence of the totem came later.
‘Still later than the totem association the phratry seems to arise,’
and the phratries are described as allied local totem groups. This is
my own opinion, but by ‘local totem group,’ I here mean (as already
explained), the original local totem group, with the other totems which
had become its elements, through exogamy, and female descent. Herr
Cunow, if I follow him, means on the other hand a local totem group of
the kind which now results among the Arunta from reckoning descent in
the male line. ‘The forbidding of marriage extended beyond the local
group, passing into the neighbouring hordes, till at length morality
enjoined the obtaining of wives from remoter districts. Hence was
developed a come-and-go of marriage between two out of several larger
local totems, and these larger local communities are the original types
of the Australian phratries. Suppose that the hordes of the Kurnai had
gradually developed themselves into local totem groups like those of
the Narrinyeri, and ... that it became the rule for the Brataulong to
take their wives from their south-western neighbours, the Kulin, and
_vice versa_, till the two groups waxed into a great community, and we
have the probable development’ (of the ‘phratries’) ‘before us.’ The
groups ‘Brataulong’ and ‘Kulin’ would now be a great community of two
intermarrying phratries.
All this implies, I think, a more advanced society, and larger
communities, than we can easily conceive to have existed in the distant
past when phratries arose. Moreover Herr Cunow, as we shall see, takes
descent, even at this primitive period, to have been reckoned in the
male line. Again, we have observed that phratry names, when they can be
translated, are usually totemic, an opinion expressed by Mr. Fison and
Mr. Howitt. The same sort of totemic names marks Red Indian phratries.
Granting male kinship, the phratries of Herr Cunow’s hypothesis might
well have totem names, but he tries to show that phratry names are
usually _local_; he gives seven cases out of which only two names of
phratries are totemic.[10] But he offers no authority for his assertion
that the other five names are non-totemic (_Eigennahme_) and Yungaru
and Wutaru, represented by him as non-totemic, are really totem names.
We know that as a result of reckoning in the male line local or
district names tend to supersede totem names, and large local totem
groups thus arise, a feature of the decay, not of the dawn, of
Totemism. My own hypothesis, on the other hand, shows why phratry names
are totemic. Herr Cunow concludes ‘the phratry is originally nothing
but an exogamous local group composed of several hordes.’ Like Mr.
Daniel McLennan, Herr Cunow quotes the legend of the wars of Eagle-Hawk
and Crow, which ended in the establishment of the intermarrying
phratries of Crow and Eagle-Hawk.[11] Herr Cunow’s theory of phratries
appears to me to find, in the remotest past, the most recent
institutions of the Australians, and to confuse the primitive local
totem group with the local totem-group later developed out of reckoning
descent in the male line. He throws back into the distant past the
large modern associations, which could not exist in times really
primitive. He makes the hordes develope themselves into totem kins, in
place of being, originally (as in my system), small associations united
by contiguity, and receiving totem names from without.[12] He makes
reckoning in the female line later than reckoning in the male line--the
Narrinyeri reckoning in the male line (p. 84)--and perhaps this method,
he thinks, is a result of ignorance of fatherhood, consequent on the
Piraungaru custom (p. 135). Unluckily we find reckoning descent in the
female line among many races, the Red Indians for example, where the
Piraungaru custom is unknown. The priority of male to female descent is
not admitted as a rule, by Mr. Tylor or any other English authorities.
Where I can agree with Herr Cunow is on the point that the two
‘primary divisions’ are the result, probably, of amalgamation, not
of bisection for purposes of exogamy. Where we differ is as to the
character of the communities that, by alliance and connubium, became
‘primary divisions’ or ‘phratries.’ On his system the communities were
large, holding great districts. On mine, they were ancient local totem
groups, whose members, through exogamy and female descent, were really
of various totems. In a note (p. 139) Herr Cunow shows that he might
easily have arrived at my conclusion, but, while allowing that alien
brides brought the totem names of their own kins into each original
totem group, he says that the men of that group still ‘belonged to
the totem identified with that horde.’ This is the result of his
belief that reckoning descent in the female line is ‘an innovation.’
His ‘horde’ is originally endogamous; then, we know not well why, is
exogamous (p. 137). Those who do not believe that men originally lived
in ‘hordes,’ and hold that, through jealousy and other causes, their
little primary sets were, or tended to be, exogamous from the first,
cannot agree with Herr Cunow. On the other hand, they may incline
to accept his theory that, as the Australian terms of relationship
indicate often status, not relationship in our sense, they do not help
to prove a past of consanguine and communal marriage.
CLASSES AGAIN
To return to the classes, Dr. Durkheim opposes Herr Cunow’s theory that
they indicated originally degrees of seniority. He takes no notice,
however, of Herr Cunow’s argument from etymology, and the original
meanings of the class names, ‘Young’ and ‘Old.’ He argues that, on Herr
Cunow’s system, each individual would, in lapse of time, move from
young to old, and so ought to change his class name, and move into
another class. Herr Cunow answers that, if this occurred, the object of
the class names, practically to prevent young and old intermarrying,
would have been defeated. But, as matters exist, a grandfather may
marry a girl who might be his grand-daughter. He is A, his children are
B, but their children are A again. He is Kubbi, he marries Ippatha, her
children are Buta, their children are Ippatha, and the venerable Kubbi
may marry a very juvenile Ippatha.
Possibly the institution grew up among people who did not look so far
forward, who ‘took short views.’ It is certain that, if the object
of the classes was to stop marriages between young and old, it is a
failure. ‘The old men marry young wives at present,’ says Mr. Mathews.
If so, Herr Cunow may be right. Dr. Durkheim offers a theory. But
his theory takes for granted, as we saw, that the two ‘phratries,’
originally, were only two totem groups, containing within them no
members of other totem kins. ‘They were not yet subdivided’ into
other totem kins. But I have tried to show that there was no such
‘subdivision’ into ‘secondary clans’ or totem kins. Dr. Durkheim
regards these totem kins as colonies split off from the two original
totem groups which became phratries.[13] My reasons against accepting
this position have already been given. This being the case, it is
unnecessary to unfold Dr. Durkheim’s theory of the origin of the
classes. Probably that of Herr Cunow comes nearest to the truth.
Mr. Mathews offers another solution of the problem. ‘Phratry’ Dilbi,
for example, has ‘classes’ Murri and Kubbi, while the linked phratry,
Kupathin, has classes Ippai and Kumbo. ‘It is possible that the group
Dilbi was divided into (female) Matha and Kubbitha to distinguish the
mothers from the daughters, and that the terms Murri and Kubbi were
adopted to provide names for the uncles and nephews of their respective
generations.’ Thus we return to distinction of generations. In any
case the ‘classes’ ‘have the effect of preventing consanguineous
marriages, by furnishing an easy test of relationship when the tribe
has become so numerous or widespread that kinship could not otherwise
be well determined.[14] Later (p. 168) Mr. Matthews writes, ‘The
mother of a man’s wife, and also his daughters, belong to the same
section’ (‘class’), ‘and therefore his marriage with that section is
prohibited.’ That is, he cannot marry out of his generation above or
below, as indicated by ‘class’ names. ‘Neither can he marry into the
section to which his mother belongs, although a woman might be found in
either case, who was in no way connected with him.’ In short, as far
as the names rudely indicate the generation above, and the generation
below a man, he cannot marry into these classes. But, as old men do
marry young wives, the apparent intention of the rules is to some
extent frustrated. We can say no more, till we are told what the class
names mean in a literal sense. Does nobody inquire into this essential
question?
As if to accentuate the problems raised by the change of ‘class’ names
in each generation, Mr. Matthews has discovered that when a man may
marry a woman of his own ‘phratry,’ but out of a set of totems not his
own, the totems of his children by her alter as the class names do.
‘The children take the totem name,’ not of their mother, but of their
maternal grandmother. ‘One totem is the mother of another totem.’[15]
This is an unusual phenomenon, and looks like the effort of a desperate
ingenuity.
The class system exists among the Arunta, with male descent. One moiety
of the southern part of the tribe consists of Panunga and Bulthara,
linked classes, calling themselves Nakrakia; the other moiety is of
Purula and Kumara, calling themselves Mulganuka. A Bulthara man of the
first moiety can only marry a Kumara woman, of the second moiety: a
Purula man marries a Panunga woman only. The children of a Bulthara
man’s union with a Kumara woman take neither the Bulthara nor Kumara
name, but are called Panunga, while the children of a Purula man and
a Panunga woman are Kumara: of a Panunga man and a Purula woman,
Bulthara; of a Kumara man and a Bulthara woman, Purula.
That is to say, the Arunta reckoning in the male line, a man’s children
do not take _his_ ‘class’ name but the name of the ‘class’ linked to
his, and forming, with his, one division of the tribe. Further each
of these four divisions consists of two moieties, and a Panunga man,
though he can marry a Purula woman, must choose her out of the proper
moiety of the Purula division. These moieties of each division, among
the Northern Arunta, have names; Uknaria, Appungerta, Umbitchana,
Ungalla, and the children of each marriage fall under these names.
This restricts a man to only an eighth of the women of his generation,
but, on the other hand, among the Arunta, the totem prohibition no
longer exists: the totems are not restricted to one or another class,
but skip among them, as we have shown in the section on the Arunta. The
eight class system, perhaps the four class system, may be regarded as
later and conscious modifications of the old phratry and totem rules,
which, on my hypothesis, had no conscious moral origin.
[Footnote 1: _Die Verwandtschafts-Organisationen der Australneger_.
Diek, Stuttgart, 1894.]
[Footnote 2: This can hardly be, as the most backward tribes have
phratries and totems, but no ‘classes.’]
[Footnote 3: Eyre, _Journals_, ii. 293-295. Cunow, p. 33, note 2.
Bulmer, in Brough Smyth, i. 235. Roth, _Ethnological Studies_, pp. 69,
70, Brisbane, 1897.]
[Footnote 4: Brough Smyth, i. 91.]
[Footnote 5: Pp. 122-124, and note 1, an argument against Westermarck.]
[Footnote 6: Pp. 127-128.]
[Footnote 7: Gason, _The Dicyrie Tribe_ (1894), p. 13. _Kam. and Kur._
p. 25. Cunow, pp. 109-110, 130-132.]
[Footnote 8: Cf. Cunow, p. 82. So, too, the Euahlayi.]
[Footnote 9: Cunow, p. 130.]
[Footnote 10: Pp. 133-134.]
[Footnote 11: Brough Smyth, i. 423. Cunow, p. 134. _Studies in Ancient
History_, second series, _ut supra_.]
[Footnote 12: See ‘The Origin of Totemism.’]
[Footnote 13: Cf. p. 83.]
[Footnote 14: _Proc. Roy. Soc. N.S.W._ xxxi. 161.]
[Footnote 15: _Op. cit._ pp. 172-175.]