Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 13, 1902.djvu/387

 The Origin of Totem Names and Beliefs. 367

Mr. Sleigh, of Lifu, says, " that creature would be sacred to his family," they would call it " papa/' and " offer it a young cocoanut." "But they did not adopt thus the name of a tribe^ The children of papa, who chose to be a butterfly (like Mr. Thomas Haynes Bailey) do not call themselves " The Butterflies," nor does the butterfly name mark their exogamous limit. Mr. Tylor concludes " an ancestor, having lineal descendants among men and sharks, or men and owls, is thus the founder of a totem.-family, which mere increase may convert into a totem-clan, already provided with its animal name." This conclusion is tentative, and put forth with Mr. Tylor' s usual caution. But, as a matter of fact, no totem-kin is actually founded thus, for example in Melanesia. The institutions of that region, as we can show, really illustrate the way out of, not the way into, totem- ism. Moreover the hypothesis as expressed by Mr. Tylor in the words cited, must be deemed unfortunate, because it takes for granted that "the Patriarchal theory " of the origin of the so-called " clan," or totem group, is correct. A male ancestor founds a family, which swells, "by natural increase," into a " clan." The ancestor is worshipped under the name of Butterfly ; his descendants, the clan founded by him, are named Butterflies. But all this can only happen where male ancestors are remembered, and are worshipped, where descent is reckoned in the male line, and where, as among ourselves, a remembered male ancestor founds a house, as Tarn o' the Cowgate founded the house of Haddington. In short Dr. Wilken has slipped back into the Patriarchal theory. Now, among totemists like the Australians, ancestors are not remembered, their names are tabued, they are not worshipped, they do not found families.^

Miss Alice Fletcher's Theory.

An interesting variant of this theory is offered, as regards the Omaha tribe of North America, by Miss Alice Fletcher,

' Tylor, Remarks on Toicinisiii, pp. 146-147, 1S98. J. A. I., .wviii.