creases in size with the dignity of the deceased^ deyeiops also from a simple mound of earth into a mound partly of stone and partly of earthy and finally into a stone structure^ still solid like a mound, and still somewhat mound-shaped, but highly elaborated architecturally. Instead of a sacred edifice evolved from the sepulchral chamber, we have, in the Indian Tope, a sacred edifice evolved from the grave-heap itself. '' The Tope is the lineal descendant of the tumulus," says Mr. Pergusson; or, as defined by Mr. Cunningham in his elaborate work, it is "a regularly -buiU cairn," as its name implies. Of these Indian Topes, some contain relics of Sakyd-muni; and others contain relics of his principal disciples, priests, and saints: relics only, because in the case of Sakyi-muni, parts of his remains were carried to different places, and because, in the other cases, burning of the dead having been adopted by the Indian Buddhists, '^ the tomb became not the receptacle of a body but of a relic." As nearly as this change of practice permits, therefore, the Tope is a tomb; and the prayers offered at Topes, the processions made round them, and the adorations paid to them (as shown in the sculptures on their own surfaces), prove that they are simply solid temples instead of hollow temples.
Their kinship is further implied by the significant fact that the name given to certain of them, Ohaitya, means, in Sanskrit, " an altar, a temple, as well as any monument raised on the site of a funeral pile."
Betuming from this special development of the graveheap, to the grave-heap in its original form, we have first to recall the fact (§ 85) that among savages who bury, and who take supplies of food to the dead, the grave-heap is thereby made a heap on which offerings are placed. Here of earth or turf, there partly of stones, elsewhere of stones entirely, it has the same relation to offerings for the dead that an altar has to offerings for a deity.
Where corpses are supported on platforms, which also bear the refreshments provided for the dead, these platforms 278 THI DATA OF SOCIOLOGFT.
become practically altars; and we have eyidence that in fiome cases the altars used in the worship of deities are deriyed from them. Cook tells us that in Tahiti^ the altars on which the natives place their offerings to the gods, are similar to the biers on which they place their dead: both are small stages^ raised on wooden pillars^ from five to seven feet high. And in the Sandwich Islands a like structure was used to support the provisions taken to the grave of one of Cook's sailors. Elsewhere, neither the grave-heap simply nor the raised stage, plays the part of a stand for offerings. Ximenez tells us of the Central Americans that ''if, after the slaves had been laid in the sepulchre beside their master, any space was left, they filled it up with earth, and levelled it. They afterwards erected an altar upon the grave, a cubit high, of lime and rock, on which generally much incense was burnt, and sacrifices offered.' ' And then, among peoples who enlarge the grave-heap, this structure carrying food and drink is placed by its side; as it is before the vast tumulus of a Chinese Emperor.
Among ancient orientals the altar had a like origin. A ceremony at one of the Egyptian festivals was '' crowning the tomb of Osiris with flowers "; and in like manner they placed garlands on the sarcophagi of dead persons. Further, we read in Wilkinson that the Egyptians had altars '' outside the doors of the catacombs at Thebes." Upon these altars " are carved in bas-relief the various offerings they bore, which are the same as those represented in the paintings of tombs '': an illustration showing us that where it became developed into a support for offerings placed in front of the dead, the altar still bore traces of having originally been the receptacle for the dead. One more case. As made known by their earliest recorded traditions, the Hebrews show us only modified forms of their primitive habits; but though, along with their advance from the pre-pastoral state, there was probably some divergence from their original observances of burial and sacrificej ) BiLCBSD PLACBS^ TSHFLSS^ AND ALTABS,' ETC. 279 tlieir altars as described suggest the origin here alleged. They were either of turf, and in so far like a grave^heap^ or they were of undressed stones, and in so far also like a grave-heap. Bearing in mind that, as illustrated in the use of the flint-knife for circumcision, religious usages are those which remain longest unchanged, we may suspect the cause of the restriction to undressed stones was that the use of them had persisted from the time when they formed the primitive cairn. It is true that the earliest Hebrew legends imply cave-burials, and that later burials were in artificial caves or sepulchres; but pastoral tribes, wandering over wide plains, could not constantly have buried thus. The common mode was probably that still practised by such wild Semites as the Bedouins, whose dead, Burkfaardt tells us, have " stones piled over the grave,'^ and who, Palgrave says, '' make sacrifices in which sheep or camels are devoutly slaughtered at the tombs of their dead kinsmen:'' the piled stones being thus clearly made an altar.
The usages of European races also yield evidence of this derivation. Here, partly from Blunt's Dictionary of Theologi/, and partly from other sources, are some of the proofs. The most ancient altar known is '' a hollow chest, on the lid or mensa of which the Eucharist was celebrated." This form was associated with '' the early Christian custom of placing the relics of martyred saints" under altars; and it is still a standing rule in the Catholic Church to enclose the relics of a saint in an altar. '^ Stone was ordered by councils of the fourth century, from an association of the altar with the sepulchre of Christ.'' Moreover, "the primitive Christians chiefly held their meetings at the tombs of the martyrs, and celebrated the mysteries of religion upon them." And to Mr. Fergusson's statement, that ^'in mediaoval Europe the sarcophagus became a stone altar," may be joined the fact that our churches still contain " altar-tombs."
Thus what we are clearly shown by the practices of primitive men, is indicated also by the practices of civilized 280 THK DATA CMP 80CIOLOOT.
men. The original altar is that which supports food for the dead; and hence its yarions forms — a heap of turf, a pile of stones^ a raised stage, a stone coffin.
§ 139. Altars imply sacrifices; and we pass naturally from the genesis of the one to the genesis of the other.
Already in § 84 I have exemplified at length the practice of leaving food for the dead; and I might, space permitting, doable the number of examples. I might, too, illostrate the various motives shown us by various peoples — ^by the Lower Calif omians, among whom ''the priest demands provisions for the spirit's journey;" by the Coras of Mexico, who, after a man's death, '' placed some meat upon sticks about the fields, for fear he might come for the cattle he formerly owned /' by the Damaras, who, bringing provisions to the grave of a relation, request '' him to eat and make merry,'' and in return " invoke his blessing " and aid. But it is needless to do more than remind the reader that uncivilized races in general, differing however they may do in their assigned reasons, agree in making offerings of meat and drink to the dead. A truth also before illustrated (§ 85), but which, as bearing directly on the argument, it will be well to re-illustrate here, is that these offerings are repeated at intervals: in some places for a short time; in other places for a long time. Of the Nootka-Sound people we are told that " for some days after death the relatives bum salmon or venison before the tomb;" and among the Mosquito Indians, '' the widow was bound to supply the grave of her husband with provisions for a year." These are extremes between which various degrees of persistence might be placed. And when, with practices of this kind, we join such practices and interpretations as those t)f the Karen, who thinks himself surrounded by the spirits of the departed dead, " whom he has to appease by varied and unceasing offerings;" we cannot fail to recognize the transition from funeral gifts to religious sacrifices.
iSACRXD PLACXS^ TSMPLSS^ AKD ALTABS; BTC. 281 The kinship becomes farther manifest on observing that in both cases there are, along with offerings of the ordinary kind, festival offerings. The Karens just named as habitually making oblations, have also annual feasts for the dead, at which they ask the spirits to eat and drink. Similarly of the Bodo and Dhimals, Hodgson tells us that '^ at harvest home, they offer fruits and a fowl to deceased parents/' Snch yearly offerings, occurring in November among the natives of the Mexican Valley, who then lay animals, edibles, and flowers on the graves of their dead relatives and friends, and occurring in August among the Pueblos, who then place corn, bread, meat, etc., in the '' haunts frequented by the dead," have prevailed widely: modem Chinese still exemplifying them, as they were exemplified by the ancient Peruvians and Aztecs.
Beyond the making of offerings to deceased persons for various periods after death, and beyond these annual feasts for the dead, we have the making of offerings on occasions specially suggesting them. St. John tells that ''when passing a burial-ground, the Sea Dyaks throw on it something they consider acceptable to the departed /' and according to Anderson, the Hottentots throw an offering on passing a burial-place, and ask the protection of the spirit. In Samoa, where the spirits of the dead are supposed to roam the bush, '' people in going far inland to work, would scatter food here and there as a peace-offering to them, and utter a word or two of prayer for protection.^' Development of funeral offerings into habitual sacrifices is carried a stage further in the practice of reserving for the dead a portion of each meal. Of the Fijians, Seeman tells us that '' often when the natives eat or drink anything, they throw portions of it away, stating them to be for their departed ancestors.^' Malcome says of the Bhik that always when liquor is given them, they pour a libation on the ground before drinking any; and as their dead ancestors are their deities, the meaning of this practice is unmistakable. So, 282 THE DATA OF BOCIOLOGT.
too^ we learn from Smith tliat the Arancanians spill a litde of their drink^ and scatter a little of their food^ before eating and drinking; and^ according to Draiy^ the Yirzimbers of Madagascar, when they sit down to meals, '' take a bit of meat and throw it over their heads, saying — ' There's a bit for the spirit/" Ancient historic races bad like ways.
The motive for these offerings, made first to the corpse of the dead man and afterwards at his grave — ^the motive for these occasional feasts and for these daily shares of meals, is everywhere the same, and is often avowed. We read in Livingstone that a Berotse having a headache said, *'' My father is scolding me because I do not give him any of the food I eat/ I asked him where his &ther was. 'Among the Barimo,' [gods] was the reply." The Elaffirs, who are described by Grardiner as attributing every untoward event to the spirit of a deceased person, and as '^ slaughtering a beast to propitiate its favour,'^ show us the same thing. So do the Amaznlu. '^ There, then, is your food," they say: *' all ye spirits of our tribe, summon one another. I am not going to say, ' So-and-so, there is your food,* for you are jealous. But thou. So-and-so, who art making this man ill, call all the spirits; come all of you to eat this food."
Alike in motive and in method, this offering of food and drink to the dead man is paralleled by the offering of food and drink to a deity. Observe the points of community. The giving of portions of meals is common to the two. Cook tells us that in the Sandwich Islands, before the priests begin a meal, they offer up a sort of prayer, and then offer some of the provisions to the deity. As with these Polynesians, so with the Homeric Greeks: '^ the share which is given to the gods of the wine that flows, and the flesh that smokes on the festal board,'' corresponds with the share cast aside by savages for the ancestral spirits. The like is true of the larger oblations on special occasions. Sacrifices made to gain Sacred places^ txmplbs^ and altabs; btc. 28S favours or to ward off evils^ are made here to gbosts and liere to gods. When a Kaffir chief kills a bullock that he may thereby get the help in war of a dead ancestor^ we are reminded that ^^ King Agamemnon offered up a fat ox^ of five years old, to the powerful son of Saturn/' • When among the Amazulu, after " an abundant hardest sometimes the head of the village dreams that it is said to him — ^ How is it, when you have been given so much food, that you do not give thanks?''' and when he thereupon sacrifices to the Amatongo (ghosts of the dead), his act differs in no respect from that of offering first-fruits to deities. And when at another time ^' he tells his dream, and says — ' Let a sin-offering be sacrificed, lest the Itongo be angry and kill us;''' we are reminded of sin-offerings made among various peoples to avert divine vengeance. There is a no less complete correspondence between the sacrifices made at fixed periods. As above shown, we find in addition to other oblations to the dead, annual oblations; and these answer to the festivals in honour of deities. Moreover, in both cases guidance by astronomical events is used. The parallel holds also in respect of the things offered: they are identical, so far as the products of different regions permit. In both cases we have oxen, goats, etc.; in both cases bread and cakes occur; in both cases the local drink is given — ^wine where it exists, chicha among American races, beer among various African tribes; in both cases, too, we find incense used;. and in both cases flowers. In short, whatever consumable commodities are most valued, down even to tobacco. As we saw above, an African chief expected to get aid by emptying his snuff-box to the gods; and among the Kaffirs, when the spirits -^ are invited to eat, beer and snuff are usually added." Nor is there any difference in the mode of preparation. Both to spirits and to deities we find uncooked offerings aud also burnt offerings. Yet another likeness must be named. Ghosts and gods are supposed to profit. by the 28 i THE DATA Of SOCIOLOGT.
sacrificos in like ways and to be similarly pleased. As given in the Iliadj Zens^ reason for fayonring Troy is tliat ''there my altars never lacked a due banquet and libation and savour/' And in the Odyssey, Athena is represented as coming in person to receive the roasted heifer offered to her, and as rewarding the offerer. So that food for deities and food for ancestors, similarly utilized, has similar effects. Lastly, we have the significant fact that in sundry oases the sacrifices to ghosts and gods coexist in undistinguishable forms. By the Sandwich Islanders provisions are placed before the dead and before images of the deities. Among the Egyptians' " the offerings made to the dead were similar to the ordinary oblations in honour of the gods.*' The mummies were kept in closets, " out of which i^ey were taken by the minor functionaries to a small altar, before which the priest officiated */* and on this altar they made ''offerings of incense and libations, with cakes, flowers, and fruits.''
There is, then, an unbroken connection between refreshments placed for the dead and religious offerings at large. The derivation of the last from the first, made sufficiently clear by the traceable gradations, is made still clearer by the maintenance of the same essential traits.
§ 140. There are reasons for suspecting that another religious observance arises incidentally along with the foregoing observances. Little as we should look for such an origin, we meet with facts suggesting that &sting, sa a religious rite, is a sequence of funeral rites. Probably the practice arises in more ways than one. Livoluntary as the going without food often is with the primitive man, and causing as it then does vivid dreams, it becomes a deliberately-adopted method of obtaining interviews with the spirits. Among various savage races fasting has now, as it had among the Jews of Talmudic times, this as one of its motives. In other cases it has the allied motive of bring- SACBSD PLACES^ TIMPLSSj AITD ALTARS; ETC. 285 ing on that pretemataral excitement regarded as inspiration.
But besides fastings of these kinds there is the fasting I which results from making excessiye provision for the ^ dead. This^ by implication^ becomes an accepted mark of reverence for the dead; and finally a religions act.
In § 108, it was shown how extensive is in many cases the destruction of property, of cattle, of food, at the tomb. I have cited the fact that, as a consequence, among the Dyaks burial-rites frequently reduce survivors to poverty; and that, on the Gold Coast, '^ a funeral is usually absolute ruin to a poor family.^^ If, as in some extinct , American societies, everything a man had except his land \ went into his grave with him — ^if on the death of a Toda I '^ his entire herd '^ of oxen was sacrificed; the implication is that his widow and children had to sufEer great want. I When, of the Chippewayans, we are told that " no article is spared by these unhappy men when a near relative dies^' — when we learn that among the Bagos a chiefs widows bum all their stores of food at his funeral; we cannot but infer lack of food as a result. And so we find it to be. Bancroft tells us that ''the Indians of the Rocky Mountains bum with the deceased all his effects, and even those of his nearest relatives, so that it not unf requently happens that a family is reduced to absolute starvation ^^; and of the Bagos above named, Cailli6 says '' the family of the deceased, who are ruined by this act of superstition [burning his property], are supported through the next harvest by the inhabitants of the village." " Now when along with these facts, so obviously related as cause and consequence, we join the fact stated by Cruikshank, that the Gold Coast people, to their other mourning observances add fasting; as well as the fact concerning the Dahomans which Burton gives, that ''the weeping relatives must fast"; we can scarcely avoid the conclusion that what is at first a natural result of great sacrifice to the dead, becomes eventually a usage signifying such sacri6ce; and continues as 286 THB DATA OV SOCIOLOGT.
a usage when no longer made needful by impoverislunent. We shall see the more reason for concluding this on finding that fasting was a funeral rite among extinct peoples whose attentions to the dead were elaborate. According to Landa^ the Yucatanese '^ fasted for the sake of the dead"^^; and the like happened among the Egyptians: during the mourning for a king ^' a solemn fast was established/^ Even among the Hebrews fasting was associated with mourning dresses.
This connection of practices and ideas is strengthened by the like connection consequent on daily offerings to the dead. The habit of throwing aside a portion of each meal for the spirits^ must often associate in thought sacrificing with fasting. Short of food^ as the improyident savage frequently is^ the giving a part of his meal to the ancestral ghosts^ diminishing the little he has^ entails hunger; and voluntarily -borne hunger thus becomes a vividly impressed sjmDibol of duty to the dead. How it thence passes into the notion of duty to the gods, is well shown by the Polynesian legend concerning Maui and his brothers. Having had a great success in fishing, Maui says to them — '^ After I am gone, be courageous and patient; do not eat food until I return, and do not let our fish be cut up, but rather leave it until I have carried an offering to the gods for this great haul of fish. * * * I y^iW then return, and we can* cut up this fish in safety.^' And the story goes on to describe the catastrophe resulting from the anger of the gods, because the brothers proceeded to eat before the offering had been made.
Naturally the fasting arising in this manner, and giving occasions for self-discipline, comes to be used for self -discipline after the original purpose is forgotten. There still clings to it, however, the notion that the approval of a supernatural power is gained; and the clinging of this notion supports the inference which we otherwise find probable.
§ 141. Beturning from this incidental result, introduced BACBED PLACES, TEMPLES, AND ALTARS; ETC. 287 parenthetically, and resuming our study of the way in which the offerings at burials develop into religious offerings, we come next to observances scarcely separable from those described above, but which yet may be conveniently grouped by themselves, I refer to propitiations in which human beings are sacrificed to the dead, and in which those who do not sacrifice themselves, sacrifice parts of themselves.
We have seen that for the immolation of human victims at funerals, there are two motives: one of them being the supply of food for the deM; and the other being the supply of attendants for service in the future life* We will glance at the two in this order. Bemembering how prevalent cannibalism is among primitive men, and remembering that a man^s other-self is supposed still to like the food he liked before death, we shall see that among cannibals the offering of human flesh to the dead as a propitiation, is inevitable. Those ferocious anthropophagi the Fijians, who have victims buried with them, and whose apotheosized chiefs join other gods to whom "human flesh is still the most valued offering ''; show us the entire series of sequences — cannibalism during life, cannibal ghosts, cannibal deities, and human sacrifices made as religious rites. So, too, was it with the ancient Mexicans. The man-eating habits of their ruling race, were accompanied by slayings of slaves, etc., at burials, as well as by slayings of prisoners before their gods; and though the immolations at graves were not, during their later times, avowedly food-offerings, yet we may suspect that they were so in earlier times, on seeing how literally a victim immolated to the god was made a foodoffering — the heart being torn out, put into the mouth of the idol, and its lips anointed with the blood. When, too, Piedrahita tells us of the Chibchas that they offered men to the Spaniards as food; and when Acosta, remarking that the Chibchas were not themselves cannibals, asks '^ can they have believed that the Spaniards, as sons of the Sun (as they were styled by them), must take delight in the bar* barons holocausts they offered to that star '' 7 we may sxis* pect that their immolations at funerals, like their immolations to the Sun, were the remains of an extinct cannibalism. Having before us such facts as that some Khonds believe the god eats the human being killed for him; that the Tahitians thought their gods fed on the spirits of the dead, and therefore provided them with such spirits by frequent slaughterings; and that the Tongans made offerings of children to their gods, who were deified chiefs; we cannot doubt that human sacrifices at graves had originally the purpose of supplying human flesh, along with other food, for the soul of the deceased; and that the sacrificing of human beings as a religious rite was a sequence. The like holds of slaying men as attendants. Already we have seen (§ 104) how conmion, in uncivilized and semicivilized societies, is the killing of prisoners, and slaves, and wives, and friends, to follow the departed; and in some cases there is a repetition of the observance. Among the Mexicans additional slaves were slain on the fifth day after the burial, on the twentieth, on the fortieth, on the sixtieth, and on the eightieth days. In Dahomy there are frequent beheadings that the victims, going to the other world to serve the dead king, may carry messages from his living descendant. Human sacrifices thus repeated to propitiate the ghosts of the dead, evidently pass without break into the periodic human sacrifices that have commonly been elements in primitive religions.
In § 89 were brought together, from peoples in all parts of the world, examples of blood-offerings to the dead. Meaningless sa such offerings otherwise are, they have meaning as made by primitive cannibals. That any men, in common with most ferocious brutes, should delight in drinking blood — especially the blood of their own species — is almost incredible to us. But on reading that in Australia, human fiesh "is eaten raw'' by /^the blood-revengers''; that the Fijian chief Tanoa, cut off a cousin's arm, drank the SACSED PLACES, TEMPLBS, AND ALTARS; ETC. 289 blood, cooked tlie arm, and ate it in presence of the owner; that the cannibal Yateans will exhnme, cook, and eat, bodies that have been buried even more than three days; that among the Ebidahs of the Pacific States^ the taamish, or inspired medicine-man, '^ springs on the first person he meets, bites out and swallows one or more mouthf uls of the man's living flesh wherever he can fix his teeth, then rushes to another and another *'; and that among the neighbouring Nootkas the medicine-man, instead of doing this, ^* is satisfied with what his teeth can tear from the corpses in the burial-places ''; we see that horrors beyond our imaginations of possibility are committed by primitive men, and, among them, the drinking of warm human blood. We may infer, indeed, that the vampyre-legends of European folk-lore, probably grew out of such facts concerning primitive cannibals: the original vampyre being the supposed other-self of a ferocious savage, still seeking to satisfy his bloodsucking propensities. And we shall not doubt that those blood-offerings to the dead described in § 89, were originally, as Burton says they are now in Dahomy, " drink for the deceased.'' Indeed, as there is no greater difference between drinking animal-blood and drinking human blood, than there is between eating animal-flesh and eating human flesh, hesitation disappears on reading that even now, the Gamoyedes delight in the warm blood of animals, and on remembering that XTlysses describes the ghosts in the Greek Hades as flocking to drink the sacrificial blood he provides for them, and as being refreshed by it. If, then, blood shed at a funeral was at first meant for the refreshment of the ghost — ^if when shed on subsequent occasions, as by the sanguinary Dahomans to get the aid of a dead king's ghost in war, it became a blood-offering to a supernatural being for special propitiation; it cannot be doubted that the offering of human blood to a deity with a like motive, is but a further development of the practice. The case of the Mexicans is typical. Their ruling races descended from u 290 THE DAI A OF BOClOUiQY.
conquering cannibals; they had cannibal-gods whose idols were fed with human hearts; the priests^ when there had not been recent sacrifices^ reminded the kings that the idols "were starving with hunger/' war was made^ to take prisoners, " because their gods demanded something to eat; '' and thousands were for this reason sacrificed annually. When we add the facts that the blood of victims was separately offered; that " the Indians gave the idols, to drink, their own blood, drawn from their ears ''; " that the priests and digfuified persons also drew blood from their legs and daubed the temples ''; and that "the effusion of blood was frequent and daily with some of the priests ''; we shall see an obvious filiation. Even in the records of ancient Eastern nations we find blood-offerings common to the two sets of rites. That self-bleedings at funerals occurred among the Hebrews, if not indigenously then by adoption from their neighbours, is proved by the fact that in Deuteronomy they are forbidden to cut themselves for the dead. And that self -bleeding was a religious ceremony among their neighbours, is proved by the fact that in propitiation of their god the prophets of Baal cut themselves "'till the blood gushed out of them.''
The only question is how &r this kind of propitiatory offering has passed into the kind we have now to glance at — the sacrificing a part of the body as a mark of subordination. In § 89 were given many cases of mutilation as a funeral rite, and they might readily be multiplied. Among the Nateotetains of North America, a woman " cuts off one joint of a finger upon the death of a near relative. In consequence of this practice, some old women may be seen with two joints off every finger on both hands." On the death of a Salish chief, it is the custom for the bravest woman and the man who is to be the succeeding chief, to cut off portions of one another's flesh, and throw them into the fire along with meat and a root. Paralleling these funeral mutilations, we elsewhere in America find mutilations as religions obaerrances. Some of the Mexicans practised circnmcision (or something like it), and mntilations mnch more serions than circnmcision, in propitiation of their deities. The Gnancavilcas, a Perayian race, pnlled out three teeth from each jaw of their young children, which they thought *^ very acceptable to their gods '*; while, as we before saw, knocking out one of the front teeth is a rite at the funeral of a chief in the Sandwich Islands.
Yet a further mutilation is common to the two classes of observances. Proofs that at funerals the cutting-off of hair is habitual among savages, have been given in abundance; and it occurs also as a religious sacrifice. In the Sandwich Islands, on the occasion of the volcanic eruption of 1799, when, to appease the gods, many offerings were made in vain, we are told that at length the king Tamehameha cut off part of his own hair, which was considered sacred^ and threw it into the torrent, as the most valuable offering. Daily by the Peruvians, hair was given as an act of worship. " In making an offering they pulled a hair out of their eyebrows,'' says Garcilasso; and Jos. d'Acosta similarly describes the presentation of eyelashes or eyebrows to the deities. Even among the Greeks we trace a kindred observance: on a marriage the bride sacrificed a lock of her hair to Aphrodite.