Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. by Sir James George Frazer

S >> Sir James George Frazer >> Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36

[Seclusion of girls at puberty among the Thonga on Delagoa Bay.]

Among the northern clans of the Thonga tribe, in South-Eastern Africa,
about Delagoa Bay, when a girl thinks that the time of her nubility is
near, she chooses an adoptive mother, perhaps in a neighbouring village.
When the symptoms appear, she flies away from her own village and
repairs to that of her adopted mother "to weep near her." After that she
is secluded with several other girls in the same condition for a month.
They are shut up in a hut, and whenever they come outside they must wear
a dirty greasy cloth over their faces as a veil. Every morning they are
led to a pool and plunged in the water up to their necks. Initiated
girls or women accompany them, singing obscene songs and driving away
with sticks any man who meets them; for no man may see a girl during
this time of seclusion. If he saw her, it is said that he would be
struck blind. On their return from the river, the girls are again
imprisoned in the hut, where they remain wet and shivering, for they may
not go near the fire to warm themselves. During their seclusion they
listen to lascivious songs sung by grown women and are instructed in
sexual matters. At the end of the month the adoptive mother brings the
girl home to her true mother and presents her with a pot of beer.[83]

[Seclusion of girls at puberty among the Caffre tribes of South Africa.]

Among the Caffre tribes of South Africa the period of a girl's seclusion
at puberty varies with the rank of her father. If he is a rich man, it
may last twelve days; if he is a chief, it may last twenty-four
days.[84] And when it is over, the girl rubs herself over with red
earth, and strews finely powdered red earth on the ground, before she
leaves the hut where she has been shut up. Finally, though she was
forbidden to drink milk all the days of her separation, she washes out
her mouth with milk, and is from that moment regarded as a full-grown
woman.[85] Afterwards, in the dusk of the evening, she carries away all
the objects with which she came into contact in the hut during her
seclusion and buries them secretly in a sequestered spot.[86] When the
girl is a chief's daughter the ceremonies at her liberation from the hut
are more elaborate than usual. She is led forth from the hut by a son of
her father's councillor, who, wearing the wings of a blue crane, the
badge of bravery, on his head, escorts her to the cattle kraal, where
cows are slaughtered and dancing takes place. Large skins full of milk
are sent to the spot from neighbouring villages; and after the dances
are over the girl drinks milk for the first time since the day she
entered into retreat. But the first mouthful is drunk by the girl's aunt
or other female relative who had charge of her during her seclusion; and
a little of it is poured on the fire-place.[87] Amongst the Zulus, when
the girl was a princess royal, the end of her time of separation was
celebrated by a sort of saturnalia: law and order were for the time
being in abeyance: every man, woman, and child might appropriate any
article of property: the king abstained from interfering; and if during
this reign of misrule he was robbed of anything he valued he could only
recover it by paying a fine.[88] Among the Basutos, when girls at
puberty are bathed as usual by the matrons in a river, they are hidden
separately in the turns and bends of the stream, and told to cover their
heads, as they will be visited by a large serpent. Their limbs are then
plastered with clay, little masks of straw are put on their faces, and
thus arrayed they daily follow each other in procession, singing
melancholy airs, to the fields, there to learn the labours of husbandry
in which a great part of their adult life will be passed.[89] We may
suppose, though we are not told, that the straw masks which they wear in
these processions are intended to hide their faces from the gaze of men
and the rays of the sun.

[Seclusion of girls at puberty in the Lower Congo.]

Among the tribes in the lower valley of the Congo, such as the Bavili,
when a girl arrives at puberty, she has to pass two or three months in
seclusion in a small hut built for the purpose. The hair of her head is
shaved off, and every day the whole of her body is smeared with a red
paint (_takulla_) made from a powdered wood mixed with water. Some of
her companions reside in the hut with her and prepare the paint for her
use. A woman is appointed to take charge of the hut and to keep off
intruders. At the end of her confinement she is taken to water by the
women of her family and bathed; the paint is rubbed off her body, her
arms and legs are loaded with brass rings, and she is led in solemn
procession under an umbrella to her husband's house. If these ceremonies
were not performed, the people believe that the girl would be barren or
would give birth to monsters, that the rain would cease to fall, the
earth to bear fruit, and the fishing to be successful.[90] Such serious
importance do these savages ascribe to the performance of rites which to
us seem so childish.

Sec. 2. _Seclusion of Girls at Puberty in New Ireland, New Guinea, and
Indonesia_

[Seclusion of girls at puberty in New Ireland.]

In New Ireland girls are confined for four or five years in small cages,
being kept in the dark and not allowed to set foot on the ground. The
custom has been thus described by an eye-witness. "I heard from a
teacher about some strange custom connected with some of the young girls
here, so I asked the chief to take me to the house where they were. The
house was about twenty-five feet in length, and stood in a reed and
bamboo enclosure, across the entrance to which a bundle of dried grass
was suspended to show that it was strictly '_tabu_.' Inside the house
were three conical structures about seven or eight feet in height, and
about ten or twelve feet in circumference at the bottom, and for about
four feet from the ground, at which point they tapered off to a point at
the top. These cages were made of the broad leaves of the pandanus-tree,
sewn quite close together so that no light and little or no air could
enter. On one side of each is an opening which is closed by a double
door of plaited cocoa-nut tree and pandanus-tree leaves. About three
feet from the ground there is a stage of bamboos which forms the floor.
In each of these cages we were told there was a young woman confined,
each of whom had to remain for at least four or five years, without ever
being allowed to go outside the house. I could scarcely credit the story
when I heard it; the whole thing seemed too horrible to be true. I spoke
to the chief, and told him that I wished to see the inside of the cages,
and also to see the girls that I might make them a present of a few
beads. He told me that it was '_tabu_,' forbidden for any men but their
own relations to look at them; but I suppose the promised beads acted as
an inducement, and so he sent away for some old lady who had charge, and
who alone is allowed to open the doors. While we were waiting we could
hear the girls talking to the chief in a querulous way as if objecting
to something or expressing their fears. The old woman came at length and
certainly she did not seem a very pleasant jailor or guardian; nor did
she seem to favour the request of the chief to allow us to see the
girls, as she regarded us with anything but pleasant looks. However, she
had to undo the door when the chief told her to do so, and then the
girls peeped out at us, and, when told to do so, they held out their
hands for the beads. I, however, purposely sat at some distance away and
merely held out the beads to them, as I wished to draw them quite
outside, that I might inspect the inside of the cages. This desire of
mine gave rise to another difficulty, as these girls were not allowed to
put their feet to the ground all the time they were confined in these
places. However, they wished to get the beads, and so the old lady had
to go outside and collect a lot of pieces of wood and bamboo, which she
placed on the ground, and then going to one of the girls, she helped her
down and held her hand as she stepped from one piece of wood to another
until she came near enough to get the beads I held out to her. I then
went to inspect the inside of the cage out of which she had come, but
could scarcely put my head inside of it, the atmosphere was so hot and
stifling. It was clean and contained nothing but a few short lengths of
bamboo for holding water. There was only room for the girl to sit or lie
down in a crouched position on the bamboo platform, and when the doors
are shut it must be nearly or quite dark inside. The girls are never
allowed to come out except once a day to bathe in a dish or wooden bowl
placed close to each cage. They say that they perspire profusely. They
are placed in these stifling cages when quite young, and must remain
there until they are young women, when they are taken out and have each
a great marriage feast provided for them. One of them was about fourteen
or fifteen years old, and the chief told us that she had been there for
five years, but would soon be taken out now. The other two were about
eight and ten years old, and they have to stay there for several years
longer."[91] A more recent observer has described the custom as it is
observed on the western coast of New Ireland. He says: "A _buck_ is the
name of a little house, not larger than an ordinary hen-coop, in which a
little girl is shut up, sometimes for weeks only, and at other times for
months.... Briefly stated, the custom is this. Girls, on attaining
puberty or betrothal, are enclosed in one of these little coops for a
considerable time. They must remain there night and day. We saw two of
these girls in two coops; the girls were not more than ten years old,
still they were lying in a doubled-up position, as their little houses
would not admit of them lying in any other way. These two coops were
inside a large house; but the chief, in consideration of a present of a
couple of tomahawks, ordered the ends to be torn out of the house to
admit the light, so that we might photograph the _buck_. The occupant
was allowed to put her face through an opening to be photographed, in
consideration of another present."[92] As a consequence of their long
enforced idleness in the shade the girls grow fat and their dusky
complexion bleaches to a more pallid hue. Both their corpulence and
their pallor are regarded as beauties.[93]

[Seclusion of girls at puberty in New Guinea, Borneo, Ceram and Yap.]

In Kabadi, a district of British New Guinea, "daughters of chiefs, when
they are about twelve or thirteen years of age, are kept indoors for two
or three years, never being allowed, under any pretence, to descend from
the house, and the house is so shaded that the sun cannot shine on
them."[94] Among the Yabim and Bukaua, two neighbouring and kindred
tribes on the coast of German New Guinea, a girl at puberty is secluded
for some five or six weeks in an inner part of the house; but she may
not sit on the floor, lest her uncleanness should cleave to it, so a log
of wood is placed for her to squat on. Moreover, she may not touch the
ground with her feet; hence if she is obliged to quit the house for a
short time, she is muffled up in mats and walks on two halves of a
coconut shell, which are fastened like sandals to her feet by creeping
plants. During her seclusion she is in charge of her aunts or other
female relatives. At the end of the time she bathes, her person is
loaded with ornaments, her face is grotesquely painted with red stripes
on a white ground, and thus adorned she is brought forth in public to be
admired by everybody. She is now marriageable.[95] Among the Ot Danoms
of Borneo girls at the age of eight or ten years are shut up in a little
room or cell of the house, and cut off from all intercourse with the
world for a long time. The cell, like the rest of the house, is raised
on piles above the ground, and is lit by a single small window opening
on a lonely place, so that the girl is in almost total darkness. She may
not leave the room on any pretext whatever, not even for the most
necessary purposes. None of her family may see her all the time she is
shut up, but a single slave woman is appointed to wait on her. During
her lonely confinement, which often lasts seven years, the girl occupies
herself in weaving mats or with other handiwork. Her bodily growth is
stunted by the long want of exercise, and when, on attaining womanhood,
she is brought out, her complexion is pale and wax-like. She is now
shewn the sun, the earth, the water, the trees, and the flowers, as if
she were newly born. Then a great feast is made, a slave is killed, and
the girl is smeared with his blood.[96] In Ceram girls at puberty were
formerly shut up by themselves in a hut which was kept dark.[97] In Yap,
one of the Caroline Islands, should a girl be overtaken by her first
menstruation on the public road, she may not sit down on the earth, but
must beg for a coco-nut shell to put under her. She is shut up for
several days in a small hut at a distance from her parents' house, and
afterwards she is bound to sleep for a hundred days in one of the
special houses which are provided for the use of menstruous women.[98]

Sec. 3. _Seclusion of Girls at Puberty in the Torres Straits Islands and
Northern Australia_

[Seclusion of girls at puberty in Mabuiag, Torres Straits.]

In the island of Mabuiag, Torres Straits, when the signs of puberty
appear on a girl, a circle of bushes is made in a dark corner of the
house. Here, decked with shoulder-belts, armlets, leglets just below the
knees, and anklets, wearing a chaplet on her head, and shell ornaments
in her ears, on her chest, and on her back, she squats in the midst of
the bushes, which are piled so high round about her that only her head
is visible. In this state of seclusion she must remain for three months.
All this time the sun may not shine upon her, but at night she is
allowed to slip out of the hut, and the bushes that hedge her in are
then changed. She may not feed herself or handle food, but is fed by one
or two old women, her maternal aunts, who are especially appointed to
look after her. One of these women cooks food for her at a special fire
in the forest. The girl is forbidden to eat turtle or turtle eggs during
the season when the turtles are breeding; but no vegetable food is
refused her. No man, not even her own father, may come into the house
while her seclusion lasts; for if her father saw her at this time he
would certainly have bad luck in his fishing, and would probably smash
his canoe the very next time he went out in it. At the end of the three
months she is carried down to a fresh-water creek by her attendants,
hanging on to their shoulders in such a way that her feet do not touch
the ground, while the women of the tribe form a ring round her, and thus
escort her to the beach. Arrived at the shore, she is stripped of her
ornaments, and the bearers stagger with her into the creek, where they
immerse her, and all the other women join in splashing water over both
the girl and her bearers. When they come out of the water one of the two
attendants makes a heap of grass for her charge to squat upon. The other
runs to the reef, catches a small crab, tears off its claws, and hastens
back with them to the creek. Here in the meantime a fire has been
kindled, and the claws are roasted at it. The girl is then fed by her
attendants with the roasted claws. After that she is freshly decorated,
and the whole party marches back to the village in a single rank, the
girl walking in the centre between her two old aunts, who hold her by
the wrists. The husbands of her aunts now receive her and lead her into
the house of one of them, where all partake of food, and the girl is
allowed once more to feed herself in the usual manner. A dance follows,
in which the girl takes a prominent part, dancing between the husbands
of the two aunts who had charge of her in her retirement.[99]

[Seclusion of girls at puberty in Northern Australia.]

Among the Yaraikanna tribe of Cape York Peninsula, in Northern
Queensland, a girl at puberty is said to live by herself for a month or
six weeks; no man may see her, though any woman may. She stays in a hut
or shelter specially made for her, on the floor of which she lies
supine. She may not see the sun, and towards sunset she must keep her
eyes shut until the sun has gone down, otherwise it is thought that her
nose will be diseased. During her seclusion she may eat nothing that
lives in salt water, or a snake would kill her. An old woman waits upon
her and supplies her with roots, yams, and water.[100] Some tribes are
wont to bury their girls at such seasons more or less deeply in the
ground, perhaps in order to hide them from the light of the sun. Thus
the Larrakeeyah tribe in the northern territory of South Australia used
to cover a girl up with dirt for three days at her first monthly
period.[101] In similar circumstances the Otati tribe, on the east coast
of the Cape York Peninsula, make an excavation in the ground, where the
girl squats. A bower is then built over the hole, and sand is thrown on
the young woman till she is covered up to the hips. In this condition
she remains for the first day, but comes out at night. So long as the
period lasts, she stays in the bower during the day-time, but is not
again covered with sand. Afterwards her body is painted red and white
from the head to the hips, and she returns to the camp, where she squats
first on the right side, then on the left side, and then on the lap of
her future husband, who has been previously selected for her.[102] Among
the natives of the Pennefather River, in the Cape York Peninsula,
Queensland, when a girl menstruates for the first time, her mother takes
her away from the camp to some secluded spot, where she digs a circular
hole in the sandy soil under the shade of a tree. In this hole the girl
squats with crossed legs and is covered with sand from the waist
downwards. A digging-stick is planted firmly in the sand on each side of
her, and the place is surrounded by a fence of bushes except in front,
where her mother kindles a fire. Here the girl stays all day, sitting
with her arms crossed and the palms of her hands resting on the sand.
She may not move her arms except to take food from her mother or to
scratch herself; and in scratching herself she may not touch herself
with her own hands, but must use for the purpose a splinter of wood,
which, when it is not in use, is stuck in her hair. She may speak to
nobody but her mother; indeed nobody else would think of coming near
her. At evening she lays hold of the two digging-sticks and by their
help frees herself from the superincumbent weight of sand and returns to
the camp. Next morning she is again buried in the sand under the shade
of the tree and remains there again till evening. This she does daily
for five days. On her return at evening on the fifth day her mother
decorates her with a waist-band, a forehead-band, and a necklet of
pearl-shell, ties green parrot feathers round her arms and wrists and
across her chest, and smears her body, back and front, from the waist
upwards with blotches of red, white, and yellow paint. She has in like
manner to be buried in the sand at her second and third menstruations,
but at the fourth she is allowed to remain in camp, only signifying her
condition by wearing a basket of empty shells on her back.[103] Among
the Kia blacks of the Prosperine River, on the east coast of Queensland,
a girl at puberty has to sit or lie down in a shallow pit away from the
camp; a rough hut of bushes is erected over her to protect her from the
inclemency of the weather. There she stays for about a week, waited on
by her mother and sister, the only persons to whom she may speak. She is
allowed to drink water, but may not touch it with her hands; and she may
scratch herself a little with a mussel-shell. This seclusion is repeated
at her second and third monthly periods, but when the third is over she
is brought to her husband bedecked with savage finery. Eagle-hawk or
cockatoo feathers are stuck in her hair: a shell hangs over her
forehead: grass bugles encircle her neck and an apron of opossum skin
her waist: strings are tied to her arms and wrists; and her whole body
is mottled with patterns drawn in red, white, and yellow pigments and
charcoal.[104]

[Seclusion of girls at puberty in the islands of Torres Straits.]

Among the Uiyumkwi tribe in Red Island the girl lies at full length in a
shallow trench dug in the foreshore, and sand is lightly thrown over her
legs and body up to the breasts, which appear not to be covered. A rough
shelter of boughs is then built over her, and thus she remains lying for
a few hours. Then she and her attendant go into the bush and look for
food, which they cook at a fire close to the shelter. They sleep under
the boughs, the girl remaining secluded from the camp but apparently not
being again buried. At the end of the symptoms she stands over hot
stones and water is poured over her, till, trickling from her body on
the stones, it is converted into steam and envelops her in a cloud of
vapour. Then she is painted with red and white stripes and returns to
the camp. If her future husband has already been chosen, she goes to him
and they eat some food together, which the girl has previously brought
from the bush.[105] In Prince of Wales Island, Torres Strait, the
treatment of the patient is similar, but lasts for about two months.
During the day she lies covered up with sand in a shallow hole on the
beach, over which a hut is built. At night she may get out of the hole,
but she may not leave the hut. Her paternal aunt looks after her, and
both of them must abstain from eating turtle, dugong, and the heads of
fish. Were they to eat the heads of fish no more fish would be caught.
During the time of the girl's seclusion, the aunt who waits upon her has
the right to enter any house and take from it anything she likes without
payment, provided she does so before the sun rises. When the time of her
retirement has come to an end, the girl bathes in the sea while the
morning star is rising, and after performing various other ceremonies is
readmitted to society.[106] In Saibai, another island of Torres Straits,
at her first monthly sickness a girl lives secluded in the forest for
about a fortnight, during which no man may see her; even the women who
have spoken to her in the forest must wash in salt water before they
speak to a man. Two girls wait upon and feed the damsel, putting the
food into her mouth, for she is not allowed to touch it with her own
hands. Nor may she eat dugong and turtle. At the end of a fortnight the
girl and her attendants bathe in salt water while the tide is running
out. Afterwards they are clean, may again speak to men without ceremony,
and move freely about the village. In Yam and Tutu a girl at puberty
retires for a month to the forest, where no man nor even her own mother
may look upon her. She is waited on by women who stand to her in a
certain relationship (_mowai_), apparently her paternal aunts. She is
blackened all over with charcoal and wears a long petticoat reaching
below her knees. During her seclusion the married women of the village
often assemble in the forest and dance, and the girl's aunts relieve the
tedium of the proceedings by thrashing her from time to time as a useful
preparation for matrimony. At the end of a month the whole party go into
the sea, and the charcoal is washed off the girl. After that she is
decorated, her body blackened again, her hair reddened with ochre, and
in the evening she is brought back to her father's house, where she is
received with weeping and lamentation because she has been so long
away.[107]

Sec. 4. _Seclusion of Girls at Puberty among the Indians of North America_

[Seclusion of girls at puberty among the Indians of California]

Among the Indians of California a girl at her first menstruation "was
thought to be possessed of a particular degree of supernatural power,
and this was not always regarded as entirely defiling or malevolent.
Often, however, there was a strong feeling of the power of evil inherent
in her condition. Not only was she secluded from her family and the
community, but an attempt was made to seclude the world from her. One of
the injunctions most strongly laid upon her was not to look about her.
She kept her head bowed and was forbidden to see the world and the sun.
Some tribes covered her with a blanket. Many of the customs in this
connection resembled those of the North Pacific Coast most strongly,
such as the prohibition to the girl to touch or scratch her head with
her hand, a special implement being furnished her for the purpose.
Sometimes she could eat only when fed and in other cases fasted
altogether. Some form of public ceremony, often accompanied by a dance
and sometimes by a form of ordeal for the girl, was practised nearly
everywhere. Such ceremonies were well developed in Southern California,
where a number of actions symbolical of the girl's maturity and
subsequent life were performed."[108] Thus among the Maidu Indians of
California a girl at puberty remained shut up in a small separate hut.
For five days she might not eat flesh or fish nor feed herself, but was
fed by her mother or other old woman. She had a basket, plate, and cup
for her own use, and a stick with which to scratch her head, for she
might not scratch it with her fingers. At the end of five days she took
a warm bath and, while she still remained in the hut and plied the
scratching-stick on her head, was privileged to feed herself with her
own hands. After five days more she bathed in the river, after which her
parents gave a great feast in her honour. At the feast the girl was
dressed in her best, and anybody might ask her parents for anything he
pleased, and they had to give it, even if it was the hand of their
daughter in marriage. During the period of her seclusion in the hut the
girl was allowed to go by night to her parents' house and listen to
songs sung by her friends and relations, who assembled for the purpose.
Among the songs were some that related to the different roots and seeds
which in these tribes it is the business of women to gather for food.
While the singers sang, she sat by herself in a corner of the house
muffled up completely in mats and skins; no man or boy might come near
her.[109] Among the Hupa, another Indian tribe of California, when a
girl had reached maturity her male relatives danced all night for nine
successive nights, while the girl remained apart, eating no meat and
blindfolded. But on the tenth night she entered the house and took part
in the last dance.[110] Among the Wintun, another Californian tribe, a
girl at puberty was banished from the camp and lived alone in a distant
booth, fasting rigidly from animal food; it was death to any person to
touch or even approach her.[111]

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36