Note 245.2 — Chapter XII · TOTEMISM—THE BLOOD COVENANT—CUSTOMS CONNECTED WITH SALIVA.

More difficult of interpretation is a horrible usage of the Hurons of North America. Unless they are belied, while torturing a prisoner to death, they would sometimes open the aorta and mingle the blood that gushed from it with some of their own, in the hope of being at all times apprised of an enemy’s approach, and so assuring safety against a sudden attack.245.2 Let us compare it, however, with a few cases of cannibalism. The Botocudos devoured their fallen enemies, in the belief that they would thus be protected from the revenge of the dead and would be rendered invulnerable by the arrows of the hostile tribe.245.3 The inhabitants of New Britain, notorious cannibals, eat their enemies, and fix the arm- and leg-bones of the men at the butt-end of their spears, thinking thus not only to acquire the strength of the deceased owner of the bone, but also to become invulnerable by his relatives.245.4 When the Tchuktchis murder a man they eat a piece of his heart or liver, in order to make his kindred sick.245.5 The Eskimo of Greenland do the like, because then the relations of the murdered man will lack the courage to revenge his death.245.6 Even in the south of Italy it is still believed that a murderer will not be able to escape unless he taste, or beslubber himself with, his victim’s blood:245.7 a superstition which, in these days, has sometimes the contrary effect of leading to his discovery. By means of these examples we may perhaps conjecture the origin of the widely prevalent custom of eating the dead body of an enemy. Little doubt can at all events remain that the savage Hurons intended so to unite themselves with their captive that they would be secured from the blood-revenge of his kindred, and that it was against the kindred and them only that the precaution was adopted. And if this result could be attained by commingling the blood in a manner similar to that of the blood-covenant, it could also be achieved by eating a portion of the foe. Closely connected with cannibalism of the kind I am referring to is the custom of alumbi practised by several tribes in Equatorial West Africa. It consists in serving in food to a guest powder scraped from the skull of a deceased ancestor. “The idea is, that by consuming the scrapings of the skull, the blood of their ancestors enters into your body, and thus, becoming of one blood, you are naturally led to love them and grant them what they wish.”246.1 In other words, a blood-covenant is entered into unwittingly by the guest with his host; and it need hardly be said that the trick is only played on those guests whose hearts a greedy host considers it is worth his while to soften.