R. Needham Mourning-Terms In: Bijdragen Tot De Taal-, Land- En

R. Needham Mourning-terms

In: Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde 115 (1959), no: 1, Leiden, 58-89

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I he objects of this article are: (1) to make a comparative survey | of sets of terms ref erring to the deaths of kin; (2) to propose a preliminary interpretation of the Penan system of teknonyms and death-names and of the other sets of terms compared. It will be f ollowed by another article on the same theme, in which other evidence will be used to conclude the analysis of the Penan usages.1

The present article continues the discussion of issues which I have raised in earlier publications, chiefly in an examination of the system of teknonyms and death-names of the Penan of Borneo (Needham 1954a).2 A full understanding of the issues requires an acquaintance with the latter article, but briefly the facts dealt with are as fóllow: At the birth of a child to him a Penan assumes a teknonym, and at the death of what a Penan calls a "true" kinsman or kinswoman he assumes one of a number of terms •— which I have called "death- names" — according to his relationship to the deceased. In many contexts there is a. regular alternation between the names connected with life (the teknonyms) and those connected with death. The teknonyms and death-names together constitute a highly unusual and beautifully consistent terminological system, and the principles that

1 My researches among the Penan in 1951-2, and a brief return visit to Sarawak in 1955, were made possible by the award of a Senior Studentship by the Treasury ("Scarbrough") Committee for Studentships-in Foreign Languages & Cultures, for which I express my gratefui acknowledgement. I am also indebted to the Institute of Social Anthropology, University of Oxford, and to Merton College, Oxford, which afforded me further means and facjlities to continue my work. My colleague Dr J. H. M. Beattie has been so kind as to comment on the first version of this paper and of its sequel. It gives me pleasure to make gratef ui recognition of the profit that I have derived, as often before, from his patiënt and astute criticism. I have not, however, burdened him with later drafts and he should not be charged with their defects. 2 See also References. The note on reference to the dead among the Penan (1954c) should be regarded as a long footnote to 1954a :429. (The resemblance to Malay royal usage, pointed out in the note, is of course fortuitous).

Downloaded from Brill.com09/23/2021 10:56:53PM via free access MOURNING-TERMS. 59 characterise it pose particularly clearly problems of general interest in sociólogical interpretation. My earlier efForts at explanation were based on an internal analysis of the Penan system in its most complete f orm, but led to only negative conclusions. I now present a corhparative study of terms similar to death-names, a"nd pursue a line of interpretation for which in the earlier analysis I could not find adequate methodological justification. Terms connected with death have not since Frazer (1911) engaged the attention of scholars as posing problems of comparative sociology, and my f irst intention is to show that one class of such terms is found in significantly regular form in widely disparate societies. This class consists of terms which are applied to surviving relatives of a deceased person and which divide these into a number of categories according to their relationship to that person. The societies possessing such terms are: Andaman Islanders Mentawai (west of Sumatra, Indonesiaj Engano (west of Sumatra) Waropen (northwestern New Guinea) Manus (Admiralty Islands) Solomon Islanders (Bougainville) Tjapwurong (western Victoria, Australia) Shasta (California).

Dr Murray Groves tells me that such terms are also found among the Motu of southeastern New Guinea (near Port Moresby). The terms refer to the deaths of father, mother, husband, wife, older sibling, younger sibling, and child. I merely mention these usages here, as an addition to the record of the distribution of such terms, and await Dr Groves' final and published exposition of their use and significance. That these terms are only now known to exist among the Motu, a society well known since the end of the nineteenth century and described in its traditional state by Seligmann fifty years ago, indicates thatthere are doubtless other societies in which such terms exist but have nót been recorded. I myself have searched for mourning-terms, or for some tracé of their former use, in Indonesia (Java, Bali, Sum- bawa, Flores, Timor; and Sumba; and by enquiry of individuals f rom Sumatra, Celebës, Lombok, Savu, Roti, and Pantara) and in Malaya, but without discovering any sign of them. Neither have enquiries made of scholafs specialising in the study of other areas had any result; but

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this is not too surprising, for mourning-terms are not necessarily revealed in the course of any type of investigation. They have to be looked for, with some fairly clear idea of what form they may take and what their importance may be. An excellent recent example of this is Keuning's survey of the ethnographic literature on the island of Engano, where mourning-terms are recorded (see below). In a com- petent and thorough review of the literature he deals with customs at death and with the details of some mourning-usages (1955: 189-190), but he makes no mention of mourning-terms, even though they have been described and their existence amply confirmed by a number of reliable observers. One of the objects of this article, therefore, and of other publications on the same theme, is to establish mourning-terms as social phenomena likely to exist in certain conditions and worth looking for. . It is one of the distinctive cultural features of all the tribes of middle Borneo3 that they use teknonyms and death-names, and a comparative study might well begin with a consideration of these; but it is clear from the literature and from my own observations that the principles guiding their use are everywhere the same as those which I have described from the Penan. Moreover, these societies, whether nomadic or settled, are fundamentally similar in social structure. The conclusions derivirig from a comparison of their usages, though interesting, are thus. likely to be limited in application to a middle-Borneo type of society and to be too closely dependent on the cultural parti- culars of Bornean ethnography.4 For this survey I have had to extract from the literature only such data as specifically suited my purposes. It might seem more desirable for me to present an adequate account of the social organisation, economy and beliefs of each of the societies whose customs are examined, but this is not possible here and in any case has not seemed necessary to make the points I wish to make. My conclusions are

3 The cultures and types of social organisation in Borneo f all into three major lateral divisions. North Borneo extends down to about 4° North; and middle Borneo lies between this cultural boundary and a line running roughly along the Rajang, the Baleh (upper Rajang), and the Barito-Mahakam watershed. The peoples of the northern division (e.g. Dusun), the middle (e.g. Kenyah and Kayan), and the southern (e.g. Iban and Ngaju) differ greatly from each other in language and social order. Death-names are one of the most useful features by which the middle Borneo peoples are distinguished from the others. (Cf. Needham 1955:161.) 4 I intend to publish eventually a complete survey of all Bornean death-names.

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The significance of some terms applied to relatives in connection with death is easily grasped. For example, in many Californian tribes there is a change in the terms used between affines after the death of the connecting relative. The Tolowa apply the term tamage to their affines in place of the normal affinal terms, and the same custom is found among a number of other Californian tribes of different stocks and languages (Gifford 1922: 17 et passim). There is a similar change in the affinal terms of many, and probably all, of the tribes of middle Borneo. For instance, among the Penan the term for brother-in-law is sabai and for sister-in-law is lango (Eastern Penan) or langu (Western Penan), but after the death of the connecting relative these terms are discarded for the single reciprocal term Heng (E.) or bieng (W.). The general significance of such changes is clear. An alliance is established between two groups of kin by the marriage of a member of one to a member of the other, and this relation is expressed by the use of terms of affinity. (The point is clearly made by the Californian custom that until the marriage payment has been made — and the new jural status of affinity formally established — the groups concerned do not use the affinal terms, even though the couple may be living together and raising children.) With the death of the connecting relative the status of the groups in respect of each other is altered; but a relation nevertheless persists, especially if children have been bom to the marriage, and this new relationship is marked by a new term. In what respects there may be an alteration in the relation depends on the particular society, but the general conclusion is evident: the death of a common relative causes a change in the social relations persisting between the living members of the groups concerned, and this is marked by the new term. Another instance of change in status at the death of kin, involving a different sort of change, is seen in Dobu. In this matrilineal society a man succeeds to the status of his mother's brother and inherits his land and other property.

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If a man's father dies he refers to the successor to his father's status — viz. his father's sister's son, normally known by the term for cross-cousin — as tamana, father, and the sister of the successor as kedeana, father's sister, and their descendants are addressed by terms consistent with these new modes of address (Fortune 1932: 37-8). A similar case is found among the patrilineal tribes of Sumba, among some of which the eldest brother is successor to the status of the deceased father and is addressed as father by the younger siblings.5 Though the particular relationships are different the general significance of these terminological changes af ter death is also clear: they symbolise a change in jural status. These cases are simply interpreted, but when we find sets of terms applied to many kinship categories after a death their interpretation is far more difficult. The Penan teknonyms and death-names form an integrated and consistent system: its terms are used whenever someone is addressed or referred to by other than a personal name, and its principles are exhibited at every birth and every death. Such a system must relate to something in Penan life and, since it is concerned with kinship and death, something important. If the terms express change of status, do they mark particular changes in the status of each of the persons to whom they are applied, or do they mark a general change in status of the entire group of kin among whom they are used? And in respect of what in Penan society or culture is there change of status ? It need not be jural status, and I have already considered some possible relations of the terms to Penan sentiment, belief, and concept (1954a: 427-431). With these considerations in mind we may now approach the study of sets of terms similarly connected with kinship and death in other societies.

5 Field research, 1954-5; also carried out with a Treasury senior studentship.

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III Andaman Islanders. During the period of mourning a "near relative" of the deceased is never addressed or spoken of by name: there are "certain terms" which are used instead, being substituted for the names that are avoided. Radcliffe-Brown gives two examples only, from the Aka-Jeru language: bolok, "meaning 'orphan', used in addres- sing or speaking of a person who has lately lost a parent", and ropuc, applied to someone who has lost a brother or sister (Radcliffe-Brown 1922: 111-2). Portman includes the former of these as one of a nümber of "nicknames" which are used instead of personal names: he renders it as "an orphan" and records bóloka as the form in the Aka-Bea-da, dialect and baüloko 6 in Akar-Balé. This seems to be confirmation of Radcliffe-Brown's statement, since he also records substantives for "an orphan" in these dialects, and these are different from the "nicknames": viz. bóla-da in Aka-Bea-da and bólo in Akar-Balé (Portman 1898: 75; Vocabulary: 114). There thus seems to be ground to believe that of these two variants one is a mourning-term and the other a normal substantive. To the two terms so far ascertained we can add mai.a- o.koli-nga, the term applied to a man for the first two or three months af ter the death of his child; chan.a okoli.nga, applied to a woman during the same period after the death of her child; mai-arle.bat the term applied to a widower; chan-arle.ba, applied to a widow; and abra.ji-go.i, applied to the survivor of an old couple who have been united since their youth (Man 1885: 207-8). The Consolidated list of terms is as below. The form of the table is that which will be followed throughout. The first column lists the relatives, from the point of view of Ego, whose deaths occasion the application of the terms; the second lists the terms which are' applied to Ego by the other members of the society; and the third, where it is necessary, notes distinctions such as whether a term is applied only to a man or only to a woman. It might be considered preferable that the terms, the ethnographic data with which we start, should be given first. The present form of table is used, though, because it is the form conventionally employed and which I used in my earlier article, and partly because in some instances it is more convenient in presenting variant terms pr for recording confirmation by different observers of the same term. Also, comparison of the range of terms used in the different societies dealt with is easier when the terms are ordered in

All indigenous terms are rendered in the original orthography of the sources.

Downloaded from Brill.com09/23/2021 10:56:53PM via free access 64 RODNEY NEEDHAM. the same way, according primarily with the category of relative whose death occasions the application of the term. It has been suggested that instead of indicating the relative to whose death a term refers the table should indicate the living person to whom it is applied; but it is deaths that occasion the use of the terms, the deceased have to be dead bef ore the appellations of the living are affected. It is true that any given term implies the correlate, viz. the survivor to whom the deceased stopd in a particular relationship; but there is no advantage in ordering the tables according to categories of living persons, especially when all previously recorded lists of terms (there are a number in the literature on Borneo) would have to be re-ordered to make a comparative study possible.

(deceased relative) (term) (appltcation) parent bolok sibling ropuc child mai.a o.koli-nga man chan.a okoli.nga woman husband chan-arle.ba - wife mai-arle.ba spouse abra.ji-go.i either aged s

Radcliffe-Brown tells us that the terms are used during the period of mourning (op. cit.: 111), and according to Man this lasts about three months (Man: 74). The period is closed by certain ceremonies at the end of an agreed time, not at the occasion of a new birth and the assumption of teknonyms (as is the case among the Penan). The Andaman institution is thus different f rom the Penan system: the terms are in fact signs of mourning and are to be distinguished from the Penan death-names which are complementary to the teknonyms. The radical significance of the two sets of terms, mourning-terms and death-names, may nevertheless be similar. For reasons that will be seen later we must take note of what sort of local group exists among the Andaman Islanders and within which most of them presumably have their most frequent social contacts and commonly use the mourning-terms. Man (op. cit.: 40) says that the "community" consists of from twenty to fifty individuals; Mouat (1863: 300), on the average from thirty to fifty; while Radcliffe- Brown (op. cit.: 27-8) finds that Mouat's estimate "agrees very well with the statements of the natives themselves" and concludes that an

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Mentawai. The reports of three observers enable us to compile a list of terms of similar range of categories to those of the Andamanese. Kruyt (1923: 179) reports merely that a widow or a widower is named süoemang, to which Loeb adds lulusai for "a child without elders" (se. parents), pailot for "any bereaved person, although specifically this means a man who has lost a brother or a wife", and si-botok for a person who has lost all of his or her children (Loeb 1928: 422). In a later account, however, Loeb writes that lusai "technically means an old person who has lost his or her father or mother" and says that it is also used "merely as a title of respect" (1929: 225). The fullest and most reliable source remains Morris's work from a generation earlier, and the terms he records are listed below in the comparative tablé:

(Kruyt) (Loeb) (Morris) parent lulusai lusai lusai father lusai mother ta-ina brother • pailot • pailot sister pailot child si-botok husband süoemang si-lumang si-luman td-tdu wife süoemang si-lumang botok : si-botpk td-tdu

Loeb's account is contradictory in one instance, assigns pailot to any bereaved person rather than to one category (which seems a priori to be against the logic of the terminology), and gives the impression of being based primarily on Kruyt's earlier account. Where his account diverges from Morris's we should accept the latter's version. Lusai (or si-lusai as it is alternatively rendered) refers to either the death of the father or of both parents (Morris 1900: 333). The term ta4na derives from ta, which means "not" or "without", and ina, Dl. 115 5

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"mother" (ibid.: 38, 247)'.7 Si-botok, according to Loeb is applied to someoiie who has lost all his or her children; but it is probable that this report is based on a confused translation. Morris records that this term is applied to a widower with no children (ibid.: 230,333), and thaf ta-tau is applied to a widower with children and to a widow with children (ibid.: 316). There is one more category but the term for it is not given: the personal name is discarded (and presumably a mourning-term adopted) when another person of thê same name dies (Hahsen 1915: 179). The period during which the personal name is discarded, and during which the mourning-terms appear to beused, is about a year af ter the death of a child, and üntil a new marriage or (alternatively, it seems) until death af ter the death of a husband or wife. The discarding of the personal name is said to be not by way of mourning but out of fear that the spirit of the deceased shall remember it (Hansen 1915: 179). This is understandable in the Hght of Loeb's reports that sickness is caused by the return of a ghost (Loeb 1929: 221), that the "souls of the dead" come to the village to bring sickness (ibid.: 224-5), and that if certain taboos are broken after a death the ghost of the deceased comes back to the village bringing sickness and death (ibid.:; 241). The general impression from accounts of Mentawai is that the villages are small.

Engano. The first report from the island of Engano that there are mourning-terms connected with kinship categories states that a widower affïxes to his personal name the term koelijd (von Rosenberg 1855: 379). A later account differs rather from this and reports that after the death of one of a married couple the survivor's personal name is lost: the widow or widower is no longer addressed by the true name. The terms used instead are cdbóco, widow; purihio, widower; and cahoüca, orphan (Modigliani 1894: 212). Walland records the terms poelio for a widower (poelie ori p. 117 may well be a misprint), kha- boekoe for a widów, kenoekoê applied on the death of an infant brother or sister, na-ieijah on the death of an adult brother or sister, kha-howka

7 In a Mentawai word-list, Oudemans renders the word for "mother" as numda ina (1879:485). This is evidently a mistake, for no other source supports hira and Morris translates numda as "gar nicht, es ist gar nicht vorhanden" (1900:272); butit indicates the possibility of another form of the mourning- . term referring to the mother's death.

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(Rosenberg) (Walland) (Modigliahi) father kha-howka cahoüca mother kha-howka cahoüca sibling kenoekoe : ' . na-ieijah husband kha-boekoe cabóco. wife koelijd poelio purihio friend na-noah

The mourning-period lasts five months according to Walland (1864: 101), three months according to Helfrich (1888: 247). The reason for the assumption of the terms is said to bé fear that the evil spirits which always roam where there is mournirig will be able to recognise and harm the living, (Modigliani 1894: 212). The local group on Engano seems to be small, the villages containing from six to eight houses and averaging about 220 individuals each (van der Hoeven 1870: 167, 200). ,. •

Waropen. Theré are various terms in the language which indicate what relationship one has lost by a death, and in "various circum- stances" a wudakanasano, mourning name, is used instead of the m'our- ner's personal name. Wudaka means "mourning" and nasano means "name, title" (Held 1942: 46, 89). Sometimes the name of the deceased is included in the mourning-term. The terms (Held 1947: 177-8) are as below: parent. tuwoft man tobai, wiofi •' wóman sibling etawai (plus name of deceased) . man raroi, rar.owai woman eldest child ' manapa (+ child's name) man binapa' woman "an older child" atuwai husband sasui, sasuiwuro (no children) bindo (children) wife ' ": • manvwa, maisani

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The period of application of the mourning-terms is not stated, nor is there given any native explanation of why the terms are used. The villages range in population from 75 to 1702, but the normal village is about 500 strong (Held 1947: 22-3).

Manus. Margaret Mead records a number of "mourning terms" (Mead 1922:264), viz.: grandfather nambumpwen mother's mother ngasvmpwen father tamapwe man yataman woman, married kutamakit woman, unmarried mother potinam man yatinam woman mother's brother kalimpwen brother ndriasimpwen man ngauwen woman, married penampwen woman, unmarried sister pilinampwen woman cross-cousin polimpwen man son natumpwen man husband pinyau wife ponyau brother-in-law kaiyempwen

To these there has been added a term in pidgin English, nufela, applied to one who has lost a child while it was still an infant, a "new fellow" (ibid.: 264, footnote). Since some of the mourning-terms are composed of the kinship term for the deceased relative plus pwen, "not", the term referring to the death of a grandparent should possibly be mambupwen (cf. Mead 1922: 221). Mead reports that "technically, these terms are only üsed between a death and the completion of the funeral rites. Actually, if the term is convenient in' solving an avoidance situation it will be kept Although informants said that all the terms should be used, investigation proved that many individuals who should have been called by various other of the terms, were not so called, and led to the conclusion that the terms are used most frequently not as a formal act of

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Solomon Istanders. "In adult life names are changed chiefly as a result of death No change is made on marriage, or on the birth of a child, but if the child should die, both mother and father take another name as part of their mourning. A woman who loses her first- born child will call herself Tchinamoa, 'mother of one (dead child)', and will continue to use that name even after the birth of other children who survive" (Blackwood 1935: 79). The complete list of terms is: iather monaman ketaman mother tatchinan child tamanakets man twmanamoa man tchinamoa woman tchinpasen woman grandchild bunamoa husband (term not given)

Tchinpasen is applied to a woman all of whose children are dead. Tamanaguwur is applied to the father of a child who has died of croup. No term is given ref erring to the death of a husband: the source states that a .widow "will sometimes take some name conhected with her husband's death, but this is not nearly so general as the change upon the death of a child" (loc. .cit). The term ketaman derives .from ake, not, and tama, father. The case from which this term was taken referred in fact to the death of the father's brother, the actual father being still alive. . .. The application of the terms seems uncertain: "for the death of a child or an adult commoner, only the nearer relatives change. their names, and even this appears to be done at. the discretion of- the individual" (loc. cit.). Even some of the terms themselves.appear to be not traditionally fixed but to be coined at will by the bereaved; but there nevertheless seems to be a core of fixed traditional terms. The period of mourning, and by inference the period during which most of

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the terms are used, seems to be at least a year (op. cit.: 500, footnote). There is no general name for the complete set of terms such as might give a clue to the native conception of their significance; nor can any particular motive in their use be safely ascribed, though it may be out of awe of the dead as persons who go on existing and inf luencing the lives of the living.8 There is certainly a general dread of the spirits of the dead "as powerfui enemies, who will, if they can, do harm to the living and even cause death", a f ear which leads the people to desert a village in which several people have died (op. cit.: 515). The villages are generally small, the village of Kurtatchi, for instance, comprising about.58 individuals of all ages (op. cit.: 584-8).

Tjapwurong. The personal names of "near relatives" of the deceased are avoided and "general terms" are used instead. The terms are as follow (Dawson 1881: 17, 42-3) : parent, father's brother palliin man palliin kuurk man sibling kaep gnunnae man kaep gnunna kuurk man mother's brother kurm kurm kuurk . woman pitchae kuurk woman "male cousin" gnullii yuurpeetch woman "female cousin" anullii vuurtoee kuurk woman

The terms are used during the "period of mourning" (op.. cit.: 17). A man mourns for his wife for three moons: "every second night he wails and recounts her good qualities, and lacerates his forehead with his nails till the blood flows down his cheeks, and he covers his head and face with white clay. He must continue to mourn and wear the white clay for another nine nioons, unless he shall succeed in taking a human life in revenge for her death". A woman mourns for her husband twelve moons: in the first three she wails and recounts the good qualities of her husband, lacerates her forehead until the blood flows, and burns her thighs with hot ashes "till she screams with agony", and for another nine moons she wears the white clay. "For the same period,

8 I owe the information in this paragraph to a personal communication from Miss Blackwood.

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Shasta.9 There are no mourning-terms entirely different in form from the kinship terms, but there are suffixes which are added.to the' terms of address for bereaved relatives of the deceased. These are -psi, -opsi, -dopsi, or -ipsi, i.e. a common suffix -psi apparently modified. for euphony. Thus the term for father is ata, from which derive the mourning-terms atadopsi (address) and atipsi applied tp a man whose child has died, i.e. whose status as a father has been affected. Similarly akwi, son, from which the term akwipsi, applied to a mari whose father has died and whose status as a son has been affected. The suffix is added to the personal name at all times, and its application among terms of relationship is said to extend to the terms for "niece", "nephew", "aunt", "uncle", grandparent and the terms of affinity (Gifford 1922:36). The period of use is not stated, but the mourning-period lasts at least a year (Dixon 1907 :476-8). The local group is small. Dixon believes that one estimate of sixty persons as the average in a village is too large (ibid.: 422) and himself records that village communities were generally of small size, "not infrequently... consisting of only a single family" (ibid.: 451). Among the other Californian tribes the Tolowa have a term trixne which is applied to a woman whose brother is dead, and trine which is applied to a man whose brother or sister is dead. The terms are in general applied to "blood relatives" following the death of "a connecting relative or of a near relaöve to whom the speakers stand in a mutually close relation" (Gifford 1922 :16). There is a special term tsanwhel for a widow but it is not clear that this is a mourning-term.

The categories denoted by the mourning-terms from seven of these societies are collated in Table I.

9 'I thank.Professor Leslie Spier for bringing this reference to my notice.

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TABLE I Comparative table of categories denoted by mourning-terms.

I S « SS I 1 1 I 1 i I 5 I S s I 3 ë grandparent + mother's mother + parent + + + +• father •+• + + + mother + + + + . father's brother + mother's brother + +• sibling + + + + + brother + sister + cross-cousin + male cousin + female cousin + child + + + son + grandchild + spouse + ' husband + + + + + + wife + + + + + brother-in-law + friend + same name + IV There is no indication in any of the accounts cited above that the mourning-terms stand in any systematic relationship to teknonyms or other terms such as that which makes the Penan system so remarkable. The Penan terms are in this important respect in a different analytical position and deserve their distinct designation of "death-names".10 But all the sets of terms, Penan and other, are similar in that they are

10 This, the term I originally chose for this type of designation in Borneo, has a disadvantage which perhaps deserves comment. The word "name" might seem to connote a purely individual appellation rather tttan a class of persons, and "term" might on this count have been preferable. "Name", however, translates

Downloaded from Brill.com09/23/2021 10:56:53PM via free access MOURNING-TERMS. 73 related to kinship categories and are applied on the occasion of deaths of relatives. Whatever additional interpretation may be necessary in the case of the Penan terms, therefore, they belong to a class of social phenomena which it may be useful to analyse as a class. Elucidation of the place of the terms in the above societies may help us to understand their place in Penan society, and further analysis of the Penan terms may support general conclusions about the whole class of terms. The observers whose accounts we have used have not for the most part. regarded mourning-terms as requiring particular attention as regular usages, or special analysis as sociologically important clues to understanding the societies they describe. The lists of terms that they give are often clearly incomplete, and in nearly all of them there are probably gaps. Even Margaret Mead, who gives a very full list, nevertheless makes hardly any .serious attempt to relate the terms to other features of Manus society: it is énough for her to observe that they are used as devices for avoiding the names of certain. relatives and to conclude that most frequently they are not used as a formal act of mourning. Most of the other observers do not go as f ar as this. Held is content merely to describe the Waropen terms as mourning-terms. Here he has the justification of the native term tvudakanasano, but we are not taken. any further than the bare translation of this. Given that zvudaka may be translated as "mourning", there is still no means of " the word by which Penan refer both to these terms connected with death and to the appellations of individuals, viz. ngaran; and this word and its cognates (such as the Kenyah ngadan) are used in. the same ways by many middle Borneo peoples with death-names. I should mention, too, that the Penan phrase masek ngaran, to "enter" a death-name (Needham 1954a :418), may be taken to indicate that we are dealing with a defined status which is assumed or entered rather than with anything resembling a personal name. The Penan for "death-name" is ngaran lumo, or ngaran lumu (according to dialect), which may be translated as "mourning-name"; but I have demon- strated elsewhere (1954a :428) that this is not an analytically profitable way in which to regard the matter. It was precisely because of the misleading con- notations of "mourning" that I decided on "death". In this connectiön I take the opportunity to amend a slight injustice I may have done Elshout. He describes the Kenyah terms as rouvmamen, "mourning-names", and I dealt with this as though it was simply his interpretative designation (1954a :427); but I should have elucidated the ambiguity at least to the extent of pointing out that his term is a translation of the Kenyah ngadan lómd (Elshout 1926:158). Elshout was a very good observer and I should not like to slight him; yet his work has generally been completèly ignored, while Hose's reputation has been vastly inflated and given authority by constant reference. This must partly be due to the f act that Elshout wrote in a very dif f icult Dutch; but nevertheless on the issue of death-names it is Elshout who has been informative and helpful while Hose's ethnography has been useless.

Downloaded from Brill.com09/23/2021 10:56:53PM via free access 74 RODNEY NEEDHAM. discovering what this means to the Waropen themselves or of discerning how Held would analyse these "mourning" customs. Gifford's only general remark on the special terms used at the deaths of relatives among the Californian tribes is that they seem to him to be "excres- cences which have grown up on the various termihologies [of kinship and affinity] rather than integral parts of each" (1922: 258). The only thorough analysis is by Radcliffe-Brown, who subsumes mourning-terms under "burial customs" and proposes an interpretation in terms of social sentiment. It is not my intention to make a critique of his interpretation of Andamanese customs as such, but it is necessary to examine the form of his argument concerning them. The relevant parts of his long and elegant exposition (so far as possible in his own words) are as follow: There is "to the mind of an Andaman Islander" a connection between a person's name and his "social personality", i.e. the sum ..of characteristics by which he has an effect on social life and therefore on thè social sentiments of other members of the society. The name is always avoided whenever the owner is for some reason pre- vented from taking his normal place in the life of the society. The social personality is at such times "suppressed" and.the name which represents it is also suppressed. Thus, during the period of mourning the mourner is withdrawn from the normal life of society and his name is not used: "his social personality is in a state of partial suppression", and after the mourning period is over, when he résumés his social personality, he résumés at the same time his own name. Radcliffe- Brown does not specifically emphasise the point, but it is during the period of avoidance of the personal name that the mourning-terms are used. It is a strong inference from this argument that he regards the terms — if he takes them into account at all — as merely terminological devices which make the same point as the avoidance of the personal name, i.e. that they are in fact avoidance-usages also. However this may be, we are presented with a picture of the members of the society con- certing in traditional avoidance of a mourner's personal name; so from consideration of the position of the individual we are turned to the social aspect of the same observances.The explanation is now based on the assumption that the cohesion of a social group depends directly on the existence of a system of collective sentiments or affective dispo- sitions that binds every member to every other. The death of a member of the group, "the most fundamental modification of the social personality that is possible", is a direct attack on these sentiments. In such a situation either the sentiments must be weakened by the attack or

Downloaded from Brill.com09/23/2021 10:56:53PM via free access MOURNING-TERMS. 75 they must be expressed and reaffirmed in some reaction of defence or compensation which restores the sentiment to its former strength. If the society permitted its solidarity to be attacked, whether by death or by ahy other means, without reacting in such a way as to give relief to wounded social féelings and so to reiristate them in their former con- ditión, these sentiments would lose their strength and the society its cohesion."The burial customs of the Andamanèse are to be explained... as a collective reaction against the attack on the collective feeling of solidarity "coristituted by the death of a member of the group" (Rad- clif f e-Browri 1922:286). - It is not possiblè tö make any'adequate examination here of the assumptions on which the interpretation rests or the ramifications of the argument, 'büt there are a number of points which may conveniently be made 'and which can be dealt with in themselves. The most obvious, perhaps, is that 'although the explanation is in terms of féelings there is in fact 'no evidence that the 'Andamanèse have the féelings posited. The concept of a system of social sentiments may have heuristic value without such explicit evidence, but if we are to be convinced that it leads to a true account of what happens in a particular society we must ask-fór more tha'n this. Sentiments can 'only exist in individual psyches, and if individuals have certain féelings then they are in a pósition — and the ónly ones in such a positioh — to say that they have them. It may be thè"case: that' Radcliffe-Brown constructed his account from numerbus such statements of' feeling, but thère is no evidence that he did. "Further, if 'thé explanation is of general sociological valuè, it should apply to theentire class of terms in the different societies whose usages wè have examined, to the Pénan and the other societies as well as tó the Andamanèse of whom Radcliffe-Brown had special knowledge. But we cannotéxpect such'evidence of sentiments from these societies wheh the aüthors of the accounts paid no particular attention to the terms they recorded; and I have shown in another place that the Penan themselves do not explain the dèath-namés in terms of féelings such as sorrow (1954a: 428). I do not mean that the Penari do not feel, and do not say they feel, sorrow at the death of a member of the local group: they certainly do, in varying degrees, and they say so. But so f ar as I have been able to discover they do not attachconnotations of sorrow or féelings of any other sort to the use of the death-names.11

11 Members of some Bornean tribes do, but their statements (which will be recorded elsewhere) do not support Radcliffe-Brown's interpretation and merely serve to confirm a point which I make below (p. 77).

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The secorid point on which I think Radcliffe-Brown's interpretation is faulty, and especially in a comparative context, is that the mourning- terms are implicitly regarded as terminological aspects of avoidance during a period in which an individual's social personality is suppressed. The first thing to be clarified in such an explanation is surely why there should be a number of terms at all, and why it is that the mourning- term refers to the kinship category of the deceased. Radcliffe-Brown only reports two terms, but he evidently knew that there were others, and we have seen from Man's account that there are in fact other terms. The second objection, though maybe partly verbal, is that there should be a suggestion of abnormality, that the individual's social personality should be "suppressedl": it is as though thère were an undif- ferentiated status of normality, a plane on which an individual lives until he is displaced to another plane by the death of a kinsman. There is certainly a change in the status of a mourner, which is conventionally recognised by the application of a special term, but Man enables us to understand this far better than Radcliffe-Brown does. He lists a large number of terms which are "applied to males and females from birth to old age in order to indicate their age, condition, etc." (Man 1885: 207-8). These mark off nineteen stages in the life of a man, and eighteén in that" of a woman with furthef distinctions withih some of the stages. It is abundantly clear from his account that Andamanese culture is preoccupied with defining the status of an individual at any stage of his life — according to progressive age, bachelorhood, father- hood, and so on — and that the mourning-terms indicate some of the many stages defined by the status-terminology. This insight does not allow us to say why there are particular terms referring to the deaths of particular kin rather than one general term denoting mourning- status, but it does allow us to see that Radcliffe-Brown's approach was mistaken. The Andamanese mourning-terms are not avoidance signs but are signs of status among a large number of other such signs. However, we are not entitled to say that they are merely parts of a series: the special relation of the terms to categories of relationship has yet to be explained, and more than this there is the main problem to be answered in some way. The terms indicate change of status in relation to the deaths of relatives; but what is the status and what is the relation? Radcliffe-Brown relates the burial customs of the Andamanese, and by implication the mourning-terms also, to the cohesion or solidarity of the group; and even if his analysis is at fault and his emphasis on

Downloaded from Brill.com09/23/2021 10:56:53PM via free access MOURNING-TERMS. 77 avoidance misplaced it may still be the case that this a prof itable direc- tion in which to look. Certainly we may agree with him that the customs of burial and mourning are "not simply the results of natural feelings of fear and sorrow but ritual actions performed under a sense of obligation and strictly regulated by tradition" (1922 :297). Individual reactions and sentiments are irrelevant to a comparative! analysis.12 Similarly, traditional statements of belief or cause in particular societies may also be irrelevant, whether we regard them as "ration- alisations" of customs or whether we describe them more precisely and informatively. For example, the Mentawai believe that the ghost of the deceased makes the person "unclean", and that sickness is caused by the return of a ghost (Loeb 1928: 221, 423-4). Hansen on similar grounds discounts mourning (presumably in the sense of expressing grief) as the cause of the use of mourning-terms, and interprets them as devices to avoid malicious recognition by the spirit of the deceased. The ghost is misled and confused by certain practices and is driven off : otherwise it would drag away one of the living to be a companion, i.e. someone else would die (Hansen 1915 : 178). The Engano also fear the spirits of the dead and also appear to advance this apprehension as reason for using the mourning-terms (Modigliani 1894: 212); the Solomon Islanders dread them and believe they may cause harm and even death; and the Tjapwurong regard them with fear. But we do not know that all the societies we have examined fear the dead, and even if we did we know that such a fear is an almost universal characteristic of mankind and therefore cannot in itself explain the existence of the terms (which are so far from being universal), let alone their form. The fact that the Manus and the Solomon Islanders (Blackwood 1935 :80) incidentally use mourning-terms as convenient means of avoiding the names of people whose personal names may not be mentioned is of even less valué in comparative interpretation. Again, the Tjapwurong husband mourns for a year unless he can take a human life "in revenge" for the death of his wife (Dawson 1881 :66), in which case he mourns — and presumably is addressed by the mourning-term for a widower — for only three months instead of the year. But even if this practice were elucidated for us, if we could understand

12 It is true that mourning-terms among the Solomon Islanders may be assumed or not according to individual feeling and decision, but the fact that a set of recognised mourning-terms exists at all is independent of such feelings and decisions.'

Downloaded from Brill.com09/23/2021 10:56:53PM via free access 78 . EODNEY NEEDHAM. the conceptual connection between the two deaths, how one can be a revenge for the other and dispensation of mourning, still we should not understand any better the class of terms which we are trying to understand; for none of the other societies, so f ar as we know, prof esses such beliefs or maintains such practices in connection with mourning. The beliefs and practices of the particular societies show great variety in so' f ar as they are recorded, and it is probable that adeqate investigation of each would reveal many more such differences. Such beliefs and practices are thus in.effect — even if it may not be admitted that they are in principle — not in • themselves necessary-or sufficient elucidation in the analysis of this institution. It remains to eliminate another and obvious line of pössible explanation. The peoples whose customs we are examining belong to different physical stocks. The Penan and Mentawai are of "Indonesian" race; the Manus and Waropen are "Papuan"; the Solorrion Islanders are Mela- nesian; the Tjapwurorig are Australoid; the Shasta are Amerindian; and the Andaman Islanders are Negrito. It is a difficult and partly abitrary matter to distinguish one physical race from another, but whatever particular distinctions may be challenged it is certain that the peoples whosé common custom we are comparing are not of one physical stock and cannot have one racial history. Similarly, it is as clear that they speak different languages. The closest related appear to be the Penan and the Mentawai, who both speak Indonesian languages which therefore possess some common features • but even in this case the relationship is a very ténuous one indeed and not gróund for making any ef fective ethnological connection between the two peoples. So on both racial and linguistic grounds (let alone general cultural considerations) these peoples evidently have quite different histories; and no speculation about their pasts can reasonably account for their similarity of custom with respect to death and kinship. (The only point to give one some slight pause is that fact that most of them live in or near the Oceanic area; but a moment's ref lection on the evidence shows that this has. no historical or ethnological significance.) Yet these societies possess what we have defined as a common class of mourning-terms, and we have to find out why. What do they have in common which could account for their common customs? With other possibilities of explanation so satisfactorily out of the way, we may now turn to what is a social anthropologist's main concern and the mode of elucidation proper tó his discipline — the relation of the phenomena which we are

Downloaded from Brill.com09/23/2021 10:56:53PM via free access MOÜKNING-TERMS. 79 trying to understand to the form or structural principles of the societies in which they are found.13 Our concern now is thus with the structural features of the societies which use the mourning-terms and specifically with the composition of the local groups of which they are constituted. The eight societies examined above and the Penan have certain common characteristics which seem to be important in interpreting the place of mourning-terms among them: (1) They are all based on kinship. Descent is reckoned, however, in very different ways: the Penan, Andamanese and Shasta are cognatic; the Waropen and Manus arepatrilineal, and the Mentawai are probably so; the Solomon Islanders are matrilineal, and the Engano appear to have been so (Helfrich 1888: 299; Keuning 1955: 185); and the Tjapwurong seem to have been bilineal with an eight-section system (Radcliffe-Brówn 1931: 52, 110). (2) They are segmentary societies,14 with no centralised administra- tion or hierarchy of of fices or functional differentiatióri of groups. (3) They are composed of small local groups in which the members arë in direct contact with each other. (4) The local groups are commonly, or appear to be from the literature, relatively isolated and self-sufficient; with the corollary that most óf the social contacts óf any individual are normally within the local group. (5) Their'bases of Üivelihood are subsisterice económies, sometimes 13 With due regard to Lord Raglan's lively, and in söme instances clearly correct, views on "diffusion" (Raglan 1957), I müst.point out that this comparative problem is one of many which show the difference between the social anthr'opologist and the ethnologist whose prime concern is to make speculative reconstructions of the past movements and contacts of peoples and cultures. Intrigued thbugh I am personaily by speculation about cultural contacts in Indonesia in the unrecorded past, and the transmission of notions and customs throughout.the archipelago, I cannot conceive of any remotely plausible para- historical hypothesis to account for common type of terms possessed by the Mentawai and middle-Borneans. And this is the most promising case for such an interpretation. How vast a ramification of egregiously tenuous connections would one hot have to contruct in order to link the Shasta and the Penan, let alone the far more different Australiaris and the Andaman Islanders. This way lies no answer whatever. 14 By common use, especially by social anthropologists working in Africa, this term has become associated with societies based on lineages; but this conno- tation isnot necessary or exclusively correct. It is true that Durkheim used • the term segmentaire in connection with clans; but it is clear from his definition that it is notonly such divisions of the social order which are denoted by the terra (Durkheim 1932:150, 152). The Penan fit the definition just as well as the Nuer, and even better.

Downloaded from Brill.com09/23/2021 10:56:53PM via free access 80 RODNEY NEEDHAM. precarious (e.g. Penan, Shasta, Tjapwurong), and feature some degree of co-operation for survival, either in common labour or by sharing foodstuffs. The division of labour is very simple. (6) In the case of some of them at least the isolation of the groups and the dependence of members upon one another is accentuated by hostility with other groups or peoples and by the danger of attack. The Penan were traditionally the prey of headhunting parties from settled tribes such as the Kenyah and Iban; the Mentawai were raided for slaves by the Batak; there were homicidal f ights among the Tjapwurong and apparently hostile relations between groups; there were armed f ights and even f euds between Andamanese groups; and the Waropen were headhunters at conflict with their near neighbours. It is evident then that in these societies the loss of an individual can be a great blow not only to other individuals but also to the livelihood and security of the group, and even in some cases to its chances of survival. It is not justifiable to extrapolate from my experience with the Penan to what may be the case in the other societies, but it is certainly the case among the Penan that each adult individual knows and feels himself to be vitally dependent on the others of his local group. The Penan say that a family left to itself in the forest would be hard put to it to live and would probably starve, and this realisation lies behind the egalitarian sharing of food and the continual passing of gifts of food between the families. It is highly probable that similar social necessities are features of the other three nomadic societies in the sample, and probable that such considerations obtain in the rest. One characteristic of this type of society, it appears, is that to its members individuals are more important as individuals than as members of groups. The death of an individual is more disruptive of such a society than a larger and structurally more complex society. By "disruption" I refer to a breach in the solidary ties which unite the local group (at least) of which the deceased was a member. In referring to solidarity I mean reciprocal dependence, the common recognition of a moral duty to help one another, and the consciousness of being at one in interests, sympathies and values.15

15 I have compounded this definition from those in the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary and in Lalande (Sth edn.). I do not claim that it is the most useful or complete definition of this difficult notion, but only that it is adequate to the present enquiry. The topic will be expanded upon in the sequel to this article.

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. I postulate that it is breaches in the solidarity of the local group which are primarily marked by the mourning-terms or death-names; that these terms mark the destruction by death of relationships which constitute the ef fective solidary-aggregate. of the society, the local group. Note that I do not say that.it is the"function" of the terms to do this, or that their use strengthens or reaffirms or protects the value of solidarity. I simply say that certain relationships are socially important; that these are manifested in the direct contact of one individual with another; that the death of. an. individual in this type of society has importance to other individuals who with him comprise the effective solidary aggregate (primarily, it seems, the local group) ; and that each category of solidary relationship is marked by a special term. The categories in the Table are, I. maintain, :of peculiar and even vital importance in the societies whose terms denote them. Their particular value is written into the terms used to denote living representatives of the categories, and is further emphasised and perpetuated- by the use of another and congruent set of terms in ref erence to the deaths of these individuals. That is, the mourning-terms are (contra Gif ford) part of the kinship systems. That they are more fundamental than the parti- cularities of these systems, however, is seen in the different classifi- cations of relatives and the different reckonings of .descent with which the terms are associated. . . It is not necessary • that the péople themselvès should make any connectiori between s'ocial solidarity and the use of the terms, and indeed even among the Penan we do not find such a connection stated. Nor is it necessary that feelings of any sórt should accompany the use of the terms. It is significant enough,- at this point,. that we can say that mourning-terms are used as a matter1 of-f act iri ségmentary societies based on srriall local groups -which are largely or entirely composed of kin, and that they are not found in non-segmentary societies or in ségmentary societies without the characteristics we have outlined above. - That terms relating to the deaths of relatives are connected with the factual and sometimes recognised solidarity 'of the group through the ties of one member to anöthêf is obvious in the case of the Penan. All Penan with whom an individual has any social relations at all are kin, traced or putative, and kinship categories cover all the members of any local group and even the entire Penan people. The death of any Penan therefore occasions the use of death-names. Since it is only the primary refërents of the kinship terms who are actually addressed by death-names (Needham 1954a : 418) it is seldom if ever the case that Dl. 115 6

Downloaded from Brill.com09/23/2021 10:56:53PM via free access 82 RODNEY NEEDHAM. all' the members of a local group are known by déath-names at the death of a member of the group. But a high proportion of them of ten do have death-names applied to them, and.the other members of the group are concerned in the death in that it is they who have to assign, sometimes even puzzle out (1954a: 425), and use the terms. This raises a point of further comparative interest. All the members of a local group in any of the societies we have dealt with are concerned in the death in that it is they who use the terms; but the most nearly concerned are those kinds of relative to whom the mourning-terms are actually applied, and the definition of these varies with the particular society. It would be a very interesting enquiry to try to relate the range of relatives to whom the terms are applied to particular structural or other emphases in the societies using them: perhaps to the duties of the co-operative work-group, the composition of a fishing-expedition, the differentiation between men and woman, or other distinctions made by the society. This is only interesting, of course, so long as the mourning-terms do not exactly parallel the terms of kinship and affinity; f or if further evidence showed that they did so the analysis would become conventional and no longer peculiarly connected with the social consequences of death. (This point will be amplified in the sequel.) We are severely handicapped by the lack of assurance that the sets of terms we have are complete, and it seems in fact almost certain that they are not, so such an enquiry is not possible here. Nevertheless, there are some comments to be made. There are certain categories in which there is almost complete overlap in the different sets of terms, viz. parent, sibling, and spouse. This is expectable, in that these are the nearest relatives in any system of kinship and affinity; but may not this common emphasis mean that it is the elementary family and not the larger range of relationship whose solidarity is reflected in the mourning-terms ? To this I should answer, firstly, that the elementary family is universal while death-names and mourning-terms are not. The most one can infer is that in the type of society we have defined its importance may be especially clear and fundamental; but its universality prevents us making any sociological correlation between it and the existence of systems of terms. Secondly, so far as we can see in the literature, the terms are not applied only by and within this small familial group but by everybody — which means the local group at least, and at any rate all who have important and direct relations with its members. The very fact that the terms are applied by those who are not directly bereaved, and who do not themselves assume them, is a sign that the

Downloaded from Brill.com09/23/2021 10:56:53PM via free access MOURNING-TERMS. 83 social significance of the.deaths is in'some way more general than the range of primary referents of the terms. It is not at all necessary that a change in appellation (e.g. at death, as here). should be observed by all the members of a local group. Cpmpare the limitedcontexts of use of different types of name, such as endearments between a man and his mistress, nicknames or personal names between f riends, professional courtesies between colleagues in a public body. These appellations are significant only to those within. the respective limits of concern (or solidarityiri some sense)' and would be inappropriate outside them: they "reflect" these limits.these particular solidary ties. - . Another point to be made explicitly is that although the discussion has centered on the local group (since it is by this that the society is characterised) it is not necessarily only the local group of which the solidary ties are marked by the mourning-térms. - This is shown by the Tjapwurong term applied at the death of the mothef's brother,-who must belong to another local group than Ego.-This does not affect thé genëral argument; however, which is that the terms are functionally associated' with effective solidary relations. In the type of- society in which the terms are f ound these appear to comprise essentially a small local group of individuals in direct contact and dependence, but relationships of similar importancë may of course.extend outside this group. Though a general enquiry is out of the question, there is nevertheless an interesting correlation between particular terms and particular social relations which can be established in the case of the Penan. I wrote in anearlier article that any hypothesis attempting to explain the Penan systém of terms would have to account for the different usages of the Eastern Penan as compared with those of the Western Penan, for example that the Eastern Penan have no death-names for affines while the Western Penan do (1954a: 431). It was dear that none of the hypotheses I advanced then could hope to do this, but if we regard the death-names as related to ef f ective solidary relations there is some pbssibility of doing so, for there is a significant difference in the range and type of such a relation in the two Penan tribes. The examination of this clearly supports the general hypothesis advanced here." The Eastern Penan can and do marry any first cousiri, while the Western Penan regard first >cousin marriage as incestuous. Since the mean size of group is almost the same in both tribes (the eastern is slightly smaller than the western) this has the consequence that while the Eastern Penan can usually marry within the natal group — which Penan in general pref er — the Western Penan are more of ten f orced

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to marry outside it. When there is a marriage between two groups the Eastern Penan do not make an obligatory marriage payment, while the Western Penan do. (This is partly to do, I think, with the f act that certain differences in economie organisation allow the western groups to accumulate and possess larger amounts of material goods, but this in itself does not explain away the difference in custom.) The eastern groups seldom if ever meet in the f orest, and rely f or contact with each other on trading-meetings held with longhouse groups of settled tribes up to three times a year. The western groups, however, maintain infre- quent but continual contact between each other, commonly in the form of individuals travelling f rom one group to another to see af f ines or close kin and staving some time with the related group. Whatever the place where the married couple settle in an inter-group marriage (there is no fixed rule of marital residence) such contacts are begun and main- tained whenever there is a marriage with another group. These contacts are means not only of ordinary social intercourse but also of effecting exchanges of objects such as manufactured articles and cloth obtained from the trading-meetings, forest products, etc. Affines are therefore more important in the relations of the local group and between individuals in Western Penan life than they are among the Eastern Penan. It is consistent with the general hypothesis that the Western groups should apply death-names when an af fine dies while the Eastern Penan do not. No such explanation can be given, I fear, for other differences, e.g. that the Eastern Penan have fewer death-names for children: the numbers of children in the families of the two tribes show no significant differences, there is no difference in the status of children, and the value attached to them is as great in one tribe as the other. Nor am I able at present to explain in such a way why the Western Penan have no death-names referring to cousins. (It is not of course necessary that there should be some structural interpretation of the presence or absence of a term or of any institution, but as social anthropologists this is where we have first to look.) That the Eastern Penan should not have the pu-usagt that I have described elsewhere (1954b) but that the Western Penan should share what appears to be the identical custom with the Mentawai (1954b : 266-7) remains a fascinating but intractable problem.16

16 In a Bornean context the difference between the Penan tribes in this respect is perhaps susceptible of some ethnological interpretation. I shall be with the Penan again this year (19S8) and hope to discover more evidence on the

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The next quéstion that poses itself is why societies which correspond in form and organisation to the nine we have examined do not have mourning-terms at all. The Negritos of Malaya, for instance, live in local groups similar in size and'composition to those of the Penan and lead a nomadic lif e of similar prêcariousness. The value of an individual in the recipröcal ties which comprise the solidarity of the local group seems to be as great, and the death of one to be as great a blow. Yet they have no mourning-terms, so far as can be discovered; and neither, it appears, do any of the other nomadic or settled simple societies of Malaya which are similarly organised and might: be expected to have them. It can* be objected that our soufcès are too fragmentary, and that there is no thorough enough report on the lives of such Malayan peóples> 'to justify the statement that they do not use such terms; but I have partïcularly searched (though only by simple enquiry in a brief survey) for mourning-terms among some who might well have them and am certain that they at least do not. The Si wang, for instance, who lead a semi-nomadic life in small local groups in the highlands of central Malaya, and who almost certainly were formerly completely nomadic, might well be expected to have, mourning-terms but they do not (Needham 1956). From the Af rican sources it appears likely that the Pygmies of the Congo should have such terms, but it is not recorded that they do.17 Asurvey of the literature on South Ame- rican tribes and detailed examination of the sources on some promising nomadic tribes in that part of the world reveal no similar usages. Even when one makes the necessary reservations about negative inferences from the ethnographic literature, this situation still presents a problem. One response to this is that the quéstion demands too much of a hypothesis which is in any case very 'general, and which makes only a rough correlatiön between rathér imprecise variables. The local groups are "small" — but vary in our sample from an average size "of thirty individuals to five hundred. "Most" social relations are or seëm to be confined to the local group (though this caii certainly be stated in the case of the Penan). The groups are "isolated", but isolation is always relative. Even the fact that the societies are segmentary, though a valuable clue to their general nature, is not entirely precise; and in any case it marks off an enormous class of societies within which only a very few possess the further features of the societies which actually

matter; but the comparison of the Western Penan and the Mentawai is a problem of a quite different kind. 17 Mr. Colin Turnbull tells me that in fact they do not.

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have mourning-terms. Finally, "solidarity" is so imprecisely qualitative a notion that 'an 'exact f ormulation is hardly to be hoped f or; and if it were not f or an argument and demonstration which I shall adduce in a later article I should perhaps hesitate to advarice the present view. However,' though I cannot say why societies of similar type should not have mourning-terms,' I should maintain that we should f irst of all be concerned with what we can say than with what we cannot. Bef ore concluding, there is anothef matter that I wish to raise. The Peiian teknonyms and death-hames constitute a terminological system which is more complex than the sets of mourning-terms which the . other societies possess: it is more intricate and ingeniously coherent. It is of interest that there is a further possible development of a system of terms relating death and categories of relationship which does not seem to have been realised in any society, even in middle Borneo. The Malays have a series of names which they give to their children in order of birth: the eldest is named Long or Awang, the second Alang, the third Ngah, and so on in a traditional series (Wilkinson 1908 :10). The Temer, aboriginal Malays, also use such a system, with separate series of names for boys and for girls (Williams-Hunt 1952 :65). Other societies with similar naming-customs are the Kachin (Wehrli 1904 :32), the Balinese (Belo 1936 :14), and the Gurkhas (Morris 1936 : 157). It is theoretically possible for a society to exist in which the'Penan (middle Borneo) system of teknonyms and death-names is united with a series' of age-order proper names to form an even more integrated system. That is, since the Penan distinguish their children by order of birth when they die (and since we are relating the significance of death to the status of the living)', th'ey'might well distinguish them in the same'way when they are alive. This consideration does not enable us-to understand any better the place of the mourning-terms in the societies examined, butit has its value as part of the sociological searchfor the fullest possible development of an institution; and this is an important part of the delineation of symbolic or other systems and the probing for all conceivable means of understanding them.

In this paper' I have correlatéd mourning-terms with a certain type of society. This is a segmentary society, composed of small isolated groups in which individuals are in direct social dependence upon each other, and are related as persons rather than- as members or representatives

Downloaded from Brill.com09/23/2021 10:56:53PM via free access MOURNING-TERMS. 87 of groups. There is no complex division of labour, and the categories of ef fective solidary relations are chiefly those of kinship and af finity. The mourning-terms are congruent with the terms of the kinship system, and their application is determined by its categories. The death of an individual is peculiarly disruptive in a society of this type, and the mourning-terms are applied when solidary relations are thus affected. There seems to be a significant relation between the existence of mourning-terms and a particular form or quality of sodal solidarity associated with this type of society. In the case of the Penan it is possible to prove this, and I shall do so in a subsequent paper.

RODNEY NEEDHAM Institute of Social Anthropology, University of Oxford.

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