Chapter 24

St. John says that "a man is supposed to tattoo one finger only, if he has been present when an enemy has been killed, but tattoos hand and fingers if he has taken an enemy's head." Among the Ida'an a man makes a mark on his arm for each enemy slain. One man was seen with thirty-seven such stripes on the arm. A successful head-hunter is also allowed to "decorate" his ears with the canine teeth of a Bornean leopard. "In some cases tatu marks appear to be used as a means of communicating a fact," writes Roth (II., 291). Among the Kayan it indicates rank. Slaughter of an enemy, or mere murder of a slave, are other reasons for tattooing. "A Murut, having run away from the enemy, was tatued on his back. So that we may justly conclude that tatuing among the natives of Borneo is one method of writing." Among the Dusun the men that took heads generally had a tattoo mark for each one on the arm, and were looked upon as very brave, though their victim might have been only a woman or a child (159).

In the fifth volume of Waitz-Gerland's _Anthropologie_ (Pt. II., 64-67), a number of authors are cited testifying that in the Micronesian Archipelago the natives of each island had special kinds of tattoo marks on different parts of the body, to distinguish them from others. These marks were named after the islands. The Micronesians themselves attached also a religious significance to these marks. The natives of Tobi believed that their island would be destroyed if the English visitors who came among them were not at once tattooed. Only those completely marked could enter the temple. The men were more tattooed than the women, who were regarded as inferiors.

In the sixth volume of Waitz-Gerland (30-40) is gathered a large mass of evidence, all of which shows that on the Polynesian islands, too, tattooing was indulged in, not for aesthetic and amorous but for religious and practical reasons. In Tonga it was a mark of rank, not permitted to common people or to slaves. Not to be tattooed was considered improper. In the Marquesas the older and more distinguished a man, the more he was tattooed. Married women were distinguished by having marks on the right hand and left foot. In some cases tattoo marks were used as signs to call to mind certain battles or festivals. A woman in Ponapé had marks for all her successive husbands made on her arm--everything and anything, in fact, except the purpose of decorating for the sake of attracting the other sex. Gerland (33-40) makes out a very strong case for the religions origin of tattooing, which he aptly compares to our confirmation.

In Samoa the principal motive of tattooing seems to have been licentiousness. It was prohibited by the chiefs on account of the obscene practices always connected with it, and there is a legend of the incestuous designs of two divine brothers on their sister which was successful.

"Tattooing thus originated among the gods and was first practised by the children of Taaroa, their principal deity. In imitation of their example, and for the accomplishment of the same purpose, it was practised among men." (Ellis, _P.R._, I., 262.)

TATTOOING IN AMERICA

On the American continent we find tattooing practised from north to south, from east to west, for the most diverse reasons, among which the desire to facilitate courtship is never even hinted at. The Eskimos, about the age of puberty, apply paint and tattooing to their faces, cut holes and insert plugs or labrets. The object of these disfigurements is indicated by Bancroft (I., 48): "Different tribes, and different ranks of the same tribe, have each their peculiar form of tattooing." Moreover, "these operations are supposed to possess some significance other than that of mere ornament. Upon the occasion of piercing the lip, for instance, a religious feast is given." John Murdoch relates (Mallery, 396) that the wife of an Eskimo chief had "a little mark tattooed in each corner of her mouth, which she said were 'whale marks,' indicating that she was the wife of a successful whaleman." Of the Kadiaks Bancroft says (72): "The more the female chin is riddled with holes, the greater the respectability." Among the Chippewayan Indians Mackenzie found (85) that both sexes had "blue or black bars, or from one to four straight lines, on their cheeks or foreheads to distinguish the tribe to which they belong." Swan writes (Mallery, 1882-83, 67) that

"the tattoo marks of the Haidas are heraldic designs or the family totem, or crests of the wearers, and are similar to the carvings depicted in the pillars and monuments around the homes of the chiefs."

A Haida Indian remarked to Swan (69): "If you were tattooed with the design of a swan, the Indians would know your family name." It is at festivals and masquerade performances, says the same writer, that "the tatoo marks show with the best effect, and the rank and family connection [are] known by the variety of design," Lafitan reports (II., 43) regarding the Iroquois and Algonquins that the designs which they have tattooed on their faces and bodies are employed as hieroglyphics, writing, and records, to indicate victories, etc. The designs tattooed on an Indian's face or body distinguish him, he adds, as we do a family by its armorial bearings.

"In James's Long it is reported that the Omahas are often neatly tattooed.... The daughters of chiefs and those of wealthy Indians generally are denoted by a small round spot tattooed on the forehead."

(Mallery, 1888-89, 395.) Bossu says regarding the practice of tattooing by the Osages (in 1756): "It is a kind of knighthood to which they are only entitled by great actions." Blue marks tattooed upon the chin of a Mojave woman indicate that she is married. The Serrano Indians near Los Angeles had, as late as 1843, a custom of having special tattoo marks on themselves which were also made on trees to indicate the corner boundaries of patches of land. (Mallery, 1882-83, 64, 182.) In his book on the California Indians, Powers declares (109) that in the Mattoal tribe the men tattoo themselves; in the others the women alone tattoo. The theory that the women are thus marked in order that the men may be able to recognize them and redeem them from captivity seems plausible for the reasons that these Indians are rent into a great number of divisions and that "the squaws almost never attempt any ornamental tattooing, but adhere closely to the plain regulation mark of the tribe." The Hupâ Indians have discovered another practical use for body-marks. Nearly every man has ten lines tattooed across the inside of his left arm, and these lines serve as a measurement of shell-money.

The same non-esthetic motives for tattooing prevail in South and Central America. In Agassiz's book on Brazil we read (318) concerning the Mundurucu Indians:

"Major Coutinho tells us that the tattooing _has nothing to do with individual taste_, but that the pattern is appointed for both sexes, and is _invariable throughout the tribe_. It is connected with their caste, the limits of which are very precise, and with their religion."

The tattooing "is also an indication of aristocracy; a man who neglected this distinction would not be respected in his tribe." Concerning the Indians of Guiana we read in Im Thurn (195-96) that they have small distinctive tribal marks tattooed at the corners of the mouth or on the arms. Nearly all have "indelibly excised lines" which are

"scars originally made for _surgical_, not ornamental purposes." "Some women specially affect certain little figures, like Chinese characters, which looks as if some meaning were attached to them, but which the Indians are either unable or unwilling to explain."

In Nicaragua, as Squire informs us (III., 341), the natives tattooed themselves to designate by special marks the tribes to which they belonged; and as regards Yucatan, Landa writes (§ XXI.) that as tattooing was accompanied by much pain, they thought themselves the more gallant and strong the more they indulged in it; and that those who omitted it were sneered at--which gives us still another motive for tattooing--the fear of being despised and ridiculed for not being in fashion.

TATTOOING IN JAPAN

Many more similar details might be given regarding the races of various parts of the world, but the limits of space forbid. But I cannot resist the temptation to add a citation from Professor Chamberlain's article on tattooing in his _Things Japanese_, because it admirably illustrates the diversity of the motives that led to the practice. A Chinese trader, "early in the Christian era," Chamberlain tells us, "wrote that the men all tattoo their faces and ornament their bodies with designs, differences of rank being indicated by the position and size of the patterns." "But from the dawn of regular history," Chamberlain adds,

"far down into the middle ages, tattooing seems to have been confined to criminals. It was used as branding was formerly in Europe, whence probably the contempt still felt for tattooing by the Japanese upper classes. From condemned desperadoes to bravoes at large is but a step. The swashbucklers of feudal times took to tattooing, apparently because some blood and thunder scene of adventure, engraven on their chest and limbs, helped to give them a terrific air when stripped for any reason of their clothes. Other classes whose avocations led them to baring their bodies in public followed--the carpenters, for instance, and running grooms; and the tradition remained of ornamenting almost the entire body and limbs with a hunting, theatrical, or other showy scene."

Shortly after 1808 "the government made tattooing a penal offence."

It will be noticed that in this account the fantastic notion that the custom was ever indulged in for the purpose of beautifying the body in order to attract the other sex is, as in all the other citations I have made, not even hinted at. The same is true in the summary made by Mallery of the seventeen purposes of tattooing he found. No. 13 is, indeed, "to charm the other sex;" but it is "magically," which is a very different thing from esthetically. I append the summary (418):

"1, to distinguish between free and slave, without reference to the tribe of the latter; 2, to distinguish between a high and low status in the same tribe; 3, as a certificate of bravery exhibited by supporting the ordeal of pain; 4, as marks of personal prowess, particularly; 5, as a record of achievements in war; 6, to show religious symbols; 7, as a therapeutic remedy for disease; 8, as a prophylactic against disease; 9, as a brand of disgrace; 10, as a token of a woman's marriage, or, sometimes, 11, of her marriageable condition; 12, identification of the person, not as a tribesman, but as an individual; 13, to charm the other sex magically; 14, to inspire fear in the enemy; 15, to magically render the skin impenetrable to weakness; 16, to bring good fortune, and, 17, as the device of a secret society."

SCARIFICATION.

Dark races, like the Africans and Australians, do not practise tattooing, because the marks would not show conspicuously on their black skins. They therefore resort to the process of raising scars by cutting the skin with flint or a shell and then rubbing in earth, or the juice of certain plants, etc. The result is a permanent scar, and these scars are arranged by the different tribes in different patterns, on divers parts of the body. In Queensland the lines, according to Lumholtz (177),

"always denote a certain order of rank, and here it depends upon age. Boys under a certain age are not decorated; but in time they receive a few cross-stripes upon their chests and stomachs. The number of stripes is gradually increased, and when the subjects have grown up, a half-moon-shaped line is cut around each nipple."

The necessity for such distinctive marks on the body is particularly great among the Australians, because they are subdivided in the most complicated ways and have an elaborate code of sexual permissions and prohibitions. Therefore, as Frazer suggests (38),

"a chief object of these initiation ceremonies was to teach the youths with whom they might or might not have connection, and to put them in possession of a visible language, ... by means of which they might be able to communicate their totems to, and to ascertain the totems of, strangers whose language they did not understand."

In Africa, too, as we have seen, the scars are used as tribal names, and for other practical purposes. Holub (7) found that the Koranna of Central South Africa has three cuts on the chest. They confessed to him that they indicated a kind of free-masonry, insuring their being well received by Koranna everywhere. On the Congo, scarifications are made on the back for therapeutic reasons, and on the face as tribal marks. (Mallery, 417; H. Ward, 136.) Bechuana priests make long scars on a warrior's thigh to indicate that he has slain an enemy in battle. (Lichtenstein, II., 331.) According to d'Albertis the people of New Guinea use some scars as a sign that they have travelled (I., 213). And so on, _ad infinitum_.

ALLEGED TESTIMONY OF NATIVES

In face of this imposing array of facts revealing the non-esthetic character of primitive personal "decorations," what have the advocates of the sexual selection theory to say? Taking Westermarck as their most erudite and persuasive spokesman, we find him placing his reliance on four things: (1) the practical ignoring of the vast multitude of facts contradicting his theory; (2) the alleged testimony of a few savages; (3) the testimony of some of their visitors; (4) the alleged fact that "the desire for self-decoration is strongest at the beginning of the age of puberty," the customs of ornamenting, mutilating, painting, and tattooing being "practised most zealously at that period of life." Concerning (1) nothing more need be said, as the large number of decisive facts I have collected exposes and neutralizes that stratagem. The other three arguments must be briefly considered.

A native of Lukunor being asked by Mertens what was the meaning of tattooing, answered: "It has the same object as your clothes; that is, to please the women," In reply to the question why he wore his ornaments, an Australian answered Bulmer: "In order to look well and make himself agreeable to the women," (Brough Smyth, I., 275.) To one who has studied savages not only anthropologically but psychologically, these stories have an obvious cock-and-bull aspect. A native of the Caroline Islands would have been as incapable of originating that philosophical comparison between the object of our clothes and of his tattooing as he would have been of writing Carlyle's _Sartor Resartus_. Human beings in his stage of evolution never consciously reflect on the reasons of things, and considerations of comparative psychology or esthetics are as much beyond his mental powers as problems in algebra or trigonometry. That such a sailor's yarn could be accepted seriously in an anthropologic treatise shows that anthropology is still in its cradle. The same is true of that Australian's alleged answer. The Australian is unequal to the mental effort of counting up to ten, and, like other savages, is easily fatigued by the simplest questions[99]. It is quite likely that Bulmer asked that native whether he ornamented himself "in order to look well and make himself agreeable to the women," and that the native answered "yes" merely to gratify him or to get rid of the troublesome question.

The books of missionaries are full of such cases, and no end of confusion has been created in science by such false "facts." The answer given by that native is, moreover, utterly opposed to all the well-attested details I have given in the preceding pages regarding the real motives of Australians in "decorating" themselves; and to those facts I may now add this crushing testimony from Brough Smyth (_I.,_ 270):

"The proper arrangement of their apparel, the ornamentation of their persons by painting, and attention to deportment, were important only when death struck down a warrior, when war was made, and when they assembled for a corroboree. In ordinary life little attention was given to the ornamenting of the person."

MISLEADING TESTIMONY OF VISITORS

"The Australians throughout the continent scar their persons, as Mr. Curr assures us, only as a means of decoration," writes Westermarck (169), and in the pages preceding and following he cites other evidence of the same sort, such as Carver's assertion that the Naudowessies paint their faces red and black, "which they esteem as greatly ornamental;" Tuckey's assumption that the natives of the Congo file their teeth and raise scars on the skin for purposes of ornament and principally "with the idea of rendering themselves agreeable to the women;" Kiedel's assertion, that in the Tenimber group the lads decorate their locks with leaves, flowers, and feathers, "only in order to please the women;" Taylor's statement that in New Zealand it was the great ambition of the young to have fine tattooed faces, "both to render themselves attractive to the ladies, and conspicuous in war," etc.

Beginning with Curr, it must be conceded that he is one of the leading authorities on Australia, the author of a four-volume treatise on that country and its natives. Yet his testimony on the point in question happens to be as worthless as that of the most hasty globe-trotter, partly because he had evidently paid little attention to it, and partly also, I fancy, because of the fatal tendency of men of science to blunder as soon as they touch the domain of esthetics. What he really wrote (II., 275) is that Chatfield had informed him that scars were made by the natives on the right thigh "for the purpose of denoting the particular class to which they belong." This Curr doubts, "without further evidence," because it would conflict with the custom prevalent throughout the continent, "as far as known, which is to make these marks for ornament only." Now this is a pure assumption of Curr's, based on a preconceived notion, and contradicted by the specific evidence of a number of explorers who, as even Grosse is obliged to admit (75), "unanimously account for a part at least of the scars as tribal marks."[100]

If so eminent an authority as Curr can err so grievously, it is obvious that the testimony of other writers and casual observers must be accepted with extreme caution. Europeans and Americans are so accustomed to regard personal decorations as attempts to beautify the appearance that when they see them in savages there is a natural disposition to attribute them to the same motive. They do not realize that they are dealing with a most subtle psychological question. The chief source of confusion lies in their failure to distinguish between what is admired as a thing of beauty as such and what pleases them for other reasons. As Professor Sully has pointed out in his _Handbook of Psychology_ (337):

"At the beginning of life there is no clear separation of what is beautiful from what is simply pleasing to the individual. As in the history of the race, so in that of the individual, the sense of beauty slowly extricates itself from pleasurable consciousness in general, and differentiates itself from the sense of what _is personally useful and agreeable_."

Bearing in mind this very important distinction between what is beautiful and what is merely pleasing because of its being useful and agreeable, we see at once that the words "decorative," "ornamental," "attractive," "handsome," etc., are constantly used by writers on this subject in a misleading and question-begging way. We can hardly blame a man like Barrington for writing (11) that among the natives of Botany Bay "scars are, by both sexes, deemed highly ornamental"; but a scientific author who quotes such a sentence ought to be aware that the evidence did not justify Barrington in using any word but _pleasing_ in place of "ornamental," because the latter implies and takes for granted the esthetic sense, the existence of which is the very thing to be proved. This remark applies generally to the evidence of this kind which Westermarck has so industriously collected, and which, on account of this undiscriminating, question-begging character, is entirely worthless. In all these cases the fact is overlooked that the "decorations" of one sex may be agreeable to the other for reasons that have nothing to do with the sense of beauty.

Briefly summed up, Westermarck's theory is that in painting, tattooing, and otherwise decorating his person, primitive man's original and conscious object was to beautify himself for the sake of gaining an advantage in courtship; whereas my theory is that all these decorations originally subserved useful purposes alone, and that even where they subsequently may have served in some instances as means to please the women, this was not as things of beauty but indirectly and unintentionally through their association with rank, wealth, distinction in war, prowess, and manly qualities in general. When Dobrizhoffer says (II., 12) that the Abipones, "more ambitious to be dreaded by their enemies than to be loved, to terrify than attract beholders, think the more they are scarred and sunburnt, the _handsomer_ they are," he illustrates glaringly the slovenly and question-begging use of terms to which I have just referred; for, as his own reference to being loved and to attracting beholders shows, he does not use the word "handsome" in an esthetic sense, but as a synonyme for what is pleasing or worthy of approval on other grounds. If the scars of these Indians do please the women it is not because they are considered beautiful, but because they are tokens of martial prowess. To a savage woman nothing is so useful as manly valor, and therefore nothing so agreeable as the signs of it. In that respect the average woman's nature has not changed. The German high-school girl admires the scars in the face of a "corps-student," not, certainly, because she considers them beautiful, but because they stand for a daredevil, masculine spirit which pleases her.

When the Rev. R. Taylor wrote (321) that among the New Zealanders "to have fine tattooed faces was the great ambition of the young, both to render themselves attractive to the ladies and conspicuous in war," he would have shown himself a better philosopher if he had written that by making themselves conspicuous in war with their tattooing they also make themselves attractive to the "ladies." That the sense of beauty is not concerned here becomes obvious when we include Robley's testimony (28, 15) that a Maori chief's great object was to excite fear among enemies, for which purpose in the older days he "rendered his countenance as terrible as possible with charcoal and red ochre"; while in more recent times,

"not only to become more terrible in war, when fighting was carried on at close quarters, but to appear more distinguished and attractive to the opposite sex, must certainly be included"