Omens of War and the Promise of Prophecy

And to seal his prayer, farseeing Zeus sent down a sign.

He launched two eagles soaring high from a mountain ridge

...All were dumbstruck, watching the eagles trail from sight,

people brooding, deeply, what might come to pass...

Until the old warrior Halitherses,

Master's son, broke the silence for them:

the one who outperformed all men of his time

at reading bird-signs, sounding out the omens,

rose and spoke, distraught for each man there

– Homer, The Odyssey, 8th century BC.

Uncertainty is embedded in the practice of warfare. The potential rewards can be great, yet the cost of failure is incalculably grave. While war is a cooperative endeavor, often undertaken to benefit a larger social group, wars are fought by individual people with their own interests and motivations. The instinct of self-preservation, the anticipation of potentially disastrous consequences, and extreme feelings of fear may act as constraints on the engagement of aggressive conflict. To mitigate these limitations, cultures developed beliefs and practices to reduce the fear of warriors, and increase their willingness to fight on behalf of the group. Many such traditions purport to offer nothing less than protection and approval from the gods themselves.  

Societies throughout history have always played close attention to the clues offered by the divine. As archaeologist Bruce Trigger notes in his cross-cultural study of the kingdoms of ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Shang China, the Aztecs, Maya, Inca, and the Yoruba: “Ascertaining the will of the gods through reading omens and practicing divination was highly elaborated in all the early civilizations.” The ubiquity of these beliefs and practices, and their association with powerful and long-lasting regimes, hints towards a functional component, particularly in the domain of warfare.

Rituals play an important role in warfare across numerous societies, as anthropologist Luke Glowacki notes in a recent commentary on the cultural evolution of war rituals. Glowacki writes that,

Although cultural systems contribute to incentivizing participation [in warfare] (Glowacki & Wrangham 2013; Zefferman & Mathew 2015), humans also adopt superstitious beliefs and behaviors to overcome anxiety and fear and increase self-confidence. Warriors in numerous societies carry amulets or use drugs and alcohol to mitigate fear (Goldschmidt 1994). With astonishing frequency, many of these interventions purport to make enemies unable to see or harm the warrior.

Importantly, such beliefs and practices can reduce the perceived cost of engaging in warfare. If you believe you cannot be harmed by conventional means you may be less hesitant about participating in a raid on a rival group.

Related to the practice of rituals that reduce fear, omens and prophecy can fulfill a similar function. The uncertainty of conflict is reduced substantially if one can foretell the outcome. Across many societies, dreams, the movement of animals, the position of stars, and the proclamations of prophets were believed to offer tantalizing hints of a momentous future.

Anthropologist George Murdock, who helped compile many of the large cross-cultural databases still in use today, such as the Ethnographic Atlas and the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample, provides multiple examples across societies where omens and visions had an important role in the practice of warfare. Murdock writes that in native Samoa, before battle:

A feast is held, and the village gods are consulted by divination. If the auspices seem favorable, the war party starts out; it returns immediately, however, if any bad omen, like the squeaking of rats, is observed... By observing the behavior of the animal incarnations of the war gods, the success or failure of a military expedition can be predicted. If, for example, an owl, heron, kingfisher, or other fetish bird of a war god flies ahead of an advancing party, it is an omen of victory; if, however, it flies across the path or toward the rear, it is a bad omen, and the party immediately retreats (Murdock 81).

Often, the insight of specialized professionals is required to interpret or act on an omen. Among the Crow American Indians, Murdock writes that, “Any man may organize a war party. But he must first have a vision, or else purchase medicine and receive the details of a vision from a war shaman”. Murdock also notes that among the Haida hunter-fisher-gatherers of British Colombia, a shaman would always accompany war expeditions to read omens.

A ritual or divinatory specialist who plays a prominent role in preparing for battle is found in many societies. Anthropologists Mathies Osterle and Michael Bollig write of the importance of prophets in war planning among Pokot pastoralists of Kenya, “Before the men congregate in a huge final ritual (kokwö luk)…[they] consult a prophet (werkoyon), a ritual specialist who forecasts future events on the basis of his dreams. Only if his visions for the attack are promising will the raid go ahead.”

Among the Mursi pastoralists of Ethiopia, men with divinatory skills examine the intestines of a stock animal to predict the location and severity of future battles. Like the Samoan societies mentioned above, the flight patterns of specific birds are believed to convey information about upcoming battles. Anthropologist David Turton writes;

It is a common occurrence during the dry season for warnings to be sent to the cattle camps from the Omo by older men who “know about birds”, warnings which certainly have the effect of increasing the vigilance of the herders, and, in particular, of persuading them to engage in the irksome and generally unpopular task of scouting in the Mago Valley.

The intestines of a stock animal are examined during Mursi divination. From ‘War, Peace and Mursi Identity’ (1979) by David Turton.

The way the bird omens are responded to by Mursi men, with their increased vigilance and scouting patrols, indicates how such beliefs may promote collective action in socially important domains, such as defense in war. Absent the increased threat hinted at by the omen, men may be more inclined to shirk on scouting duty.

When it comes to the professional prophets and seers, we might expect them to be particularly perceptive individuals—or, perhaps in some cases, persuasive charlatans—with a keen ability to anticipate future events. While repeated false predictions risk a loss of credibility or faith in the omens themselves, the literal accuracy of individual predictions is less important than their ability to induce confidence in potential recruits, increasing participation and a willingness of—perhaps unwitting—self-sacrifice on the part of warriors.

In her work on the kingdom of Buganda in Uganda, anthropologist Lucy Mair describes the organizational role played by prophets and prophecy in assembling for battle. Mair writes that,

The one activity in which magic exercised a positive organizing force was warfare…[I]n the conduct of the war itself the prophet played a more influential part than the general. But it was not only over the course of the actual fighting that they predominated. The time and place of the war, the selection of the general, and probably also the districts whose inhabitants were to stay at home “to guard the king”, were decided by them in answer to inquiries.

The proclamations of prophets can also have significant propaganda value to affirm existing rulership and promise future success in conquest. Apolo Kagwa, former prime minister of the kingdom of Buganda, describes the grandiose assurances given to the new king by his obsequious priests,

Finally the king asked Kinyoro to ask all the gods to prophecy for him. The priests were brought and stood before the king. They said. “You will live longer than all the other kings. You will be the father and all your subjects will love you dearly. Love the gods. They will defend your cause. Love your kingdom and be just. You will be more prosperous than the other kings and whenever you wage war you will win.” This was the introduction of the prophets to the king. They were all given gifts and then the king left for Nakere’s for the final ceremonies.

A similar history can be found in classical Greece. Plutarch describes Alexander the Great hectoring the Oracle at Delphi until she proclaims him invincible. Afterwards, Plutarch writes that, “Alexander taking hold of what she spoke, declared he had received such an answer as he wished for, and that it was needless to consult the god any further.”

While omens and prophecies do seem to provide some social functions, they also likely come with a cost. The use of divination in making important policy or military decisions can—at least in some cases—compound uncertainty, lead to contradictory decision making, and promote an undue focus on details unrelated to making informed choices on the battlefield.

For example, classicist William Kendrick Pritchett notes in The Greek State at War (1974) that Spartan military decisions were not infrequently influenced by the capricious and contradictory whims of the gods. Pritchett writes that,

it is not difficult to find examples where an unsatisfactory omen held back [an expedition]... The project of erecting a fort on the Argive frontier in 388 B.C. was abandoned in consequence of unfavorable [sacrificial omens]. Moreover, there are three examples in Thucydides (5.54.2, 5.55.3, and 5.116) where the Spartans abandoned proposed military expeditions because the sacrifices were not right (Pritchett 113).

While this devotion to omens might seem unproductive, the fifth century BC Greek philosopher Xenophon offers a strong case for why omens should be taken seriously enough to inform decisions in times of war:

If anyone is surprised that I have so often prescribed that one should act 'with the gods', it is certain that he will be less surprised if he often comes into danger, and if he realizes that in a war enemies plot against one another but seldom know whether these plots are well-laid. It is impossible to find any other advisers in such matters except the gods. They know everything, and give signs to those they wish to through sacrifices, birds of omen, voices and dreams.

The explanation given by Xenophon points to the role of omens in dealing with uncertainty. The decision-making process in the ‘fog of war’ can be so chaotic that giving credence to the ambiguous whispers of the gods may not always harm—and in some circumstances perhaps improve—the outcome of conflict.

At the same time, the practice of interpreting omens can come with significant flexibility. Spartan kings seem to have had considerable latitude in the decision-making process, and may have sometimes used omens as a way of selectively confirming decisions that were already made. As historian Robert Parker writes in his work on Spartan religion,

Above all, if the omens from a first sacrifice were discouraging, it was the king's decision whether to perform it again in hope of something better or to abandon the enterprise. Unless there were unusually strict restrictions on the repetition of crossing-sacrifices, they would always have come right in the end for a sufficiently determined leader. Divination, therefore, left room for manoeuvre even to the pious. What mattered above all was the king's strength of will and confidence in his cause… If, therefore, a plan or expedition was abandoned because of the lesser obstacle of discouraging sacrifices, the king must either have been unusually timorous, or have felt genuine doubt whether the proposed action was wise (Parker 203).

In a recent paper illustrating how introducing some (but not too much) randomness in a network of people can actually improve coordination, sociologists Hirokazu Shirado and Nicholas Christakis describe some of the beneficial aspects of having some noise within complex systems;

Prior theoretical work has suggested a surprising, even paradoxical, solution to the coordination problem: adding “noise.”13–15 Noise is usually defined as meaningless information, and it is often seen as problematic16. When it comes to optimization, however, noise can help a system to reach a global optimum. For example, mutation has an essential role in evolution17; error can facilitate search for information18; random fish schooling may enhance survival19; and cooperation may benefit from deviant behavior7

Similarly, economist Peter Leeson’s paper on oracles demonstrates how randomizing strategies that manage to coordinate individuals’ choices (through their acceptance of the oracles decision) can help solve ‘low grade’ interpersonal conflict. Analogously, perhaps the divine assurances of omens and prophecies help coordinate activity in war, where otherwise participants may have been more hesitant to join, or scattered in the midst battle.

In addition to acting as focal points for coordination, omens and prophecies can reduce the perceived risk of engaging in conflict, embolden participants in warfare, and confer increased legitimacy to existing rulers. While the amount of noise induced by giving undue credence to omens may lead to suboptimal decision making, in some circumstances—perhaps when access to information is quite poor, as in the ‘fog of war’—the randomness effect might in fact prove beneficial.

Forbidden Utterances: Naming the Dead

All societies know grief, though how they handle it can vary significantly. One notable manner in which some cultures deal with the death of a member of their community is through name taboos; where the name of the deceased is forbidden from being spoken.

As anthropologists Lyle Steadman and Craig Palmer wrote in The Supernatural and Natural Selection (2008), “prohibitions on saying the name of a dead person, especially in front of his or her relatives, are fairly widespread.” Anthropologist James Frazer wrote that across Australian aboriginal societies, “to name aloud one who has departed this life would be a gross violation of their most sacred prejudices, and they carefully abstain from it.” Frazer adds that, “A similar reluctance to mention the names of the dead is reported of peoples so widely separated from each other as the Samoyeds of Siberia and the Todas of Southern India; the Mongols of Tartary and the Tuaregs of the Sahara; the Ainos of Japan and the Akamba and Nandi of Eastern Africa; the Tinguianes of the Philippines and the inhabitants of the Nicobar Islands, of Borneo, of Madagascar, and of Tasmania.”

Ethnographer Stephen Powers wrote of the Tolowa tribe of California that, “The Tolowa share in the superstitious reverence for the memory of the dead which is common to the Northern California tribes. When I asked the chief, Takhokolli, to tell me the Indian words for “father”, “mother”, and certain others similar, he shook his head mournfully and said, “All dead, all dead; no good”. They are forbidden to mention the names of the dead, as it is a deadly insult to the relatives; and this poor aboriginal could not distinguish between the proper names and the substantives which denote those relations [ed: Probably this is a case of miscommunication rather than an inability on the part of the chief to understand the difference between the name and the category].”

Among Australian aboriginal societies in the western district of Victoria, pieces of land were named after the family or individuals that were considered to own them, and the existence of the name taboo affected how the land was described after its owner died. James Dawson wrote that, “Should a family die out without leaving 'flesh relatives' of any degree, the chief divides the land among the contiguous families after the lapse of one year from the death of the last survivor. During that period the name of the property, being the same as the name of its last owner, is never mentioned...”

The name taboo can radically change communication after the death of an individual, particularly a prominent one, or one whose name is similar to everyday objects. Among the Apaches, anthropologist Morris Opler wrote that, “There is, first of all, a strong taboo against mentioning the name of the deceased. If it becomes necessary, for any reason, to mention his name, a phrase meaning “who used to be called” must be added.” Opler adds that, “In cases of the death of prominent men who have been named after some object or animal, that animal or object is given an alternative name or another.” And further that, “Ordinarily the names of all the children are changed when a death occurs in a family. The reason given is that the deceased called the children by these names and to repeat them now would be to evoke painful memories of the one who is gone.”

Violations of name taboos can be a significant source of conflict. Of the Apaches, Opler wrote that, “In fact, nothing is more insulting, provocative, and certain to precipitate conflict than to call out the name of a dead man in the presence of his relative. A surprising number of feuds between families have had such an origin or include such an episode in their histories.” Opler describes one such example,

In the case of one feud which I recorded, a drunken man went to undue lengths to stir up trouble. For some time he abused the man who had aroused his anger, but without causing a conflict. Then he hit upon the sure method of shouting out the name of a deceased relative of his opponent. The other man had been earnestly trying to avoid a fight to this point. Instantly his attitude changed. “You did not have to say that!” was his reply, and he reached for his weapons. In the battle which followed seven men lost their lives, and the hate that was generated then persists among the descendants of the combatants to this day.

Opler also tells an Apache story of another violation of the name taboo which is almost Shakespearian in its element of poetic revenge:

The tale recounts how some Chiricahuas, led by a certain man, raided a group of Mescalero camps. Among the prisoners taken were an old woman and a young boy, her grandson. The old woman was a robust spirit who possessed a ready tongue. She proceeded to give her captors a sound lashing with it and singled out the leader for a number of uncomplimentary remarks. She succeeded in infuriating him and brought a death sentence to herself. Her grandson escaped and made his way back to his people. He swore that some day he would meet the murderer of his grandmother face to face. When he grew to a warrior’s estate he started out on his mission of revenge. He penetrated into Chiricahua territory and wandered from camp group to camp group seeking his enemy. Finally he found the camps which this man controlled. That night he sat in the tent of this chief and listened while many men told stories of their past exploits. He stayed until this chief recounted the story of the raid he had led upon the camps of the Mescaleros. Then the young man left and procured a lance. He entered the dwelling again. By this time the other men were leaving. The Mescalero waited until all were gone and he was alone with the chief.

“Won’t you tell the story of the raid on the Mescalero camps once more?” he asked.

The chief politely began his recital again. When he paused the young man asked, “And were any killed?”

“Yes, an old woman.”

“Do you remember what she was called?”

“Yes, I believe they called her -.”

The name was the last word he ever uttered. The Mescalero youth had deliberately led the Chiricahua chief to commit this foulest of insults, and when he heard the name of his dead grandmother, in the cold fury that possessed him, he sent the lance through the older man’s heart.

The name taboos can also cause significant difficulties for anthropologists attempting to collect genealogical data. Two extended examples are reproduced here. In 1934, Morris Opler wrote of his problems during field work among the Apache;

As a result of this taboo it proved extremely difficult for me to obtain reliable genealogical material. It was considerably easier to persuade Apaches to discuss and reveal rites and ceremonies than it was to bring them to the point of talking freely of the kinship ties which had existed between them and those now dead. After considerable effort I felt sure that I had obtained a very complete genealogy from one of my best informants. This was a man who went to some little trouble to provide me with ways and means of obtaining valuable ethnological material. Once when we were passing a certain locality my friend chanced to remark that he had formerly lived near-by. When I asked him why he had moved he became glum and silent. I learned later from other sources that a child of his had died there. No mention of that child appeared in the genealogy.

Another informant, so willing and precise that he would make me read back pages of notes to him if he suspected me of missing and omitting a detail, gave me what he assured me was his full genealogy. Later I had reason to believe that he had omitted mention of a maternal uncIe, a man who had been very close to him and could not easily have been forgotten. When I questioned my informant concerning this lapse he offered a perfect Apache explanation. The man was dead, he said. Moreover, he had died a horrible death. Under the circumstances how could one be expected to call his name?

Napoleon Chagnon also faced similar problems during his fieldwork among the Yanomami. Chagnon noted that the Yanomami “have very stringent name taboos and eschew mentioning the names of prominent living people was well as all deceased friends and relatives. They attempt to name people in such a way that when the person dies and they can no longer use his or her name, the loss of the word in their language is not inconvenient.”

Chagnon gives a fairly comical description of his attempt to collect genealogies of the Yanomami and how they responded to his attempts to get around their name taboos:

They reacted to this in a brilliant but devastating manner: They invented false names for everybody in the village and systematically learned them, freely revealing to me the “true” identities of everyone. I smugly thought I had cracked the system and enthusiastically constructed elaborate genealogies over a period of some five months. They enjoyed watching me learn their names and kinship relationships. I naively assumed that I would get the “truth” to each question and the best information by working in public. This set the stage for converting my serious project into an amusing hoax of the grandest proportions. Each “informant” would try to outdo his peers by inventing a name even more preposterous or ridiculous than what I had been given by someone earlier, the explanations for discrepancies being “Well, he has two names and this is the other one.” They even fabricated devilishly improbable genealogical relationships, such as someone being married to his grandmother, or worse yet, to his mother-in-law, a grotesque and horrifying prospect to the Yanomamö. I would collect the desired names and relationships by having my informant whisper the name of the person softly into my ear, noting that he or she was the parent of such and such or the child of such and such, and so on. Everyone who was observing my work would then insist that I repeat the name aloud, roaring in hysterical laughter as I clumsily pronounced the name, sometimes laughing until tears streamed down their faces. The “named” person would usually react with annoyance and hiss some untranslatable epithet at me, which served to reassure me that I had the “true” name. I conscientiously checked and rechecked the names and relationships with multiple informants, pleased to see the inconsistencies disappear as my genealogy sheets filled with those desirable little triangles and circles, thousands of them.

My anthropological bubble was burst when I visited a village about 10 hours’ walk to the southwest of Bisaasi-teri some five months after I had begun collecting genealogies on the Bisaasi-teri. I was chatting with the local headman of this village and happened to casually drop the name of the wife of the Bisaasi-teri headman. A stunned silence followed, and then a villagewide roar of uncontrollable laughter, choking, gasping, and howling followed. It seems that I thought the Bisaasi-teri headman was married to a woman named “hairy cunt.” It also seems that the Bisaasi-teri headman was called “long dong” and his brother “eagle shit.” The Bisaasi-teri headman had a son called “asshole” and a daughter called “fart breath.”

And so on. Blood welled up to my temples as I realized that I had nothing but nonsense to show for my five months of dedicated genealogical effort, and I had to throw away almost all the information I had collected on this the most basic set of data I had come there to get. I understood at that point why the Bisaasi-teri laughed so hard when they made me repeat the names of their covillagers, and why the “named” person would react with anger and annoyance as I pronounced his “name” aloud (Chagnon, 21).

To get around these issues, Chagnon ended up interviewing children, who could generally use names without being punished, and socially marginalized individuals, who may have been less wary of violating taboos, to get accurate genealogical information from them. Chagnon ended up receiving some criticism for this tactic.

A name is more than an arbitrary designation; over time its meaning becomes indelibly associated with the character of its owner.

Taking a wife

Marriage is nominally by capture. The word “to marry” means also “to fetch” and “to catch.” – D.F. Bleek, The Naron: A Bushman Tribe of the Central Kalahari, 1928.

One of the benefits of reading 19th and early 20th century ethnographic accounts is learning about cultural traditions that, in many cases, either no longer exist, or are not commonly discussed by present-day anthropologists. Headhunting, men’s cults, ritual mutilation, and infanticide are some topics that I have covered previously. Bride capture is another practice that is highly prevalent in early ethnography, but has not been the subject of much systematic investigation by anthropologists today, so I figure it warrants further attention.

Sociologist Nguyen Thi Van Hanh offers a useful definition of the practice, writing that, “Bride capture, or bride kidnapping (also known as marriage by capture or marriage by abduction), is a form of forced marriage in which the bride is kidnapped by the groom.”

One aspect of bride capture that may surprise many readers is how prevalent the practice was among hunter-gatherer societies in the 19th and early 20th centuries. In The Bushmen of South West Africa (1920), ethnographer Louis Fourie described bride capture during intergroup conflict, writing that, “Women are never killed intentionally during the course of these feuds but it not infrequently happens that when one group overwhelms another the women are made captive and taken in marriage.” In 1930, anthropologist Isaac Schapera noted the regional pattern, writing that, “Among the North-Western Bushmen girls taken in war or found trespassing are also often held as wives by their captors.”

In 1928, anthropologist Dorothea Bleek made note of the practice of bride capture among the Naron hunter-gatherers of the Central Kalahari, writing that, “The women said, a man seizes a girl of another village, and takes her to his village, and thereby she is married, whether she likes it or not. He comes with an older man just to pay a visit and sits chatting without mentioning his purpose. They look out for a good opportunity and carry the girl off. The Bridegroom keeps watch on his bride at first, till she settles down.” Bleek described one failed attempt at bride capture:

One day, the Bushmen had collected in front of the house to give exhibitions of dancing for the purpose of photography. At mid-day we made a short interval. On coming out again, we found that all the men had gone; and were told that the huts were on fire and they had gone to put it out. We could see no sign of smoke or fire in the direction of the huts, and by and by some of the men began to trickle back, said it had been a bush fire, no huts were in danger. Later, when I was a lone with the natives, I was told what had occurred. One of the women had been at the huts with her young daughter and two Auen men from the north had turned up and tried to carry off the girl as wife for one of them. The mother lighted a fire to summon her men to her assistance. They arrived in time, and after a verbal quarrel, the would-be wife-stealer retired (Bleek, 33).

In The Uttermost Part of the Earth (1948), explorer E. Lucas Bridges wrote about the Ona hunter-gatherers of Tierra del Fuego, noting that, “Most of the marriages I knew amongst those primitive people were brought about either by conquest or by abduction.” Bridges describes one such case, where three brothers named Koh, Kaniko, and Tisico, were massacred by a neighboring band that they had previously been on good terms with, specifically because some of the men from that band wanted their wives. After they were killed and their wives were taken, Bridges writes that,

The numerous widows had cut their hair in mourning, but if the funeral and wedding bells were not intermixed, there had been hardly a pause between one and the other. The women of a party vanquished in a battue [hunt] would have been unwise to refuse to follow their new husbands when those victors had “blood in their eyes.” The fear would soon subside; women captives were wooed and made much of, to prevent them from running away. When badly treated, women took the first opportunity to give their captors the slip, though, if they were caught by their new husbands before they could get back to their own people, they ran the risk of being soundly beaten or arrowed through the legs with arrows from which the barbs had been removed—generally. A wife of long standing, if she obstinately refused to do her husband’s will, was just as likely to be thrashed or arrowed (Bridges, 223).

Bridges indicates that one of the wives may not have been entirely displeased with the outcome, however, having previously been a lower status wife to an apparently unattractive man:

Halimink, who had already had one wife, had gained a second from the massacre just described. She had been one of the wives of Koh—the third, I imagine—and her name was Akukeyohn (Afraid of Fallen Logs). I have noticed Halimink, with a mischievous grin on his face, lay unnecessary stress on the word koh [Koh, in addition to being a name, means “bone”] when speaking to Akukeyohn. She would put on a vexed, but coy, expression. Her anger was obviously only skin deep, for Halimink was a good husband to his favourite wife, and Koh had been by no means attractive (Bridges, 223).

In some circumstances, the practice of bride capture seems to be at least partially voluntary, with the potential bride herself choosing her putative captor. Though, this sort of voluntary elopement, ostensibly by capture, can cause much friction between different groups. In Life Amongst the Native Race (1884), John T. Hinkins described how one such conflict between two Australian tribes was dealt with:

A blackfellow of the Murray tribe had stolen a lubra (i.e., woman) from the Goulbourn tribe, though quite with the lubra's consent. This created a great commotion among the two tribes, and such a scene took place as I never before witnessed, nor am I likely to see again. The chief and friends of the captive girl, who was remarkably pretty, came to demand her from the hands of her captor. A meeting took place between the two tribes on a plain not far distant from my hut, and, owing to the influence my child had over them, I was permitted to attend this gathering, as they had especially invited her to be present, and I had positively refused to let her go unless I accompanied her. On arriving at the plain we found that upwards of a hundred of the two tribes had met. They placed us in a good spot for seeing all that was going on amongst them. As far as I could understand their "yabber" (talk) it was decided that the young lubra was to be given up to her friends, unless the captor, her intended husband, could stand an "ordeal " of six of her friends—her nearest relatives—endeavouring to wound or even kill him by throwing a certain number of each of their war instruments at him. He was to use no weapons to defend himself against these attacks but a shield. This ordeal seems to have been customary with them on such occasions. Six able young men were chosen, and each of them was supplied with a certain number of "spears," "nulla nullas," a kind of club, "boomerangs," and other implements of war. The captor was to stand, as far as I could judge about fifty yards distant from the warriors, and these instruments were hurled at him one at a time by the six men. If he was either killed or wounded the young lubra was to return with her friends to her own tribe, but if by his dexterity her would-be husband was able to evade all their weapons he would then rightly claim her as his bride, and she would be delivered up to him accordingly. Prior to the contest this young fellow had completely smeared himself with opossum fat till he shone like a mirror. This was no doubt, as he thought, to cause the weapons to glide off from him and also to give suppleness to his limbs. A greater sight of agility and cleverness on the part of this young aboriginal I never witnessed. Every weapon was hurled at him with unerring aim, but he cleverly disposed of them all by turning them off with his shield, stooping down or stepping aside, lifting an arm or a leg, showing how good and steady his sight must have been. One "nulla nulla" was thrown with such force that it broke his shield, which was made from the bark of a tree. He was immediately supplied with another, for they would have scorned to take advantage of his undefended state, and then with the same success he avoided all the rest of the weapons that were cast at him, not receiving a single wound. There was a great shout raised for the victor, and he was allowed to carry off his prize, who seemed greatly pleased, for she had evidently been watching the scene anxiously. Indeed, all parties appeared completely satisfied, and her friends returned home (Hinkins, 68).

In other cases, however, the practice is described as being wholly coercive and violent. In 1798, David Collins, Lieutenant Governor of the Colony of New South Wales, which was the first European settlement in Australia, described the practice of capturing wives among some native hunter-gatherer societies in the region, writing that, “[wives] are, I believe, always selected from the women of a tribe different from that of the males…and with whom they are at enmity.” Collins offers an extended description of the practice:

Secrecy is necessarily observed, and the poor wretch is stolen upon in the absence of her protectors; being first stupified with blows, inflicted with clubs or wooden swords, on the head, back, and shoulders, every one of which is followed by a stream of blood, she is dragged through the woods by one arm, with a perseverance and violence that one might suppose would displace it from its socket; the lover, or rather the ravisher, is regardless of the stones or broken pieces of trees which may lie in his route, being anxious only to convey his prize in safety to his own party, where a scene ensues too shocking to relate. This outrage is not resented by the relations of the female, who only retaliate by a similar outrage when they find it in their power. This is so constantly the practice among them, that even the children make it a game or exercise; and I have often, on hearing the cries of the girls with whom they were playing, ran out of my house, thinking some murder was committed, but have found the whole party laughing at my mistake.

Collins adds that, “The women thus ravished become their wives, are incorporated into the tribe to which the husband belongs, and but seldom quit him for another. “

In Our Primitive Contemporaries (1934), anthropologist George Murdock, who helped create many of the cross-cultural databases we still use today, such as the Human Relations Area Files, the Ethnographic Atlas, and the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample, described many bride capture practices across societies all over the world. Murdock noted that:

Among Tasmanian hunter-gatherers, “When a man was of age to marry, he usually seized a women by stealth or force from another tribe. In other words, marriage was exogamous and by capture.” (pg. 9)

Among Aranda hunter-gatherers of Australia, “A man may take a wife -- from another man -- by capture, elopement, or magic. The capture of a woman from another group usually follows the murder of her husband in blood-revenge.” (pg. 38)

Of the Crow Native Americans, Murdock writes that, “The Crows often marry women captured from hostile tribes, and under certain circumstances the stealing of women is permitted even within the tribe. The approved mode of marriage, however, is by purchase." Murdock adds, however that, "Marriages are easily terminated.  A woman may desert a husband whom she dislikes, and a man may send away his wife for infidelity or incompatibility, or even for being “cranky.”” (pg. 274)

Among the Ganda farmers of Uganda, “Although wives may be obtained by inheritance, by gift from a superior or a subordinate, or by capture from the enemy in wartime, the most usual and honorable mode of marriage is by purchase.” (pg. 538)

Among Samoan horticulturalists, Murdock notes that during warfare, “Male prisoners are slain, unless held as hostages. Sometimes, as the acme of revenge, they are cooked and certain parts of their bodies eaten. Women, however, are usually spared and distributed among their captors.” (pg. 64)

Even where bride capture is no longer conducted, elements of the practice may continue in more symbolic or ritualized form. In describing the prevalence of bride capture in Indo-European history and literature, Ruth Katz Arabagian writes that, “Like the theme of cattle raiding, the theme of bride stealing in Indo-European heroic literature appears to reflect actual practice. It is noteworthy that this practice catches the imagination so powerfully that echoes of it persist in ritual even when the actual practice is no longer sanctioned by society.”

Richard Lee notes that among the Ju/’hoansi hunter-gatherers of the Kalahari, “The Ju/'hoansi marriage ceremony involves the mock forcible carrying of the girl from her parents' hut...In fact, the “normal” Ju marriage has many aspects of marriage-by-capture.” Even though they do not practice bride capture today, these ritualized elements may represent a holdover from a previously practiced tradition. This is speculative, but it would not be surprising considering how prevalent the practice was among other Bushmen societies in the Kalahari in the past.

In The Comanches: Lords of the South Plains (1952), anthropologist E. Adamson Hoebel writes that, among the Comanche, “It was a normal pattern for a man to take as wives the younger sister or sisters of his first wife and any women he might have captured or girls who grew up as captives in the tribe.” In addition, elements of the Comanche ritual Eagle Dance also show similarities with bride captures practices:

When the smoking was over, the leader arose and, followed closely by the dancers, sneaked silently to a near-by camp to “capture” a girl. Spectators remained some distance apart. In the old days the girl had to be a captive. The girl's family made a pretense of defending their camp against the attacking party, but the "victorious raiders" carried the "captured" girl to their own camp where preparations had been made for the remainder of the ceremony…During the dance, the warriors of the girl's people rushed up and made a sham attempt to recapture her. In actual practice they rushed in and recited some coups of their own…After the "failure" of the girl's relatives to recapture her, they brought in presents, which they deposited before her in a circle (Hoebel, 205).

Of course, the abduction of wives is not exclusive to small-scale societies of the past. Sociologist Nguyen Thi Van Hanh notes its existence in larger, historical and contemporary nations as well, writing that bride capture,

is practiced in the Caucasus region (e.g., Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia), in Central and Southeast Asia (Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, China, among the Hmong community in Vietnam, Laos, etc.), in some nations in Africa (e.g., Rwanda, Ethiopia, Kenya), in South America (Chile, Mexico),and among the Roma community in Europe. In all of these areas, bride capture may be practiced throughout the country but is most common in the rural areas and in ethnic minority communities. Normally, young girls (often under 25, even as young as 8–12-years-old in some cases) are victims of bride capture. Bride capture was widely practiced throughout history and continues to be in some parts of the world today.

The Kidnapping of the Sabine Women (1574–82) by Giambologna.

In Albion’s Seed (1991), historian David Hackett Fischer mentions the practice of bride abductions among the border counties of Scotland, Ireland, and England, and how this practice continued when many ‘borderlanders’ came to America,

Marriage customs among the people of the backcountry also derived from border roots. An ancient practice on the British borders was the abduction of brides. In Scotland, Ireland and the English border counties, the old custom had been elaborately regulated through many centuries by ancient folk laws which required payment of "body price" and "honor price." Two types of abduction were recognized: voluntary abduction in which the bride went willingly but without her family's prior consent; and involuntary abduction in which she was taken by force. Both types of abduction were practiced as late as the eighteenth century. It was observed of the borderlands and Ulster during this period that “abductions, both 'under the impulse of passion and from motives of cupidity,' were frequent.”

The border custom of bridal abduction was introduced to the American backcountry. In North and South Carolina during the eighteenth century, petitioners complained to authorities that "their wives and daughters were carried captives" by rival clans (Fischer, 367).

Fischer also writes that, “Even future President of the United States Andrew Jackson took his wife by an act of voluntary abduction,” providing an extended description:

Rachel Donelson Robards was unhappily married to another man at the time. A series of complex quarrels followed, in which Rachel Robards made her own preferences clear, and Andrew Jackson threatened her husband Lewis Robards that he would “cut his ears out of his head.” Jackson was promptly arrested. But before the case came to trial the suitor turned on the husband, butcher knife in hand and chased him into the canebreak. Afterward, the complaint was dismissed because of the absence of the plaintiff--who was in fact running for his life from the defendant. Andrew Jackson thereupon took Rachel Robards for his own, claiming that she had been abandoned. She went with Jackson willingly enough; this was a clear case of voluntary abduction. But her departure caused a feud that continued for years (Fischer, 367).

To conclude, if you have read some of my previous articles: in particular, The Behavioral Ecology of Male Violence, On secret cults and male dominance, and my post on Yanomami warfare, the prevalence of bride capture practices across cultures is probably unsurprising to you. Further, the decline of these sort of practices in small-scale societies – why you don’t see them as often today – may be unsurprising if you’ve read my piece on The sad and violent history of ‘peaceful’ societies, and my post on The Complicated Legacy of Colonial Contact. If not, I’d recommend you check those pieces out, as I think they help flesh out the historical, evolutionary, and ecological logic behind the ebb and flow of bride capture practices, and other similar institutions.

The Cause of Illness

Nowhere is the duality of natural and supernatural causes divided by a line so thin and intricate, yet, if carefully followed up, so well marked, decisive, and instructive, as in the two most fateful forces of human destiny: health and death…by far the most cases of illness and death are ascribed to [sorcery] - Bronislaw Malinowski, Magic, Science, and Religion, 1925.

In The Afterlife is Where We Come From (2004), anthropologist Alma Gottlieb describes her fieldwork among the Beng farmers of West Africa. In this book, Gottlieb recounts her failure to persuade Beng villagers to boil their drinking water;

During our stays in Beng villages, Philip and I have always either boiled or filtered our own drinking water. To our dismay, our neighbors often derided our laborious efforts. One day we thought to explain our mysterious actions. The village had been experiencing an especially crippling outbreak of Guinea worm. After reading about the disease, Philip and I were convinced that polluted drinking water was the cause of our neighbors’ misery. We urged our friends to boil their water as protection against future infestation. But even our closest and most open-minded friends dismissed our suggestion with casual laughter.

“Can you see the worms in our water?” our friend Yacouba challenged us. We admitted we couldn’t.

“There’s nothing wrong with the water,” he insisted. “Anyway, even if the Guinea worms come to us through the water, they’re put there by witches.” Yacouba added emphatically, “Boiling the water wouldn’t stop the witches.” (Gottlieb, 189).

There are a few interesting elements to this passage.

First, there is the belief, common across cultures, that illness is due to witchcraft or sorcery. I discussed this in my last blog post, where I wrote that,

Sorcery beliefs can be used to understand the world, seeking out causes of uncertain events, and may [also] be embraced by self-interested parties to scapegoat enemies and promote collective violence. Functioning as a legal system, a practical tool of manipulation and control, a social philosophy, and a conceptual framework for understanding the world, sorcery beliefs have been a fundamental component of human societies the world over.

Second, while Yocouba’s position may seem absurd to many educated Westerners, his logic seems to me no less sound than that of Gottlieb. Gottlieb posits invisible worms causing disease in the water, while Yocouba posits invisible magic causing the sickness. In both cases, each of them are working from the body of knowledge they have inherited from their society. Further, in his objection to Gottlieb’s assertion that worms are causing the disease outbreak, Yocouba is making a distinction between levels of causation that, in many cases, is quite an important one. Namely that, even if it’s true that worms are causing the disease outbreak, that would only be the proximate cause, in contrast to what he asserts is the ultimate cause: withcraft.

Now, obviously we know that Gottlieb’s explanation comes from centuries of empirical work demonstrating the existence of disease causing parasites, but the point is, no less than Yocouba’s sorcery beliefs, Gottlieb (and us) have inherited this knowledge, not generated it independently.

In other words, it is not that Gottlieb’s logic here is superior to that of Yocouba’s, it’s that the body of knowledge she has inherited was generated through the rigors of the scientific method. It is information that we are fortunate indeed to have inherited, and that none of us could have come up with on our own. As anthropologists Robert Boyd, Joseph Henrich, and Peter Richerson write in ‘The cultural evolution of technology’ (2013);

Isaac Newton remarked that if he saw farther it was because he stood on the shoulders of giants. For most innovations in most places at most times in human history, innovators are really midgets standing on the shoulders of a vast pyramid of other midgets. Historians of technology believe that even in the modern world the evolution of artifacts is typically gradual, with many small changes, often in the wrong direction. Nonetheless, highly complex adaptations arise by cultural evolution even though no single innovator contributes more than a small portion of the total.

The third and final element of Gottlieb’s anecdote that I find interesting is the dilemma anthropologists face in trying to ‘change’ the culture they study. There are obvious and sad public health implications to the refusal of Yocouba and other Beng villagers to boil their water, and the difficulties of persuasion in this kind of context can come at a severe cost to the population in question. I think a comparable issue in the United States would be opposition to vaccines.

Persuasion is more than simply being right; you have to understand the attitudes and social contexts people’s beliefs come from (and even when you do have such knowledge, it may not be enough, as we can see with Dr. Gottlieb's difficulties among the Beng). As psychologists Michele J. Gelfand and Joshua Conrad Jackson write, “many studies have shown that people often rely on intersubjective consensus to a greater extent than objective information.” One of main virtues of the scientific method is the manner of subjecting the intersubjective consensus to falsification, with ideas continuously tested and retested, which has led to a more accurate understanding of the causes of death and disease. As I wrote in my last article at Quillette, you can see this reflected in the substantial decline in infant and child mortality throughout the world over the last few decades, due in no small part to the expansion of vaccinations and effective sanitation practices.

The knowledge passed down that provides us with a more accurate picture of the causes of sickness came about through a cultural evolutionary process that we are the fortunate beneficiaries of.