James Frazer - The Golden Bough - A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 09 of 12)

Demons in the Philippines and in Melanesia.

Speaking of the natives of the Philippine Islands a writer observes that “the basis of all the superstitious beliefs of the Negritos, what might else be termed their religion, is the constant presence of the spirits of the dead near where they lived when alive. All places are inhabited by the spirits. All adverse circumstances, sickness, failure of crops, unsuccessful hunts, are attributed to them.” 257 257 W. A. Reed, Negritos of Zambales (Manilla, 1904), p. 65 ( Ethnological Survey Publications , vol. ii. Part i.). As to the Melanesians of New Britain we read that “another deeply rooted belief which exercises an extraordinary influence on the life and customs of these people is a belief in demons. To their thinking the demons, tambaran (a word synonymous with ‘poor wretch,’ ‘sufferer’) are spirits entirely perverse, deceitful, maleficent, and ceaselessly occupied in injuring us. Diseases, death, the perturbations of nature, all unfortunate events are imputed to them. The demons exist in legions; they live everywhere, especially in the forests, desert places, and the depths of the sea.” 258 258 Mgr. Couppé “En Nouvelle-Poméranie,” Les Missions Catholiques , xxiii. (1891) pp. 355 sq. The beliefs and customs of one particular tribe of this great island – the Livuans, who occupy the eastern coast of the Gazelle Peninsula in New Britain – have been described by a Catholic missionary in similar terms. “The distrustful natives,” he tells us, “have not attained to a belief in a beneficent, compassionate deity. All the more numerous, however, are the evil spirits with which they people the universe. These are legion. The power which the natives ascribe to these spirits extends not merely to the property of mankind but also to life and death. The Livuan always believes that he can trace the pernicious influence of these tambaran (devils) on his actions. In his conviction, the whole thoughts and endeavours of the evil spirits have no other object than to injure men in every possible way. This dismal, comfortless superstition weighs heavy on the native.” 259 259 P. A. Kleintitschen, Die Küstenbewohner der Gazellehalbinsel (Hiltrup bei Münster, preface dated 1906), pp. 336 sq. Compare Joachim Graf Pfeil, Studien und Beobachtungen aus der Südsee (Brunswick, 1899), p. 159; id. , in Journal of the Anthropological Institute , xxvii. (1898) pp. 183 sq. Again, another writer who lived for thirty years among the Melanesians of the Bismarck Archipelago, of which New Britain forms part, observes that “we often find the view expressed that the native is a being who lives only for the day, without cares of any kind. The view is very erroneous, for in fact he leads a life which is plagued by cares of all sorts. Amongst the greatest plagues of his life is his bottomless superstition. He sees himself surrounded at every step by evil spirits and their influences. He trusts nobody, for who knows whether his nearest neighbour, his professedly best friend, is not plotting to bring trouble, sickness, and even death on him by means of magic? Everywhere he sees snares set for him, everywhere he scents treachery and guile. We need not wonder, therefore, that mistrust is a leading feature in the character not only of the New Britons, but of the Melanesians generally… The native is simply not accessible to rational motives. The only motive he understands is sorcery on the part of malicious men or the influence of evil spirits.” 260 260 R. Parkinson, Dreissig Jahre in der Südsee (Stuttgart, 1907), pp. 120, 121.

Demons in Dutch New Guinea and German New Guinea.

A Dutch missionary, who spent twenty-five years among the natives of Dutch New Guinea, tells us that “in their ignorance of a living God the Papuans people earth and air, land and sea with mysterious malignant powers, which take up their abode in stones and trees or in men and cause all kinds of misfortunes, especially sickness and death.” 261 261 J. L. van Hasselt, “Die Papuastämme an der Geelvinkbai (Neu-guinea),” Mitteilungen der Geographischen Gesellschaft zu Jena , ix. (1891) p. 98. As to Mr. van Hasselt's twenty-five years' residence among these savages, see id. , p. 22. Again, speaking of the Bukaua, a tribe of German New Guinea, a German missionary writes that “the Bukaua knows himself to be surrounded by spirits ( balum ) at every step. An insight into the life and mode of thought of the natives, as the latter is expressed especially in their stories, confirms this view completely. What wonder that the fear of spirits dominates the whole existence of the Bukaua and causes him to tremble even in the hour of death? There are spirits of the beach, the water, the fields, the forests, spirits that reside in the villages and particular places, and a sort of vagabonds, who can take up their abode even in lifeless things.” Then after describing the demons of the beach, the water, and the field, the writer proceeds as follows: “Of forest spirits the number is infinite; for it is above all in the mysterious darkness, the tangled wildernesses of the virgin forest that the spirits love to dwell. They hold their meetings in what are called evil places. They are never bent on good. Especially at nightfall the native fancies he hears the voice of the spirits in the hum and chirping of the insects in the forest. They lure hunting dogs from the trail. They make wild boars rabid; in the form of snakes they make inroads into human dwellings; they drive men crazy or into fits; they play roguish tricks of all sorts.” 262 262 Stefan Lehner, “Bukaua,” in R. Neuhauss's Deutsch Neu-Guinea , iii. (Berlin, 1911) pp. 414-416.

Demons in British New Guinea.

Among the tribes who inhabit the south-eastern coasts of New Guinea “a death in a village is the occasion of bringing plenty of ghosts to escort their new companion, and perhaps fetch some one else. All night the friends of the deceased sit up and keep the drums going to drive away the spirits. When I was sleeping one night at Hood Bay, a party of young men and boys came round with sticks, striking the fences and posts of houses all through the village. This I found was always done when any one died, to drive back the spirits to their own quarters on the adjacent mountain tops. But it is the spirits of the inland tribes, the aborigines of the country, that the coast tribes most fear. The road from the interior to Port Moresby passed close to our house, and the natives told us that the barking of our English dog at night had frightened the evil spirits so effectually that they had had no ghostly visitors since we came. I was camping out one night in the bush with some coast natives, at a time when a number of the natives of the interior were hunting in the neighbourhood; noticing that the men with me did not go to sleep, I asked if they were afraid of the mountain men. ‘No,’ they replied, ‘but the whole plain is full of the spirits who come with them.’ All calamities are attributed to the power and malice of these evil spirits. Drought and famine, storm and flood, disease and death are all supposed to be brought by ‘Vata’ and his hosts.” 263 263 W. G. Lawes, “Notes on New Guinea and its Inhabitants,” Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society , 1880, p. 615.

Demons in Timor and Celebes.

The inhabitants of Timor, an island to the south-west of New Guinea, revere the lord of heaven, the sun, the mistress of the earth, and the spirits of the dead. “These last dwell, some with the mistress of the earth under ground, others on graves, others in stones and springs and woods, some on mountains and some in the habitations of their kinsfolk, where they take up their abode in the middle of the principal post of the house or in copper cymbals, in swords and pikes. Others again assume the shape of pigs and deer and bees; men who have fallen in battle love especially to turn into bees, that they may roam over the earth at will. The ghosts who reside with the mistress of the earth are male and female, and their offspring swarm by myriads in the air, so that the people think you cannot stir without striking against one of them. According to their whim of the moment the ghosts are good or bad.” “All diseases which are not due to infection or transmitted by inheritance are ascribed to the mistress of the earth, to the ghosts, and to their wicked offspring, who inflict them as punishments for insults and injuries, for insufficient food, for the killing of deer and of wild pigs, in which the ghosts take up their abode temporarily, and also for the sale of cymbals, swords and pikes, in which a ghost had settled.” 264 264 J. G. F. Riedel, “Die Landschaft Dawan oder West-Timor,” Deutsche geographische Blätter , x. 278 sq. The natives of Amboyna think that “woods, mountains, trees, stones, indeed the whole universe, is inhabited by a multitude of spirits, of whom many are the souls of the dead.” 265 265 G. W. W. C. Baron van Hoëvell, Ambon en meer bepaaldelijk de Oeliasers (Dordrecht, 1875), p. 148. In Bolang Mongondo, a district of Celebes, “all calamities, great and small, of whatever kind, and by whatever name they are called, that befall men and animals, villages, gardens and so forth, are attributed to evil or angry spirits. The superstition is indescribably great. The smallest wound, the least indisposition, the most trifling adversity in the field, at the fishing, on a journey or what not, is believed by the natives to be traceable to the anger of their ancestors. The superstition cripples every effort to remedy the calamities except by sacrifice. There is perhaps no country the inhabitants of which know so little about simples as Bolang Mongondo. What a native of Bolang Mongondo calls medicine is nothing but sacrifice, magic, and talismans. And the method of curing a sick man always consists in the use of magic, or in the propitiation of angry ancestral spirits by means of offerings, or in the banishment of evil spirits. The application of one or other of these three methods depends again on the decision of the sorcerer, who plays a great part in every case of sickness.” 266 266 N. P. Wilken en J. A. Schwarz, “Het heidendom en de Islam in Bolaang Mongondou,” Mededeelingen van wege het Nederlandsche Zendelinggenootschap , xi. (1867) p. 259.