Childhood of Man

Ethnologists of the Smithsonian Institution agree with Pope that "the proper study of mankind is man," and that no detail is too small to be recorded. Recently, in dedication to this proposition, they offered a weighty work: The Marginal Tribes--Vol. I of their monumental Handbook of South American Indians (U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington; $2.75). In its closely printed pages, readers could study the childhood of man.

Some of the "marginal tribes" have faded into legend; some have taken a bumpy ride on the tailboard of civilization, and a few still follow their ancient way of life. Ethnologists cherish them all as significant "fossil cultures." The ancestors of modern, civilized man, they believe, also passed through comparable stages many thousands of years ago.

Difficult Primltivism. None of the people described are the "carefree savages" idealized by civilization-haters. The cultures are primitive, but the lives of the individuals are anything but simple. Since they lack effective agriculture, they have to depend on nature's stingy gifts, laboriously gathering everything even faintly edible. They hack down palms, make sawdusty flour out of the pith. They build brush dams across streams to trap fish. They pick up tiny seeds, break hard nuts with stones. They eat skunks, grasshoppers, alligators, armadillos.

Social customs among the fossil cultures have been unchanged by the progress of the rest of the world. Example: the ceremonies among some Chaco tribes when a girl reaches puberty. She cowers in a hut with a blanket over her head while long lines of older women parade around her, striking the ground with sticks, rattling bunches of deer hooves. Medicine men beat drums. Young men, masked like evil spirits, howl on the outskirts, try to break through the picket line. The coming-out party lasts a month. Then the pickets disperse; the girl throws off the blanket, takes a bath, is thenceforth considered grown up. Among the Bororos of Brazil, she moves to the bachelors' club.

Help from the Husband. Best time of life for a marginal Indian is adolescence, when responsibilities are at a minimum and chastity unusual. But soon come marriage and pregnancy. A common ceremony is the "couvade": the pregnant woman ignores her condition as best she can, while the husband secludes himself, sticks to a careful diet. At last the woman creeps into the bush, delivers her baby secretly. The husband screams in pain.

Spiritual life is intricate too, for the world is alive with gods and demons, ghosts and evil spirits. They bring disease and famine and floods. Senior spirit of the Botocudos is Maretkhmaknian, who has white hair, a red beard, and kills women by raping them. Sometimes the souls of the dead (a person may have six) turn into man-eating jaguars.

Speeding the Ghost. Most Indians believe in a life after death. But among the Caingang tribe of Brazil the souls of the dead did not want to leave this earth, and offered stout resistance. When a man died, his relatives gathered food and liquor, heaped them around the grave. The neighbors marched round & round, blowing horns, shaking rattles, screaming, and helping themselves from the punchbowl.

Experts could tell when the soul could stand no more. They gave a signal. Everyone shouted "Xogn, xogn." Then the soul was in heaven and harmless.

The Simple Onas. To find primitive virtues, the ethnologist must go all the way to the Onas, who lived in cold Tierra del Fuego. Their only clothing was a skin cape. They ate meat, seafood and fungi, washed themselves with liver. They did not drink or smoke, had determinedly rigid standards of chastity. They attached no prestige to wealth. They were free of restraints of government, seldom gathering in large groups except to eat a dead whale. They counted up to five only.

In religion the Onas were Theists, believing in a supreme god, Temaukel, who lived "beyond the stars." He was rather indifferent to worldly affairs; they did not bother much about him either.

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