Section 9. Spittle tabooed.
THE SAME fear of witchcraft which has led so many people to hide
or destroy their loose hair and nails has induced other or the same
people to treat their spittle in a like fashion. For on the principles of
sympathetic magic the spittle is part of the man, and whatever is
done to it will have a corresponding effect on him. A Chilote Indian,
who has gathered up the spittle of an enemy, will put it in a potato,
and hang the potato in the smoke, uttering certain spells as he
does so in the belief that his foe will waste away as the potato dries
in the smoke. Or he will put the spittle in a frog and throw the
animal into an inaccessible, unnavigable river, which will make the
victim quake and shake with ague. The natives of Urewera, a
district of New Zealand, enjoyed a high reputation for their skill in
magic. It was said that they made use of people's spittle to bewitch
them. Hence visitors were careful to conceal their spittle, lest they
should furnish these wizards with a handle for working them harm.
Similarly among some tribes of South Africa no man will spit when
an enemy is near, lest his foe should find the spittle and give it to a
wizard, who would then mix it with magical ingredients so as to
injure the person from whom it fell. Even in a man's own house his
saliva is carefully swept away and obliterated for a similar
reason. 1
If common folk are thus cautious, it is natural that kings and chiefs
should be doubly so. In the Sandwich Islands chiefs were attended
by a confidential servant bearing a portable spittoon, and the
deposit was carefully buried every morning to put it out of the reach
of sorcerers. On the Slave Coast, for the same reason, whenever a
king or chief expectorates, the saliva is scrupulously gathered up
and hidden or buried. The same precautions are taken for the same
reason with the spittle of the chief of Tabali in Southern Nigeria. 2
The magical use to which spittle may be put marks it out, like
blood or nail-parings, as a suitable material basis for a covenant,
since by exchanging their saliva the covenanting parties give each
other a guarantee of good faith. If either of them afterwards
foreswears himself, the other can punish his perfidy by a magical
treatment of the purjurer's spittle which he has in his custody. Thus
when the Wajagga of East Africa desire to make a covenant, the
two parties will sometimes sit down with a bowl of milk or beer
between them, and after uttering an incantation over the beverage
they each take a mouthful of the milk or beer and spit it into the
other's mouth. In urgent cases, when there is no time to spend on
ceremony, the two will simply spit into each other's mouth, which
seals the covenant just as well. 3
