University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology, Vol. 4, No. 6

The Religion of the Indians of California

Fundamentally the religion of the Indians of California was very similar to that of savage and uncivilized races the world over. Like all such peoples, the California Indians were in an animistic state of mind, in which they attributed life, intelligence, and especially supernatural power, to virtually all living and lifeless things. They lacked no less the ideas and practices of shamanism, the universal accompaniment of animism: namely, the belief that certain men, through communication with the animate supernatural world, had the power to accomplish what was contrary to, or rather above, the events of daily ordinary experience, which latter in so far as they were distinguished from the happenings caused by supernatural agencies, were of natural, meaningless, and, as it were, accidental origin. As in most parts of the world, belief in shamanistic power was centered most strongly about disease and death, which among most tribes were not only believed to be dispellable but to be entirely caused by shamans. In common with the other American Indians, those of California made dancing, and with it always singing, a conspicuous part of nearly all their ceremonies that were of a public or tribal nature. They differed from almost all other tribes of North America in showing a much weaker development of the ritualism, and symbolism shading into pictography, that constitute perhaps the most distinctive feature of the religion of the Americans as a whole. Practically all the approaches to a system of writing devised in North America, whether in Mexico, Yucatan, or among the tribes of the United States and Canada, are the direct outcome of a desire of religious expression. The California Indians however were remarkably free from even traces of this tendency, equally in their religion and in the more practical aspects of their life. In many parts of North America, and more often where the culture was considerably developed than where it was rude, there was a considerable amount of fetishism, not of the crass and so to speak superstitious type of Africa, but rather as an accompaniment and result of over-symbolism. This fetishistic tendency was very slightly developed in California, and this in spite ofor as an Americanist could more properly say on account ofthe generally rude and primitive condition of culture. By contrast, as the action and the visible symbol were a less important means of religious expression, the word, both spoken and sung, was of greater significance in California. The weakness of the ritualistic tendency is however again marked in the circumstance that the exact form of religious speech was frequently less regarded than its substance. In this aspect the Indians of California differed widely from such nations as the Egyptians and the peoples of Asia, where the efficacy of the word and speech used for a religious purpose was usually directly dependent upon the accuracy of their external and audible rendering, even to their pronunciation and intonation. ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 35745
Author: Kroeber, A. L. (Alfred Louis)
Release Date: Apr 1, 2011
Format: eBook
Language: English