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SavioursA. M. HocartPublished online: 30 Jan 2012.

To cite this article: A. M. Hocart (1936) Saviours, Folklore, 47:2, 183-189, DOI:10.1080/0015587X.1936.9718636

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S A V I O U R S

BY A. M. HOCART

IN m a n y countries, especially in Africa, there is a rule t h a t

only the sons born to a king after his consecration can suc­

ceed to the throne (e.g. Johnson, History of the Yoruba, 8 f.).

More commonly sons born before the consecration are

al lowed to succeed. E v e n then a special sanct i ty or prestige

at taches to sons born after the coronation. Hence such

titles as the B y z a n t i n e Porphyrogenitus, " Born-in-the-

Purp le ." If a Sinhalese k ing was born from the w o m b of an

anointed queen the inscriptions are careful t o l a y stress on

the. fac t (Epigraphia Zeylanica, i. 49, 98, etc.) . T h e k ing is merely one species of the genus Head-of - the-

R i t u a l . H e is the head of the national ritual. Minor

r i tuals h a v e minor heads. Is the a b o v e rule t h a t only sons

born after installation can succeed peculiar to the species,

or is it c o m m o n to the genus ?

T h e father is head of the fami ly cult . N o son can succeed

to the headship of the fami ly w h o w a s b o r n before his

parents had gone through the sacrament o f marriage. In

Western Europe this rule has recent ly been r e l a x e d : bas ­

tards are allowed to succeed to the fami ly name and es tate

prov ided the parents m a r r y subsequent ly . T h e marr iage

has been m a d e retrospective, b u t still there m u s t b e a

marriage, or there is no succession.

T h e po int of this insistence is not v e r y obvious in this c o u n t r y where the household cu l t has disappeared com­plete ly , or survives only in the a t tenuated form of family prayers . It is v e r y obvious in countries where the household

cult is in full v igour. In India a man and a woman by marriage come into possession of a fami ly hearth. At their

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Saviours

wedding they are king and queen (Kingship, ch. v i i i . ) .

Thereafter they preside over the family cult , as the k i n g

does over the state cult. So much so that the S a n s k r i t pati means both king and husband. T h e Siamese k i n g is f a t h e r

of the country as the householder is father of the h e a r t h

(Quaritch Wales, Siamese Government, 1 7 , 1 0 3 ) .

One rule thus covers both cases : " A man m a y n o t suc­

ceed to a dignity unless he was born while his fa ther h e l d

it " ; or better, " A man cannot procreate offspring fit t o

carry out a ritual until he himself has been consecrated t o

carry out that ritual." W e should perhaps ge t still nearer

to the fundamentals if we said : " A son cannot a t t a i n t o

a life to which his father had not attained before t h e s o n

was born." For the ritual confers life, and each s tep in t h e

ritual confers a higher life than that before (my " P r o g r e s s

of M a n , " 163, and " T h e Purpose of R i t u a l , " Folk-Lore,

vol . x lv i . 1935, P- 343)-

Since it is the aim of science to reduce as m a n y f a c t s t o

as few principles as possible it would be a dist inct a c h i e v e ­

ment if we could show that all ritual comes under th i s

rule.

L e t us begin w i th the first step, the b ir th c e r e m o n y .

Infants cannot procreate, and so we cannot tes t t h e rule

unless the ceremony is omitted or delayed. B u t such cere­

monies are seldom omitted, because they are s imple a n d so

cheap, and because they are women's rites, and w o m e n

cling to them. There are people who are not b a p t i z e d , b u t

t h e y are children of unbelievers, who do not care a j o t a b o u t

the ritual and its rules. T h e Church does care v e r y m u c h ,

however, and y e t it does not prohibit the child of a n un-

bapt i zed man from being bapt ized. O n the contrary it is

only too pleased to bapt ize h im in order to save h im. T h e

rule does not then app ly in this country , b u t neither does

the rule about the king's son, and that a b o u t the ord inary

man's son is relaxing. This is not then a v e r y good c o u n t r y

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Saviours 185 in which to test the rule. It would be interesting to know

w h a t happens in countries where birth ceremonies are taken

v e r y seriously.

P u b e r t y initiation is the next step. A n uninitiated b o y

is often old enough to procreate. H e is generally forbidden

to do so, b u t supposing he breaks the rule w h a t will be the

consequence for his child ? According to the rule we laid

d o w n t h a t child should be incapable of initiation, he should

remain an outcaste . H e was born before his father w a s

m a d e into a man, so he can never become a full man. T h a t

is e x a c t l y w h a t happens in India. There is a t ime l imit

there for the initiation of a twice-born. If he is not init iated

b y a certain age he becomes a V r a t y a " deprived of the

morning prayer (gayatri), and despised b y the aristocracy."

(Manu, ii. 39.) T h e sons of V r a t y a s cannot b y initiation

recover their fathers' lost status of Twice-born, b u t remain

outs ide the pale (Manu, x . 2 0 ff.).

In India then our rule holds good for initiation. It is to

b e hoped t h a t observers will look out for cases elsewhere,

for t h e y are necessarily scarce.

O u r first impulse is to pass over death rites, since a dead

m a n cannot procreate. T h a t is a mis take : there are cases

of dead men beget t ing offspring. T h e r e is, for instance, the

sacred marriage of Isis and the dead Osiris from w h i c h

Horus was born to avenge his father on the adversary Se t

and to reign in his stead. For those w ho still bel ieve m y t h s

to b e pure fantasy , not records of facts , there is the sacred

marriage of the queen and the dead horse in the V e d i c

horse-sacrifice. T h a t is fact , not m y t h . T h e horse is iden­

tified b o t h w i t h her l iv ing lord, the king, and w i t h the god

V a r u n a , w h o reigns b o t h in heaven and in the underworld

(Satapatha Brahmana, xiii . 5 , 2, 2 ; Taittiriya Brahmana, iii. 9 , 17, 4 ) . Unfor tunate ly there is only one case (to m y

knowledge) where the results of such a union are k n o w n :

the Queen K a u s a l y a becomes pregnant wi th the god Vi shnu

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Saviours

in consequence ; he is born as R a m a (Ramayana, Gorres io 'g

ed., i. 12, 3 4 ; Muir's Sanskrit Texts, iv. 171). R a m a is n o t an ordinary k i n g ; he is an avatar, t h a t is one of t h o s e

manifestations Vishnu assumes in order to come d o w n i n t o

the world to smite the demons and save the world.

T h u s where it seemed most absurd to seek the rule , i t

holds good. A dead king is higher than a live k ing , a n d so

the son of a dead king can rise to a station a b o v e t h a t of

kings, to be what we m a y call a hero or a saviour.

It is worth while making a search for more ins tances .

A m o n g the kings of Ceylon two stand out a b o v e the o t h e r s

as the saviours of the Sinhalese nation. Popu lar t r a d i t i o n

has remodelled their lives to some extent on the p a t t e r n of

myth ica l heroes. T h e first, Dut thagamani , in the first c e n ­

tury B.C., is born after a visit of his mother to a d y i n g m o n k ;

he is the monk reborn (Mahavamsa, xxi i . ) . H e is to b e t h e

future Buddha . T h e second one, P a r a k r a m a B a h u I

(tenth century-twelfth century A.D.) is born of the s a c r e d

marriage of the queen and a live elephant, b u t a d r e a m o n e

(Mahavamsa, lxii). B o t h cases come near to our requirements b u t not q u i t e .

W e have to go to Mexico for a perfect example . B r a s s e u r

de Bourboufg's Popol Vuh tells us at great l ength h o w t h e

virgin daughter of a king, apparent ly of the U n d e r w o r l d ,

conceived from the spittle dropped into her hand b y t h e

head of a man destroyed b y her father. She g ives b i r t h t o

twins who grow up to avenge their father and rid the world of demons. T h e y are of the nature of saviours or avengers , ,

W h e n we go into the details of the career of these t w i n s

we find t h a t t h e y fit in remarkably w i th L o r d R a g l a n ' s

pattern of the hero, as will be seen in the fol lowing ana lys i s

in which I h a v e kept his numbers for comparison (see Folk'

Lore, vo l . x lv . , 1934, p.' 212) . I g ive in brackets the p a g e

of the Popol-Vnh, , •

M I . Their mother is a roya l virgin. Her father is obyi-;

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Saviours 187 ously king of the Underworld, and so Ximenes takes h im to

be (91). 2. T h e story opens w i th the pedigree of the father. I t

traces h im b a c k to the Creator and the Creatr ix (cxviii . 5,

21, 23, 69). 4. T h e father is killed b y the future mother's people.

His head drops sal iva into her hand, whereupon she con­

ceives.

5. See 2. 6A. A n a t t e m p t is m a d e to destroy the mother, b u t a

subst i tute is produced for her heart (97).

7. She goes to the home of the father of her children and

gives birth to twins.

6B. Their elder brothers seek to destroy t h e m (107). 10. W h e n they grow up they perform miracles and gain

their father's regalia (119 ff., 129 ff.).

11 . T h e y are challenged to a g a m e of ball b y their

mother's people. T h e y go to the U n d e r w o r l d where t h e y

are exposed to various ordeals, b u t tr iumph. In the end

however t h e y are p u t to death b y burning. T h e y are

reborn wi th greater miraculous powers and destroy their

mother's people b y the same means as M e d e a used aga ins t

Pelias.

1 5A. T h e n they rid the world of demons.

These facts suggest the following h y p o t h e s i s : L o r d

R a g l a n ' s hero is a super-king, a saviour, born of a d e a d king .

T h a t is inconsistent w i th one i tem in his p a t t e r n : he

bel ieves it to be part of the original pat tern t h a t the hero

s lays his own father on coming of age.

I th ink here L o r d R a g l a n has been misled b y the m y t h

which he took as his start ing point, t h a t of (Edipus . T h e r e

the hero (and saviour of Thebes) does kill his o w n f a t h e r ;

b u t in the major i ty of m y t h s he is his father's avenger.-

F r o m E g y p t eastwards it is not his father the hero s lays or

defeats, b u t his mother's brother. T h e struggle is b e t w e e n

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the hero and his mother's people, or with his fu ture wife's,

people, which in a cross-cousin system is all the s a m e . I t

is a part of the dual organization (Progress of Man, 240 ff.).

B u t w h y , it m a y be asked, should the Orienta l v e r s i o n b e

the original one ? w h y not the Greek ? B e c a u s e i t is e a s y

to explain the facts on the first hypothesis , imposs ible , a s

far as I can see, on the second. Can a n y b o d y s u g g e s t a

plausible w a y in which the father could h a v e been a l t e r e d

to the mother's brother ? O n the other hand w e k n o w t h a t

the men of the mother's generation on her side do g e t con­

fused wi th the men of the father's generation on his s i d e ;

the " uncles " get confused wi th the " fathers " . I h a v e

seen the mother's side confused wi th the father's e v e n in

that- highly cross-cousin region, Fiji , especial ly a m o n g

children. T h u s it becomes impossible to tell w h e t h e r t h e

" father " of the m y t h is on the mother's side or the father's,

unless the genealogy is preserved. L e t the t e r m f a t h e r

become narrowed down to the progenitor, and the m o t h e r ' s

brother is mistaken for the father. I have produced f a i r l y

good evidence, I think, in the Ceylon Journal of Science, Section G., that such has been the history of Greek k i n s h i p ,

t h a t it has developed, like all A r y a n kinship sys tems , o u t of

a classificatory system, u l t imate ly out of one w h i c h dis­

tinguished the mother's side from the father's. (Progress of

Man, 264.)

T h e point is important , because the psycho-ana lys t s h a v e

made great capital out of the CEdipus m y t h . I t w o u l d serve

them right if it turned out t h a t originally it w a s n o t t h e

father, b u t the mother's brother, t h a t w a s killed, for t h e y

will rush into history w i t h o u t ever consulting the c o m p a r a ­

t ive historian.

W e can now sum up our results and Lord R a g l a n ' s as

in the following hypothesis , subject to further veri f icat ion :

I. E a c h sacrament confers-a higher life and power (Pro-

gress of Man, 188). A m a n cannot normal ly a t ta in to a,

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degree of life not reached by his predecessor (I say normally because there are always accommodations). The highest degree can only be reached by the son of one who has reached the highest, namely the death rites.

II. A king can be put to death by the other side of a dual society. His posthumous son will have power above all other living men. He is the man of destiny, the avenger, and saviour. He conforms to the pattern sketched by Lord Raglan except that it is his mother's people, the other side of the dual society, which he smites, not his father.

A. M. HOCART

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