Identifier: handbooktoethnog00brit (find matches)
Title: Handbook to the ethnographical collections
Year: 1910 (1910s)
Authors: British Museum. Dept. of British and Mediaeval Antiquities and Ethnography Joyce, Thomas Athol, 1878-1942 Dalton, O. M. (Ormonde Maddock), 1866-1945
Subjects:
Publisher: (London) : Printed by order of the Trustees
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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Mandingo, has Ijeen carried by slaves to theWest Indies, where it is known as Voodoo. Human sacrifice wasa great feature of the cult of the rojal dead and other ceremoniesin the large kingdoms of the west (Ashanti, Dahomey, &c.).Belief in a double .soul (Ewe, Tshi) and in transmigration(Banyang, Ikwe, Ibo, Yoruba) both occur. Connected withreligion are the powerful secret societies which flourish among thenegroes of this area ; many of these are very large, far transcendingthe limits of the tribe, and exercise great political power. Some ofthem (such as the Leopard society of the Mendi) make murder theirprime object. Poison ordeal and other forms of divination aregeneral. The Sudanese and Berber tribes are all Mohammedan,though the religion is debased and certain restrictions, such as theveiling of women, are neglected ; the Fula have been chieflyresponsible for the spread of this religion amongst the negroes.The use of charms is universal amongst Mohammedans and pagansalike. R 2
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iBETSIMlSARAKA A NOS V Mat C—Madatiascar. 245 Madagascar The population of the island of Madagascar has long beena puzzle to anthropologists, and the many attempts to disentanglethe various elements of which it is composed have given riseto a large number of theories which it is impossible to discussat length. The points to be noted are these:—The greater partof the population is negroid ; the language spoken over the wholeof the island and many institutions and customs are Malayo-Polynesian. A small section (Antimerina)—forming the domi-nant people in the nineteenth century—is of fairly pure Malay(or Javanese) blood, but is composed of sixteenth-centuryimmigrants, whereas the language belongs to a very early branchof the Malayo-Polynesian family. It would be natural to supposethat the negroid element was African, for in later times largenumbers of Africans have been brought over by Arabs and otherslavers ; but there are several objections to this view. In thefirst place, the

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