PRIMITIVE MAN AND ENVIRONMENT 165
an individual and a given locality lies at the bottom of the idea of property in land.^ At any rate, it is remarkable that we find what our sources refer to as "property" in land at rf stage ol social evo- lution in which there can be no economic meaning whatever attached to this idea. At the initiation ceremony of the Yaraikanna tribe (Cape York) with each blow the name of one of the "coun- tries" owned by the lad's mother, by her father or by any other relative, is mentioned. These names are given in order, and the country whose name is mentioned when the tooth breaks away is the land to which the lad will belong.^ On the Pennefather River when a child is bom the grandmother takes the afterbirth away and buries it in the sand, marking the situation by a number of twigs which are stuck in the ground and tied together at their tops, forming a structure resembling in shape a cone. It is from these places that Anjea (a spirit) takes the choi (the vital essence which resides in the afterbirth) and conveys it to one of the la- goons or rocks which are regarded as his haunts. It is here that he stores up a sufficient supply of choi for the formation of new babies. When the navel-string is cut by the grandmother the diflfer- ent haunts of Anjea are called out and the name mentioned at the moment of breaking off tells them whence the choi was brought. This part of the country, and not the place where the child was actually born, will in the future be regarded as its "home", as tlie place where it has a right to hunt and roam.» The parallelism between the Proserpine River and Central Australia lies in the circumstance that a special mystic connection is sup-
> For the exposition of this view I must refer to my article "Der Ur- sprung des Eigentumsbegriffes" to be published in the InUmationaUi Arckw fur Etknografkie. See also B. Malinowski: The Family among the Australian Aborigines, 1913, p. 153.
» A. C. Haddonr Reports of the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits, 1904, V, p. 221.
> W. E. Roth: Superstition Magic and Medicine. North Queensland Etkno- grafh. Bull V, 1903, p. 182. This perhaps is the explanation of how the Greek "Omphaloi" came to be represented by a stone in the shape of a cone which has no similarity whatever to a human navel. Such stones were perhaps ori- ginally erected over the place where the placenta had been buried; hence their similarity to gravestones. These places would then come to be regarded as "navels" of the earth. Cf. W, H. R. Roscher: "Omphalos". Abh. d. PhiL- Hist. KlMse der KSnigl, Sacks. Ges. d. Wiss., 1913, Bd. XXIX, No. IX; Idem: Neue Omphalosstudien, iSid., 1915, Bd. XXXI, No. I; Meringer: "Omphalos, Nabel und Nebel". fV<frter und Sachen, V, S. 43—91.
