Edward Burnett Tylor

“ Even the covenant among many ancient and modern nations by the parties mixing their blood or drinking one another’s is in itself only a solemn rite of union, not an oath proper, unless some such ceremony is introduced as dipping weapons into the blood, as in the form among the ancient Scythians (Herod. iv. 70) ; this, by bringing in the idea of death befalling the covenant-breaker, converts the proceeding into an oath of the strongest kind. The custom of swearing by weapons, though frequent in the world, is far from consistent in meaning. ”

“ To modern views, a bear or a tiger seems at any rate a more rational being to appeal to than a river or the sun, but in the earlier stage of nature-religion these and other great objects of nature are regarded as animate and personal. The prevalence of river-worship is seen in the extent to which in the old and modern World oaths by rivers are most sacred. In earlier ages men swore inviolably by Styx or Tiber, and to this day an oath on water of the Ganges is to the Hindu the most' binding of pledges, for the goddess will take awful vengeance on the children of the perjurer. ”

“ The yet more disastrous effect of the practice of swearing is the public inference that, if a man has to swear in order to be believed, he need not speak the truth when not under oath. The early Christian fathers were alive to this depreciation of ordinary truthfulness by the practice of swearing, and opposed, though unavailingly, the system of oaths which more and more pervaded public business. ”

“ The accused, with solemn ceremony and invocation, drinks freely of it; if it nauseates him and he throws it up he is triumphantly acquitted, but if he becomes dizzy he is guilty, and the assembly fall on him, pelt him with stones and even drag him over the rocks till he is dead. Here the result of the ordeal depends partly on the patient's constitution, but more on the sorcerer who can prepare the proper dose to prove either guilt or innocence. ”

“ Barker: “No country can subsist a twelvemonth where an oath is thought not binding; for the want of it must necessarily dissolve society.” On the other hand, wherever the belief in supernatural interference becomes weakened, and oaths are taken with solemn form but secret contempt or open ridicule, they become a serious moral scandal, as had already begun to happen in classical times. ”

“ In the United States an oath is required in practically every case in which it is required in the United Kingdom, and with the same latitude as to affirmation., The formula or details may vary in different states of the Union. The same may be said generally of every civilized country, with the reservation that an affirmation is not so usually accepted as in English-speaking countries. In Germany an oath is compulsory on a witness in criminal cases, except in the case of certain sects, whose tenets forbid the taking of an oath. ”

“ On the other hand, all who practise in courts of justice declare that a large proportion of the evidence given under oath is knowingly false, and that such perjury is perceptibly detrimental to public morals.
The oaths now administered among civilized nations are chiefly intended for maintaining governments and securing the performance of public business. In England the Coronation oath is to be administered by one of the archbishops or bishops in the presence of all the people, who, on their parts, reciprocally take the oath of allegiance to the crown. ”

“ An oath, though not necessarily expressed in words, is usually so. In the Homeric instances the prayer which constitutes the oath has a somewhat conventional form, and in the classical ages we find well-marked formulas. These are often references to deities, as “by Zeus!” “I call Zeus to witness” (ναὶ μὰ Δία: ἴστω Ζεύς) ; “by the immortal gods!” “I call to witness the ashes of my ancestors” (per deos immortales; testor majorum cineres) . Sometimes a curse is invoked on himself by the swearer, that he may perish if he fail to keep his oath, as “the gods destroy me,” “let me perish if,” &c. ”

“ The cases of “ducking” witches which have occurred in England within the last few years are remains of the ancient ordeal.
If there is one thing that may be predicated of man in a state of nature it is that two disputants tend to fight out their quarrel. When in the warfare of Greeks and Trojans, of Jews and Philistines, of Vandals and Alamans, heroes come out from the two sides and their combat is taken to mark the powers of the opposing war-gods and decide the victory, then the principle of the ordeal by battle has been practically called in. ”

“ Archbishop or bishop: “Will you, to the utmost, of your power, maintain the laws of God, the true profession of the Gospel, and the Protestant reformed religion established by law? And will you maintain and preserve inviolably the settlement of the Church of England and the doctrine, worship, discipline and government thereof, as by law established in England. ”

“ Durham peasants, apparently remembering the old belief, still expect those who come to look at a corpse to touch it, in token that they bear no ill-will to the departed (W. Henderson, Folklore of Northern Counties, p. 57) .
Certain ordeals are closely related to oaths, so that the two shade into one another. Let the curse which is to fall on the oath-breaker take effect at once, it then becomes a sign condemning the swearer—in fact, an ordeal. ”

“ When a Chinese witness is to be sworn, a saucer is handed to him, which he takes in his hand and kneeling down breaks into fragments. The colonial legislatures generally make provision for receiving unsworn evidence of barbarous and uncivilized people who have no religious belief. The great number of oaths formerly required was much reduced by the Promissory Oaths Act 1868, which prescribed the forms of oath of allegiance, the official oath and the judicial oath. ”

“ As a general rule, however, the supernatural retribution on perjury has been transferred from the present world to the regions beyond the grave, as is evident from any collection of customary oaths. A single instance, will show at once the combination of retributions in and after the present life, and the tendency to heap up remote penalties in the vain hope of securing present honesty. The Siamese Buddhist in his oath, not content to call. ”

“ On the whole, though the half-meaningless forms of salutation may often seem ridiculous, society would not carry them on so universally unless it found them useful. They serve the purpose of keeping up social intercourse, and establishing relations between the parties in an interview, of which their tone may strike the keynote. ”

“ The actual practice of the fire-ordeal contrasts shamefully with its theory, that the fire rather than harm the innocent restrained its natural action. Thus it stands in the Hindu code of Manu (viii. 115) : "“He whom the flame does not burn, whom the water does not cast up, or whom no harm soon befals, is to be taken as truthful in his oath.” The water-ordeal here referred to is that well known in Europe, where the accused is thrown bound into the water, which receives him if innocent, but rejects him if guilty. ”

“ The Roman oath by the genius of the emperor being objected to by Christians as recognizing a demon, they swore by his safety (Tertull. Apol. 32) . The gesture of holding up the hand in swearing has been already, spoken of. The Christian oath on a copy of the Gospels seems derived from the late Jewish oath taken holding in the hand the scroll of the law (or the phylacteries) , a ceremony itself possibly adapted from Roman custom (see treatise “Shebuoth”. in Gemara) . ”

“ The bowing salutation, varying in Europe from something less than the Eastern salaam down to the slightest inclination of the head, is interesting from being given mutually, the two saluters each making the sign of submission to the other, which would have been absurd till the sign passed into mere civility. Uncovering is a common mode of salutation, originally a sign of disarming or defencelessness or destitution in the presence of a superior. ”

“ Thus the drinking of water on which a curse or magical penalty has been laid is a mere oath so long as the time of fulfilment is unfixed (see Oath) . But it becomes an ordeal when, as in Brahmanic India, the accused drinks three handfuls of water in which a sacred image has been dipped; if he is innocent nothing happens, but if he is guilty sickness or misfortune will fall on him within one to three weeks (for accounts of these and other Hindu ordeals see Ali Ibrahim Khan in Asiatic Researches, i. 389, and Stenzler’s summary in Z. D. M. G., vol. ix.) ”

“ Writers viewing the subject among civilized nations only have sometimes defined the oath as an appeal to a deity. It will be seen, however, by some following examples, that the harm or penalty consequent on perjury may be considered to result directly, without any spirit or deity being mentioned ”

“ Among striking instances of the Teutonic custom which influenced the whole of medieval Europe may be cited the custom of the Franks that the princes, if they could not quell the strife, had to fight it out between themselves, and Wipo's account of the quarrel between the Christian Saxons and the Pagan Slavs as to which broke the peace, when both sides demanded of the emperor that it should be settled by duel, which was done by choosing a champion on each side, and the Christian fell. ”

“ Ewald (Antiquities of Israel, 236) regards the draught as in itself harmless, and the operation of this curse on the guilty as due to the influence of the mind on the body. But the term “bitter” is applied to the water before it has been cursed, which suggests that it already contained some drug, as in the poison-water ordeal still in constant use over a great part of Africa. ”

“ Taking off the hat by men has for ages been the accepted mode in the Western world. Modern usage has moderated this bowing and scraping (the scrape is throwing back the right leg as the body is bent forward) , as well as the curtseys (courtoisie) of women. Some Eastern nations are apt to see disrespect in baring the head, but insist on the feet being uncovered. ”

“ The question of legal oaths is more difficult. On the one hand, it is admitted that they do induce witnesses, especially the ignorant and superstitious, to give evidence more truthfully than they would do on even solemn declaration. ”

“ The passages here referred to will give an idea of the theological grounds on which in more modern times Anabaptists, Mennonites and Quakers have refused to take even judicial oaths, while, on the other hand, the laws of Christendom from early ages have been only directed against such swearing as was considered profane or otherwise improper, and against perjury. Thus from the 3rd or 4th century we find oaths taking much the same place in Christian as in non-Christian society. ”

“ The person taking the oath shall hold the New Testament, or in the case of a Jew, the Old Testament, in his uplifted hand, and shall say or repeat after the officer administering the oath the words I swear ‘by Almighty God that . ”

“ Statutes of Charles II. and George I. enacted that no member should vote or sit in either house of parliament without having taken the several oaths of allegiance, supremacy and abjuration. The oath of supremacy in the reign of William III. was: “I A B doe swear that I doe from my heart abhorr detest and abjure as impious and hereticall this damnable doctrine and position that princes excommunicated or deprived by the pope or any authority of the see of Rome may be deposed or murdered by their subjects or any other whatsoever. ”

“ Etymologically the word salutation (Lat. salutatio, “ wishing health ”) refers only to words spoken. Forms of salutation frequent among savages and barbarians may last on almost unchanged in civilized custom. The habit of affectionate clasping or embracing is seen at the meetings of the Andaman islanders and Australian blacks, or where the Fuegians in friendly salute hug “ like the grip of a bear." [1] This natural gesture appears in old Semitic and Aryan custom: “ Esau ran to meet him (Jacob) and embraced him, and fell on his neck, and kissed him, and they wept ” (Gen. xxxiii. 4) ”

“ Giving the right hand of fellowship (Gal. ii. 9) passed naturally into a salutation throughout Christendom, and spread, probably from Byzantium, over the Moslem world. The emphatic form of the original gesture in “ striking hands " is still used to make the greeting more hearty. The variety called in English “ shaking hands ” (Ger. Hände-schütteln) only appears to have become usual in the middle ages. [12] In the Moslem legal form of joining hands the parties press their thumbs together. ”