Thus we hear of a native of these
islands who might not use the common words for "pig" and "to die,"
because these words occurred in the polysyllabic name of his
son-in-law; and we are told of another unfortunate who might not
pronounce the everyday words for "hand" and "hot" on account of his
wife's brother's name, and who was even debarred from mentioning the
number "one," because the word for "one" formed part of the name of
his wife's cousin.
The reluctance to mention the names or even syllables of the names
of persons connected with the speaker by marriage can hardly be
separated from the reluctance evinced by so many people to utter
their own names or the names of the dead or of the dead or of chiefs
and kings; and if the reticence as to these latter names springs
mainly from superstition, we may infer that the reticence as to the
former has no better foundation. That the savage's unwillingness to
mention his own name is based, at least in part, on a superstitious
fear of the ill use that might be made of it by his foes, whether
human or spiritual, has already been shown.
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