totemism is found
associated.[876]

+518+. It is possible that such facts as these may point to a primitive
totemistic stage of ancient civilized society. But it is to be noted
that the usages in question almost all relate to the general sacredness
of animals (or of plants), not to their specific character as totems.
They occur in lower tribes in cases where totemism does not exist.[877]
Animal clan-names and tribe-names, belief in kinship with animals and
plants and in descent from them, exogamy, transformations, refusal to
eat certain animals except ceremonially, apologies for killing them,
omens derived from them, worship of animal-gods, incarnations of gods in
animals, animals sacred to gods, tribal marks derived from animals--all
these are found in such diverse social combinations that it is
impossible to infer merely from the occurrence of this or that custom
the existence of the peculiar form of social organization to which the
name 'totemism' proper is given above. The same remark holds of
inferences from the general constitution of early society; a custom of
matrilineal descent, for example, by no means carries totemism with it.

+519+. The evidence for the existence of totemism among the ancient
civilized peoples, consisting, as it does, of detached statements of
customs that are found elsewhere without totemism, is not decisive.
Animal-worship has played a great role in religious history, but the
special part assigned to totemism has often been exaggerated. It has
been held that the latter is at the base of all beliefs in the
sacredness of animals and plants, or that certain usages (such as those
mentioned above) are inexplicable except on the supposition of an
original totemism. These positions are not justified by known facts, and
it will conduce to clearness to give totemism its distinct place in that
general regard for animals and plants of which it is a peculiar part.

+520+. Totemistic forms of society, as far as our present knowledge
goes, are found only among the lower peoples, and among these a
perplexing variety of conditions exists. As our review of what may be
called totemistic features shows,[878] the one permanent element in the
relation between men and nonhuman, nondivine objects is reverence for
these last on men's part; and the conception of an alliance, defensive
and offensive, between the two groups has been proposed above as an
additional differentia of totemism, a sense of kinship bein