Prehistory (pre 10 000 bce) *

Introduction *

The Spirit of the Time *

Creation Myths and the Concept of Difference in the Pre-Historic Mind *

Gender and Sexuality *

Children *

Suggestions from Artefacts *

Infanticide and Traditional Societies *

Suggestions from Traditional Societies *

Suggestions from Primate Studies *

Bodily Functional Difference *

Existence of Bodily Functional Difference *

Infanticide and Bodily Functional Difference *

Invalicide and Bodily Functional Difference *

Role Adaption and Bodily Functional Difference *

Reasons for Poor Treatment of People With Bodily Functional Difference *

Suggestions from Traditional Societies *

Suggestions from Primate Studies *

Suggestions From Artefacts *

Poor Treatment of People With Bodily Functional Difference *

Mental Difference- Mental Disorder *

Existence of Mental Difference- Mental Disorder *

Suggestions from Artefacts *

Suggestions from Primate Studies *

Suggestions from Traditional Societies *

Suggestions from Myths *

Mental Difference- Mental Impairment *

Forensic Difference *

Social Difference *

Ethnic Difference *

Financial Difference *

The Aged *

Summary of the Treatment of Potentially Deviant Groups in Pre-History *

Prehistory (pre 10 000 bce)

Introduction

The very fact that this is Pre-history- meaning no written records- ensures that nuances of social reaction will be missing from this section.

Surviving physical artefacts may indicate something about the treatment of human difference. Certain inferences may be made, but these may need to be treated warily because of the amount of speculation necessary.

Some parallels may be drawn with existing human and primate societies which may allow inferences about social behaviour to be made.

Present day ‘Traditional’ societies may reflect historic societies at a similar stage of economic development. Although there are major pitfalls in this approach, it may be the only way of approaching as close as possible to pre-historic society.

Using present day primate studies of socialisation and exclusion may indicate the possibilities available to early humankind and its non predecessors (Homo Erectus etc.). However, an even greater caveat needs to be made about the reliability of such parallels. Nevertheless, such an approach may be the only one possible.

The Spirit of the Time

The many Millennia covered by this period ensure that there is no single spirit of the time.

This period starts with the evolution of Homo Sapiens and the gradual decline of other hominid competitors. It is possible that considerations of social difference, and perceived and actual differences in intelligence (seen as impairment) may have led to the wilful exclusion and extinction of other hominids.

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At the beginning of this period, Homo Sapiens is thought to have been a hunter gatherer, little different from primate groups existing today. However, increased intelligence, physical dexterity and the ability to pass information from generation to generation led to a gradual technological development within the society. This was noticeable both in the increased possibilities for complex social life and also the possession of oppositional thumbs which led to greater probability of manufacture and use of tools.

There was probably much interplay between all these changes. The greater need to inculcate complex cultural behaviour in the young probably led to longer childhood. Longer childhood led to greater opportunities for learning.

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As the challenges of life changed, so did the organisation and activities of Homo Sapiens. There was a general move to a more static life style and involvement with agriculture. Rural and roaming gave way to settlement and static. These changes would have led to social changes about which we can only speculate.

Production of regular surpluses may have led to a greater ability to act well towards the less gifted; conversely, the surplus may have led to an increased concentration of wealth and power with a small leading elite, and the loss of power by the ordinary and the impaired. Both of these outcomes may have occurred in different cultures, and they may even have occurred together in the same culture-what we would now describe as noblesse oblige.

Increased levels of settlement and the ensuing population increase would have increased the need for more complex social rules in order to maintain individual and group boundaries. This would have produced greater ‘criminality and hence increased the need for forensic intervention.

Increased stratification can be predicted to have occurred as regular surpluses were generated and distributed- leading to problems with Social and Financial Difference.

Creation Myths and the Concept of Difference in the Pre-Historic Mind

All cultural myths, but especially creation myths are important in determining the beliefs of the pre-historic societies lying behind those societies which have left records.

Valerie Sinason in her book Mental Handicap and the Human Condition: New Approaches from the Tavistock considers the various creation myths. She notes that these are based on differentiation-

Greeks- Earth gave birth to Sky, from Chaos, Erebus and Night produced Day.

Egyptians- Num, the primordial ocean precedes Sun and Sky

Indian Brahmanas- world of unknowable darkness becomes heaven, earth, air and water as Brahma seeds himself.

Old Testament: TEXT

Iclandic: Fire and Ice

Assyro-Babylonian: Male and Female

Oppositions:

Wet/Dry- Sea/Earth

Light/Dark- Sun/Dark, Day/Night

Up/Down

Hot/Cold

Male/Female

She notes that differing states are often seen as threats.

EXPAND AND EXPLAIN

Gender and Sexuality

Women in pre-history- sources ??

LOOK FOR REFERENCES TO SUTTEE FOR SECTION ON GENDER- move to appropriate era- early modern.

Venkoba Rao notes:

‘Sati and Jauhar are the two types of suicide that have been an important factor in Indian history. Sati, a form of widow-burning, was an ancient religious suicide. This practice was not peculiar to India, but "owes its origin to the oldest religious view and superstitious practice of mankind in general." It was believed to be prevalent in ancient Greece, Germany, and among the Egyptians and the Slavs. It was known in China until the present century. … It was during the viceroyalty of Lord Bentinck that legislation was enacted, in 1829, to declare those who encouraged sati as guilty of culpable homicide.

‘Jauhar was a type of mass suicide resorted to by women of Rajasthan (Western India) in the event of an invasion to escape sexual dishonor and captivity by the victors.’

Children

Suggestions from Artefacts

deMause notes that infanticide was probably common in early times, judging by the sex-ratio of fossils in Mesolithic people being 148:100 male/female. This can only be explained by selective infanticide.

Infanticide and Traditional Societies

Scheer and Groce note that it was Greek practice to abandon disabled children but Weiss reviewed 47 societies with information on this and found that 13 societies reported infanticide, but only 5 practised infanticide on disabled infants only. Only one society (the Besongye) wait beyond the neonatal period to make the decision, using a council; in other societies considered, the decision is immediate.

Scheerenberger notes:

‘Disabled persons in primitive society were not always provided for, however. In many cultures, the afflicted individual was killed at birth. Infanticide has been practiced throughout the world since ancient times and continues in some parts of the world today. A child might be killed if it was deformed, diseased, female or a bastard. In some instances, child killing served to limit the population. Superstition, famine, and incest were also reasons for infanticide. The most severe of all practices was that of the inhabitants of the New Hebrides, who not only killed the malformed child but the mother as well. (Sumnar W, Folkways New York: Ginn 1906)’

Suggestions from Traditional Societies

ten Bensel, Rheinberger and Radbill note that:

‘Some North American Indian Indians threw the newborn into a pool of water and saved it only if rose to the surface and cried.’

ten Bensel, Rheinberger and Radbill note that:

‘In British New Guinea, traditionally an infant was taken to the banks of a stream and the infant’s lips moistened with water. The baby that did not accept the water was thrown away.’

Bakan notes that many current and historic ‘Traditional’ societies have practiced infanticide, among these

‘the Eskimo, Polynesian, Egyptian, Chinese, Scandinavian, African, American Indian and Australian aborigine.’

Bakan summarises the infanticidal practices of Tahitians- they may have regularly killed two-thirds of

their offspring.

Bakan further notes that Devereaux found that there was evidence of the practice of abortion among 60 per cent of Primitive (Traditional) Societies studied, these admissions being made against a great taboo. He suggests that as infanticide is functionally equivalent to abortion, although under a greater taboo, there may at least be an universal infanticidal impulse, and a possible acting-out of this.

Suggestions from Primate Studies

Bakan notes that Charles Darwin suggests that early hominids (pre-homo sapiens) would not have practiced infanticide because they had truer instincts. I am not sure that this is supported by modern evidence.

Bodily Functional Difference

Scheerenberger notes that an excavation of a Neanderthal site in Iraq at Shanidar by Solecki found the remains of a 40 year old (elderly in Neanderthal terms) man with multiple disabilities, some congenital. Despite these he had apparently been well treated by his group. Some of the reasoning by Solecki in this may be biased by a desire for a good outcome for persons with disability – not all of the conclusions seem to be borne out by the facts offered.

Scheerenberger notes:

‘By 7000 BC, people had begun systematic treatment of physical and mental disorders. Treatment was generally provided by two groups of individuals: the empirical practitioner and the shaman, or medicine man. Neolithic peoples were animistic, believing in the existence of natural spirits who could do evil. Thus, when an individual became ill, a shaman exorcised the evil spirits. The shaman relied heavily on magic and ritual – and the belief in these powers by the afflicted. In other cases, the empirical practitioner was called upon to use such techniques as massages, baths, extractions, vegetable drugs, and bloodletting. In the case of trepanning (skull boring), both magical and empirical approaches were combined to expel demons among persons with mental disorders and epilepsy. Recently, skull fragments were discovered on the Jutland peninsula of Denmark that indicated trepannation had been performed on a pre-historic hydrocephalic infant. (Harms 1976)’

Scheerenberger notes:

‘Although many of the more severely physically and mentally disabled individuals from these primitive societies were killed or died at an early age, it is also probable that the less severely afflicted not only survived but also contributed to their societies.’

Existence of Bodily Functional Difference

Oliver and Barnes in their book Disabled People and Social Policy quote Scheer and Groce from their article Impairment as a human constant: cross cultural and historical perspectives on variation:

‘Early evidence of physical disability is available in the fossil record but no such record exists from non-physical disability. Such continued existence indicates that early societies did not necessarily exclude (to the point of death) their impaired.’

(However, one of the earliest sociological explanation for such exclusion (often to the point of death) is the ‘surplus population thesis’. They argue that such explanation may be founded on nineteenth century liberal ideology.)

From Scheer and Groce: They consider myths of the non-existence of disabled adults in ancient societies and dismiss them. They quote Birdsell

‘ Biologically handicapped children are a humanistic concern in our society, whereas in simple human populations they died early and were not missed.’

Also DiCarlo:

‘Long before societies cast the handicapped from their chosen ranks, the forces of nature exerted a similar extinguishing blow. Men without hearing under primitive conditions were forced to seek survival alone. They did not gather collectively and the counter offer each other protection from the overwhelming forces of nature. Those who could not survive were swept away. Those who were fit struggled to live a meagre existence and a precarious one. Those who lived with the Saber-toothed Tiger needed to hear. Thus, the deaf were probably among the first perish.’

Scheer and Groce note that this is mere conjecture.

Scheer and Groce consider parallels from Primate groups where disabled do survive- and give various examples.

Scheer and Groce also consider surviving evidence from pre-human ancestors: a Neanderthal skeleton with severe arthritis, an amputated arm and a head injury. Other examples available.

Scheer and Groce consider pre-historic human evidence:

‘ Virtually every reported large skeletal population includes at least one individual - and often several - whose remains show congenital malformations, and improperly healed bones, missing limbs, head trauma.’

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Scheer and Groce consider contemporary traditional societies: They quote Hanks and Hanks The Physically Handicapped in Certain Non-occidental Societies as ‘the only attempt to formulate a model linking socio-cultural variables with the status of the disabled in non-western societies’. Their findings quoted by Scheer and Groce are

‘ Social participation of persons with disabilities increases in societies where standard of living is high, or in societies where economic hierarchy is less competitive, where the criteria for achievement acknowledge individual capacity, and where standards of are relative rather than absolute.’

Sheer and Groce note some problems with Hanks and Hanks’ analysis.- they assume that disabled people need to be protected, rather than offered social opportunities, they overlook valued non-economic roles played by disabled people in non-western societies, and they romanticise traditional societies as egalitarian and non-competitive.

Infanticide and Bodily Functional Difference

Scheer and Groce consider Infanticide and the disabled in the above paper. They attempt to show that infanticide was not the norm, and may be seen as engaging in special pleading on this issue. I quote here their findings, but they should be seen in the context laid out below, where evidence of infanticide in many societies are detailed.

Scheer and Groce note that even infanticide does not dispose of disability because disabilities can develop later. They further note that it was Greek practice to abandon disabled children but Weiss reviewed 47 societies with information on this and found that 13 societies reported infanticide, but only 5 practised infanticide on disabled infants only. Only one society (the Besongye) wait beyond the neonatal period to make the decision, using a council; in other societies considered, the decision is immediate.

They attempt to suggest that infanticide was not usual in pre-history. This will be considered below. Even if there was not a cultural norm of infanticide at birth or soon after, children with disability may have been neglected in an intended or unconscious manner.

Number of societies where disabled children are well-treated is notable. The Azande ‘treasure disabled children like sound ones.’

Note that most common cross-cultural justification for infanticide is a belief that they represent an evil spirit - review of literature on this is available in Scheer and Groce.

Invalicide and Bodily Functional Difference

Scheer and Groce consider invalicide- the killing of invalids: extremely rare- usually reserved for persons considered violent, insane and uncontrollable.

However, although this may claim to show that there was no overt killing of invalids, later culture’s habits of covert killing (abandonment and exclusion to the point of death) of their invalids would indicate that it is likely that such practices did not suddenly appear with the rise of literacy!

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Role Adaption and Bodily Functional Difference

Scheer and Groce consider role adaptation: disabled people occupying special positions: shaman, priest or priestess or other less exalted special occupation:

Ibos, Nigeria Blind Priests

Suye Mura, Japan Blind Priests

Kanuri, Nigeria Blind Rope makers

Besongye, Africa Blind Musicians

This review of current anthropological studies of persons with disability may give some indication of treatment in earlier human societies.

Begging is a frequent role. Traditional in pre-industrial societies for unemployed, widows, orphans, unmarried mothers, disabled and sick.

Scheer and Groce note that in traditional societies the status of disability is not a master role- people still maintain their age and kin related roles.

Compensation: Modern Example: Martha’s Vineyard, Groce- most people, deaf or not, could use sign language. EXPAND

Reasons for Poor Treatment of People With Bodily Functional Difference

Oliver and Barnes reference Mary Douglas’s books Purity and Danger and Natural Symbols as source for early treatment of impairment. Psychological fear of the unknown. Douglas: ‘primitive’ cultures react to ‘anomalies’ such as impairment by reducing it, physically controlling it, avoiding it, labelling it dangerous or adopting it as ritual.

Suggestions from Traditional Societies

Considering evidence from modern day Traditional societies, Oliver and Barnes reference Hanks and Hanks The Physically Handicapped in certain non-occidental societies (infanticide prohibited, age was a sign of authority and respect, individuals with impairments were not abandoned.) Ths needs to be interpreted carefully- often what is reported is not what actually happens- compare with reports of incidence of abortion/infanticide and actual incidence shown by male/female ratio outcomes (see later section).

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Suggestions from Primate Studies

Suggestions From Artefacts

Poor Treatment of People With Bodily Functional Difference

Oliver and Barnes talking about people with physical disability:

‘Until the seventeenth century, despite the harshness of living conditions, most people were included in village communities even if they were subjected to controlling measures such as the pillar and the stocks and even ridicule’

I am not sure if this is supported by the evidence. There is other evidence from historical sources in all ages to suggest that such potential adults may have been allowed to die in childhood. Additionally there is similar evidence to support the notion that should such people be a major problem to a society and have no solid family support, that they may have been cast out of that society, and consequently have died.

Mental Difference- Mental Disorder

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Scheerenberger notes:

‘By 7000 BC, people had begun systematic treatment of physical and mental disorders. Treatment was generally provided by two groups of individuals: the empirical practitioner and the shaman, or medicine man. Neolithic peoples were animistic, believing in the existence of natural spirits who could do evil. Thus, when an individual became ill, a shaman exorcised the evil spirits. The shaman relied heavily on magic and ritual – and the belief in these powers by the afflicted. In other cases, the empirical practitioner was called upon to use such techniques as massages, baths, extractions, vegetable drugs, and bloodletting. In the case of trepanning (skull boring), both magical and empirical approaches were combined to expel demons among persons with mental disorders and epilepsy. Recently, skull fragments were discovered on the Jutland peninsula of Denmark that indicated trepannation had been performed on a pre-historic hydrocephalic infant. (Harms 1976)’

Scheerenberger notes:

‘Although many of the more severely physically and mentally disabled individuals from these primitive societies were killed or died at an early age, it is also probable that the less severely afflicted not only survived but also contributed to their societies.’

Scheerenberger notes:

‘Some forms of mental retardation and epilepsy are evident, and it appears that some cultures tried treating these conditions and integrating the more disadvantaged members into their social structure.’

Scheerenberger notes:

‘The notions that evil spirits caused epilepsy and mental deviations and that afflicted persons needed spiritual healing persisted well into the eighteenth century.’

Lambo notes of the traditional period in Mid and West Africa:

‘Periodic collective group psychotherapeutic practices (e.g. possession, dancing, confession) were common. They constituted powerful psychotherapeutic measures and psychological safety valves through which excessive psychic pressure could be released. Possession, for example, can be induced and is so frequent an occurrence that it can be expected at most tribal ceremonies.’

Lambo notes:

‘In many parts of West and Central Africa nearly all forms of mental illness, disease, personal and communal catastrophes, are attributed to machinations of the enemy and malicious influence of spirits that inhabit the world around us. Among some of the tribes, the spirits of the ancestors which have been offended are also believed to cause mental disturbances. On the other hand, many of the tribes are equally aware of the concept of natural causations such as micro-organisms and parasites. The idea of natural causation has been observed to reach its peak among the Masai of East Africa, who seldom attribute disease to spiritual agency and only rarely to human interventions. Many other tribes (the Shona of Central Africa), also believe that any disease, including mental disorder, may be due to natural causes.’

Lambo notes:

‘Social attitudes to mental disorder vary a great deal, but on the whole in Africa there is very little social stigma, if any, attached to mental illness. … On the whole, community attitudes permitted the bulk of African mentally ill persons with varying grades of social insufficiency to live as tolerated members of the community in simple, rural, and unadulterated cultures. Consequently, many African psychotics were (and still are) able to keep themselves at some sort of functioning level.

‘This high level of tolerance made it possible to institute community oriented therapy, enabling psychotics to be treated among their families and I their homes even when shackled to a log in the traditional manner. Tooth (Tooth TG Studies in mental illness in the Gold Coast London: Colonial Research Publications No. 6), during his survey in Ghana, observed that "the madman is seldom alone for long, is well fed, and enjoys the company of his children and friends." He continues, "This tolerant attitude accounts for the number of harmless lunatics at large; most earn a living as professional beggars but some exploit their eccentricity as buffoons and entertainers.

‘In large towns and coastal areas of Africa, however, mental illness was regarded with horror, as a disgrace – something which crippled social activities of the families of the sick and reduced their chances and opportunities. For example, it would be almost impossible to find a husband for a girl who was known to have a mentally ill relative. In the forest zone, especially in Ashanti, the mentally sick were feared and identified with evil.’

Lambo notes:

‘Many of the tribes in West and Central Africa have a sound idea of what psychosis constitutes. Madness has always been defined as "loss of insight, irrelevant and peculiar utterances, and foolish actions, with or without violent behaviour." They define a person as being mad when he talks nonsense, performs foolishly and irresponsibly, and is unable to look after himself or his family without realizing what he is doing.’

Lambo notes:

‘In 1967, Gelfand (Gelfand M, Psychiatric disorders as recognized by the Shona Cent Afr J Med, 13, 39-) wrote: "The Shona understand mental backwardness in a child, but often do not recognize the differences between the congenital form, and that developed by a normal infant or child after a brain infection, such as meningitis. All forms of idiocy and mental retardation are included in the term rema, which is attributed to the action of a witch upon the fetus. Most nganga [traditional healers/witch doctors] inform me that nothing can be done for this form of mental disorder.’

Alexander and Selesnick note:

‘Primitive man cured his minor troubles through various intuitive, crude, empirical techniques …. Primitive medicine may be considered mainly primitive psychiatry. Mental and physical suffering were not separated, and neither were medicine, magic and religion. Magic was always directed against some mortal or superhuman being who had malevolently inflicted a disease on another. The primitive medicine man quite logically dealt with these beings and with evil spirits torturing his patient by such human devices as appeal, reverence, supplication, bribery, intimidation, appeasement, confession and punishment as expressed through exorcism, magical rituals, and incantations. It was felt that disease was caused by something superfluous being added, usually by being ‘shot’ into the body by a sorcerer or god, using blow tubes or darts. The concept of removal from the body involved the primitive’s idea of the soul as manifested in dreams, shadows, hallucinations etc.. ‘

Alexander and Selesnick note:

‘Primitive man’s explanation of abnormal behaviour was that some outside power, an evil spirit, must have taken possession of the sufferer. In short, mental disease, like most physical illness, was to him obviously caused by evil spiritual forces. In principle, man was right when he associated mental disease with psychological forces; what he did not recognize until recently was that these forces were not outside him, were not caused by magic, but were his unacceptable desires, fears, and impulses. The essence of mental disturbance is precisely man'’ inability to face himself, to recognize his feelings and motivations that his conscious self repudiates.'

Alexander and Selesnick note:

‘The story of psychiatry began when one man attempted to relieve another man’s suffering by influencing him. When psychic and physical suffering were not distinguished one from the other, the precursor of the psychiatrist was any man who tended another in pain. The story of psychiatry thus begins with the story of the first professional healer, the medicine man.’

Alexander and Selesnick note:

‘Frequently a man became a witch doctor after he had a convulsion or went into a trance and had a hallucination which revealed to him what he should be. This method of selection is especially common among the Osa-Kaffirs of South Africa, some Siberian tribes, and the North American Indians. (Mackenzie D, Infancy of Medicine, London: Macmillan & Co., 1927).’

Alexander and Selesnick note:

‘A prospective witch doctor must usually undergo rigorous training, including falling sick himself, and an elaborate initiation ceremony. For example, an islander who lives in Indonesia on the island of Nias may be selected because his father was the chief witch doctor and had taught him the magic formulas and the use of the drum, but this alone does not entitle him to inherit his father’s position: he also must become ill. Often this illness is a psychosis.’

Existence of Mental Difference- Mental Disorder

Suggestions from Artefacts

Oliver and Barnes quote Scheer and Groce:

‘Early evidence of physical disability is available in the fossil record but no such record exists from non-physical disability..’

Clarke notes that there may be artefacts from ancient Britain which indicate possible attempted treatment of psychological difference- trepanning and trephining of skulls, although there is no guarantee that this intervention was not just for physical problems of the head.

Suggestions from Primate Studies

Suggestions from Traditional Societies

Suggestions from Myths

There is some evidence from myths to suggest that medicines were used for mental disorder in pre-historic times.

WL Jones in Ministering To Minds Diseased: A History Of Psychiatric Treatment claims:

‘The use of medicines, simple or compound, organic or inorganic, started in prehistoric days. The earliest would be plant extracts and mineral waters.’

This refers to medical treatment for mental disorder. He refers to extant Greek myths as a record of the pre-historic period. This needs further investigation and tracing to ‘primary’ sources, at least for the myths. It should be noted that the resort to herbs could indicate a belief, spoken or unspoken, that mental disorder was a physical problem. It would also be appropriate to look to such myths for details of other approaches to mental disorder. However, the ‘medicines’ could have been conceptualised as a means of affecting, positively or negatively, ‘spirits’ believed to cause the mental disorder. More information is needed.

Walter Bromberg in The Mind of Man: A History of Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis gives a review of issues in early medicine and reactions to madness and notes the survival of artefacts indicating trephining and other amulets for treatment of mental difference.

But does this indicate that such treatments were for mental disorders? What is his rationale for connecting remnants with motives?

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Belief that mentally ill are chosen as visionaries or priests is not well supported according to Scheer and Groce.

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Mental Difference- Mental Impairment

Wallis and Henderson in Prisoners, Patients or People quote Kirman from his textbook Mental Retardation:

‘Man has survived and developed because he is more quick-witted than other species, he is aware of this and attaches great importance to it. Therefore, ever since speech developed there must have been words like ‘fool’ and ‘stupid’’

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Robert Edgerton in his 1970 paper Mental Retardation in non-Western societies: Toward a cross-cultural perspective on incompetence which is included in the Haywood (1970) and was originally delivered as part of the 1968 Peabody-NIMH Conference at George Peabody College in ??? in the USA discusses the reaction to Mental Incompetence in traditional and partially industrialised societies.

He seeks to refute four common myths about Mental Retardation:

1/ That severely retarded persons (idiots and imbeciles) did not constitute a problem in ‘primitive’ (traditional) societies, as they were automatically dispatched at birth.

2/ That persons with milder deficits would not have been seen as any different from other ‘ordinary’ people

3/ That in non-industrialised society, mildly retarded people are not labelled and stigmatised.

4/ That persons with mental retardation do not constitute a problem because of the lower developmental and technological expectations.

Edgerton notes that an anthropologist Thomas Gladwyn, noted in 1959 (Gladwyn T, Methodologies applicable to the study of learning deficits, American Journal of Mental deficiency, 1959, 64, 311-315):

‘…[he] noted … that we know next to nothing about the nature or severity of the problems which differences in mental abilities pose in various cultures.’

Edgerton notes:

‘As Gladwyn (1959) remarked, anthropologists have too seldom asked whether differences in intelligence "make a difference."’

Edgerton notes that mental retardation at the date of his writing was viewed by the use of a "conventional understanding", much of which Edgerton wished to rebut. Below are some statements that support the conventional understanding:

Edgerton notes:

‘Eli Ginzberg (Ginzberg E, The Mentally Handicapped in a technological society In s Osler and R Cooke (eds) The biosocial bases of mental retardation Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press 1965) … concluded that our complex society produces many difficulties for the retarded, whereas simpler societies can absorb such persons as useful, even productive, members. This, then, is the conventional, cultural-relativistic understanding in a nutshell: Complex, industrial societies demand greater intellectual competence than do small, technologically simple societies. In vulgar terms, the understanding reads as follows: Simple people for simple societies.’

Edgerton notes:

‘Lewis A Dexter (Dexter LA Sociology of the exceptional person Indian Journal of Social research 1963 4 31-36, Dexter LA On the politics and sociology of stupidity in our society In HS Becker (ed) The Other Side Glencoe IL: Free Press 1964a, Dexter LA The Tyranny of Schooling In HS Becker (ed) The Other Side Glencoe IL: Free Press 1964b) … has it that societies make their own problems through the operation of a familiar kind of Mertonian self-fulfilling prophecy. He observes, for example, that if our social system, through its institutions, particularly its schools, chose to make something such as gawkiness unacceptable, then our society would have no difficulty whatever in transforming gawky children into problem children. In arguing for the force of social programming as he does, Dexter is eloquent, and he is unquestionably correct. I am certain that any social system can make any behaviour into a social problem. Furthermore, I agree with Dexter when he argues that our society makes mental retardation exceedingly troublesome because of our exceptional emphasis upon the kind of intellectual skills – literacy and verbal adroitness – that our schools and our IQ testing require. We have indeed made ineptness in school performance a greater problem than it need necessarily be.’

Edgerton notes that Dexter (1963, 1964a, 1964b) notes:

‘Dexter…goes on to say that he doubts that less complex, less "education" dominated societies make of intellectual incompetence a social problem to any comparable degree. For example, he notes of sixteenth and seventeenth century England , that "…the people who were merely stupid – the high grade retarded, according to our present system of classification – did not stand out in any way in a world in which most people were peasants or simple workers (Dexter, 1964a, p50)." Indeed, Dexter’s assumption find support from Tredgold and Soddy (1956) (Tredgold Af, Soddy K, A textbook of mental deficiency. Baltimore: Williams and Wilkins, 1956): "At the close of the last century (in Egland0 the only defectives generally recognised were those of low grade – idiots and imbeciles – and the number of these was comparatively small (p.9).’

Edgerton notes:

‘…Margaret Mead in her account of Manus, a small and simple scoiety of the Admiralty Islands, north of New Guinea. Among these people, physical agility and grace are valued, and gawkiness, or clumsiness, provokes harsh ridicule. Mead writes (1953) (Mead M, Growing up in New Guinea, New York: Mentor 1953): "That he [the child] should not understand the art of handling his body, his canoes, well…is unthinkable [p.28]." Mead goes on to show that the Manus make gawkiness quite a problem for themselves, but despite the technological simplicity of their non-literate culture, they also make a problem of mild intellectual deficit (Mead 1953): "The Manus are live to individual differences in skill or knowledge and quick to brand stupid, the slow learner, the man or woman with poor memory [p28]."’

Edgerton notes that Dornan (Dornan SS Pygmies and Bushmen of the Kalahari London: Seeley Service 1925) notes that the Bechuana of South Africa ‘kill idiots’.

Edgerton notes:

‘…Skinner (Skinner AB Notes on the Eastern Cree and Northern Saulteaux Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History, 1912, ( (Part I), 1-177) reported of the Northern Saulteaux Indians near Lake Superior that "idiots …are thought of to be possessed of devils and are accordingly killed by shooting or strangling and their bodies are burned. Formerly, they were burned alive and it is strongly suspected that this is still occasionally done. (p 161)"’

Edgerton notes that there is in the literature a belief that generally, poor treatment of the severely disabled does not occur. He quotes an example:

‘Masland, Sarason and Gladwin (Masland R, Sarason S and Gladwin T Mental Subnormality New York : Basic Books 1958) who in referring to the problem of mental subnormality, said that "…in most non-European societies it is inconsequential, confined to cases of severe pathological defect who are cared for, as lond as they live, wit minimum of distress and dislocation."’

Edgerton notes:

‘Margaret Mead (1928) (Mead M Coming of Age in Samoa New York Morrow 1928) reported that one "idiot" and one "imbecile" ("able to do the tasks of s child of 5 or 6") were alive and being cared for in the Manu’s archipelago in 1925.’

Edgerton notes:

‘In 1962, I saw two micro-cephalic Pokot living with their families in a remote part of northern Kenya, and I saw a hydro-cephalic child living among the Kamba of central Kenya. All three were being restrained in their houses in order that they not annoy anyone, but they were being fed and made comfortable.’

Edgerton notes:

‘In some parts of the world, the severely retarded are permitted to roam more or less freely so long as they do not constitute a danger to persons or property. Stephen Fuchs (Fuchs S The Childfen of Hari Vienna: Verlag Herold 1950) recorded [that] … among the Hari of Nimar district in India: "Harmless idiots are left free to wander about as they please [p 184]."’

Edgerton notes:

‘In some instances, the severely retarded may receive quite solicitous care, as this case among the Lepchas of Sikkim illustrates (Donaldson F Lepcha Land London: Sampson, Low, and Marston 1900): "It speaks well for the simple goodness of the native that this idiot boy [whom the author had just met] was looked upon as the common property of the inhabitants, being carefully tended and fed by them all, with no need of alms house or compulsory maintenance laws [p 21].""

Edgerton notes:

‘In a substantial number of societies, we hear that the severely retarded may have both freedom and tolerably affectionate care so long as they threaten to harm no-one.’

Edgerton notes of Hetherwick (Hetherwick A Some animistic beliefs among the Yaos of British Central Africa Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, 1902, 32, 89-95) on the Yao of Africa:

’Idiots and the insane are allowed to wander at will about the village and only when violent symptoms show themselves as a danger to the community is any physical restraint put upon them (p 90). Gomes (Gomes EH Seventeen years among the Sea Dyaks of Borneo London: Seeley 1911), speaking of the Sea Dyaks of Borneo, found an identical set of considerations in the treatment of the severely retarded, and so did Warner (Warner WL A black civilization: A study of an Australian tribe NewYork: Harper 1937 p208) for the Murngin, an aboriginal tribe in Australia.’

Edgerton notes:

‘The Chagga who live in the mountains that border Kenya and Tanzania believe that even the severely retarded should be well treated, and they support this belief with the sanctions of their customary law (Gutmann B Das recht der Dshagga Munich Beck 1926, Gutmann B Die Stammeslebren der Dshagga Munich 1932)’

Edgerton notes:

‘…during my research in East Africa in 1961-62 I learned of several cases in which fathers had risked punishment by killing their severely retarded infants.’

Edgerton notes:

‘The Pokot in Northern Kenya … assert that while a man may do what he pleases with such monsters [severely retarded persons] he actually ought to put them to death.’

Edgerton notes that Eaton and Weill (Eaton JW, Weill RJ Culture and Mental Disorder: A study of the Hutterites and other populations Glencoe Il: Free Press 1955) found that the Hutterites who live a simple life allowed mild mental retardation to be constructed as no problem at all. They note that a:

‘…mildly defective individual can function without becoming a community problem (p 155).’

Edgerton continues by noting that:

‘…Eaton and Weill did not say that the Hutterites do not recognise mild mental retardation or that persons we would perceive as such go unrecognized there.’

Edgerton notes that Masland, Sarason and Gladwin (Masland R, Sarasn S, Gladwyn T Mental Subnormality New York: Basic Books 1958) note of the Pacific island society the Truk :

‘…inadequacy in intellectual functioning is simply not viewed as a problem except for a scattering of obvious pathological cases; people of both sexes appear to fall readily into productive activities they are fully competent to perform (p 284)’

Edgerton notes:

‘…we know without doubt that in a great many non-Western societies, intelligence is prized (Lewis O Life in a Mexican village Urbana Il: University of Illinois Press 1951, Phillips HP Thai peasant personality Berkeley: University of California Press 1965, Radin P Primitive man as philosopher New York: Appleton 1927), and we also know that various sorts of stupidity are recognized. For example Burrows and Spiro (Burrows EG, Spiro ME An Atoll Culture: Ethnography of Ifaluk in the Central Carolines New Haven: Human relations Area Files 1953) stated that for the people of Ifaluk, a tiny atoll in Micronesia where life is at least as simple as it is on Truk, feeblemindedness is recognized. And, as we have seen, Mead has noted that the people of Manus are aware of subtle differences in intelligence. So are the Lepchas of Sikkim as described by Geoffrey Gorer (Gorer G Himalayan village: An account of the Lepkas of Sikkim, London: Michael Joseph 1938). The Pokot of Kenya not only recognize mild degrees of stupidity, they have a word for such persons- selevia. So do the Hehe of Tanzania.’

Edgerton notes on the previously received view of stigmatisation of mild retaradation, quotes Dexter (Dexter 1964b reference above):

‘But, in most societies, the stupid are not victims of the same sort of discrimination as in our society (p 42).’

Edgerton notes in opposition to the above:

‘There is ample evidence that, in a great many of the world’s societies, persons whose intellectual deficit would appear to be slight (corresponding roughly to that which we have come to associate with mild mental retardation in this society) are regularly spoken about and labeled.’

Edgerton notes:

‘In parts of South East Asia, the retarded are favorably spoken of, and on certain occasions, they may even occupy favorable positions in secular and religious proceedings. The following example suggests that such favored treatment may be extended even to the most severely retarded: "After dinner fifty small torch-bearers came to fetch us and we traversed the long causeway in a procession, followed by a group of Cambodians who had hastened over from their village. At their head was an idiot, called ‘king of Angkor,’ who spends his days among the ruins, crowned with a tiara of fresh flowers" (Dorgeles R, On the Mandarin road, New York: Century 1926)’

Edgerton notes:

‘That persons of mild and severe mental retardation are seen as being somehow imbued with religious significance, and are hence well regarded, is a pattern that has been repeated in several parts of the world. Such was the case in peasant Russia, in parts of central Asia, and in the Himalayas. So it was over most of Siberia and among at least some of the Eskimo (Bogoraz VG, The Chukchee New York: GE Stechert 1909). Favorable evaluation of mental retardation is perhaps most highly institutionalized and best known among the Muslims of the Middle East, where the term "saint" is applied to the retarded (as well as to some psychotics, epileptics, and religious ascetics). (Cline WB, Notes on the people of Siwah and El Garah in the Libyan Desert,American Anthropologist Memoir Series No.4 1936, Ammar H, Growing up in an Egyptian Village London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1954)’

Edgerton notes:

‘…in a substantial majority of the primitive societies for which I have found relevant information, the retarded are the victims of overt discrimination.’

Edgerton notes:

‘In a few societies, the retarded my no be seen as a problem of any sort. For example Thompson (Thompson VM, French Indo-China New York: Macmillan 1937) wrote that in many parts of Vietnamese Annam even the severely retarded posed no social dilemma and that such people were permitted to marry and inherit property. Evidence that the retarded pose no problem, for themselves or for others is, however, rare and insubstantial. In the great majority of societies for which I have information, the retarded are problem-engendering.’

Edgerton notes:

‘In some societies the problem may be a simple one of practical subsistence.’

Edgerton notes:

‘In a large number of societies, the problem that the retarded pose is reflected in norms regulating marriage. In many societies, it is simply stated that the retarded never marry…but in others the question is more complex and, as has been the case in parts of India, recourse to court adjudication is sometimes necessary to decide the jural propriety of marriages involving retardates.’

Edgerton notes:

‘In other non-western societies, the retarded are viewed as a problem bcase of their potential for trouble-making.

Edgerton notes that Goode (Goode WJ The protection of the inept American Sociological Review 1967 32 5-18) addresses the ‘problem’ of social ineptness. He points out that social ineptness is ‘…a universal system problem: How to utilize the services of the less able.’ (p6)‘ Edgerton goes on to point out that:

‘In assuming that all societies will label some of their members as inept, Goode is on safe ground. In addition to the blind, the deaf, the clumsy, and the lame, there will be some who learn slowly, plan poorly, remember too little, or solve problems incorrectly – that is, persons whom we would call stupid, or mentally retarded.’

Edgerton notes:

‘Most answers [to how society should deal with the retarded] have been phrased in functional terms. For example, it has become fashionable to cover more and more persons under the under the label "social deviant", and those who are inept are sometimes so regarded. Explanations of deviance often search for reasons why deviance exists, suggesting that deviance may serve to support the social system in which it occurs.’

Edgerton notes the Bedouin proverb:

‘No tribe but has its idiot’

Edgerton notes:

‘The Eskimo themselves live so close to the margin of survival that on frequent occasions they leave behind their old and infirm, some of whom, at least, readily acquiesce in seeking death so that the rest of the band may hunt more efficiently, and thus may survive (Stefansson V My Life With The Eskimo New York :Macmillan 1951). Here, the non-productive person has no chance, as Bilby (Bilby JW Among unknown Eskimo London: Seely Service 1923) illustrated with his account of Nandla, a blind man: "…the inexorable law of the wild left one handicapped as Nandla was no choice. The man was comparatively young, but by reason of his blindness useless to himself and a burden to others. In a hungry land, where every extra mouth to be filled represents a problem, there is no room for one who cannot provide for himself (p150)." After some years of non-productivity, Nandla’s fellow Eskimo led him one day to a gaping seal hole in the ice into which he unknowingly stepped and was drowned."

Edgerton notes that in hyper-marginal societies where life is particularly demanding, the rate of natural attrition of those not able to scrape a living will be extremely high. In these circumstances, many able and all disabled people will die in childhood or later, and this will be a natural consequence of life lived under such conditions.‘

Edgerton notes:

‘…something more than a simplistic, environmental, deterministic formula must be involved to account for the differential treatment accorded the mentally retarded in the world’s non-Western societies. It is not simply that in some societies life is difficult whereas in others it is easy. Something far more complicated is involved; the answer must lie somewhere in the complex web that unites cultures and social organizations within their physical environment.’

Edgerton notes:

‘Since persons who are, in our terms, mentally retarded may be expected to breach some rules of any society – especially those rules having to do with subtle distinctions about the proprieties, and those having to do with property – we might expect that if the retarded are to be maintained in the community, then someone other than the retarded person himself must be responsible for any misdeeds he might commit.’

Edgerton notes:

‘Every society, even the most simple, makes substantial demands upon its members for competencies of all sorts, intellectual, interpersonal, and physical. Even the least elegant of cultures establishes forms of proper conduct that require subtlety, self-control, tact, deceit, and verbal skill. In fact, such skills are often more highly valued in non-Western societies than they are in the West.’

Edgerton notes of Cline (Cline WB, Notes on the people of Siwah and El Garah in the Libyan Desert, American Anthropologist Memoir Series No.4 1936 ) and the relationship between spirituality and retardation:

‘…the person too incompetent to perform everyday tasks is believed to have religious thoughts on his mind and is, hence, accorded the status of a religious personage. Similar role entitlement was sometimes afforded the retarded in medieval Europe, where at times the retarded were considered to posess great saintly powers (although at other times they were scourged and killed).’

Edgerton notes:

‘It is possible, however, that in roles requiring inspired religious revelation, as with mediums or oracles through which divinities are thought to speak, the mentally retarded have a greater probability of success, for in such roles, the otherwise inappropriate or inept conduct of the retarded may be seen to imply supernatural significance.’

Edgerton notes:

‘…we should … note that, in many societies, mental retardation, especially severe retardation, is thought to be a sign of divine displeasure or punishment for past misconduct. In such societies, the mentally retarded would presumably occupy less favorable roles.’```

Belief Difference

Forensic Difference

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Drapkin notes:

‘…it is worthwhile to mention that in the Palaeolithic cave of Addaura, in Sicily, there is an engraved scene of many human figures moving around a central one, which is in a severely contracted position, presumably because he was tied in such a manner that if he straightened out he would strangle himself – a form of torture or ritual not unknown in ancient times. The scene itself shows, in the most vivid colours that homo sapiens has ever had, together with the gift of creation, the potential for self destruction.’

Drapkin notes:

‘It is difficult to imagine that the Australopithecus or the Pithecanthropus had even the faintest idea of behavioural prohibitions. Killing a fellowman in case of need or in self-defense was the accepted way of life. Homo hominis lupus was the norm of yesterday as well as today. Such concepts could not have developed until man began to settle in groups of hundreds or thousands. Only then could there have been the social motives to instigate such prohibitions or limitations and the establishment of an authority that would enforce them. Before then, perhaps the witch doctor, peering at the entrails of sacrificial goats, was the one who could decide. These early limitations may have been similar to what the Polynesians – much later – coined with the expression tabu, or taboo: something forbidden because of its magical, religious, or social implications. Religious taboos, for example, prohibited profane contact – be it by touch, word, or deed – with a person or object of sacred or damned nature. Violation of these taboos was believed to arouse the wrath of supernatural forces against the entire community. Primitive fertility symbols were "untouchable," as were the totem poles that marked the entrance of the early American Indian communities, as they still do in some areas of Africa and Asia.’

HOW ABOUT CONTRARY EVIDENCE FROM PRIMATE AND OTHER ANIMAL STUDIES WHICH SHOW THAT SOCIAL ANIMALS WITH CONSIDERABLY LESSER INTELLECTS WILL EXCLUDE MEMBERS FROM A CLAN.

Drapkin notes:

‘There is no universal morality; there are only local and temporal ones. Morality is not man’s inborn gift; it took many centuries of heredity and experiences before it was more or less established.’

Drapkin notes:

‘In early times, morality and religion were not synonomous. When someone killed an ox, a slave, or the wife of his neighbor, he owed compensation, but he did not have to implore the pardon of the gods. For a very long time, religion (man’s duties towards the gods) had nothing to do with morals (man’s duty to his fellowmen), and often they were in aggressive opposition. A religion’s request to exterminate prisoners of war only retarded the evolution of ethics. The children sacrificed to Moloch, Krishna’s demand that Indian virgins should engage in sexual orgies with priests, the Holy Office of the Inquisition, organized by the most religious nations of Europe; and so many other similar historical examples are the best confirmation that morality and religion are not the same thing. More than religion, the basic need to assure the general welfare of the community moved the people to defend it against all kinds of dangers. From this natural need of mutual defense derived, also, the first reciprocal duties from one to another and to the community as a whole. No society can survive in chaos, and those torn by schisms soon disappeared. Slowly, man’s life – especially his adult life, for his usefulness to the community – began to be respected. The same happened with private property and avoiding dangerous conflicts with other members of the group. And in such a way the first rudiments of law, which is nothing else than the collective morality, codified, started to appear.’

Drapkin notes:

‘Law and morality are not natural gifts. The real natural law is a law of the strongest; it dominates the entire history of mankind. Man’s earliest societies knew no law. They relied on the forces of custom, magic, religion, and social pressures to achieve their desired ends. The community’s reaction to antisocial behaviour was governed and dictated by a simple basic drive: revenge. In its earliest stages, the group determined that the account to be settled between victim and wrongdoer was a private affair. It was up to the victim to extract vengeance; neither the clan, the tribe, nor the community as a whole would interfere. And to rule out the possibility of future attacks, the victim often found it best to wreak vengeance to the utmost; killing the wrongdoer ensured that the victim would never suffer at his hands again. The injured party was, therefore, victim, judge, and executioner; the burden of protecting his person and property was his and his alone. Private revenge was the initial form of vengeance.’

Drapkin notes:

‘Revenge is an inherent, if unconscious, element of man’s psychological structure; ….Nor was it originally conceived of as a legal institution or as a vehicle of justice. It was for the victim to determine the extent of damage, and it is little wonder that the measure of vengeance was generally out of all proportion to the injury sustained. This, in turn, created a new imbalance: the wrongdoer became the victim and could exercise his right to vengeance. The conflict thus established could continue indefinitely, despite the fact that these early communities could ill afford the resulting loss of life and destruction of property. The dire consequences of such an unbroken cycle of revenge forced these primitive societies to develop certain restrictive measures, some of which appear in the first laws and codes of historical times. The first restriction took the form of what is known as blood revenge. "Blood" refers to the question of family relationship rather than to the mode of vengeance – the blood tie or bond uniting a group of individuals in varying degrees of kinship. Blood revenge placed the responsibility of punishing the wrongdoer in the hands of the group rather than the individual. An injury suffered by a ember of a family, clan, or tribe was considered a blow to the victim’s entire community, and revenge was exacted from the wrongdoer’s family or community. Revenge was now the domain of the community rather than the individual. Perhaps this is the remote origin of what became known as collective punishment, in which an entire community pays for a single member’s crime.’

Drapkin notes:

‘As religion became an institutionalized force and the fear of divine wrath as well as the belief in an afterlife took root, the concept of divine revenge was a natural development. Injurious behaviour was defined as an affront to the gods, who might express their wrath in the form of earthquakes, fires, plagues, and the like. The punishment that would assuage divine wrath was to be determined and executed by the priests within their temples. It was within the framework that the concepts of asylum (refuge for the wrongdoer), tregua dei (a period of peace "in the name of god"),, and talio (a limitation of the consequences of revenge) first developed.’

THOUGH POSSIBLY NOT IN CHINESE CULTURE

Drapkin notes:

‘The power of the religious institutions was gradually joined, and eventually eclipsed, by the power of the state. State revenge, which was the origin of public justice, gradually displaced all other forms of meting out punishment. Rather than answering to the victim, his clan, or the priests, the wrongdoer was now judged and punished by the state alone.’

Drapkin notes:

‘In the beginning, when men lived from hunting and fishing, the entire catch belonged to the community and was distributed equally among its members; this primitive communism had no rich and poor people. But with the development of agriculture appears the concept of family property: those who worked a piece of land, usually the members of the same family, were entitled to benefit from the fruits of their work. Much later appeared the notion of private or individual property. Parallel to such a development there was also a kind of industrial development, which has so influenced civilization by creating rivalries and stimulating wars, slavery, and so on.’

Drapkin notes:

‘Then came division of work; each member of the community specialized in a given work (hunting, fishing, etc.) which contributed to industrial development and, as a direct consequence, slavery, which persists, in different forms, to the present.’

QUERY TO SOCIAL DIFFERENCE

Drapkin notes about illness and disability in pre-history:

‘The attitude toward disease was rather an emotional reaction to pain and to fear. The frightened man was drive into the realm of fantasies about God and evil spirits, the outcome of his own anxiety. It is possible that the sick and old people were simply killed as annoying encumbrances. The mentally ill were probably no exception, although the Chinese tradition of being kind to them would suggest that killing was not the only "treatment" employed. As primitive man developed, he soon discovered that one might influence the sick by means of what we now call hypnosis. The shamans of certain Siberian tribes definitely practiced it, and in some parts of the East (Cochin China, the Malay Archipelago), priests indulged in a form of hypnotic treatment, using an assistant as medium. Our knowledge of primitive psychiatry is less than fragmentary, but it seems that the psychological energies of early man were dedicated more to the problem of getting rid of the uncertainties and fears generated by illness than to realistic efforts to eliminate the sickness itself.’

Social Difference

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Ethnic Difference

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Financial Difference

Any effort to address ‘Financial Difference’ in pre-historic society would by necessity have to concentrate on access to material resources, or conversely their denial.

In a hunter-gatherer society, membership of a clan would be necessary for survival; exclusion from the clan would lead to immediate impoverishment, starvation and consequent likely death.

‘Poverty’ might affect a whole society in times of climatic change or other catastrophic event.

The Aged

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Summary of the Treatment of Potentially Deviant Groups in Pre-History