Tuite_K-Huneter_Shaman_Oracle_Priest.pdf

Hunter, shaman, oracle, priest :

An ethnohistorical overview of inspirational practices in highland

Georgia.

Kevin Tuite

Université de Montréal

Sixth Harvard Round Table on Archaeology, Language, Genetics and

Comparative Mythology

May 2004

tuitekj@anthro.umontreal.ca

www.philologie.com

SOME APPROACHES TO THE DEFINITION OF SHAMANISM

1. STADIALIST (e.g. Lev Shternberg’s theory of divine election [ izbrannichestvo ])

2. PROTOTYPE-BASED (cp. Eliade’s shamanic prototype primarily drawn from

Siberian data: ecstatic voyage to sky or underworld, mastery of fire, psychopomp)

3. CULTURALLY-SITUATED (cp. R. Hamayon’s definition of shaman’s role in

terms of imagined alliance and gender asymmetries, contrasting it to spirit

possession — Prototypical shaman adopts a masculine role, as imagined by his

society, as an active seeker of women and resources outside of the community.

Possession, by contrast, is a passive and stereotypically feminine stance: the

possessed does not seek, but rather is sought, by the soul or spirit that seizes her)

4. POLITICALLY/HISTORICALLY/SOCIALLY-SITUATED (cp. contributions to N.

Thomas & C. Humphreys 1994 Shamanism, history, and the state , which seek to

“loos[en] the classificatory paradigms” left by Eliade, in favor of a “historical

anthropology of inspirational practices”, that situates shamanism and shamans in

their historical and political context)

PREVIOUS ATTEMPTS TO IDENTIFY SHAMANISM IN THE CAUCASUS

1. G. Nioradze (1940) likened Abkhazian and Georgian “soul-returning” rituals to

similar practices performed by Buryat shamans.

2. R. Bleichsteiner (1936) on “Reste von Schamanismus” in ethnographic descriptions

from the highland provinces of northeast Georgia, in particular, those of Pshavi and

Xevsureti (subsequently cited by Eliade in his monograph).

3. Tinatin Ochiauri (1954) situating Xevsur institution of oracles ( kadag ) in

Shternberg’s evolutionary sequence of stages of divine election, of which Siberian

shamanism represents a more primitive manifestation.

4. Drawing on descriptions by Ochiauri and others, Charachidzé (1968, 1995) defines

Xevsur kadag as “chamane”, and interprets legendary accounts of past oracles as

evidence that until recently the northeast Georgian highlanders had the practice of a

“shamanic quest”, through which the practitioner received his powers.

II. Common features of Caucasian (esp. Kartvelian) traditional religions.

A. SUPERNATURALS AND HUMANS .

(1) Gradient hierarchy of beings according to their degree of participation in the divine

principle.

(2) Wild-game patroness, taking hunter-shaman as lover in exchange for hunting success.

Game pre-eaten & resuscitated to be killed by hunters.

B. GENDER , FAMILY AND SOCIETY .

(3) The contrast, or opposition, of male-linked/divine “purity” (Geo. sic’minde ) and

female-linked/corporeal “impurity” (Geo. uc’mindureba ); seclusion of women during

bloodflow.

(4) Interconnectedness, network-building: exogamically-oriented marital preferences,

fictive kinship, “believer-unbeliever” shrines; necessary complementarity of women and

men.

(5) marriage and “anti-marriage” (Geo. c’ac’loba , Svan ch’æ:ch’i:lær) .

(6) Trajectories associated with female and male divine beings, and their human

counterparts.

WOMEN: “exterior of the exterior” (beyond community) to “interior of the interior”

(domestic hearth)

MEN: “exterior of the interior” (public spaces) to “interior of the exterior” (exploited

for benefit of community)

C. DEAD SOULS & FUNERARY RITES .

(7) i. soul-returning/capture

iii. funeral games (horse-racing, target shooting)

iv. souls returning to visit living, influencing events among living

D. RITUAL AND SACRIFICE .

(8) sacrifice as means of contact with divinities: Primarily under species of (i) animals,

(ii) alcohol, (iii) bread. Also candles (and honey), and special case of lightning and

smallpox victims as “sacrifice”, taken by initiative of celestial god.

NB Geo. m-sxverp’-l “sacrifice, victim” < Proto-Kartv. *sxwerp’- “catch, encompass” —

sacrifice as “seized, grasped” rather than set aside, given or consecrated as in IE

languages ( sacrificium, offerre/oblatio, victima )

ii. exposure of deceased’s clothing: nishan, t’alavar

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