The Medical Art of the Maoris is wholly Polynesian
and exorcistic

(23) The art of healing, for example, so often in primitive times and peoples, as in the most modern times, shared in by the women of the community, was wholly in the hands of the men; for it was almost altogether a matter of karakias or rites and incantations, and the women, like the Patupaiarehe, had no karakia. Most primitive medicine is page 175to a large extent sorcery, or in other words, like so many diseases of both savage and civilised, an outcome of imagination; and of all semi-cultured or barbarous races perhaps the Polynesian was the most ridden by imagination in this department. The islanders were not much harassed by diseases. The common ailments of humanity, toothache, rheumatism, indigestion, and the rest, were doubtless fairly common amongst them, though their open-air and active life must have reduced them to a minimum. Eye disease arose from the chimneyless houses, and skin diseases, including leprosy, from the use of food, and especially fish, in a state of rottenness; but the region was practically quarantined for thousands of yearsin fact, the absence of all sign of the epidemics of the Asiatic coast, like beriberi, cholera, and plague, seems to indicate that these vast congestions of population, that are the nesting-places of such diseases, had not yet crowded on to the Chinese and Indian shores, when Polynesia was finally isolated; and the tremendous effects on the Polynesians of even the epidemics of childhood, like measles, show that the diseases could not have taken root there in previous ages, else the virulence would have been less. The islands, in fact, came to have a horror of the approach of European ships; evidently the epidemics the first voyagers had left had decimated the ranks of their inhabitants. Every indication seems to point to such absence of the widespreading diseases as only complete quarantine for thousands of years could have secured.

(24) It is evident that in the pre-European times two-thirds of the diseases that harassed the Polynesians must have originated in imagination or the influence of the mind on the nerves. Thus it was that amongst them the curative profession was in the hands of men. As long as the matriarchate endured it was probably in women's hands all over the world. With the patriarchate all rites, and, in fact, page 176all religion, would pass to the other sex, and with them therefore all the curative art, and in a healthy region, such as pre-European Polynesia was, the chief scope of this art lay in the province of beliefa large province, even in the most modern medicine. The priest became the doctor, too, and not only that, but the inflicter of diseases. The extraordinary extension of the system of tapu was due to this double power of the tohunga over the imagination. There were a few simples, chiefly herbals, for the common ailments, and the Maori, from his experience as a cannibal and an exhumer of ancestral bones, was an expert bone-setter, and in so healthy a race wounds were easily cured. But all the other degenerations of human flesh, due to the entrance of demons, or the anger of ancestral spirits, or sorcery, in other words, due to the influence of imagination, were beyond such common remedies. As it was, the force of the idea became so strong that it could kill a man at sight; in fact, this was the final test in the wharekura or theological school of a candidate for the rank of tohunga. If he could not kill by mere force of mind the victim pointed out he was not fit to become a priest; and once a man had got the idea into his mind that he was to die, nothing could save him.

(25) The medical art, both offensive and curative, was a branch of religion, and was taught in the theological school or wharekura, though there were some incantations that could not be taught even there, but only in the open or in the forest. To this teaching only the first-born of noble or priestly families could be admitted, and they had to be taught the secrets for many years in an atmosphere of mystery, and tested again and again before they could be passed as full priests. No woman could approach during the courses of teaching, the only exception being an aged priestess. And this seems to indicate that the last immigrants brought some of their women with them, who introduced some relics of page 177the matriarchate into the new region. The building was intensely holy, and food could not be cooked in or near it.

(26) The extreme elaboration of sorcery and the predominance of the man in medicine imply that the conquerors came from a race well advanced. Theirs was not the mere jugglery and stupid practices of the northern shaman. It was rather the refinement of sorcery so widespread amongst the South Asiatic nations before our era. It was a fine art, both there and in Polynesia. Of one thing we may be sure, that where the power of incantations was felt to be supreme the intruding men monopolised it.

(27) It is clear from all this that the Polynesian is stratified in his arts and industries, as in his beliefs and customs. There are traces of the matriarchate; but there are still clearer traces of conquest, once at least, if not oftener, of an aboriginal people by an immigrant aristocracy.