Re: The Three Functions.

----- Original Message -----

From: markodegard@...

To: cybalist@eGroups.com

Sent: Monday, November 15, 1999 6:12 AM

Subject: [cybalist] The Three Functions.

Has anyone ever made the observation that the three functions of Dumézil apply in spades to mediaeval Japan? You have the Emperor, the priest-judge, the priest-king, the emblem of the first function. Then you have the shogun, the warrior-king, leader of the samurai, as emblem of the second function. Finally, you have the peasants, the merchants, the working class who fulfill the third function.

In societies where warriors have high social standing, this tripartition of societal functions seems logical. Stating this in nasty left-wing terms, the priestly class provides the ideological niceties that justify the two joining together to keep the working classes in their place. Sometimes, the priestly class even convinces the underclass that they need to keep their place and fulfill their function.

I don't think that relations between social groups in early IE societies could be described in terms of Klassenkampf (as far as I remember, even Soviet teachers of the "Scientific Communism" didn't affirm it: they started with slave-holders - slaves opposition). IEs of the "third estate" can't be considered as the underclass. They were those who possessed the 'pecunia' (wealth = cattle).

In nicer terms, it describes the testosterone-supercharged second-function adolescent who first bears arms. If he does not get himself killed, he graduates from the second function to the third, by settling down, getting married and having children, and becoming man of property. In old age, he becomes the priest, the prophet, the wise man, and fulfills the first function.

An interesting idea but I'm afraid it hardly can be accepted. How the Induistic rigid caste system might develop from such a labile state of affairs? Besides, there should be hints of this in the IE mythologies.

I don't think this three-fold division is uniquely Indo-European.

So don't I. However, specializations of the people of the second and the third IE strata were rather original for those times. The warriors were first of all the chariot riders (an unique peculiarity), and the 'peasants' had the pronounced cattle-breeding specialization (not so typically for other Eneolithic folks). As to the first stratum I'm not quite sure that we may affirm more tight connection with the fire of the IE priests in comparison with their alien colleagues.

 

 

Alexander