War Before Civilization

by Lawrence H Keeley

  FORTIFICATIONS

  In denigrating the poor security and supposedly defective defensive techniques of primitive warriors, Tumey-High pointed to the common neglect of fortification by nonstate peoples. He claimed that if groups “erected good fortifications, they are on the threshhold of the state.”31 This pronouncement is contradicted by the existence of many groups that did employ fortifications and yet were politically organized as small tribes or weak chiefdoms. Although only a few states have not built them, fortifications have commonly been constructed by nonstate societies.32

  Yet fortifications are the costliest and largest-scale pieces of preindustrial military technology, and some features of social life constitute necessary preconditions for their construction. Because of the large input of labor necessary to construct even the simplest log palisade around a small settlement, the requisite labor can seldom be mustered for the whole period of construction by very egalitarian societies whose leaders have little power. Moreover, fortifications are stationary fixtures and protect only a small point in the landscape. Therefore, people with very nomadic life-styles and very portable possessions do not waste their time on such labor-intensive projects that they will soon abandon. The variable sufficient condition for the construction of defenses is the relative intensity of the preceived threat. Groups that are only infrequently attacked or that can easily absorb the losses suffered from small raids may have little impetus to fortify themselves.

  The principal tactical function of fortifications is as an extension of the handheld shield. Fortifications shield defenders, their noncombatant dependents, their property, and their livestock from enemy weapons. Because they must be scaled or torn down by attackers, fortifications also increase the amount of time during which assailants are vulnerable to defenders’ weapons. Fortifications are a barrier to easy infiltration or flanking by attackers, and they make surprise attacks more difficult to accomplish. They tend to force attackers to concentrate on specific points such as gates, mitigating any advantage in numbers an attacker might otherwise enjoy. Fortifications also provide a “screen of manuever,” preventing attackers from observing directly the defenders’ strength and movements. Depending on how they are constructed, they can include elevated platforms to fight from; they also provide defenders with a better view of the battle and enable them to use gravity to increase the force of their missiles. Obviously, fortifications are militarily very advantageous, but their immobility and substantial cost of construction may outweigh these benefits for many small social units.

  But fortifications also have some significant strategic functions. They can offer extra protection to settlements on frontiers, which are often thinly settled or otherwise geographically exposed. Judging from ethnographic records, fortifications are most commonly located on hostile borders or frontiers. Where the territories of sedentary social units are small, nearly every settlement is only a few hours’ walk from a hostile frontier, and in such circumstances nearly every village is fortified. This has often been the case in areas of tropical South America and highland New Guinea. It was also the case for the Mandan, Arikara, and Hidatsa villagers of the Upper Missouri River who farmed the floodplains and restricted their settlements to a narrow band along the river. With such a lineal settlement pattern, every village was on the “frontier,” subject to raids by the more nomadic tribes of the surrounding plains. Where tribal territories are larger, only frontier settlements may require fortification and then only if the neighbors are hostile.

  Because wealth and population—that is, potential booty and captives—are usually concentrated in one or a few large centrally located settlements in chiefdoms and states, these attract the unwelcome attentions of raiders and invaders more often than do the poorer peasant villages. Fortification of such “central places” is often useful and may even be necessary.

  Concentration of fortified settlements on frontiers and fortification of central places with elite residents have been documented in the prehistory of several well-studied regions.33 In northwestern Europe, fortified settlements of pioneer Early Neolithic farmers (ca. 7,000 years ago) were clustered along the limits of their settlement zone, presumably to defend against the Mesolithic hunter-gatherers living beyond the frontier (Chapter 8). On the Missouri River in South Dakota, between A.D. 1300 and 1500, fortified villages clustered along the fluctuating boundary between Middle Missouri and Coalescent prehistoric cultures, ancestors of the historic Mandan and Arikara tribes, respectively. In the American Southwest, fortified or defensively situated farming settlements often appeared in pioneering periods or at the limits of major cultural provinces. Indeed, at Spanish contact, the “border” pueblo of Pecos was heavily fortified with an outer wall enclosing defensible buildings without ground-floor windows or doors. In prehistoric Europe, by the end of the Early Bronze Age (ca. 1800 B.C.), fortified regional centers had become common. Remains found in them often give evidence that they were centers for metal production and for distribution of high-status goods, and they probably were the residences of chiefs.

  Few human artifacts do not acquire at least some symbolic functions and attributes, and fortifications certainly have their symbolic aspects. At the most prosaic level, they symbolize their owners’ military sophistication, military power, and determination to hold occupied territory. More abstractly, they demarcate the boundary between defenders and attackers, “owners” and “usurpers” (although the owners are often the newcomers, and the usurpers are indigenous). In chiefdoms and states, fortifications symbolize the importance and manifest the power of a leader.

  But all these symbolic functions derive from and depend on the practical military functions of such constructions. A house designed by a famous architect may be a status symbol, but it remains a habitation, too. Furthermore, occupation of a fine house is much more symbolically valuable than absentee ownership (otherwise the mortgage clerk would enjoy a status superior to the occupant). Similarly, fortifications must be capable of withstanding attack, and the most symbolically useful of these are ones that have actually done so on occasion. The medieval castle lost much of its symbolic cachet when the modern monarchy and its artillery rendered them militarily useless. The nobility—and even royalty, which needed no permit to fortify residences—then displayed their importance by building unfortified Renaissance mansions and palaces, often on the newly razed sites of their by then purely symbolic and comparatively uncomfortable castles.

  There are four general types of fortifications (which are not mutually exclusive): fortified settlements, fortified refuges, fortified elite residences, and purely military fortresses. Fortified settlements are by far the most common type ethnographically, especially among nonstates. Indeed, these are usually the only type found among village and tribal societies. They are not situated in locations with any special military advantages, but appear where villages and towns are normally located for economic reasons. They enclose otherwise normal settle ments in which all the common activities of daily life take place. Fortified refuges or fortresses proper are located at sites chosen for their military advantages, such as at high points or places difficult to reach. They do not normally serve as residences, except briefly during crises. This type of fortification seems to occur most frequently in chiefdoms or petty states such as those on the Pacific Northwest Coast and in Polynesia. In one case, some small Indian bands in northern California and Washington State were so continually raided by their neighbors that they eventually built small stone fortresses to use as refuges.34 During the obviously troubled period between A.D. 1200 and 1300 in the American Southwest, many large tribal settlements were relocated to defensible locations and served as refuges for smaller hamlets located on valley floors.35 The most infrequently encountered type of fortification in nonstates is the fortified elite residence or castle. In its purest form, it is little more than a fortified “household” (which can include as many as several thousand people) belonging to a paramount chief or petty king. The royal kraals of ma
ny African kings and paramount chiefs are of this type. In the eastern woodlands (especially the Southeast) of North America and in the large chiefdoms of South America, the chief or principal chiefs resided in the largest town, which was also fortified. Purely military fortresses occupied primarily by soldiers or warriors are found most frequently in states and occasionally in high chiefdoms, usually on frontiers. The military kraals occupied by young age-set warriors of some African chiefdoms are examples of the latter. These are small settlements—sometimes defended by walls, but often open—where members of an age-grade serve for several years, guarding the tribal frontiers and cattle herds, as well as raiding hostile neighbors, before being permitted to marry.

  Small-scale societies do not “neglect” fortification, but the social and economic conditions requisite for undertaking such constructions are seldom met by bands and tribes. Even when the necessary social conditions exist, the level of threat may be too low to justify the cost. When tribal and village societies do construct fortifications, these are merely less specialized and elaborate than the ones erected by chiefdoms and states.

  FOUR

  Imitating the Tiger

  Forms of Combat

  The forms of combat used by nonstate peoples have varied tremendously, but they can be divided roughly into formal battles, small ambush raids, and large raids or massacres. For most primitive groups, small raids have been the most and massacres the least frequent form of combat.

  BATTLES

  Because battles are the largest-scale, most prolonged, and most dramatic kind of warfare, both primitive and modern, much ethnographic attention has focused on them at the expense of the other types of fighting. Much of the traditional view of primitive warfare as sportive and ineffectual comes from the direct comparison of primitive and civilized battles. Many primitive battles were arranged—that is, a challenge or warning was issued to the enemy, and a battle site was named or understood.1 For example, early on the day chosen for formal battle, the Dugum Dani sent a herald to the enemy border to shout a challenge, which might be accepted and a battle site agreed on. If the challenge was not accepted, the challengers returned home and tried again another day. Among the Maring of New Guinea, if the challenge was refused, the challengers immediately invaded enemy territory, killing anyone they caught and destroying property. The Kalinga of Luzon, the Nguni tribes of southeastern Africa, and several California Indian groups also prearranged battles. Usually—on both sides in a challenge battle and on the aggressor’s side in an encounter (or unarranged) battle—the warriors are painted and dressed in special decorative or nonfunctional paraphernalia: war paint, headdresses, armbands, and so on. Such battles are typically preceded and accompanied by considerable taunting and exchanging of insults. Many primitive battles consist of little more than two lines of warriors armed with throwing spears or bows, firing at one another at about the maximum effective range of their weapons. For example, the bows of the Huli of New Guinea have a maximum range of about 150 yards but are really only effective within 50 yards. During a battle, the contending parties exchange arrows and skirmish at a distance of between 50 and 100 yards (just beyond effective bow range).2 Throughout the world, primitive battles—whether they last a few hours or a few days—are commonly terminated by agreement after each side has suffered a few-serious casualties. These various features of prearrangement, elaborate dress, catcalling, long-distance skirmishing, and low casualties give primitive battles their ritualized allure.

  Of course, it is essential to recognize that all battles take place by mutual agreement, although such agreement is usually informal in the modern era. The military historian John Keegan notes that battle “requires, if it is to take place, a mutual and sustained act of will by two contending parties” and that one party’s refusal to accept battle can “inflict a very serious frustration on its enemy’s plans.”3 Among the most important decisions made by military leadership involve deciding when and where to offer or accept battle. Armies and war parties consist of concentrations of men, and the area covered by these concentrations is invariably small in comparison to the territories in which they operate. Fabian strategies that simply avoid battle by yielding space, used successfully by the Romans against Hannibal, by the Russians against Napoleon, and by guerrillas everywhere, are based on this fact. For any battle to take place, the contenders must cooperate with one another: they must agree to fight. Thus the arranged battles of primitive groups and of medieval European armies merely formalize an inherent aspect of battle.

  Other features of primitive battle have been cited as evidence of its particularly stylized or sportive nature. One of the most commonly cited was the Plains Indian custom of “counting coup.” When a Plains warrior “counted coup,” he committed an act of bravery or daring. The French word coup (meaning “blow,” “stroke,” or “deed”) attached to the custom. Customs varied somewhat among tribes, but a number of different acts committed in combat could be counted as a coup, including stealing a horse from an enemy camp, killing an enemy with a hand-held weapon, saving a wounded comrade, and charging alone into a group of enemies. Relatively few countable coups—being one of the first three or four braves to touch a dead enemy with the hand or with a handheld object, touching a live enemy, or being first to sight the enemy—were at all unusual. Nevertheless, all these deeds carried a serious risk of death—even that of touching a dead enemy, since Plains warriors would fight furiously to recover fallen comrades and save them from scalping and other mutilations. Merely killing an enemy with a projectile was considered useful, but it was not counted as a coup. There is every evidence that Plains warriors tried and often succeeded in killing large numbers of one another, but a warrior’s reputation as a brave man depended on the number of coups he could recount.4

  This attitude is not terribly different from the civilized concept of military courage—and the reward of honors for it; in both cases, the personal risk involved, and not the effect on the enemy, is deemed the paramount consideration. Nation-states award soldiers decorations and promotions not for killing but for conspicuously risking death in combat. The main divergence of coup counting from civilized customs is related to the specific acts rewarded (such as stealing a horse or touching an enemy versus tending wounded comrades under fire or volunteering to go for help through a gauntlet of enemies).5 The Classical Greeks, for example, awarded honors for maintaining order in the ranks under extreme difficulty and for being the first to reach an enemy camp.6 Counting coups no more ameliorated the deadliness of combat than does the civilized custom of awarding medals. Moreover, equally important to Plains warriors was the custom of taking scalps, and these were decidedly difficult to obtain from living enemies.

  In some areas, modern warfare is far more ritualized than the primitive variety. One of these areas involves surrender—by both individuals and units. For individuals, this ritual entails raised hands, white flags, weapons proffered or tossed out, shouts of key words, and so on. The surrender of units requires an even more involved choreography: the white-flag approach of emissaries; the discussion of terms; an arranged cease-fire at a prescribed moment; and, for very large units, a formal signing of “instruments.” Thus individuals and groups that have made every effort to kill their enemies can, by the enactment of appropriate rituals, preserve themselves from immediate harm at the hands of their adversaries. Additional niceties of prisoner exchange and parole (that is, release after a promise not to bear arms again) have practically disappeared from warfare, but they were common until the nineteenth century.7 Other conventions govern sparing and even rescuing enemy sailors and airmen who have abandoned their ships and planes. Ritual battles prior to a foregone surrender are not absent even from quite recent wars. Several times during World War II, commanders of some Allied and Axis positions requested that their adversaries fire briefly at their position so that they could surrender “with honor.” Even the German commander of the citadel at Cherbourg asked that investing American forces “fire
artillery at the main gate, to give him a pretext for surrender.”8 As we shall see, these civilized rituals of submission have few counterparts in primitive warfare.

  Many other irrational conventions are peculiar to modern civilized warfare. Killing of enemy civilians by bombardment or by systematic starvation via blockade is to some degree acceptable under international law, but murdering them with small arms is considered completely vile. In modern warfare, the more personal the cruelty or destruction, the more likely it is to be regarded as reprehensible. Historically, some weapons (such as Greek fire, boiling oil, napalm, and shrapnel) have been countenanced despite the horrible suffering they inflict, while equally brutal items (such as serrated swords, square and dum-dum bullets, and poison gas) have been officially banned. International conventions and customs also tend to outlaw or eschew use of weapons that kill with certainty (for example, poisoned bullets and nerve gas). Customary civilized laws of war and the Geneva Conventions (and their historical predecessors) manifest the ritualized nature of modern warfare.