ABSTRACT
To investigate perceptions of the past among any socially coherent group of people is, in effect, to carry out an historical investigation into social process. Furthermore, this investigation provides only one of several data sources potentially available to the investigator, other obvious sources being the observation of current social action together with investigation of their cognitive bases, the archaeological record, and the various written records which may be left either by the society under investigation or by an alien observer. For any anthropologist working among kin-based societies, there are limitations here: he or she is lucky indeed if detailed archaeological information is available for the region within which the study takes place, and the only written records will be those left by outside observers, usually European explorers, pioneering entrepreneurs in search of easily extracted wealth, missionaries or early governmental officials. In these situations reconstruction of social processes relies heavily upon current ethnography, including modern perceptions of the past.
