ABSTRACT
A rich source of omens and auguries, beasts was the medium of domestic sacrifices. The capacity of the beast to carry social identity, both individual and collective, was most vividly marked in two sets of conventional practices. The first involved the "cattle linkage" of siblings and bridewealth; the second arose out of inheritance. For a man to hold a beast that belonged to the ruler was to have the presence of the sovereign himself in his midst. To succour that beast was to honor the chief and, by extension, the chiefship and polity embodied in him; to hurt it was to strike against him, and to risk the sanction that might follow. For citizens of the chiefdom, beasts were both the medium through which men achieved their relative standing and the social means of producing a labor force.
