alcheringa (or its equivalent) ancestors, who made the country and left behind numberless spirit individuals."[1]
From Melanesia the evidence is equally interesting. Codrington mentions two superhuman beings who at any rate "were never human, yet in some ways originators of the human race; both were female, both subjects of stories not objects of worship." A little farther on he expresses some surprise at the existence in the New Hebrides and Banks' Islands of spirit-beings of two orders. He writes of Qat, —
"The place of Qat in the popular beliefs of the Banks' Islands was so high and so conspicuous that when the people first became known to Europeans it was supposed that he was their god, the supreme creator of men and pigs and food. It is certain that he was believed to have made things in another sense from that in which men could be said to make them . . . The regular courses of the seasons are ascribed to him, the calm months from September to December, when the un, Palola sea-worm, comes, the yearly blow, and the high tide in the month wotgoro. . . . With all this it is impossible to take Qat very seriously or to allow him divine rank. He is certainly not the lord of spirits."[2]
Let us note that these creators are not worshipped, although they occupy a higher station than any of the worshipped gods.
If recent travellers are to be believed, even the Negritos of central Africa, who are among the lowest human beings, know of a Great Maker, above and distinct from the host of spirits that are around them.[3]
Although the general existence of the belief in High Gods is now accepted by most anthropologists, there is no unanimity of opinion in regard to the origin of the belief Some supporters of the Christian religion have tried to make capital out of this so-called original monotheism.
