The question of the orientation of the dead has recently engaged the attention of anthropologists, the term in this connexion meaning, not, as the derivation of the word implies, a position in the direction of the west, but in some specified relation to the points of the compass. For example, Mr. W. J. Perry, discarding what he terms the “solar theory” of Sir E. Tylor, reverts to the explanation suggested by Herbert Spencer, that the beliefs concerning the direction of the Other World depend on the migrations of the tribes, the Land of the Dead being identified with the region from which a certain tribe has, or believes it has, come. Mr. Perry's investigation is confined to Indonesia, and Sir J. G. Frazer quotes a case from British New Guinea in which the dead are buried on their sides with their heads pointing in the direction from which the totem clan of the deceased is believed to have come originally.
The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead. J. G. FrazerThe Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead: Vol. I. The Belief Among the Aborigines of Australia, the Torres Straits Islands, New Guinea and Melanesia.
