Vendetta

a state of private warfare between two sets of relatives. The term is Italian meaning vengeance. In Corsica the relatives of a murdered person deem it a duty to assassinate the murderer, or, failing to find him, they kill the nearest of kin. Failure to do so is deemed cowardice. Persons knowing themselves liable to death not infrequently hide in the mountains or barricade their houses for years, only to meet death at the end. A vendetta once begun is apt to end in killing back and forth until both circles of relatives are practically exterminated. Oftentimes a feud of this sort is handed down from generation to generation, the descendants deeming it a sacred duty to take vengeance for the injuries done on ancestors. Shakespeare makes a feud of this sort a barrier between his Romeo and Juliet. The vendetta is a local institution also in Sicily, Sardinia, Circassia, and Afghanistan. Many of the brigands or mountain robbers in these countries are refugees from the vendetta. Similar feuds in the mountains of Tennessee are of long standing. Certain Tennesseean families or clans even yet shoot at sight. Fortunately this state of affairs is yielding everywhere in favor of punishment by due course of law. A very similar custom prevailed among the North American Indians. Among the Dakotas, a son, brother, or other near relative drove his tomahawk into the brain of a murderer and that was the end of the matter. It was a private affair. The chief assumed no authority, no responsibility. No trial was held beforehand, no inquiry was made afterward. If public sentiment recognized the vengeance as just, the case was expected to end there. It behooved the executioner to look out for himself, however, for a reasonable length of time.