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-The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Evolution of Culture, by
-Augustus Henry Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers
-
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-Title: The Evolution of Culture
- and Other Essays
-
-Author: Augustus Henry Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers
-
-Editor: J. L. Myres
-
-Release Date: February 8, 2014 [EBook #44844]
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-Language: English
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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 44844 ***
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@@ -10772,361 +10734,4 @@ Inconsistent punctuation in plates XV and XVI has been retained.
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+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 44844 ***
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-The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Evolution of Culture, by
-Augustus Henry Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
-almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
-re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
-with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
-
-
-Title: The Evolution of Culture
- and Other Essays
-
-Author: Augustus Henry Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers
-
-Editor: J. L. Myres
-
-Release Date: February 8, 2014 [EBook #44844]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EVOLUTION OF CULTURE ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by Henry Flower and the Online Distributed
-Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
-produced from images generously made available by The
-Internet Archive)
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-Transcriber's Note
-
-
-Greek text is indicated by ~swung dashes~, and superscript text
-by caret signs.
-
-
-
-
- THE
- EVOLUTION OF CULTURE
- AND OTHER ESSAYS
-
- BY THE LATE
- LT.-GEN. A. LANE-FOX PITT-RIVERS
- D.C.L., F.R.S., F.S.A.
-
- EDITED BY J. L. MYRES, M.A.
- STUDENT OF CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD
-
- WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
- HENRY BALFOUR, M.A.
- FELLOW OF EXETER COLLEGE, OXFORD
- CURATOR OF THE PITT-RIVERS MUSEUM
-
- TWENTY-ONE PLATES
-
- OXFORD
- AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
- 1906
-
-
-
-
- HENRY FROWDE, M.A.
-
- PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
-
- LONDON, EDINBURGH
-
- NEW YORK AND TORONTO
-
-
-
-
-PREFACE
-
-
-These Essays, or rather Lectures, contain the first-fruits of the
-earliest systematic attempt to apply the theory of Evolution to the
-products of human handiwork. In their original form they have long been
-difficult to obtain; and they are reprinted now to supply the needs of
-candidates for the Oxford Diploma in Anthropology, and of the numerous
-visitors to the Pitt-Rivers Museum in Oxford. But they will certainly
-appeal to a far wider public also, as a brief and authentic statement
-of their author's discoveries.
-
-The four Essays are reprinted substantially as they were first
-delivered and published. But verbal errors and actual misquotations
-have been corrected; and allusions to specimens or diagrams exhibited
-during the original discourses, but not published, have been replaced
-so far as possible by references to similar objects figured in the
-Plates.
-
-The Plates are photographic reproductions of the original
-illustrations, with the exception of Plates V, XIII, XVII, XVIII. Of
-these, Plate XIII has simply been re-drawn, from a faded original;
-Plates XVII and XVIII have been translated, without loss of detail,
-from colours to monochrome shading; Plate V has been reconstituted
-from illustrations quoted in the text, with the permission of their
-publisher, Mr. Murray. Plate XXI is reproduced, by permission of Sir
-John Evans, from the paper which it illustrated originally.
-
-The footnotes demand a word of explanation. The author, as the original
-publications show, was not precise in indicating his sources: he
-frequently gave, as a quotation, the general sense rather than the
-exact words of his authority; and occasionally his memory played him
-false. In the reprint, the precise references have been identified,
-and are given in full, and obvious errors in the text have been either
-amended or corrected in a footnote. The editor desires to acknowledge
-much valuable help in the search for references from Miss C. M. Prior,
-of Headington.
-
-
-
-
-CONTENTS
-
-
- PAGE
-
- PREFACE iii
-
- INTRODUCTION v
-
- PRINCIPLES OF CLASSIFICATION (1874) 1
-
- ON THE EVOLUTION OF CULTURE (1875) 20
- WITH PLATES I-V, AND XXI
-
- PRIMITIVE WARFARE. I (1867) 45
- WITH PLATES VI-XI
-
- PRIMITIVE WARFARE. II (1868) 89
- WITH PLATES XII-XVI
-
- PRIMITIVE WARFARE. III (1869) 144
- WITH PLATES XVII-XX
-
- EARLY MODES OF NAVIGATION (1874) 186
-
-
-
-
-INTRODUCTION[1]
-
-
-It was about the middle of last century that an officer in Her
-Majesty's Army began to apply the lessons which he had learnt in
-the course of some of his professional experimental work to studies
-pursued by him as a hobby in a far wider field of science. The story
-of the famous ethnographical collection of Colonel Lane Fox is well
-known, and I need but briefly refer to it. During his investigations,
-conducted with a view to ascertaining the best methods whereby the
-service firearms might be improved, at a time when the old Tower musket
-was being finally discarded, he was forcibly struck by the extremely
-gradual changes whereby improvements were effected. He observed that
-every noteworthy advancement in the efficiency, not only of the whole
-weapon, but also of every individual detail in its structure, was
-arrived at as a cumulative result of a succession of very slight
-modifications, each of which was but a trifling improvement upon the
-one immediately preceding it. Through noticing the unfailing regularity
-of this process of gradual _evolution_ in the case of firearms, he
-was led to believe that the same principles must probably govern the
-development of the other arts, appliances, and ideas of mankind. With
-characteristic energy and scientific zeal Colonel Lane Fox began at
-once, in the year 1851, to illustrate his views and to put them to
-a practical test. He forthwith commenced to make the ethnological
-collection with which his name will always be associated, and which
-rapidly grew to large proportions under his keen search for material
-which should illustrate and perhaps prove his theory of progress by
-evolution in the arts of mankind.
-
-Although as a collector he was omnivorous, since every artefact
-product fell strictly within his range of inquiry, his collection,
-nevertheless, differed from the greater number of private ethnological
-collections, and even public ones of that day, inasmuch as it was built
-up _systematically_ with a definite object in view. It is unnecessary
-for me to describe in detail the system which he adopted in arranging
-his collection. His principles are well known to ethnologists, either
-from the collection itself or from his writings, more especially from
-the series of lectures which he gave at the Royal United Service
-Institution, in the years 1867-9, upon 'Primitive Warfare'; from
-his paper read before the Anthropological Institute in 1874 on 'The
-Principles of Classification, as adopted in the arrangement of his
-Anthropological Collection', which was then exhibited at the Bethnal
-Green Museum; from that portion of the _catalogue raisonné_ of his
-collection which was published in 1877; and from numerous other
-papers dealing with special illustrations of his theory. Suffice it
-to say that, in classifying his ethnological material, he adopted
-a _principal_ system of groups into which objects of like form or
-function from all over the world were associated to form series, each
-of which illustrated as completely as possible the varieties under
-which a given art, industry, or appliance occurred. Within these main
-groups objects belonging to the same region were usually associated
-together in _local_ sub-groups. And wherever amongst the implements or
-other objects exhibited in a given series there seemed to be suggested
-a _sequence of ideas_, shedding light upon the probable stages in
-the evolution of this particular class, these objects were specially
-brought into juxtaposition. This special grouping to illustrate
-sequence was particularly applied to objects from the same region as
-being, from their local relationships, calculated better to illustrate
-an actual continuity. As far as possible the seemingly more primitive
-and generalized forms--those simple types which usually approach most
-nearly to _natural_ forms, or whose use is associated with primitive
-ideas--were placed at the beginning of each series, and the more
-complex and specialized forms were arranged towards the end.
-
-The primary object of this method of classification by series was
-to demonstrate, either actually or hypothetically, the origin,
-development, and continuity of the material arts, and to illustrate the
-variations whereby the more complex and specialized forms belonging
-to the higher conditions of culture have been evolved by successive
-slight improvements from the simple, rudimentary, and generalized forms
-of a primitive culture.
-
-The _earlier_ stages in these sequence series were more especially the
-object of investigation, the later developments being in the greater
-number of cases omitted or merely suggested. It was necessary for
-Colonel Lane Fox to restrict the extent of the series, any one of
-which, if developed to the full extent, would easily have filled a
-good-sized museum. The earlier stages, moreover, were less familiar,
-and presented fewer complications. The general principles of his theory
-were as adequately demonstrated by the ruder appliances of uncivilized
-races as by the more elaborate products of peoples of higher culture;
-and, moreover, there was doubtless a great attraction in attacking
-that end of the development series which offered a prospect at least
-of finality, inasmuch as there was always a chance of discovering
-the absolute origin of a given series. Hence the major part of his
-collection consisted of specimens procured from savage and barbaric
-races, amongst whom the more rudimentary forms of appliances are for
-the most part to be found.
-
-The validity of the general views of Colonel Lane Fox as to evolution
-in the material arts of Man was rapidly accepted by a large number of
-ethnologists and others, who were convinced by the arguments offered
-and the very striking evidence displayed in their support. I have heard
-people object to the use of the term 'evolution' in connexion with
-the development of human arts. To me the word appears to be eminently
-appropriate, and I think it would be exceedingly difficult to find one
-which better expresses the succession of extremely minute variations
-by means of which progress has been effected. That the successive
-individual units of improvement, which when linked together form the
-chain of advancement, _are_ exceedingly small is a fact which any one
-can prove for himself if he will study _in detail_ the growth of a
-modern so-called 'invention'. One reason why we are apt to overlook
-the greater number of stages in the growth of still living arts is
-that we are not as a rule privileged to watch behind the scenes. Of
-the numberless slight modifications, each but a trifling advance upon
-the last, it is but comparatively few which ever meet the eye of the
-public, which only sees the more important stages; those, that is to
-say, which present a sufficiently distinct advance upon that which has
-hitherto been in use to warrant their attracting attention, or, shall
-we say, having for a time a marketable value. The bulk of the links in
-the evolutionary chain disappear almost as soon as they are made, and
-are known to few, perhaps none, besides their inventors. Even where the
-history of some invention is recorded with the utmost care it is only
-the more prominent landmarks which receive notice; the multitude of
-trifling variations which have led up to them are not referred to, for,
-even if they be known, space forbids such elaborately detailed record.
-The smaller variations are, for the most part, utterly forgotten,
-their ephemeral existence and their slight individual influence upon
-the general progress being unrecorded at the time, and lost sight of
-almost at once. The immediately succeeding stage claims for the moment
-the attention, and it again in its turn becomes the stepping-stone upon
-which the next raises itself, and so on.
-
-Before proceeding further, let me give as briefly as I can an example
-of a development series worked out, in the main, upon the general line
-of inquiry inaugurated by Colonel Lane Fox. It is commonly accepted as
-a fact, which is borne out by tradition, both ancient and modern, that
-certain groups of stringed instruments of music must be referred for
-their origin to the bow of the archer. The actual historical record
-does not help us to come to a definite conclusion on this point, nor
-does the direct testimony of archaeology; but from other sources very
-suggestive evidence is forthcoming. A comparative study of the musical
-instruments of modern savage and barbaric peoples makes it very clear
-to one that the greater portion of the probable chain of sequences
-which led from the simple bows to highly specialized instruments of
-the harp family may be reconstructed from types still existing in use
-among living peoples, most of the well-defined early stages being
-represented in Africa at the present day[2]. The native of Damaraland,
-who possesses no stringed instrument proper, is in the habit of
-temporarily converting his ordinary shooting-bow into a musical
-instrument. For this purpose he ties a small thong loopwise round
-the bow and bow-string, so as to divide the latter into two vibrating
-parts of unequal length. When lightly struck with a small stick the
-tense string emits a couple of notes, which satisfy this primitive
-musician's humble cravings for purely rhythmic sound. Amongst many
-other African tribes we find a slight advance, in the form of special,
-rather slightly made bows constructed and used for musical purposes
-only. In order to increase the volume of sound, it is frequently the
-custom amongst some of the tribes to rest the bow against some hollow,
-resonant body, such as an inverted pot or hollow gourd. In many parts
-again, we find that the instrument has been further improved by
-_attaching_ a gourd to the bow, and thus providing it with a permanent
-resonating body. To achieve greater musical results, it would appear
-that somewhere in Africa (in the West, I suspect) two or more small
-bows were attached to a single gourd. I have, so far, been unable to
-trace this particular link in Africa itself, but, curiously enough,
-this very form has been obtained from Guiana. It may be thought that I
-am applying a breaking strain to the chain of evidence when I endeavour
-to work an instrument from South America into an African developmental
-series. But, when we recall the fact that evidence of the existence of
-_indigenous_ stringed instruments of music in the New World has yet to
-be produced, coupled with the certain knowledge that a considerable
-number of varieties of musical instruments, stringed and otherwise,
-accompanied the enforced migration of African natives during the days
-of the slave trade, and were thus established in use and perpetuated
-in many parts of the New World, including the north-east regions of
-South America, we may, I think, admit, with some confidence, that, in
-this particular instance, from Guiana to Guinea is no very far cry,
-and that the more than probable African origin of this instrument
-from South America gives it a perfect claim to take its place in the
-African sequence. I still anticipate that this type of instrument will
-be forthcoming from some hinterland region in West Africa. Were _no_
-evidence at all forthcoming of such a form, either in past or present,
-we should be almost compelled to infer that such a one had existed,
-as this stage in the sequence appears to be necessary to prevent a
-break in the continuity of forms leading to what is apparently the
-next important stage, represented by a type of instrument common in
-West Africa, having five little bows, each carrying its string, all of
-which are fixed by their lower ends into a box-like wooden resonator.
-This method of attaching the bows to the now improved body of the
-instrument necessitates the lower attachment of the strings being
-transferred from the bows to the body, so that the bow-like form begins
-to disappear. The next improvement, of which there is evidence from
-existing types, consists in the substitution of a single, stouter,
-curved rod for the five little 'bows', all the five strings being
-serially attached to the upper end of the rod, their lower ends to
-the body as before. This instrument is somewhat rare now, and it may
-well be a source of wonder to us that it has survived at all (unless
-it be to assist the ethnologist), since it is an almost aggressively
-inefficient form, owing to the row of strings being brought into
-two different places at right angles to one another. The structure
-of this rude instrument gives it a quaintly composite appearance,
-suggesting that it is a banjo at one end and a harp at the other. This
-is due to the strings remaining, as in the preceding form, attached
-to the resonating body in a line disposed _transversely_, while the
-substitution of a single rod for the five 'bows' has necessitated the
-disposal of their upper attachments in a _longitudinal_ series as
-regards the longer axis of the instrument. Inefficient though it be,
-this instrument occupies an important position in the apparent chain
-of evolution, leading on as it does through some intermediate types to
-a form in which the difficulty as regards the strings is overcome by
-attaching their _lower_ ends in a longitudinal series, and so bringing
-them into the same plane throughout their length. In this shape the
-instrument has assumed a harp-like form--a rude and not very effective
-one, it is true, but it is none the less definitely a member of the
-harp family. The modern varieties of this type extend across Africa
-from west to east, and the harps of ancient Egypt, Assyria, Greece,
-and India were assuredly elaborations of this primitive form. The
-Indian form, closely resembling that of ancient Egypt, still survives
-in Burma, while elsewhere we find a few apparently allied forms. In
-all these forms of the harp, from the rudest Central and West African
-types to the highly ornate and many-stringed examples of Egypt and
-the East, one point is especially noteworthy. This is the invariable
-_absence of the fore-pillar_, which in the modern harps of Western
-Europe is so important, nay, essential a structural feature. In spite
-of the skill and care exercised in the construction of some of the
-more elaborate forms, none were fitted with a fore-pillar, the result
-being that the frame across which the strings were stretched was
-always weak and disposed to yield more or less to the strain caused by
-the tension of the strings. This implied that, even when the strings
-were not unduly strained, the tightening up of one of them to raise
-its pitch necessarily caused a greater or less slackening of all the
-other strings, since the free end of the rod or 'neck' would tend
-to be drawn slightly towards the body of the instrument under the
-increased tension. The mere addition of a simple, strut-like support
-between the free end of the 'neck' and the 'body' would have obviated
-this difficulty and rendered the instrument relatively efficient and
-unyielding to varying tension. And yet, even in Western Europe, this
-seemingly obvious and invaluable addition did not appear, as far as I
-can ascertain, until about the seventh or eighth century A.D.; and even
-then it seems to have been added somewhat half-heartedly, and a very
-long time had yet to elapse before the fore-pillar became an integral
-part of the framework and was allotted its due proportion in the
-general design.
-
-I have purposely selected this particular series for my illustration,
-not because it is something new--indeed, it is already more or less
-familiar, and, maybe, has even some merit in its lack of newness,
-since, in accordance with a popular dictum, it may urge a greater
-claim to be regarded as true--nor because it is specially striking,
-but rather for the reason that it illustrates suitably several of
-the points upon which I wish briefly to touch. Even in the severely
-condensed form in which I have been obliged to present this series of
-developments from bow to harp, there is, I think, demonstrated the
-practical application of several of the general principles upon which
-is based the theory whereby Colonel Lane Fox sought to elucidate the
-phenomena of human progress.
-
-A series of this kind serves, in the first place, to demonstrate
-that the absence of historical and archaeological evidence of the
-_actual_ continuity in development from simple to complex does not
-preclude investigations into the early history of any product of human
-ingenuity, nor prevent the formation of a suggestive and plausible
-if largely hypothetical series, illustrating the probable chain of
-sequences along which some highly specialized form may be traced back
-link by link to its rudimentary prototypes, or even to its absolute
-origin, which in this particular instance is the ordinary shooting bow
-_temporarily_ converted into a musical instrument. Where an actual
-chronological series is not forthcoming, a comparative study of
-such types as are available, even though they be _modern_ examples,
-reveals the fact that, if classified according to their apparent
-morphological affinities, these types show a tendency to fall into
-line; the gap between the extreme forms--that is, the most simple and
-the most advanced--being filled by a succession of intermediate forms,
-more or less completely linked together, according to the number of
-varieties at our disposal. We are thus, at any rate, in possession of
-_a_ sequence series. Is it unreasonable for us to conclude that this
-reflects, in great measure, _the_ actual chronological sequence of
-variations through which in past times the evolutionary history of the
-instrument was effected, from the earliest rudimentary form?
-
-It is difficult to account, at all, for the existence of many of the
-forms, such as I have briefly described, except on the supposition
-that they are _survivals_ from more or less _early stages_ in a
-series of progressive evolution; and, for myself, I do not believe
-that so inefficient and yet so elaborate an instrument, as, to take
-an example, the harp of ancient Egypt, Assyria, and India, could have
-come into being by any sudden inventive process, by 'spontaneous
-generation', as it were, to use a biological term; whereas, the innate
-conservatism of the human species, which is most manifest among the
-lower and more primitive races (I use the term conservatism, I need
-hardly say, in a non-political sense), amply accounts for such forms
-having been arrived at, since the rigid adherence to traditional types
-is a prevailing characteristic of human culture, and only admits
-of improvement by very slight and gradual variations upon existing
-forms. The difficulty experienced by man, in a primitive condition of
-culture, of emancipating himself from the ideas which have been handed
-down to him, except by a very gradual and lengthy process, causes him
-to exert somewhat blindly his efforts in the direction of progress, and
-often prevents his seeing very obvious improvements, even when they are
-seemingly forced upon his notice. For instance, the early Egyptian,
-Assyrian, and Greek harps, as I have already stated, were destitute of
-a fore-pillar, and this remained the case for centuries, in spite of
-their actually existing in an environment of other instruments, such
-as the lyre and _trigonon_, which in their rigid, unyielding frames
-possessed, and even paraded, the very feature which was so essential
-to the harp, to enable it to become a really efficient instrument. The
-same juxtaposition of similar types, without mutual influence, may be
-seen in modern Africa among ruder forms of these instruments.
-
-And yet, in spite of instances such as this--where a valuable feature
-suggested by one instrument has not been adopted for the improvement
-of another, even though the two forms are in constant use side by
-side--we must recognize that progress, in the main, is effected by a
-process of bringing the experience gained in one direction to bear upon
-the results arrived at in another. This process of grafting one idea
-upon another, or, as we may call it, the hybridization of ideas and
-experience, is a factor in the advancement of culture whose influence
-cannot be overestimated. It is, in fact, the main secret of progress.
-In the animal world hybridization is liable to produce _sterile_
-offspring; in the world of ideas its results are usually far different.
-A fresh stimulus is imparted, which may last through generations
-of fruitful descendants. The _rate_ at which progress is effected
-increases steadily with the growth of experience, whereby the number of
-ideas which may act and react upon one another is augmented.
-
-It follows, as a corollary, that he who would trace out the
-phylogenetic history of any product of human industry will speedily
-discover that, if he aims at doing so _in detail_, he must be prepared
-for disappointments. The tangle is too involved to be completely
-unravelled. The sequence, strictly speaking, is not in the form of
-a simple chain, but rather in that of a highly complex _system_ of
-chains. The time-honoured simile afforded by a river perhaps supplies
-the truest comparison. The course of the _main stream_ of our evolution
-series may be fairly clear to us, even as far as to its principal
-source; we may even explore and study the general effect produced
-by the more important tributaries; but to investigate in detail the
-contributions afforded in present and past of the innumerable smaller
-streams, brooks, and runlets is clearly beyond any one's power, even
-supposing that the greater number had not changed their course at
-times, and even, in many cases, run dry. While we readily admit that
-important effects have been produced by these numberless tributary
-influences, both on the course and on the volume of the river, it is
-clear that we must in general be content to follow the main stream. A
-careful study of the series of musical instruments, of which I gave but
-a scanty outline, reveals very clearly that numberless ideas borrowed
-from outside sources have been requisitioned, and have affected the
-course of development. In some cases one can see fairly clearly whence
-these ideas were derived, and even trace back in part their own
-phylogenetic history; but a complete analysis must of necessity remain
-beyond our powers and even our hopes.
-
-It will have been observed that, in the example of a sequence series
-which I have given, the early developmental stages are illustrated
-entirely by instruments belonging to _modern savage races_. It was a
-fundamental principle in the general theory of Colonel Lane Fox that in
-the arts and customs of the still living savage and barbaric peoples
-there are reflected to a considerable extent the various strata of
-human culture in the past, and that it is possible to reconstruct in
-some degree the life and industries of Man in prehistoric times by a
-study of existing races in corresponding stages of civilization. His
-insistence upon the importance of bringing together and comparing the
-archaeological and ethnological material, in order that each might
-serve to throw light upon the other, has proved of value to both
-sciences. Himself a brilliant and far-seeing archaeologist as well as
-ethnologist, he was eminently capable of forming a conclusion upon this
-point, and he urged this view very strongly.
-
-The Earth, as we know, is peopled with races of the most heterogeneous
-description, races in all stages of culture. Colonel Lane Fox argued
-that, making due allowance for possible instances of degradation from
-a higher condition, this heterogeneity could readily be explained by
-assuming that, while the progress of some races has received relatively
-little check, the culture development of other races has been retarded
-to a greater or less extent, and that we may see represented conditions
-of at least partially arrested development. In other words, he
-considered that in the various manifestations of culture among the less
-civilized peoples were to be seen more or less direct _survivals_ from
-the earlier stages or strata of human evolution; vestiges of ancient
-conditions which have fallen out at different points and have been left
-behind in the general march of progress.
-
-Taken together, the various living races of Man seem almost to form a
-kind of living genealogical tree, as it were, and it is as an epiphyte
-upon this tree that the comparative ethnologist largely thrives; while
-to the archaeologist it may also prove a tree of knowledge the fruit of
-which may be eaten with benefit rather than risk.
-
-This certainly seems to be a legitimate assumption in a general way;
-but there are numerous factors which should be borne in mind when we
-endeavour to elucidate the past by means of the present. If the various
-gradations of culture exhibited by the condition of living races--the
-savage, the semi-civilized or barbaric, and the civilized races--could
-be regarded as accurately typifying the successive stages through
-which the higher forms of culture have been evolved in the course of
-the ages; if, in fact, the different modern races of mankind might
-be accepted as so many sections of the human race whose intellectual
-development has been arrested or retarded at various definite stages
-in the general progression, then we should have, to all intents and
-purposes, our genealogical tree in a very perfect state, and by its
-means we could reconstruct the past, and study with ease the steady
-growth of culture and handicrafts from the earliest simple germs,
-reflecting the mental condition of primaeval man, up to the highest
-manifestations of the most cultured races.
-
-These ideal conditions are, however, far from being realized.
-Intellectual progress has not advanced along a single line, but, in its
-development, it has branched off in various directions, in accordance
-with varying environment; and the tracing of lines of connexion
-between different forms of culture, as is the case with the physical
-variations, is a matter of intricate complexity. Migrations, with the
-attendant climatic changes, change of food, and, in fact, of general
-environment, to say nothing of the crossing of different stocks,
-transmission of ideas from one people to another, and other factors,
-all tend to increase the tangle.
-
-Although in certain instances savage tribes or races show obvious signs
-of having _degenerated_ to some extent from conditions of a higher
-culturedom, this cannot be regarded as the general rule, and we must
-always bear in mind the seemingly paradoxical truth that degradation
-in the culture of the lower races is often, if not usually, the direct
-result of contact with peoples in a far higher state of civilization.
-
-There can, I think, be little doubt that Colonel Lane Fox was well
-justified in urging the view that most savage races are in large
-measure strictly _primitive_, survivals from early conditions, the
-development of their ideas having from various causes remained
-practically stationary during a very considerable period of time. In
-the lower, though not degenerate, races signs of this are not wanting,
-and while few, possibly none, can be said to be absolutely in a
-condition of arrested development, their normal progress is at a slow,
-in most cases at a _very_ slow, rate.
-
-Perhaps the best example of a truly primitive race existing in recent
-times, of which we have any knowledge, was afforded by the native
-inhabitants of Tasmania. This race was still existing fifty years ago,
-and a few pure-blooded survivors remained as late as about the year
-1870, when the race became extinct, the benign civilizing influence
-of enlightened Europeans having wiped this extremely interesting
-people off the face of the earth. The Australians, whom Colonel Lane
-Fox referred to as being 'the lowest amongst the existing races of
-the world of whom we have any accurate knowledge', are very far in
-advance of the Tasmanians, whose lowly state of culture conformed
-thoroughly with the characteristics of a truly primitive race, a
-survival not only from the Stone Age in general, but from almost the
-earliest beginnings of the Stone Age. The difference between the
-culture of the Tasmanians and that of the Australians was far greater
-than that which exists between man of the 'River Drift' period and
-his Neolithic successors. The objects of everyday use were but slight
-modifications of forms suggested by Nature, involving the exercise of
-merely the simplest mental processes. The stone implements were of
-the rudest manufacture, far inferior in workmanship to those made by
-Palaeolithic man; they were never ground or polished, never even fitted
-with handles, but were merely grasped in the hand. The _varieties_ of
-implements were very _few in number_, each, no doubt, serving a number
-of purposes, the function varying with the requirements of the moment.
-They had no bows or other appliances for accelerating the flight of
-missiles, no pottery, no permanent dwellings; nor is there any evidence
-of a previous knowledge of such products of higher culture. They
-seem to represent a race which was isolated very early from contact
-with higher races; in fact, before they had developed more than the
-merest rudiments of culture--a race continuing to live under the most
-primitive conditions, from which they were never destined to emerge.
-
-Between the Tasmanians, representing in their very low culture the one
-extreme, and the most civilized peoples at the other extreme, lie races
-exhibiting in a general way intermediate conditions of advancement or
-retardation. If we are justified, as I think we are, in regarding the
-various grades of culture, observable among the more lowly of the still
-existing races of man, as representing to a considerable extent those
-vanished cultures which in their succession formed the different stages
-by which civilization emerged gradually from a low state, it surely
-becomes a very important duty for us to study with energy these living
-illustrations of early human history, in order that the archaeological
-record may be supplemented and rendered more complete. The material
-for this study is vanishing so fast with the spread of civilization
-that opportunities lost now will never be regained, and already even
-it is practically impossible to find native tribes which are wholly
-uncontaminated with the products, good or bad, of higher cultures.
-
-The arts of living races help to elucidate what is obscure in those
-of prehistoric times by the process of reasoning from the known
-to the unknown. It is the work of the zoologist which enables the
-palaeontologist to reconstruct the forms of extinct animals from such
-fragmentary remains as have been preserved, and it is largely from the
-results of a comparative study of living forms and their habitats that
-he is able, in his descriptions, to equip the reconstructed types of a
-past fauna with environments suited to their structure, and to render
-more complete the picture of their mode of life.
-
-In like manner, the work of the ethnologist can throw light upon the
-researches of the archaeologist; through it, broken sequences may be
-repaired, at least suggestively, and the interpretation of the true
-nature and use of objects of antiquity may frequently be rendered
-more sure. Colonel Lane Fox strongly advocated the application of the
-reasoning methods of biology to the study of the origin, phylogeny, and
-etionomics of the arts of mankind, and his own collection demonstrated
-that the products of human intelligence can conveniently be classified
-into families, genera, species, and varieties, and must be so grouped
-if their affinities and development are to be investigated.
-
-It must not be supposed--although some people, through misapprehension
-of his methods, jumped at this erroneous conclusion--that he
-was unaware of the danger of possibly mistaking mere accidental
-resemblances for morphological affinities, and that he assumed that
-_because_ two objects, perhaps from widely separated regions, appeared
-more or less identical in form, and possibly in use, they were
-necessarily to be considered as members of one phylogenetic group.
-On the contrary, in the grouping of his specimens according to their
-form and function, he was anxious to assist as far as possible in
-throwing light upon the question of the monogenesis or polygenesis of
-certain arts and appliances, and to discover whether they are exotic
-or indigenous in the regions in which they are now found, and, in
-fact, to distinguish between mere analogies and true homologies. If
-we accept the theory of the monogenesis of the human race, as most of
-us undoubtedly do, we must be prepared to admit that there prevails a
-condition of unity in the tendencies of the human mind to respond in a
-similar manner to similar stimuli. Like conditions beget like results;
-and thus instances of independent invention of similar objects are
-liable to arise. For this very reason, however, the arts and customs
-belonging to even widely separated peoples may, though apparently
-unrelated, help to elucidate some of the points in each other's history
-which remain obscure through lack of the evidence required to establish
-_local_ continuity.
-
-I think, moreover, that it will generally be allowed that cases of
-'independent invention' of similar forms should be considered to have
-established their claim to be regarded as such only after exhaustive
-inquiry has been made into the possibilities of the resemblances being
-due to actual relationship. There is the alternative method of assuming
-that, because two like objects are widely separated geographically, and
-because a line of connexion is not immediately obvious, therefore the
-resemblance existing between them is fortuitous, or merely the natural
-result of similar forms having been produced to meet similar needs.
-Premature conclusions in matters of this kind, though temptingly easy
-to form, are not in the true scientific spirit, and act as a check
-upon careful research, which, by investigating the case in its various
-possible aspects, is able either to prove or disprove what otherwise
-would be merely a hasty assumption. The association of similar forms
-into the same series has therefore a double significance. On the
-one hand, the sequence of related forms is brought out, and their
-geographical distribution illustrated, throwing light, not only upon
-the evolution of types, but also upon the interchange of ideas by
-transference from one people to another, and even upon the migration
-of races. On the other hand, instances in which two or more peoples
-have arrived independently at similar results are brought prominently
-forward, not merely as interesting coincidences, but also as evidence
-pointing to the phylogenetic unity of the human species, as exemplified
-by the tendency of human intelligence to evolve independently identical
-ideas where the conditions are themselves identical. Polygenesis in
-his inventions may probably be regarded as testimony in favour of the
-monogenesis of Man.
-
-I have endeavoured in this review to dwell upon some of the main
-principles laid down by Colonel Lane Fox as a result of his special
-researches in the field of Ethnology, and my object has been twofold.
-First, to bear witness to the very great importance of his contribution
-to the scientific study of the arts of mankind and the development
-of culture in general, and to remind students of Anthropology of the
-debt which we owe to him, not only for the results of his very able
-investigations, but also for the stimulus which he imparted to research
-in some of the branches of this comprehensive science. Secondly, my
-object has been to reply to some criticisms offered in regard to points
-in the system of classification adopted in arranging his ethnographical
-collection. And, since such criticisms as have reached me have appeared
-to me to be founded mainly upon misinterpretation of this system, I
-have thought that I could meet them best by some sort of restatement of
-the principles involved.
-
-It would be unreasonable to expect that his work should hold good
-in all details. The early illustrations of his theories were to
-be regarded as tentative rather than dogmatic, and in later life
-he recognized that many modifications in matters of detail were
-rendered necessary by new facts which had since come to light. The
-crystallization of solid facts out of a matrix which is necessarily
-partially volatile is a process requiring time. These minor errors and
-the fact of our not agreeing with all his details in no way invalidate
-the general principles which he urged, and we need but cast a cursory
-glance over recent ethnological literature to see how widely accepted
-these general principles are, and how they have formed the bases
-of, and furnished the inspiration for, a vast mass of research by
-ethnologists of all nations.
-
- HENRY BALFOUR.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[1] Extracted from Mr. Henry Balfour's address to the Anthropological
-Section of the British Association at Cambridge in 1904.
-
-[2] _The Natural History of the Musical Bow_, by H. Balfour: Clarendon
-Press, Oxford, 1899.
-
-
-
-
-PRINCIPLES OF CLASSIFICATION
-
-(1874)[3]
-
-
-I gladly avail myself of the opportunity that has been afforded me of
-explaining the principles of classification that I have adopted in the
-arrangement of my collection, in the hopes that, by offering them to
-the consideration of anthropologists, their soundness may be put to the
-test, and that they may elicit criticism on the part of those who have
-devoted their attention to the subject of primitive culture.
-
-The collection is divided into four parts. The first has reference
-to physical anthropology, and consists of a small collection of
-typical skulls and hair of races. This part of the collection, as it
-relates to a subject that has received a large amount of attention
-from anthropologists, and has been frequently treated by abler hands
-than mine, I do not propose to enter into. The remainder of the
-collection is devoted to objects illustrating the development of
-prehistoric and savage culture, and consists of--Part II. The weapons
-of existing savages. Part III. Miscellaneous arts of modern savages,
-including pottery and substitutes for pottery; modes of navigation,
-clothing, textile fabrics, and weaving; personal ornament; realistic
-art; conventionalized art; ornamentation; tools; household furniture;
-musical instruments; idols and religious emblems; specimens of the
-written character of races; horse furniture; money and substitutes for
-money; fire-arms; sundry smaller classes of objects, such as mirrors,
-spoons, combs, games, and a collection of implements of modern savages,
-arranged to illustrate the mode of hafting stone implements. Part IV
-refers to the prehistoric series, and consists of specimens of natural
-forms simulating artificial forms, for comparison with artificial
-forms; a collection of modern forgeries for comparison with genuine
-prehistoric implements; palaeolithic implements; neolithic implements;
-implements of bronze, iron, and bone.
-
-The collection does not contain any considerable number of unique
-specimens, and has been collected during upwards of twenty years, not
-for the purpose of surprising any one, either by the beauty or value
-of the objects exhibited, but solely with a view to instruction. For
-this purpose ordinary and typical specimens, rather than rare objects,
-have been selected and arranged in sequence, so as to trace, as far as
-practicable, the succession of ideas by which the minds of men in a
-primitive condition of culture have progressed from the simple to the
-complex, and from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous.
-
-Many ethnological museums exist in this country and elsewhere, and
-therefore, in claiming to have accomplished a useful purpose in forming
-this collection, I am bound to endeavour to show that it performs some
-function that is not performed by the majority of the other museums
-that are to be found. I propose, therefore, to consider, in the first
-place, what the defect of an ethnological museum usually is.
-
-The classification of natural history specimens has long been a
-recognized necessity in the arrangement of every museum which professes
-to impart useful information, but ethnological specimens have not
-generally been thought capable of anything more than a geographical
-arrangement. This arises mainly from sociology not having until
-recently been recognized as a science, if indeed it can be said to be
-so regarded by the public generally at the present time. Travellers, as
-a rule, have not yet embraced the idea, and consequently the specimens
-in our museums, not having been systematically collected, cannot be
-scientifically arranged. They consist of miscellaneous objects brought
-home as reminiscences of travel, or of such as have been most easily
-procured by sailors at the seaports. Unlike natural history specimens,
-which have for years past been selected with a view to variety,
-affinity, and sequence, these ethnological _curiosities_, as they have
-been termed, have been chosen without any regard to their history or
-psychology, and, although they would be none the less valuable for
-having been collected without influence from the bias of preconceived
-theories, yet, not being supposed capable of any scientific
-interpretation, they have not been obtained in sufficient number or
-variety to render classification possible.
-
-This does not apply with the same force to collections of prehistoric
-objects, which during the last ten or fifteen years have received
-better treatment. It is to the arts and implements of modern savages
-that my remarks chiefly relate.
-
-Since the year 1852 I have endeavoured to supply this want by selecting
-from amongst the commoner class of objects which have been brought to
-this country those which appeared to show connexion of form. Whenever
-missing links have been found they have been added to the collection,
-and the result has been to establish, however imperfectly, sequence in
-several series.
-
-The primary arrangement has been by form--that is to say, that the
-spears, bows, clubs, and other objects above mentioned, have each
-been placed by themselves in distinct classes. Within each there is a
-sub-class for special localities, and in each of these sub-classes, or
-wherever a connexion of ideas can be traced, the specimens have been
-arranged according to their affinities, the simpler on the left and the
-successive improvements in line to the right of them. This arrangement
-has been varied to suit the form of the room, or of the screens, or the
-number of specimens, but in all cases the object kept in view has been,
-as far as possible, to trace the succession of ideas.
-
-This is the distinctive difference between my collection and most
-others which I have seen, in which the primary arrangement has been
-geographical, that is to say, all the arts of the same tribe or
-nation have been placed together in one class, and within this there
-may perhaps have been in some cases a sub-class for special arts or
-special forms. Both systems have their advantages and disadvantages.
-By a geographical or racial arrangement the general culture of each
-distinct race is made the prominent feature of the collection, and it
-is therefore more strictly _ethnological_, whereas in the arrangement
-which I have adopted, the development of specific ideas and their
-transmission from one people to another, or from one locality to
-another, is made more apparent, and it is therefore of greater
-_sociological_ value. Different points of interest are brought to
-light by each, and, in my judgement, a great National Anthropological
-Collection, should we ever possess such a desideratum, can never be
-considered complete until it embraces two series, arranged upon these
-two distinct systems.
-
-Following the orthodox scientific principle of reasoning from the known
-to the unknown, I have commenced my descriptive catalogue with the
-specimens of the arts of existing savages, and have employed them, as
-far as possible, to illustrate the relics of primaeval men, none of
-which, except those constructed of the more imperishable materials,
-such as flint and stone, have survived to our time. All the implements
-of primaeval man that were of decomposable materials have disappeared,
-and can be replaced only in imagination by studying those of his
-nearest congener, the modern savage.
-
-This being the system adopted, one of the first points to which I
-desire to invite your attention is the question, to what extent the
-modern savage truly represents primaeval man, or rather to what extent
-may we take the arts of modern savages to represent those of the first
-progenitors of our species?
-
-In order to do this it is necessary to view the question in its
-psychological aspects. This I shall touch upon as lightly as possible,
-avoiding all technicalities, which in a cursory view of the matter,
-might tend to confuse, and confining myself to those parts of the
-subject which appear to have a direct bearing on evolution.
-
-It is a matter of common observation that animals act by instinct, that
-is to say, that in the construction of their habitations and other
-arrangements for providing for their wants, they act intuitively, and
-apparently without the intervention of reason; and that the things
-which they construct, though often of a more or less complex character,
-are usually of a fixed type; that they are repeated by nearly all
-animals of the same kind with but little variety; and that within the
-limited space of time during which we are able to observe them, they do
-not appear to be susceptible of progress, although evidence has been
-adduced to show that animals, even in a wild state, do change their
-habits to a certain extent with the change of external conditions.
-
-On the other hand, we recognize in many animals the operation of a
-reasoning mind. In their efforts to escape, or when conditions of a
-novel character are presented to them, they act in a manner that shows
-clear evidence of intelligence, although they show this to a very
-limited extent as compared with man. We also know that habits acquired
-by animals during domestication, or taught them by the exercise
-of their reasoning faculties, become instinctive in them, and are
-inherited in their offspring, as in the familiar case of the pointer
-dog. We also know that under domestication animals lose the instincts
-acquired in a wild state.
-
-In the human mind we recognize the presence of all these phenomena,
-only in a different degree. We are conscious of an intellectual mind
-capable of reasoning upon unfamiliar occurrences, and of an automaton
-mind capable of acting intuitively in certain matters without effort
-of the will or consciousness. And we know that habits acquired by the
-exercise of conscious reason, by constant habit, become automatic,
-and then they no longer require the exercise of conscious reason to
-direct the actions, as they did at first; as, for example, the habit
-of walking upright, which the child learns with pain and labour, but
-in time performs without conscious effort of the mind. Or the habit
-of reading and writing, the learning of which requires a strong and
-continuous effort of the intellect, but which in time becomes so
-completely automatic that it becomes possible to read a whole page
-aloud whilst the intellectual mind is conscious of being engaged in
-other things.
-
-We perceive clearly that this automatic action of the brain is
-dependent on frequent repetition by the intellectual brain, as in
-the familiar case of learning by heart; and also that the transfer
-of the action from the intellectual to the automaton brain--if
-indeed there are separate portions of the brain allotted to these
-separate functions, as appears probable--is a gradual and not a sudden
-process, and that there are intermediate stages in which an action
-may be performed partly by direction of the intellect and partly
-automatically. This is shown in the case of a person who, wishing to
-make an effective speech at a public meeting, reasons out his address
-carefully, and then learns it partially by heart. When the time comes
-to address the assembly, the speech having been partly referred to the
-automaton brain, the intellect is relieved from action, and, being
-unoccupied, is apt to wander and engage itself in other matters that
-are passing at the time; but the automaton brain, being insufficiently
-prepared to bear the whole responsibility, is unable to continue, and
-the intellectual brain, having already started on a journey elsewhere,
-is unable to return quick enough to take up the thread of the
-discourse. The result is that the would-be orator breaks down pitiably
-in the middle of his speech, owing to his having learnt his lesson too
-well for one function of his mind, and not well enough for the other.
-The same is seen in many business transactions, which, from frequent
-repetition, become what is called a second nature, and in the conduct
-of which the conscious intellect is partly freed from the control of
-the actions.
-
-We see also that both automatic and intellectual activity are inherited
-in different degrees by different persons. Thus it is a matter of
-common observation that there are some persons who are able to acquire
-with great facility the power of conversing upon simple subjects in
-many different languages, whilst upon more complex subjects, requiring
-intellectual effort, they never acquire the power of conversing in any
-language. Thus, also, it is frequently seen that some children show
-a remarkable aptitude for learning in their youth. It is said to be
-a pleasure to educate them; everything speedily becomes automatic in
-them; great hopes are entertained of their future prospects; but they
-frequently become a grievous disappointment to their parents, who have
-built castles in the air upon the strength of their apparent precocity,
-whereas an acute observer might have seen that they had never from the
-first showed signs of great intellectual capacity. On the other hand,
-we hear of dunces who are the despair of their tutors, who can with
-difficulty be taught to read and write and spell, but in after years
-become philosophers and scientists, all which might have been foretold
-from the first if the system of education had been such as to call
-forth the intellectual powers.
-
-It is not merely that some inherit automatic capacity whilst in others
-the capacity is intellectual. There is, without doubt, in both cases
-an hereditary capacity for special things. Thus, whilst some acquire
-a knowledge of music with facility, others can never be made to
-appreciate a note of music, and so with respect to other arts.
-
-How then are we to account for this innate indifference in the
-capacity of individuals, unless by supposing it to be proportioned
-to the length of time during which, or the degree of intensity with
-which, the ancestors of the individuals have had their minds occupied
-in the particular branch of culture for which capacity is shown?
-Unfortunately the difficulty of tracing the channel of hereditary
-transmission stands in the way of obtaining any certainty on this
-point, although the labours of our Vice-President, Mr. Galton, have
-already thrown much light on this interesting subject. But on this
-assumption, it is easy to account for the more perfect action of
-instinct in the lower animals than in men, when it is considered
-that the minds of their progenitors must have been confined to the
-experience of those particular things for which instinct is shown, far
-longer than is the case with man; and this brings us to the point which
-has an important bearing upon the question before us, viz. that every
-action which is now performed by instinct, has at some former period in
-the history of the species been the result of conscious experience.
-
-But, in adopting this theory, it is not necessary to assume that the
-ideas themselves have been communicated by hereditary transmission.
-The doctrine of innate ideas, exploded by Locke, I believe, can never
-again establish itself. What is inherited is no doubt a certain
-organization of the nervous system, which, by repeated use through
-many generations, aided by natural selection, has become exquisitely
-adapted to the recognition of experience of a particular kind, and
-which, by the constant renovation that is going on within the body,
-has grown in harmony with those experiences, so that, when the spring
-is touched, as it were, the machinery is at once set in motion; but,
-until the necessary external conditions are presented to the mind,
-there can be no consciousness of them in the mind. The mind creates
-nothing apart from experience; its function is limited to building with
-the materials presented to it through the medium of the senses. The
-broader the basis of experience, the more lofty the superstructure that
-can be raised upon it. Or, to use the words of Mr. Herbert Spencer[4],
-'the supposition that the inner cohesions are adjusted to the outer
-persistencies by accumulated experience of these outer persistencies,
-is in harmony with all our actual knowledge of mental phenomena. Though
-in so far as reflex actions and instincts are concerned, the experience
-hypothesis seems insufficient; yet, its seeming insufficiency occurs
-only where the evidence is beyond our reach. Nay, even here, such few
-facts as we can get, point to the conclusion that automatic physical
-connexions result from the registration of experiences continued for
-numberless generations.' And further on he says: 'In the progress of
-life at large, as in the progress of the individual, the adjustment of
-inner tendencies to outer persistencies must begin with the simple and
-advance to the complex, seeing that, both within and without, complex
-relations, being made up of simple ones, cannot be established before
-simple ones have been established.'
-
-From the foregoing considerations it follows that, in studying the
-evidence of intellectual progress, the phenomena which we may expect
-to observe are--firstly, a continuous succession of ideas; secondly,
-that the complexity of the ideas will be in an increasing ratio in
-proportion to the time; and thirdly, that the tendency to automatic
-action upon any given set of ideas will be in proportion to the length
-of time during which the ancestors of the individual have exercised
-their minds in those particular ideas. Hence it follows, as a corollary
-to this, that at the present time the tendency to automatic action
-will be greater in the lower animals than in the higher, because the
-minds of their progenitors have been exercised in the simple ideas, for
-which instinct is shown, for a greater length of time than those of the
-higher animals, amongst whom the simpler ideas have, at a comparatively
-recent period in the history of the race, been replaced, or otherwise
-modified, by ideas of a more complex character, which latter have not
-yet had time to become instinctive. And this is in accordance with what
-is practically observed in nature.
-
-Now, in applying these principles to the study of progress in man, we
-must expect to find that the phenomena observed will be in proportion
-to the spaces of time we have to deal with in treating of man as
-compared with animals in general.
-
-Assuming this psychological standard of humanity to have been at the
-level at which we find the highest of the lower animals that exist at
-the present time, we may suppose primaeval man to have been so far
-acquainted with the use of tools as to be able to employ a stone for
-the purpose of cracking the shells of nuts, but incapable of trimming
-the stone into any form that would answer his purpose better than that
-into which it had been shaped by rolling in a river bed or upon the
-seashore.
-
-By the repeated use of stones for this and similar purposes, it would
-be found that, as Sir John Lubbock has pointed out, they sometimes
-split in the hand, and that the sharp edges of the fractured portions
-were more serviceable than the stones before fracture. By constant
-repetition of the same occurrence, there would grow up in the mind of
-the creature an association of ideas between the fracture of the stone
-and the saving of labour effected by the fractured portion, and also a
-sequence of ideas by which it would be perceived that the fracture of
-the stone was a necessary preliminary to the other, and ultimately, by
-still continued repetition, the creature would be led to perform the
-motions which had been found effectual in cracking the stone before
-applying it to the purposes for which it was to be used. So also in
-using the various natural forms of the branches of trees which fell
-into his hands, it would be found that particular forms were of use
-for particular purposes; and by constant repetition there would arise
-an association of ideas between those forms and the purposes for which
-they were useful, and he would begin to select them for such purposes;
-and in proportion to the length of time during which this association
-of ideas continued to exist in the minds of successive generations of
-the creatures which we may now begin to call men, would be the tendency
-on the part of the offspring to continue to select and use these
-particular forms, more or less instinctively--not, indeed, with that
-unvarying instinct which in animals arises from the perfect adaptation
-of the internal organism to external condition, but with that modified
-instinct which assumes the form of a _persistent conservatism_.
-
-'The savage,' says Mr. Tylor, 'is firmly, obstinately conservative.
-No man appeals with more unhesitating confidence to the great
-precedent-makers of the past; the wisdom of his ancestors can control
-against the most obvious evidence of his own opinions and actions.'
-
-In a similar manner mankind would be led to the conception of many
-other ideas, but of the majority of them no record would be preserved;
-it is only where the ideas have been associated with material forms
-that any record of them would be kept in prehistoric times; and this
-brings us to what I conceive to be the object of an anthropological
-collection--to trace out, by means of the only evidence available, the
-sequence of ideas by which mankind has advanced from the condition of
-the lower animals to that in which we find him at the present time, and
-by this means to provide really reliable materials for a philosophy of
-progress. We may not be able to find in these objects any associations
-that may lead us to form an estimate of the highest aspirations of
-the mind at any period of its development, but their importance to
-anthropologists consists in their value as evidence. Affording us
-as they do the only available evidence of man in his most primitive
-condition, they are well worthy of our attention, in order that by
-studying their grammar, we may be able to conjugate their forms.
-
-Yet, although our data are thus limited to the material arts of
-mankind, only a small portion of those of prehistoric races are
-available for our purpose. As already said, only those tools and
-implements which were constructed of durable materials have remained;
-the rest have perished, and we have only the implements of existing
-savages by which to judge of them. The question, therefore, is, to what
-extent they may be taken as the representatives of the implements of
-prehistoric men, seeing that in point of time they are contemporaneous
-with the arts of the most civilized races, and not with those of
-prehistoric races.
-
-Scattered over the world in various localities are savage races
-showing various degrees of culture, some higher and some lower than
-others, many of which have now been greatly influenced by contact with
-civilized races, but of the majority of which we have more or less
-detailed records, dating from the time of their first discovery by
-Europeans, when their arts may be regarded as indigenous, or, at any
-rate, free from any admixture with the arts of civilized races.
-
-If these savage races have been degraded from a higher condition of
-culture, then, seeing that sequence of ideas is necessary to the
-existence of any ideas whatever, we must inevitably find traces in
-their arts of those higher arts from which they descended. But if, on
-the other hand, they have risen from a lower state, and their present
-savage condition arises from their having advanced less rapidly than
-those races which are now above them in the social scale, then what are
-the conditions which we must expect to find prevailing amongst them?
-
-We shall find, firstly, that the forms of their implements, instead of
-showing evidence of having been derived from higher and more complex
-forms, will, in proportion to the low state of their civilization, show
-evidence of being derived from natural forms, such as might have been
-employed by man before he had learnt the art of modifying them to his
-uses; and secondly, we shall find that the persistency of the forms is
-proportioned to the low state of their culture.
-
-Now this is found to be the case with nearly every race of savages of
-whose condition we have any knowledge. Lowest amongst the existing
-races of the world of whom we have any accurate knowledge are the
-Australians. All their weapons assimilate to the forms of nature; all
-their wooden weapons are constructed on the grain of the wood, and
-consequently their curves are the curves of the branches out of which
-they were constructed. In every instance in which I have attempted to
-arrange my collection in sequence, so as to trace the higher forms
-from natural forms, the weapons of the Australians have found their
-place lowest in the scale, because they assimilate most closely to the
-natural forms.
-
-Of this many examples may be given. I will not now again enter into the
-history of the boomerang, to which I have already drawn the attention
-of the Society on former occasions. Those who wish to see the subject
-treated in greater detail will find it discussed in my catalogue of
-the collection, in which are also given the authorities for many facts
-that are mentioned here, and which the limits of time and space do
-not enable me to quote at length. Suffice to say that the whole of
-the Australian weapons can be traced by their connecting links to the
-simple stick, such as might have been used by an ape or an elephant
-before mankind appeared upon this earth, and I have arranged them so as
-to show this connexion on the screens. Here also we are able to trace
-the development of the idea of a shield to cover the body, which in
-its simplest form is a simple parrying-stick held in the centre, and
-which expands gradually into an oval shield. It is also shown upon the
-screens how the simple waddy, or club with a lozenge-shaped head, by a
-gradual development of one side, grew into a kind of wooden hatchet,
-which ultimately became converted into a hatchet-boomerang.
-
-The whole of the Australian weapons, without exception, are of this
-simple character, and in proof of the persistency with which this
-nation has continued to employ the same forms, no further evidence
-is necessary than the fact that they are the same, with but slight
-variations, over the whole continent. The slight differences between
-them, as Mr. Oldfield has pointed out, are so minute as scarcely to
-be perceptible to a European, but sufficient to enable a native to
-determine at a glance from what locality any specimen that may be shown
-him has been obtained.
-
-But although all the connecting forms between the forms of nature
-and the more advanced forms are found amongst the _existing_ weapons
-of these savages, we are not to assume from this that the whole of
-the progress observed has been effected in modern times. The whole
-sequence of ideas connecting these weapons (which are now constructed
-in a manner to show that the art of producing them is partly
-automatic) was reasoned out by such processes of the mind as stood for
-reason, at various former periods in the history of the race, each
-successive improvement constituting a link in the chain of progressive
-development. Each link has left its representatives, which, with
-certain modifications, have survived to the present time; and it is by
-the means of these _survivals_, and not by the links themselves, that
-we are able to trace out the sequence that has been spoken of.
-
-This is the hypothesis put forward, and which I profess to justify by
-the facts accumulated in this collection.
-
-Every form marks its own place in sequence by its relative complexity
-or affinity to other allied forms, in the same manner that every word
-in the science of language has a place assigned to it in the order of
-development or phonetic decay.
-
-If there is such a thing as a science of language, and none can doubt
-it, who shall affirm that there is no such thing as a science of the
-arts? Language, it is true, embraces a wider sphere, and includes the
-arts; but, on the other hand, it is liable to sources of uncertainty
-for the purposes of science, from which the arts are free. Language
-is impalpable, invisible to the eye, except through the medium of a
-written character, which may or may not accurately express the sounds,
-and subject to acoustic changes in the collection of the materials,
-which are a perpetual cause of error and misclassification.
-
-In tracing the development of the material arts, on the other hand,
-we have, in the earliest periods, the support of collateral evidence
-afforded by the fauna with which they are associated and by geological
-sequence, all which is wanting in the science of language.
-
-Why, then, has language hitherto received more scientific treatment
-than the arts? Merely on account of the greater facility with which the
-data are collected. Whilst words take seconds to record, hours and days
-may be spent in the accurate delineation of form. Words cost nothing,
-are packed in folios, transmitted by post, and stored on the shelves
-of every private library. A million classified words may be carried in
-the coat pocket without inconvenience, whilst a hundredth part of that
-number of material objects require a museum to contain them, and are
-accessible only to a few. This is the reason why the arts have never
-been subjected to those classifications which form the groundwork of a
-science.
-
-Then, again, in approaching prehistoric times, or in studying modern
-savages who represent prehistoric man, language loses its persistency,
-or fails us altogether. Although, in an advanced stage of civilization,
-especially when it has been committed to writing, it affords the
-surest test of culture, this is certainly not the case with the
-lowest savages, amongst whom language changes so rapidly that even
-neighbouring tribes cannot understand one another. And if this is the
-case in respect to language, still more strongly does it apply to all
-ideas that are communicated by word of mouth. In endeavouring to trace
-back prehistoric culture to its root forms, we find that in proportion
-as the value of language and of the ideas conveyed by language
-diminishes, that of ideas embodied in material forms increases in
-stability and permanence. Whilst in the earliest phases of humanity the
-names for things change with every generation if not more frequently,
-the things themselves are handed down unchanged from father to son and
-from tribe to tribe, and many of them have continued to our own time,
-faithful records of the condition of the people by whom they were
-fabricated.
-
-Of the antiquity of savages we at present know little or nothing;
-but when archaeologists have exhausted the antiquities of civilized
-countries, a wide and interesting field of research will be open to
-them in the study of the antiquities of savages, which are doubtless to
-be discovered in their surface and drift deposits; and if the stability
-of their form has been such as we have reason to believe, we shall then
-be able to arrive at something like certainty in respect to the degree
-of slowness or rapidity, as well as the order, in which they have been
-developed.
-
-Leaving now the Australians, and turning to other existing races in
-a higher, though still in a low, stage of civilization, such as, for
-example, the Fijians, who at the time of their discovery were still in
-the stone age, we find, on examining the forms of their implements,
-that we are in a higher stratum of culture, the characteristics of
-which correspond exactly to what might have been expected to be found
-on the principle of gradual evolution. The forms of their tools and
-weapons present the same connexions of form between themselves as
-amongst those of the Australians, but they are of a more complex
-type, and are no longer directly traceable to the natural forms of
-the limbs of trees, &c. The links of connexion between weapons of the
-same kind are as close as before, but in their varieties they present
-forms so singular as scarcely to make it possible to infer that they
-were designed for the purposes of use. They appear rather to have
-varied through the instrumentality of some law of succession similar
-to that by which species of animals have been evolved. In many cases,
-indeed, the sequence of ideas has led to the use of forms that are
-absolutely unserviceable as weapons and tools, and human selection,
-corresponding to natural selection, appears to have retained for use
-only such forms as could be employed, whilst the others have been
-consigned to state purposes or applied to symbolic uses. In many cases
-we find that their clubs have been converted into the forms of animals'
-heads, and in all such cases (and there are several in the collection)
-we see, by grouping a sufficient number of like forms together, that
-those which are in the shape of animals' heads have not been designed
-for the purpose of representing animals' heads, but their forms have
-simply been evolved during the numerous variations which the weapon
-has undergone in the process of development, and when the idea of an
-animal's head suggested itself, it has merely been necessary to add an
-eye, or a line for the mouth, in order to give them the resemblance in
-question. Examples of this may be seen in the collection of specimens
-from Africa, New Caledonia, New Zealand, and Solomon Isles.
-
-In ornamentation, the stability of form is very remarkable. Particular
-forms of ornamentation fix themselves on a tribe or nation, and are
-repeated over and over again with but little variation of detail, as,
-for example, in the case of the coil and broken coil ornaments amongst
-the New Zealanders and the inhabitants of New Guinea, which were
-probably derived from Assam, or the representation of the head of an
-albatross amongst the Indians of the north-west coast of North America,
-or that of a human head amongst the inhabitants of New Ireland.
-
-In the transformations of this latter ornament, which I took occasion
-to bring to the notice of the meeting of the Anthropological Department
-of the British Association at Brighton in 1872[5], and which are
-represented in Plate IV, we see a remarkable example of degradation of
-form, produced by gradual changes, caused by these people in copying
-from one another until the original design is lost. The representation
-of a human figure is here seen to lose gradually its limbs and body,
-then the sides of the face, leaving only the nose and ears, and
-ultimately the nose only, which finally expands at the base, and is
-converted into the representation of a half moon. In this sequence we
-have an exact parallel to the transformations observed upon ancient
-British coins by Mr. Evans[6], by which a coin of Philip of Macedon,
-representing a chariot and horses, becomes converted by a succession
-of similar changes into the representation of a single horse, and
-ultimately into fragments of a horse. Other examples of similar
-transformations from other countries are also shown.
-
-Amongst other advantages of the arrangement by form, is the facility it
-affords for tracing the distribution of like forms and arts, by which
-means we can determine the connexion that has existed in former times
-between distant countries, either by the spread of race, or culture, or
-by means of commerce. Thus I have been able to trace the distribution
-of the bow over a large area, with evidence of its having spread from a
-common centre. In the Asiatic islands and the Pacific, the line of its
-southern boundary is very clearly defined, marking off as non-bow-using
-races the whole of the inhabitants of Australia except Cape York,
-Tasmania, and formerly New Zealand and New Caledonia. Above this line
-the use of the bow spread from the Asiatic isles, and its transmission
-to the Papuan and Polynesian isles is due to the Malays, the Malay
-word for it--viz. 'panna'--being used over the whole of the region in
-question with but slight variations.
-
-In the southern hemisphere, where suitable materials for the
-construction of it are abundant, the bow is of the form of the arcus,
-or simple arch; but in the frigid regions to the north, there are large
-tracts in Europe, Asia, and America which are either totally destitute
-of trees, or covered with coniferous forests, yielding few if any
-woods that have sufficient spring for the construction of a bow, and
-there is reason to believe, from the traces of forests discovered at
-low levels beneath the soil in various places, that this inhospitable
-region extended more to the southward in ancient prehistoric times.
-In such a region it is unlikely that the invention of the bow should
-have originated, and when the knowledge of it was communicated from the
-south, it would be necessary to employ some other elastic material to
-combine with the stiff pinewood, and give it the necessary elasticity;
-hence the composite bow, which is the bow of the northern hemisphere,
-and which consists of a combination of wood and sinew, or wood and
-bone. In its varieties I have traced this bow over the whole of the
-northern hemisphere, including Lapland, Siberia, and the northern
-part of North America. It is the bow of the ancient Persians and
-Scythians. The northern people carried it into India and into China,
-and also eastward into America, where its distribution is traced in two
-channels, one extending along the region inhabited by the Esquimaux
-into Greenland, and the other along the west coast as far south as
-California; and throughout the region mentioned, its varieties show it
-to have sprung from a common prototype.
-
-Here also I may select, from amongst other illustrations of the same
-kind that are to be found, a single example of the manner in which the
-implements of modern savages may be made to explain the construction of
-those of races of antiquity, described upon their monuments. Quivers
-for arrows do not admit of much variety by which to trace improvement,
-and for this reason they must have continued unchanged in form much
-longer than contrivances which were susceptible of development; but
-the combination of quiver and bow case in one, may be traced over the
-whole of the region of the composite bow, the sinews of which made
-it necessary that it should be kept dry. Mr. Rawlinson, in his _Five
-Great Monarchies of the Ancient Eastern World_ (London, 1864, vol.
-ii. p. 57), gives an illustration of an Assyrian quiver taken from
-ancient sculptures at Khorsabad. 'It had an ornamental rod attached to
-it, which projected beyond the arrows and terminated in a pomegranate
-blossom or other similar carving. To this rod were attached the rings
-which received the strap by which it was suspended to the shoulders.'
-The learned author adds: 'It is uncertain whether the material of the
-quivers was wood or metal.' The conventional mode of representing
-these objects and the imperfect command which the Assyrians had over
-the hard stone of the sculptures, give to the majority of the objects
-represented, the appearance of having been constructed of some hard
-material, as is clearly seen in the case of the hair and drapery; but,
-on turning to the quivers now used by the Indians of California, we at
-once see that the material of the quiver is explained by the form and
-position of the above-mentioned rod, which is fastened on the outside
-of it for the purpose of keeping the _limp_ skin bag that contains the
-arrows stiff and straight, and thereby enabling the bowman to draw out
-his arrows with the necessary rapidity. And this enables us clearly to
-understand why, as stated by Mr. Rawlinson, not a single example of
-a quiver was found in the Assyrian excavations. In the Californian,
-as in the Assyrian quivers, the rod extends beyond the quiver, and is
-probably intended to guard the arrows from injury.
-
-It is unnecessary in this place to add to the number of examples. The
-object of this paper, as already stated, is to explain the principles
-of classification. For the evidence on which these principles are
-based I must refer you to the catalogue. Whether these principles of
-classification are correct or not is a matter of less consequence than
-the arrangement of the facts, by which every person is enabled to form
-his own idea of the manner in which progress has been evolved in early
-times.
-
-Human ideas, as represented by the various products of human industry,
-are capable of classification into genera, species, and varieties, in
-the same manner as the products of the vegetable and animal kingdoms,
-and in their development from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous they
-obey the same laws. If, therefore, we can obtain a sufficient number
-of objects to represent the succession of ideas, it will be found that
-they are capable of being arranged in museums upon a similar plan.
-
-The resemblance between the arts of modern savages and those of
-primaeval man may be compared to that existing between recent and
-extinct species of animals. As we find amongst existing animals and
-plants, species akin to what geology teaches us were primitive species,
-and as among existing species we find the representatives of successive
-stages of geological species, so amongst the arts of existing savages
-we find forms which, being adapted to a low condition of culture, have
-survived from the earliest times, and also the representatives of
-many successive stages through which development has taken place in
-times past. As amongst existing animals and plants, these survivals
-from different ages give us an outline picture of a succession of
-gradually improving species, but do not represent the true sequence by
-which improvement has been effected, so, amongst the arts of existing
-people in all stages of civilization, we are able to trace a succession
-of ideas from the simple to the complex, but not the true order of
-development by which those more complex arrangements have been brought
-about. As amongst existing species of animals, innumerable links are
-wanting to complete the continuity of structure, so amongst the arts
-of existing peoples there are great gaps which can only be filled
-by prehistoric arts. What the palaeontologist does for zoology, the
-prehistorian does for anthropology. What the study of zoology does
-towards explaining the structures of extinct species, the study of
-existing savages does towards enabling us to realize the condition of
-primaeval man. To continue the simile further, the propagation of new
-ideas may be said to correspond to the propagation of species. New
-ideas are produced by the correlation of previously existing ideas in
-the same manner as new individuals in a breed are produced by the union
-of previously existing individuals. And in the same manner as we find
-that the crossing of animals makes it extremely difficult to trace
-the channel of hereditary transmission of qualities in a breed, so the
-crossing of ideas in this manner makes it extremely difficult to trace
-the sequence of ideas, although we may be certain that sequence does
-exist as much in one case as in the other.
-
-Continuing still further the simile, we find that, as in the breeding
-of animals, when the divergence of races has gone so far as to
-constitute what is called distinct species, they cannot interbreed,
-so when the development of ideas has run in distinct channels far
-enough to create a hiatus, no intercommunication can take place. Two
-men of very different culture may travel in the same coach together,
-and, though speaking the same language, may find themselves unable
-to communicate except upon commonplace topics in which the simple
-ideas are common to both. Or two nations in very different stages of
-civilization may be brought side by side, as is the case in many of our
-colonies, but there can be no amalgamation between them. Nothing but
-the vices and imperfections of the superior culture can coalesce with
-the inferior culture without break of sequence.
-
-Progress is like a game of dominoes--like fits on to like. In neither
-case can we tell beforehand what will be the ultimate figure produced
-by the adhesions; all we know is that the fundamental rule of the game
-is _sequence_.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[3] A Paper read at a Special Meeting of the Anthropological Institute
-of Great Britain and Ireland on July 1, 1874, on the occasion of the
-opening of the Anthropological Collection to the public: and published
-in the _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, iv (1875), pp.
-293-308.
-
-[4] _The Principles of Psychology_ (London, 1881), i.^3 pp. 424-6.
-
-[5] Address to the Department of Anthropology--Report of the British
-Association, 1872 (London, 1873), p. 168.
-
-[6] _The Coins of the Ancient Britons_, by John Evans, F.R.S. (1864),
-pp. 24-32.
-
-
-
-
-ON THE EVOLUTION OF CULTURE
-
-(1875)[7]
-
-
-If we accept the definition of the term science as 'organized common
-sense', we necessarily reject the idea of it as a 'great medicine'
-applicable only to particular subjects and inapplicable to others;
-and we assume that all those things which call forth the exercise
-of our common sense are capable of being scientifically dealt with,
-according as the knowledge which we pretend to have about them is based
-on evidence in the first place, and in the sequel is applied to the
-determination of what, for want of a better word, we call general laws.
-
-But in using this term 'law', we do not employ it in the sense of a
-human law, as a regulating or governing principle of anything, but
-merely as deduction from observed phenomena. We use it in the sense of
-a result, rather than a cause of what we observe, or at most we employ
-it to express the operation of proximate causes; and of the ultimate
-causes for the phenomena of nature we know nothing at all.
-
-Further, in this development of the principle of common sense it has
-been said that the inductive sciences pass through three phases, which
-have been termed the empirical, the classificatory, and the theoretical.
-
-Of these, the first or empirical stage may be defined as representing
-that particular phase of unorganized common sense in which our
-knowledge is simply a record of the results of ordinary experience,
-such as might be acquired by any savage or uneducated person in his
-dealings with external nature.
-
-But as this condition of knowledge might perhaps be denied the claim to
-be considered scientific, it might be better perhaps to extend the term
-so as to embrace all that can be included under a practical knowledge
-of the subjects treated, in which these subjects are studied for their
-own sakes, or on account of their practical uses to man, and not with
-a view to generalizing upon them.
-
-In this way it may be said that agriculture represents the empirical
-or practical stage of botany; mining, that of geology; hunting and the
-domestication of animals, that of zoology; the trade of the butcher,
-that of anatomy; navigation by means of the stars, that of astronomy.
-
-Passing now over the boundary line which separates what are generally
-recognized as the physical sciences from the science of culture, in
-which the subjects treated are emanations from the human mind, we find
-that these also have their corresponding phases of development.
-
-Commencing first with the science of language, which has been the
-earliest and perhaps the most important branch of human culture the
-study of which has been scientifically treated as yet, we find that
-Professor Max Müller, in the series of lectures delivered in this
-Institution in 1861-3,[8] has shown that the science of language
-has its corresponding empirical or practical stage, in which it is
-studied only for its own sake, or for its utility as a means of
-intercommunication; not as a means of generalizing upon language as
-a whole, but merely for the purpose of understanding the particular
-languages which we wish to make use of in our intercourse with others.
-
-In like manner passing from language to the particular department
-of culture which, for the reasons to be explained hereafter, I
-shall make the subject of this discourse, viz. the material arts, I
-shall endeavour to show that there exists also in relation to them
-a practical or empirical stage, which is the stage that we are now
-in with respect to them, in which we may include the whole of the
-constructive arts of mankind, from the simple flint knife to the most
-complex machine of modern times, when viewed from the standpoint of
-the mechanic or the artificer, not as subjects for generalization, but
-merely from an utilitarian point of view.
-
-There are many persons no doubt who regard utility, not as a primary
-stage, but as the final and highest result of science. But the highest
-achievements of science, even the highest practical achievements, would
-never have been reached by the mere utilitarian. There is a force
-within us by which we are moved in the direction of acquiring knowledge
-for its own sake and for the sake of truth, regardless of any material
-advantage to be derived from such knowledge. Sooner or later such
-knowledge is sure to bear practical fruits, even though we may not live
-to realize them.
-
-It is in this spirit that men of science have advanced to the
-second or classificatory stage, in which, with a view to higher
-generalization, the subjects studied are grouped together according to
-their affinities, and specific points of resemblance are taken as the
-representatives of each class.
-
-These classes are at first grouped round independent centres; but such
-an arrangement of them, having no existence in reality, is purely
-subjective and can only be transitional. The margins of the classes so
-formed represent only the margins of our knowledge or our ignorance, as
-the case may be.
-
-By degrees, as the classes become extended, sub-classes are formed, and
-they are seen to arrange themselves in the form of branches radiating
-from a central stem. By still further observation, the stems of the
-several classes are seen to tend towards each other, and we are led to
-trace them to a point of union.
-
-Thus from the classificatory or comparative we pass gradually into the
-third stage, which I have spoken of as the theoretical, but which may
-perhaps be more clearly defined as the evolutionary. By the use of this
-term 'evolutionary' we make it apparent that our third stage is but a
-development of the second, evolution being merely the necessary and
-inevitable result of the extension of classification, implying greater
-unity and broader generalizations.
-
-These three stages then, the empirical or practical, the classificatory
-or comparative, and the evolutionary, are applicable to the development
-of all the inductive sciences.
-
-But it has been held by some that a broad line of demarcation must
-be drawn between the physical sciences properly so called, such as
-zoology, botany, and geology, which deal with external nature, and
-those sciences which have been termed historic, which deal with the
-works of man.
-
-This question has been ably treated by Professor Max Müller in the
-series of lectures to which I have referred, a course of lectures
-which must be regarded as a starting-point and basis of instruction for
-all who follow after him in the same path.
-
-But in claiming for the science of language, and for language only,
-a place amongst the physical sciences, he has made admissions to
-opponents which, in my humble judgement, ought not to be made, and
-which are inconsistent with that more extended view of the subject by
-which I contend that, if language, then all that comes under the head
-of culture must be included amongst the physical sciences. Thus, for
-example, we find him admitting this passage as a sound and reasonable
-argument on the part of those who deny the claim of language to be
-included amongst the physical sciences: 'Physical science,' he says,
-'deals with the work of God, historical science with the works of man.'
-
-Now if in dealing with what are here termed the historical sciences,
-we were to take the subjects of such sciences, as for example the arts
-or language, implements or words, and were to regard them as entities
-to be studied apart from their relation to mind, and were to endeavour
-to deduce from them the laws by which they are related to each other,
-it is evident that we should be dealing with a matter which could not
-be correlated with the physical sciences; but such a course would be
-absurd. It would be as absurd to speak of a boomerang as being derived
-by inheritance from a waddy, as to speak of a word in Italian being
-derived by inheritance from a corresponding word in Latin; these words
-and these implements are but the outward signs or symbols of particular
-ideas in the mind; and the sequence, if any, which we observe to
-connect them together, is but the outward sign of the succession of
-ideas in the brain. It is the mind that we study by means of these
-symbols.
-
-But of the particular molecular changes or other processes which
-accompany the evolution of ideas in the mind, we know no more than
-we do of the particular molecular changes and other processes which
-accompany the evolution of life in nature, or the changes in chemistry.
-
-If then we are to understand the expression 'the work of God' as
-implying the direct action of ultimate causes, it is evident that
-we are not in a position either to affirm or to deny or to make any
-statement whatever respecting such ultimate causes, which may operate
-either as directly or as indirectly in the one case as the other. We
-know nothing about them, and therefore to invoke ultimate causes as a
-reason for distinguishing between the sciences is to take up a position
-which cannot be scientifically maintained.
-
-With equal if not greater truth we may combat the assertion that the
-science of culture is historical, whilst nature, on the other hand, as
-dealt with by the physical sciences, is incapable of progress. However
-valid this objection might have appeared during the empirical and
-comparative stages of the physical sciences, it cannot be maintained,
-since the researches of Darwin and others have fairly landed them in
-their evolutionary phase. The principles of variation and natural
-selection have established a bond of union between the physical and
-culture sciences which can never be broken. History is but another
-term for evolution. There are histories and histories, as any one may
-determine who has read Green's _Short History of the English People_,
-and compared it with the kind of matter which passed for history in
-his school days. But our position with regard to culture has always
-been one which has forced on our comprehension the reality of progress,
-whilst with respect to the slow progress of external nature, it has
-been concealed from us, owing to the brief span of human existence and
-our imperfect records of the past. The distinction, therefore, between
-the sciences, as historical and non-historical, is but a subjective
-delusion, and not an objective reality; and herein, I believe, lies the
-secret of most of those errors that we have to contend with.
-
-But the point in which I venture more particularly to differ from the
-conclusions of the learned author of the _Science of Language_ is the
-line which he has drawn between language and the other branches of
-culture by including language amongst the physical sciences whilst he
-excludes the rest. 'If language,' he says, 'be the work of man in the
-same sense in which a statue, a temple, a poem, or a law, are properly
-called works of man, the science of language would have to be classed
-as an historic science'; and again he says, 'It is the object of these
-lectures to prove that language is not a work of human art in the same
-sense as painting, or building, or writing, or printing.'
-
-In dealing with this question it is material, as regards the relative
-claims of language and the arts to be studied as physical sciences,
-to distinguish between the general and the particular. If it is said
-that language as a whole is not a work of human design, the same may
-with equal truth be said of the arts as a whole. A man who constructs
-a building, a tool, or a weapon, can no more be said to have devised
-a scheme of arts, than the introducer of a new word can be said to
-have invented a language; but each particular word bears the impress
-of human design as clearly as a weapon or a coin. A word may be said
-to be a tool for the communication of thought, just as a weapon is an
-implement of war.
-
-But, says Professor Müller, 'art, science, philosophy, religion, all
-have a history; language or any other production of nature admits
-only of growth.' But unless it can be shown that words are entities
-having the power of generating and producing other words, which arts,
-tools, or weapons, do not possess, the word growth can only be applied
-figuratively to language as it is to the arts, and in that case growth
-and history are synonymous terms. But this is absurd. Words, as I said
-before, are the outward signs of ideas in the mind, and this is also
-the case with tools or weapons. Words are ideas expressed by sounds,
-whilst tools are ideas expressed by hands; and unless it can be shown
-that there are distinct processes in the mind for language and for the
-arts they must be classed together.
-
-But it is said, 'language has the property of progressing gradually
-and irresistibly, and the changes in it are completely beyond the
-control of the free will of man.' This, however, can only be accepted
-relatively. We know that in certain phases of savage life the use of
-particular words may be tabooed in the same manner that the use of
-particular implements or weapons may be tabooed; but it would be quite
-as hopeless for any individual to attempt to change the entire course
-of the constructive arts as to change the form of a language; the
-action of the individual man is limited in both cases to the production
-of particular words or particular implements, which take their place
-like bricks in a building.
-
-Man is not the designer in the sense of an architect, but he is the
-constructor in the sense of a brickmaker or a bricklayer.
-
-But the difficulty of tracing fleeting words to their sources operates
-to a great extent in effacing the action of the individual in language.
-Words become public property before they are incorporated in a
-language. It would be difficult to establish a system of patents for
-new words. Here again we see that the line drawn between language and
-the arts is a subjective delusion, not an objective reality. It is not
-true that words do not originate with individual men, but merely that
-we do not perceive it.
-
-Modifications of words, like modifications in the forms of the
-arts, result from the succession of ideas or other causes affecting
-particular minds. They obtain acceptance through natural selection by
-the survival of the fittest.
-
-The chance which a new word or a new implement has of surviving depends
-on the number of words or implements to be superseded, on their
-relative importance to the art or the language, and the persistency
-with which these superseded words or implements are retained. The truth
-of this is seen in the fact that vocabularies change far more rapidly
-than grammatical forms; because the same grammatical terminations are
-employed with a large number of different words, and they are therefore
-a more constant necessity of speech.
-
-Hence early and barbaric languages may be connected by their
-grammatical forms long after their vocabularies have entirely changed.
-The same truth is seen in the fact admitted by philologists, that in
-small communities new words and modifications of words gain more ready
-acceptance than in large communities; because the struggle of the new
-words for existence is less in small than in large communities, and the
-dialects therefore change more rapidly. And the same causes influence
-the transformations which take place in the arts. Objects in common
-use change more slowly than those which are but little employed; the
-difference is merely one of degree and not of kind.
-
-In dealing with the arts, each separate contrivance occupies a larger
-share of our attention, to the exclusion of any comprehensive survey
-of them as a whole. The arts present themselves to our mental vision
-on a larger scale, and we view them analytically; we are as it were in
-the brickmaker's yard seeing each brick turned out of hand, whereas in
-dealing with language we see only the finished building; the details
-are lost. We view language synthetically. The arts may be said to
-present themselves to us as a sea beach in detached fragments; language
-in the form of a compact sandstone. The empiric or the utilitarian may
-deny that there is any resemblance between them; but the geologist
-knows that the mode of deposition has been the same in both cases, and
-he classes the whole as rocks.
-
-Then again there are facilities for collecting and arranging the data
-for the study of language which do not exist in the case of the arts.
-Whilst words take seconds to record, hours and days may be spent in
-the accurate delineation of form. Words cost nothing, may be packed
-in folios, transmitted by post, and stored on the shelves of every
-private library. Ten thousand classified words may be carried in
-the coat pocket without inconvenience, whilst a tenth part of that
-number of material objects require a museum to contain them, and are
-accessible only to a few: this is the reason why the arts have never
-been subjected to those classifications which form the groundwork of a
-science.
-
-But when we say that words and implements are both tools employed
-for the expression of thought, it is important to bear in view one
-difference between them, which has a practical bearing on the relative
-value of the two studies as a means of tracing the evolution of culture
-in prehistoric times and amongst savages. The word is the tool of the
-ear, the implement the tool of the eye; and for this reason language is
-the science of historic times, whilst the arts constitute the subject
-of science to be studied in relation to prehistoric times.
-
-Every new tool or weapon formed by the hand of man retains the same
-form as long as it continues to exist; it may be handed from man to
-man, from tribe to tribe, from father to son, from one generation
-to another; or, buried in the soil, it may under special conditions
-continue for untold ages without change of form, until in our time it
-may be discovered and employed as evidence of the condition of the arts
-at the time it was fabricated. Very different, however, is the history
-of words. Each word coined by the exercise of the inventive faculty of
-man to express an idea is liable to change as it passes from mouth to
-ear. Its continued identity is dependent solely on memory, and it is
-subject to phonetic and acoustic changes from which the forms of the
-arts are exempt.
-
-When by the invention of writing each word receives its equivalent in
-forms that are appreciable to the sense of sight, it gains stability,
-which places it on a footing of equality with the arts, and enables us
-to trace with certainty the changes it has undergone; and therefore
-in historic times language is the surest test of social contact that
-we can have. But in prehistoric times, before it had acquired this
-permanence through the invention of writing, the forms of language
-were, to use Mr. Sayce's expression, in a constant state of flux.
-
-The truth of this is seen in the immense number of dialects and
-languages employed by savages at the present time. Thus amongst the
-one hundred islands occupied by the Melanesian race, the Bishop of
-Wellington tells us, and his statement is confirmed by the late
-lamented Bishop Patteson, that there are no less than two hundred
-languages, differing so much that the tribes can have but very little
-interchange of thought; and similar accounts are given of rapid changes
-of language in Cambodia, Siberia, Central Africa, North, Central, and
-South America.
-
-The greater stability of the material arts as compared with the
-fluctuations in the language of a people in a state of primaeval
-savagery, is well shown by a consideration of the weapons of the
-Australians, and the names by which they are known in the several parts
-of that continent. These people, from the simplicity of their arts,
-afford us the only living examples of what we may presume to have been
-the characteristics of a primitive people. Their weapons are the same
-throughout the continent; the shield, the throwing-stick, the spear,
-the boomerang, and their other weapons differ only in being thicker,
-broader, flatter, or longer, in different localities; but whether
-seen on the east or the west coast, each of these classes of weapons
-is easily recognized by its form and uses. On the other hand, amongst
-the innumerable languages and dialects spoken by these people, it
-would appear that almost every tribe has a different name for the same
-weapon. The narrow parrying-shield, which consists of a piece of wood
-with a place for the hand in the centre, in South Australia goes by
-the name of 'heileman', in other parts it is known under the name of
-'mulabakka', in Victoria it is 'turnmung', and on the west coast we
-have 'murukanye' and 'tamarang' for the same implement very slightly
-modified in size and form. Referring to the comparative table of
-Australian languages compiled by the Rev. George Taplin, in the first
-number of the _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_ (i, 1872, pp.
-84-8), we find the throwing-stick, which on the Murray River is known
-by the name of 'yova', on the Lower Darling is 'yarrum', in New South
-Wales it is 'wommurrur', in Victoria 'karrick', on Lake Alexandrina
-'taralye', amongst the Adelaide tribes of South Australia it is
-'midla', in other parts of South Australia it is called 'ngeweangko',
-and in King George's Sound 'miro'.
-
-From these considerations we arrive at the conclusion that in the
-earliest stages of culture the arts are far more stable than language:
-whilst the arts are subject only, or chiefly, to those changes which
-result from growth, language, in addition to those which result from
-growth, is also affected by changes arising from phonetic decay.
-
-The importance therefore of studying the grammar, so to speak, of the
-arts becomes apparent, as it is by this means alone that we can trace
-out the origin and evolution of culture in the earliest times.
-
-The task before us is to follow by means of them the succession of
-ideas by which the mind of man has developed, from the simple to the
-complex, and from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous; to work out
-step by step, by the use of such symbols as the arts afford, that
-law of contiguity by which the mind has passed from simple cohesion
-of states of consciousness to the association of ideas, and so on to
-broader generalizations.
-
-This development has to be considered under the two heads of culture
-and constitution, that is to say, that we have to consider not only the
-succession of ideas in the mind resulting from experience, but also the
-development by inheritance of the internal organism of the mind itself,
-or, to use the words of Mr. Herbert Spencer, 'In the progress of life
-at large, as in the progress of the individual, the adjustment of
-inner tendencies to outer persistencies must begin with the simple and
-advance to the complex, seeing that, both within and without, complex
-relations, being made up of simple ones, cannot be established before
-simple ones have been established' (_Princ. of Psych._, i^3, p. 426).
-
-We find no difficulty in assenting to the general proposition that
-culture has been a work of progress. Our difficulty lies in realizing
-the slow stages of its early development, owing to the complexities
-both of our mental constitution and of the contemporaneous culture
-from which experience is drawn, or, again to use Mr. Spencer's more
-expressive words, of our 'inner tendencies', and 'outer persistencies';
-we are apt to regard as intuitive, if not congenital, many simple
-ideas which in early culture can only have been worked out through the
-exercise of experience and reason during a long course of ages.
-
-We see this error of our own minds constantly displayed in the
-education of children. The ideas in a child's mind, like those of
-mankind at large, are necessarily built up in sequence. The instructor
-makes use of some word, the meaning of which is clearly understood
-by him, but which does not fall into the sequence of the child's
-reasoning; the conception associated with it in the child's mind must,
-however, necessarily conform to such sequence. Hence a confusion of
-ideas, which is often attributed to the stupidity of the child, but
-which is in reality due to the inexperience of the instructor; as,
-for instance, in the case exemplified by Pip, in Dickens' _Great
-Expectations_, who, having imbibed the precept that he was to 'walk in
-the same all the days of his life', was led by his sequence of ideas to
-infer therefrom that he was invariably to walk to school by the same
-path, and on no account go round by the pastrycook's.
-
-And so in studying savages and early races whose mental development
-corresponds in some degree to that of children, we have to guard
-against this automorphism, as Mr. Spencer terms it; that is to say, the
-tendency to estimate the capacity of others by our own, which appears
-almost completely to incapacitate some people from dealing with the
-subject.
-
-The question of the free will of man enters largely into this study. I
-shall not be expected to say much upon a subject which has so lately
-occupied the attention of the public, having been discussed by some of
-our ablest scientists; but I cannot avoid quoting, in reference to this
-point, a passage from Dr. Carpenter's _Mental Physiology_, who in this
-controversy is certainly entitled to be regarded as the champion of
-free will; and therefore by quoting him we run no risk of overstating
-the case against free will. 'Our mental activity,' he says (p. 25), is
-'entirely spontaneous or automatic, being determined by our congenital
-nervous organism.... It may be stated as a fundamental principle that
-the will can never originate any form of mental activity....' But
-it has the power, he continues, of selecting any one out of several
-objects that present themselves either simultaneously or successively
-before the mental vision, and of so limiting and intensifying the
-impression which that particular object makes upon the consciousness,
-that all others shall be for the time non-existent to it.
-
-The truth of this, in so far as regards the limitation of the will,
-cannot fail to force itself upon the student of culture. It is,
-I venture to think, by classifying and arranging in evolutionary
-order the actual facts of the manifestations of mind, as seen in the
-development of the arts, institutions, and languages of mankind, no
-less than by comparative anatomy, and far more than by metaphysical
-speculation, that we shall arrive at a solution of the question,
-to what extent the mental Ego has been, to use Professor Huxley's
-expression, a conscious spectator of what has passed.
-
-I propose, therefore, with your permission, to give a few examples,
-by means of diagrams, of material evolution derived from the earliest
-phases of culture. In language and in all ideas communicated by word
-of mouth there is a hiatus between the limits of our knowledge and the
-origin of culture which can never be bridged over, but we may hold in
-our hand the first tool ever created by the hand of man.
-
-It has been said that the use of speech is the distinctive quality of
-man. But how can we know that? We are literally surrounded by brute
-language. We can imitate their calls, and we find that animals will
-respond to our imitations of them. But who has ever seen any of the
-lower animals construct a tool and use it.
-
-The conception of man, not as a tool-_using_ but as a tool-_making_
-animal, is clear, defined, and unassailable; probably if we could
-trace language to its sources, we should be able to draw the same line
-between natural sounds employed as a medium of communication, and the
-created word. Thus the arts which we can study may perhaps be taken to
-illustrate the origin of language, which we cannot study in this phase.
-
-The ape employs both sticks and stones as missiles and as hammers to
-crack the shells of nuts. But we have no evidence that he ever selects
-special forms for special uses. The arts therefore afford us a clearly
-defined starting-point for the commencement of culture.
-
-To go in search of a particular form of stick or stone in order to
-apply it to a particular use would require greater effort of the will
-in fixing attention continuously on the matter in hand than is found to
-exist amongst the lower animals except in cases of instinct, which term
-I understand to mean an inherited congenital nervous organism which
-adapts the mind to the ready reception of experience of a particular
-kind. But this instinct does not exist in the case in question; there
-is no tool-making instinct: our tool has to be evolved through reason
-and experience, without the aid of any special organism for the purpose.
-
-The process we have to assume therefore is that, in using stones as
-hammers, they would occasionally split. In using certain stratified
-rocks this would occur frequently, and so force itself on the attention
-of the creature. The creature going on hammering, it would force itself
-on his notice that the sharp fractured end was doing better work than
-before. It would be perceived that there were hard things and soft
-things, that the hard things split the stone, and the soft things were
-cut by it; and so there would grow up in the mind an association of
-ideas between striking hard things and splitting, and striking soft
-things and cutting, and also a sequence by which it would be perceived
-that the fracture of the stone was a necessary preliminary to the
-other; and in the course of many generations, during which the internal
-organism of the mind grew in harmony with this experience, the creature
-would be led to perform the motions which had been found effectual in
-splitting the stone before applying it to the purposes for which it was
-to be used.
-
-Thus we arrive at a state of the arts in which we may suppose man to
-be able to construct a tool by means of a single blow. By constantly
-striking in the same direction, flakes would be produced; and by still
-further repeating the same motions, it would at last be found that by
-means of many blows a stone could be chipped to an edge or a point so
-as to form a very efficient tool.
-
-But this continued chipping of the stone in order to produce a tool,
-implies a considerable mental advance upon the effort of mind necessary
-to construct a tool with one blow.
-
-It implies continued attention directed by the will to the
-accomplishment of an object already conceived in the mind, and its
-subsequent application to another object which must also have been
-conceived in the mind before the tool was begun.
-
-Now we know from all experience, and from all evolution which we can
-trace with certainty, that progress moves on in an accelerating ratio,
-and that the earlier processes take longer than the later ones.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XII.
-
-_Diagram 1._]
-
-But the implements of the drift, which are the earliest relics of human
-workmanship as yet recognized, are most of them multi-flaked tools,
-such as the implements figured on Plate XII, Nos. 1-10, requiring a
-considerable time to construct, and the use of innumerable blows in
-order to trim to a point at one end.
-
-It appears therefore evident that in the natural course of events
-the drift period must have been preceded by an earlier period of
-considerable extent characterized by the use of single-flaked tools.
-And we may therefore consider it probable that should any evidences of
-man be hereafter discovered in miocene beds, they will be associated
-with such large rude flakes as those now exhibited, which require a
-feebler effort of attention and of reason to construct.
-
-If we examine the forms of the flint implements of the drift, we
-find that out of many intermediate shapes we may recognize three in
-particular, which have been minutely described by Mr. Evans in his
-valuable work on the stone implements of Britain[9]: (1) a side-tool,
-consisting of a flint chipped to an edge on one side and having the
-natural rounded outside of the flint left on the other side, where it
-appears to have been held in the hand; (2) a tongue-shaped implement
-chipped to a point at one end, and having the rounded surface for the
-hand at the big end; and (3) an oval or almond-shaped tool, which is
-often chipped to an edge all round.
-
-We have no evidence to show which of these kind of tools was the
-earliest; but that they were employed for different uses there can be
-little reason to doubt. But have we any evidence to throw light on the
-way in which these several forms originated in the minds of men in the
-very low condition of mental development which we may suppose to have
-existed at the time?
-
-About eight years ago, whilst examining the ancient British camps on
-the South Downs, I chanced to discover in the camp of Cissbury, near
-Worthing, a large flint factory of the neolithic age. There were some
-sixty or more pits from which flints had been obtained from the chalk,
-and these pits were full of the débris of the flint-workers. The
-factory was of the neolithic age, the most characteristic tool of which
-is the flint celt, a form which differs but slightly from the oval
-or almond-shaped palaeolithic form, but the cutting edge of which is
-more decidedly at the broad end. The débris, some six hundred or more
-specimens of which were collected, consisted chiefly of these celts in
-various stages of manufacture.
-
-If any one will attempt to make a flint celt, as I have done sometimes
-(and Mr. Evans, from whom I learnt that art, has done frequently), he
-will find that it is difficult to command the fracture of the flint
-with certainty; every now and then a large piece will come off, or a
-flaw will be discovered which spoils the symmetry of the tool, and it
-has to be thrown away. In arranging and classifying the remains of this
-flint factory, I found that all the palaeolithic forms were represented
-by one or other of these unfinished celts, so much so as to make it
-doubtful whether some of them may not actually have been used like them.
-
-A celt finished at the thin end, and abandoned before the cutting edge
-was completed, represented a tongue-shaped palaeolithic implement; a
-celt finished only on one side represented a palaeolithic side-tool;
-and a celt rudely chipped out, and abandoned before receiving its
-finishing strokes, represented almost exactly an oval palaeolithic
-tool, only differing from it in being somewhat rougher, and showing
-evidence of unfinish.
-
-Taking a lesson then from this flint-worker's shop of the later
-neolithic age, we see how the earlier palaeolithic forms originated.
-They were not designed outright, as the nineteenth-century man would
-have designed them for special uses, but arose from a selection of
-varieties produced accidentally in the process of manufacture. The
-forms were also suggested by those of the nodules out of which they
-were made. We see, by examining the outside surfaces that were left on
-some of them, how a long thin nodule produced a long thin celt, a broad
-thick nodule a broad thick celt, and so forth. Indeed, so completely
-does the fabricator appear to have been controlled by the necessities
-of his art, that in tracing these successive forms one is almost
-tempted to ask whether the principle of causation lay mostly in the
-flint or in the flint-worker, so fully do they bear out the statement
-of Dr. Carpenter and the other physiologists, that nothing originates
-in the free will of man.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE I.]
-
-[Illustration: PLATE II.]
-
-On these two diagrams (Plates I and II) I have shown how, from the same
-form of palaeolithic implement already described, the more complex
-forms of the spear and axe-blade of the subsequent periods were
-developed. The point developed into a spear, and the broad end into an
-axe-blade. You will see by reference to Plate I that the oval tool of
-the drift suggested the smaller leaf-shaped spear-head of the early
-neolithic age. This, by a gradual straightening of the sides, became
-the lozenge-shaped form, which latter developed into the barbed form,
-and this last into the triangular form, which consists of barbs without
-a tang.
-
-On the other hand, this same oval tool of the drift (Plate II), when
-used as an axe-blade with the broad end, became the celt of the
-neolithic period, chipped only at first and subsequently polished. This
-gave rise to the copper celt of the same form having convex surfaces,
-which grew into the bronze celt with flat sides. Then the bronze celt
-was furnished with a stop to prevent its being pressed too far into
-the handle by the blow. Others were furnished with projecting flanges
-to prevent them from swerving by the blow when hafted on a bent stick.
-Others had both stops and flanges. By degrees the flanges were bent
-over the stops and over the handle, and then the central portion above
-the stops, being no longer required, became thinner, and ultimately
-disappeared, the flanges closed on each other, and by this means the
-weapon grew into the socket celt. On this socket celt you will see that
-there is sometimes a semicircular ornamentation on each side. This
-semicircular ornament, as I pointed out in a paper on primitive warfare
-read some time ago, is a vestige of the overlapping flange of the
-earlier forms out of which it grew, which, like the rings on our brass
-cannon, are survivals of parts formerly serving for special uses (pp.
-182-3 below).
-
-In the vertical columns I have given, in the order of their
-occurrence, the successive periods of prehistoric time, viz. the early
-palaeolithic, late palaeolithic, early neolithic, late neolithic,
-early bronze, late bronze and iron periods, beneath which I have placed
-lines for two distinct phases of modern savage culture, viz. the
-Australian and the American Indian. A cross beneath each form denotes
-the periods in which they occur, and a vertical bar denotes that they
-are of rare or doubtful occurrence; so that the sequence of development
-may be seen at a glance, and it is only a glance that I ask you to take
-at these diagrams on the present occasion. I have checked them with Mr.
-Evans' work and also with Sir William Wilde's Catalogue,[10] and I do
-not think that any of the statements made in them will be challenged;
-but as these forms were not developed for the purpose of filling in the
-spaces in rectangular diagrams, such diagrams only imperfectly convey
-an idea of the evolution which has taken place, and must be regarded
-only as provisional and liable to be improved.
-
-In tracing the evolution of prehistoric implements, we are of course
-limited to such as were constructed of imperishable materials. No doubt
-our prehistoric ancestors used also implements of wood, but they have
-long since disappeared; and if we wish to form an idea of what they
-were, we must turn to those of his nearest congener, the modern savage.
-
-In speaking of savages, the question of progression versus degeneration
-is probably familiar to most of those present, through the writings of
-Sir John Lubbock and Mr. E. B. Tylor. To the several weighty arguments
-in favour of progression given by those writers I will add this one
-derived from the sequence of ideas.
-
-If the Australians, for example, were the degenerate descendants of
-people in a higher phase of culture, then, as all existing ideas are
-made up of previous ideas, we must inevitably find amongst their arts
-traces of the forms of earlier and higher arts, as is the case amongst
-some of the savages of South America who early came in contact with
-Peruvian civilization; but the reverse of this is the case: all the
-forms of the Australian weapons are derived from those of nature.
-
-In the same way that we saw that the forms of the palaeolithic flint
-implements were suggested by accidental fractures in the workshop, so
-the several forms of the Australian wooden implements were suggested
-by the various forms of the stems and branches out of which they were
-made. These savages, having only flint tools to work with, cannot
-saw out their weapons to any form they please; they can only trim
-the sticks into a serviceable shape. All their weapons are therefore
-constructed on the grain of the wood, and their forms and uses have
-arisen from a selection of the natural curves of the sticks.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE III.]
-
-I have arranged, on Plate III, drawings of nearly all the weapons used
-by the Australians, placing them together according to their affinities
-in such a manner as to show hypothetically their derivation from a
-single form. As all the forms given on this diagram are drawings of
-weapons in use at the present time, and there are many intermediate
-forms not given here, I have not arranged them in horizontal lines,
-as in the previous diagrams, to show their place in time, but have
-arranged them as radiating from a central point. We know nothing of
-the antiquities of savage countries as yet, and therefore cannot trace
-their evolution in time. The development has therefore been shown by
-means of survivals of early forms existing at the present time.
-
-In the centre I have placed the simple cylindrical stick, as being
-the simplest form. By a gradual development of one end I have traced
-upwards the formation of a sharp ridge and its transition into a
-kind of mushroom form. To the right upwards I have traced the same
-development of the mushroom head, the projecting ridge of which
-is constantly liable to fractures by blows; and as savages always
-systematize accidental fractures so as to produce symmetry, scollops
-have been cut out of the ridge in different places for this purpose,
-which had the effect of concentrating the force of the blow on the
-projections. These were further developed; one of the pilei of the
-mushroom head was made larger than the others, and this suggested the
-form of a bird's head, so that it was only necessary to add a line for
-the mouth and a couple of eyes to complete the resemblance. To the
-right we see that the plain stick held in the centre gave the first
-idea of a defensive weapon, and was used to parry off the darts of the
-assailant; an aperture was then made in the stick for the hand, and
-the face of it became broader, developing into a shield, the narrow
-ends, however, being still retained for parrying. Below I have shown
-that the long stick simply pointed at one end became a lance; a row
-of sharp flints were gummed on to one side to produce a cutting edge,
-and these were then imitated in wood, and by pointing them obliquely
-they were converted into barbs. To the right another kind of barb was
-produced by binding on a piece of sharp-pointed wood. Between this
-and the shields we see that the first idea of the throwing-stick,
-employed to project these lances, was simply constructed like the
-barbed point of the lance itself. The gradual expansion of the stick
-arose from its being employed like a battledore, to fence off the
-enemy's lances. To the left below I have shown the gradual development
-of a peculiar curved weapon, called the 'malga', formed from a stem
-and the branch projecting from it at different angles. The part where
-the continuation of the stem was cut off was trimmed to a kind of
-ridge; this ridge developed, and suggested the crest of a bird's head;
-ultimately the eyes were added, in the same manner as in the club
-on the opposite side of the diagram. To the left we see the plain
-round stick first flattened, then curved. Savages are in the habit
-of throwing all their weapons at their adversaries and at animals.
-In throwing a flat curved stick it rotates of its own accord, and as
-the axis of rotation continues parallel to itself, the thin edge is
-presented to the resistance of the air in front; this increases the
-range, and its peculiar flight must have forced itself on the attention
-of the savage as the result of experience: but he has never had the
-slightest knowledge of the laws of its flight. The different curves
-of the boomerang are the natural curves of the sticks, and like all
-the Australian weapons, they are made on the grain of the wood. Some
-are thicker than others; some will fly in the curves peculiar to that
-weapon, and others will not: scarcely two are alike.
-
-To the left above, we see the mushroom-headed 'waddy', with its
-projecting ridge flattened, then curved; one side becomes more
-developed than the other, and this being thrown develops into the waddy
-boomerang, the ridge of the earlier forms being still represented by a
-mark on the flat head of the weapon; an intermediate link connects it
-with the true boomerang.
-
-Many other examples might be given to illustrate the continuity which
-exists in the development of all savage weapons; but I only ask you
-to glance at the sequence shown in this diagram and the preceding ones
-in order to convince you of the truth of the statement which I made
-at the commencement of this discourse, that although, owing to the
-complexity of modern contrivances and the larger steps by which we
-mount the ladder of progress in the material arts, their continuity
-may be lost sight of, when we come to classify the arts of savages and
-prehistoric men, the term 'growth' is fully as applicable to them as to
-the development of the forms of speech, and that there are no grounds,
-upon the score of continuity, history, or the action of free will, to
-separate these studies generically as distinct classes of science.
-
-But in dealing with evolution we have to speak not only of growth,
-but, as in all other natural sciences, of the principle of decay. By
-decay I do not mean the decay of the materials of the arts, but the
-decomposition of the mental ideas which produced them.
-
-As complex ideas are built up of simple ones, so there is also a
-further process by which they become disintegrated, and the parts go to
-form parts of other ideas.
-
-This decay in the arts corresponds to what is called phonetic decay
-in language; and in both cases it arises either from incapacity, the
-desire to save trouble, or the necessity of abbreviating when ideas
-originally evolved for one purpose come to form parts of other ideas to
-which they are merely accessory and subordinate, as in the well-known
-dialectic changes of speech. Every sound in language had originally a
-distinct meaning of its own; gradually these sounds or roots came to
-form parts of words in which the original meanings of the sounds were
-lost.
-
-I will now endeavour to draw a parallel to this in the arts, by means
-of what may be termed realistic degeneration.
-
-I will not say much as to the place of realism in culture. The
-archaeological world has lately been somewhat startled by the
-discovery of well-executed designs of elephants and other animals in
-the French caves in association with the rude stone implements of the
-palaeolithic age, and by the more recent discovery of Mariette Bey,
-that the earliest Egyptian sculptures of the third dynasty are the most
-truthful representations of the human form that are to be found in
-that country. I see nothing surprising in this, when we consider the
-power that is developed in many children of eight or nine years old of
-making drawings of animals and other objects, which, when allowance is
-made for the feeble hand of childhood, are often as truthful as those
-of the cave-period men, at a time when their minds have acquired but
-little power of reasoning or generalizing, or even of taking care of
-themselves; all which goes to prove that this power of imitation, which
-is a very different thing from ideal art, is one of the most early
-developed faculties of the mind of man.
-
-When the power of imitation had once been developed, it would
-naturally be made use of as a means of intercommunication; thus the
-drawing of a stag would be made to convey information to people at
-a distance that there was a herd of deer in the neighbourhood to be
-hunted; and as the object of the drawing was no longer to depict
-truthfully the peculiarities of the beast, but merely to convey
-information, the amount of labour expended upon it would be the
-least that could be employed for the required purpose. All written
-characters have originated in this way; and no one now requires to be
-told how pictographic representations developed into hieroglyphic and
-subsequently into phonetic characters.
-
-But realistic degeneration would equally take place in all cases in
-which pictorial representations came to be employed for other purposes
-than those for which they were originally designed, as in the case of
-ornamental designs.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XXI.
-
-EVOLUTION OF TYPES ON ANCIENT BRITISH COINS.]
-
-So also a coin receives upon its surface the image of a king or a god
-as a stamp of authority. When from any cause the object of the original
-design is lost, the object of the stamp being no longer to convey a
-likeness, but being merely used as a test of genuineness, or perhaps
-amongst an unlettered people to denote its value, the tendency to
-realistic degeneration would be proportioned to the difficulties of
-execution; no further labour would be expended on it than was necessary
-for the object to be attained. Here I must again remind you of the
-interesting discourse delivered in this Institution on May 14, 1875,
-by Mr. Evans, on the evolution of British coins.[11] His examples are
-figured in his _Coins of the Ancient Britons_, pp. 24-32. With his
-permission I have introduced some of his diagrams (Plate XXI). You will
-remember how the coin of Philip of Macedon having been introduced into
-Britain, the head on the obverse gradually disappeared, leaving only
-the wreath as a band across the coin, which was ultimately converted
-into a cross; and how on the reverse, the chariot and two horses
-dwindled into a single horse, the chariot disappeared, leaving only
-the wheels, the driver became elevated, not elevated after the manner
-unfortunately but too common amongst London drivers, but elevated
-after the manner of the Spiritualists, except that you see he had the
-precaution to take on a pair of wings, differing also both from the
-London driver and the Spiritualists, inasmuch as instead of having lost
-his head he has lost his body, and nothing but the head remains; the
-body of the horse then gradually disappears, leaving only four lines to
-denote the legs.
-
-I will now show you an exact parallel to these transformations in a
-collection of designs, supposed to be tribal marks, which are drawn
-upon the paddle blades of the New Irelanders, a race of Papuan savages
-inhabiting an island on the north-east coast of New Guinea.
-
-Having noticed one or two allied varieties of design in specimens that
-came into my possession, I determined to collect all that I could
-find as they came to this country. In the course of several years I
-succeeded in obtaining the series represented upon Plate IV.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE IV.
-
-ORNAMENTATION OF NEW IRELAND PADDLES, SHOWING THE TRANSITION OF FORM.]
-
-The first figure you will see clearly represents the head of a Papuan:
-the hair or wig is stuffed out, and the ears elongated by means of
-an ear ornament, after the manner of these people; the eyes are
-represented by two black dots, and the red line of the nose spreads
-over the forehead. This is the most realistic figure of the series. In
-the second figure the face is somewhat conventionalized: the line of
-the nose passes in a coil round the eyes; there is a lozenge pattern
-on the forehead, representing probably a tattoo mark; the body is
-represented sitting in full. In the third figure the man is represented
-sitting sideways, simply by lopping off an arm and a leg on one side.
-In the fourth figure the legs have disappeared. In the fifth figure
-the whole body has disappeared. In the sixth figure the nose has
-expanded at the base, and the sides of the face are made to conform
-to the line of the nose; the elongated ears are there, but the ear
-ornament is gone: the nose in this figure is becoming the principal
-feature. In the seventh figure nothing but the nose is left: the sides
-of the face and mouth are gone; the ears are drawn along the side of
-the nose; the head is gone, but the lozenge pattern on the forehead
-still remains; the coil round the eyes has also disappeared, and is
-replaced by a kind of leaf form, suggested by the upper lobe of the
-ear in the previous figures; the eyes are brought down into the nose.
-In the eighth figure the ears are drawn at right angles to the nose.
-In the ninth figure the nose has expanded at the base; all the rest is
-the same as in the last figure. In the tenth figure the lozenge pattern
-and the ears have disappeared, and a vestige of them only remains, in
-the form of five points; the base of the nose is still further expanded
-into a half moon. In the last figure, nothing but a half moon remains.
-No one who compared this figure with the first of the series, without
-the explanation afforded by the intermediate links, would believe that
-it represented the nose of a human face. Unfortunately we do not know
-as yet the exact meaning of these designs, but when further information
-is obtained about them it will throw considerable light on similar
-transformations in prehistoric times.
-
-My next and last illustration is taken from the relics of Troy,
-recently brought to light by Dr. Schliemann.[12] In the valuable
-work lately published by him he gives illustrations of a number of
-earthenware vases and other objects, called by him idols, having on
-them the representation of what he conceives to be the face of an owl,
-and which he believes to represent Athena, the tutelary goddess of
-Troy, called by Homer 'Glaukopis Athene', which signifies, according
-to him, 'with the face of an owl.' Professor Max Müller has given his
-opinion that the word 'glaukopis' cannot possibly be taken to mean
-owl-faced, but can only mean large- or bright-eyed. On this point
-I will venture no opinion, but accepting Professor Müller's high
-authority for the usually received interpretation of it being correct,
-I shall in no way weaken the evidence in favour of Dr. Schliemann's
-discovery of the true site of Troy if I succeed in proving that,
-according to the true principle of realistic degeneration, this figure
-does not represent an owl but a human face.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE V.
-
-REALISTIC DEGENERATION.
-
-ILLUSTRATED BY REPRESENTATIONS OF THE HUMAN FACE, FOUND BY DR.
-SCHLIEMANN AT TROY.
-
-[_The numerals in brackets give_--(1) _the number of the figure in
-Schliemann's_ Troy and its Remains, (2) _the depth at which the figure
-was found, in metres_.]]
-
-The figures on Plate V are all taken from Dr. Schliemann's
-representations, and as the depth of each is given it will be seen
-that the different varieties of face occur in all the different strata
-excavated by him except the highest, and therefore no argument as to
-antiquity can be based upon the depth at which they were found. The two
-first figures, it will be seen, are clearly intended to represent a
-human face, all the features being preserved. In the two next figures
-(3, 4) the mouth has disappeared, but the fact of the principal feature
-being still a nose and not a beak, is shown by the breadth of the base
-and also by the representation of the breasts. In the two succeeding
-figures (5, 6) the nose is narrowed at the base, which gives it the
-appearance of a beak, but the fact of its being still a human form
-is still shown by the breasts. Had the idea of an owl been developed
-through realistic degeneration in these last figures, it would have
-retained this form, but in the two succeeding figures (7, 8) it will be
-seen that the nose goes on diminishing.
-
-In the remaining figures, some of which are (12-16) of solid stone,
-not earthenware, and are believed by Dr. Schliemann to be gods, it is
-clearly shown by the rude scratches representing the eyebrows, and
-their want of symmetry, that this degeneration of form is the result of
-haste.
-
-What then are these solid stone objects? I cannot for a moment doubt,
-from their resemblance to the vases, from the marks denoting the
-junction of the cover with the vase, and from the representations of
-handles, that they are votive urns of some kind, similar to those
-Egyptian stone models of urns represented in the two figures above.
-Urns of this kind were used by the Egyptians to contain the viscera of
-the mummies; but with the cheaper form of burial, in which the viscera
-were retained in the body, stone models of urns, of which these figures
-are drawings from originals in the British Museum, were deposited in
-the graves as vestiges of the earlier and more expensive process; these
-objects therefore cannot be idols, but votive urns. The fact of human
-remains having been found in some of the human-headed urns, and the
-hasty scratches on the stone models, show that they are merely models
-appertaining to the conventionalized survival of some earlier or more
-elaborate system of urn burial.
-
-We see from these facts that both growth and decay, the two component
-elements of evolution, are represented in the study of the material
-arts.
-
-My object in this discourse has been not, as I fear it may have
-appeared to you from the brief time at my disposal and my imperfect
-treatment of the subject, to extol the material arts as being
-intrinsically of more interest or importance than other branches
-of culture, but to affirm the principle that it is by studying the
-psychology of the material arts alone that we can trace human culture
-to its germs.
-
-The theory of degradation is supported only by the study of those
-branches of culture of which the early history is lost.
-
-The tree is the type of all evolution: all trees are seedlings,
-but they differ in their mode of growth. Some, like the beech and
-oak, throw their branches upwards, and these are typical of the
-development of the material arts; others, like the straight-stemmed
-pine, throw off their branches downwards, and these are typical of the
-development of some other branches of culture. It is quite true, as
-stated by mythologists, that the history of myths is one of continued
-degeneration in so far as they can be traced, and that the element
-of decay enters far more into their composition than that of growth.
-But the whole accessible history of these myths represents drooping
-branches from the upward-growing stem of free thought out of which they
-sprang. What is the space of time which separates us from the Vedas, as
-compared with the whole upward growth of humanity before and since!
-
-There are huge gaps in our knowledge of the history of the human race,
-and it has been the pleasure of mankind in all ages to people these
-gaps with jugglers and bogies; but surely, if slowly, science will open
-up these desert places, and prove to us that, so far as the finite mind
-of man can reach, there is nothing but unbroken continuity to be seen
-in the present and in the past.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[7] A Lecture delivered at the Royal Institution of Great Britain on
-Friday, May 28, 1875, and published in _Proc. Roy. Inst._, vol. vii.
-pp. 496-520, Pl. i-iv.
-
-[8] _Lectures on the Science of Language_ (London, 1861), i, Lecture 1.
-
-[9] John Evans, _The Ancient Stone Implements, Weapons, and Ornaments
-of Great Britain_ (London, 1872^1), 1897^2, p. 641.
-
-[10] Sir W. Wilde, _Catalogue of the Antiquities of the Museum of the
-Royal Irish Academy_ (Dublin, 1863).
-
-[11] John Evans, 'On the Coinage of the Ancient Britons and Natural
-Selection,' _Journal of the Royal Institution_, vii. p. 476 ff.; with a
-Plate, which is reproduced, by permission, in Plate XXI.
-
-[12] For illustrations, see _Troy and its Remains_, by Dr. Henry
-Schliemann (Murray, 1875). The figures may be taken in the following
-order: No. 185, No. 74, No. 132, No. 13, No. 173, No. 207, No. 12, No.
-11, No. 133, No. 141, No. 165. [Plate V has been compiled from the
-references here given.]
-
-
-
-
-PRIMITIVE WARFARE[13]
-
-
-I
-
-Although it is more in accordance with the purposes for which this
-establishment has been organized, that the Lecture-room should be
-devoted chiefly to subjects of practical utility connected with the
-improvement of our military system and the progress of the mechanical
-appliances, the organization, and general efficiency of our Army and
-Navy, than to the efforts of abstract science, yet the fact of your
-possessing in the three large apartments that are devoted to your
-armoury, one of the best assortments of semi-civilized and savage
-weapons that are to be found in this country, or, perhaps, in any
-part of the world, is sufficient to prove that it is not foreign to
-the objects of the Institution that the science of war should be
-ethnographically and archaeologically, as well as practically, treated.
-
-The requirements of our advancing age demand that every vein of
-knowledge should be opened out, and, in order to make good our title
-to so interesting a collection of objects as that comprised in what
-may very properly be called our ethnographical military department, it
-should be shown that, whether or not the subject may be considered to
-fall within the ordinary functions of the Society, our Museum is made
-available for the purposes of science.
-
-The age in which we live is not more remarkable for its rapid onward
-movement than for its intelligent retrospect of the past. It is
-reconstructive as well as progressive. The light which is kindled by
-the practical discoveries of modern science, throws back its rays,
-and enables us to distinguish objects of interest, which have been
-unnoticed in the gloom of bygone ages, or passed over with contempt.
-
-Men observe only those things which their occupations or their
-education enable them to understand and appreciate. When a savage is
-introduced on board the deck of a European vessel, he notices only
-those objects with the uses of which he is familiar--the sewing of a
-coat, a chain, or a cable, at once rivets his attention, but he passes
-by the steam-engine without observation, and if a work of art is forced
-upon his notice, he is unable to say whether it represents a man, a
-ship, or a kangaroo![14] So in past ages the flint implements of the
-drift, the parents of all our modern implements, whether for war or
-handicraft, must have been carted away in hundreds, unobserved, and in
-ignorance that these inconspicuous objects would one day be the means
-of upsetting the received chronology of our species.
-
-Whilst, therefore, we devote our energies chiefly to progress, and
-fix our attention upon the present and future of war, it cannot fail
-to interest those who are actively engaged in the duties of their
-profession, if we occasionally take a glance backward and see what
-recent discoveries have done towards elucidating its origin and early
-history.
-
-It might, perhaps, assist a right understanding of the principles on
-which the weapons and implements of savages deserve to be studied, if
-I were to notice some of those great questions respecting the origin
-of our species, and man's place in nature, which the investigations
-of science have been the means of raising in our day. I need hardly
-say that the rude implements, which I am about to describe, are of
-little practical interest in themselves, as models for instruction or
-imitation. We have no need of bows and arrows in the existing state
-of war, and if we did require them, the appliances of modern times
-would enable us to construct them in far greater perfection than could
-be acquired by any lessons from savages. These weapons are valuable
-only, in the absence of other evidence, from the light they throw
-on prehistoric times, and on those great questions to which I have
-alluded, and from their enabling us to trace out the origin of many of
-those customs which have been handed down to us by past generations.
-
-As, however, the discussion of these interesting subjects would lead
-me into matters that are hardly suited to the Lecture-room of this
-Institution, I must pass over the consideration of them with a few
-brief remarks.
-
-In so doing, I may appear to postulate some opinions upon points
-that are still the subject of animated controversy in the scientific
-world. But it would require a far broader field of investigation than
-is here afforded me, in order to treat these inquiries successfully,
-and to adduce all the evidence that would be necessary to support the
-hypotheses put forward; and I am anxious to devote no greater space to
-these preliminary remarks than is necessary to point out some of the
-main features of interest that are involved in the particular study
-which forms the subject of my lecture.
-
-We are apt to speak of the creation of the universe as a thing of
-the past, and to suppose that the world, with all the varied life
-upon it, previous to man's appearance, having been created for his
-especial happiness and supremacy, was afterwards left to his control
-and government. But this view of the subject belongs to an age in which
-the laws of nature in their all-sufficiency and completeness were but
-little studied and appreciated. Modern science finds no evidence of
-any such abandonment of the universe to man's jurisdiction. The more
-comprehensively the subject is viewed, the more restricted appear to be
-those limits over which the free will of mankind is permitted to range,
-and the more evident it becomes, that in his social advancement, his
-laws, arts, and wars, he moves on under the influence and development
-of those same laws which have been in force from the very first dawn
-of creation. The lower the archaeologist searches in the crust of the
-earth for the relics of human art, the more faint become the traces of
-that broad gulf, which in our times appears to separate man from the
-brute creation. In all the numerous and varied offsprings of the human
-intellect, in the arts, and even in speech, the more we investigate and
-trace them back, the more clearly they appear to point to a condition
-of the human race in which they had no existence whatever. The great
-law of nature, 'natura non facit saltum,' was not broken by the
-introduction of man upon the earth. He appears to have been produced in
-the fullness of time, as the work of creation required a more perfect
-tool, and to have ameliorated his condition, only as the work to be
-performed became more complicated and varied, just as in the hands of
-man, the rougher tool is employed for felling, and the finer tool for
-finishing and polishing.
-
-By this view we come to look upon even the most barbarous state of
-man's existence, as a condition, not so much of degradation, as of
-arrested or retarded progress, and to see that, notwithstanding many
-halts and relapses, and a very varied rate of movement in the different
-races, the march of the human intellect has been always onward.
-
-As, in the lower creation, we find no individuals that are capable of
-self-improvement, though some appear, by their imitative faculties,
-to contain within them the germs of an improving element, so the
-aboriginal man, closely resembling the brutes, may have passed through
-many generations before he began to show even the first symptoms
-of mental cultivation, or the rudiments of the simplest arts; and
-even then his progress may have been, at first, so slow, that it is
-not without an effort of imagination that the civilized races of
-our day can realize, by means of the implements which he has left
-us, the minute gradations which appear to mark the stages of his
-advancement. This appears to be the view taken by Sir Charles Lyell in
-his _Antiquity of Man_, when, in comparing the flint implements found
-in the higher and lower-level gravels of the valley of the Somme, he
-arrives at the conclusion 'that the state of the arts in those early
-times remained stationary for almost indefinite periods'. 'We see,'
-he says, 'in our own time, that the rate of progress in the arts and
-sciences proceeds in a geometrical ratio as knowledge increases,
-and so, when we carry back our retrospect into the past, we must
-be prepared to find the signs of retardation augmenting in a like
-geometrical ratio; so that the progress of a thousand years at a remote
-period, may correspond to that of a century in modern times, and in
-ages still more remote man would more and more resemble the brutes in
-that attribute which causes one generation exactly to imitate, in all
-its ways, the generation which preceded it' (4th ed. 1873, p. 421).
-
-In order to understand the relationship which the savage tribes of
-our own time bear to the races of antiquity, it is necessary to keep
-in view that, neither in historic nor prehistoric times is there any
-evidence that civilization has been equally or universally distributed;
-on the contrary, it appears always to have been partial, and confined
-to particular races, whose function it has been, by means of war and
-conquest, to spread the arts amongst surrounding nations, or to
-exterminate those whose low state of mental culture rendered them
-incapable of receiving it.
-
-Assuming the whole of the human species to have sprung originally
-from one stock, an hypothesis which, although disputed, appears to me
-by all existing evidence and analogy of known facts, to be the most
-reasonable assumption, the several races appear to have branched off at
-various and remote periods, many of them, perhaps, previously to the
-present geographical arrangement of land and water, and to have located
-themselves in the several regions in which they are now found, in a
-state which probably differs but little from that in which they existed
-at the time of their separation from the parent stem.
-
-Each race, after separation, shows evidence of arrested growth; and,
-finally, the intellect of the nation fossilizes and becomes stationary
-for an indefinite period, or until destroyed by being brought again in
-contact with the leading races in an advanced stage of civilization,
-precisely in the same way that the individuals composing these races,
-after propagating their species, stagnate, and ultimately decay, or, in
-a low state of savagery, are often destroyed by their own offspring.
-
-Taking a comprehensive view of the development of civilization, it may
-be compared to the growth of those plants whose vigour displays itself
-chiefly in the propagation of their leading shoots, which, overtopping
-the older and feebler branches, cause them to be everywhere replaced by
-a fresh growth of verdure. The vegetable kingdom thus furnishes us with
-the grand type of progress; continuity and bifurcation are principles
-of universal application, uniting the lowest with the highest created
-thing.
-
-The analogy of tree growth has been frequently employed in relation
-to natural phenomena, and it may very well be taken to explain the
-distribution of the human race, and the progress and expansion of the
-arts. It forms the key to the Darwinian theory of natural selection,
-which is essentially monogenistic in its application to the origin of
-the human race.
-
-Thus the existing races of mankind may be taken to represent the
-budding twigs and foliage, each in accordance with the relative
-superiority of its civilization, appertaining to branches higher and
-higher placed, upon the great stem of life.
-
-So little is as yet known of the early history of any but our own
-family of nations, that in the existing state of knowledge, the
-attempt to classify and place them on their proper branches, must be
-attended with much difficulty, and great liability to error. However,
-by arranging the existing races according to their civilization, a
-tolerably correct judgement may perhaps be formed as to the value of
-this system of classification, if we distribute them with those of
-antiquity in some two or three broad divisions. The Caucasian races
-of modern Europe, for example, may be said to bear to their ancestors
-of the historical period the same relationship that geologists have
-shown the existing mammalia of our forests to bear to the mammalia
-of the tertiary geological period. The semi-civilized Chinese and
-Hindoos, in like manner, may be classed with the races of ancient
-Assyria, Egypt, and other nations immediately prior to the first dawn
-of history, the civilization of which nations they still so greatly
-resemble, and appear to have retained, in a state of retarded progress
-from those ages to our own. A third division may perhaps be made of the
-Malay, Tartar, and African negro nations, which, though now in an age
-of iron, may, by the state of their arts, and more especially by the
-form of their implements, be taken as the best representatives of the
-prehistoric bronze period of Europe, towards which they appear to hold
-the same relationship that the fish and reptiles of our seas bear to
-those of the secondary geological period. In a fourth division may be
-included the still more barbarous races of our times, the Australian,
-Bushman, and hunting races of America, whose analogy to those of the
-stone age of Europe may be typified by that of the mollusca of recent
-species to the mollusca of the primary geological period.
-
-In all these existing races, we find that the slowness of their
-progression and incapacity for improvement is proportioned to the low
-state of their civilization, thereby leading to the supposition that
-they may have retained their arts with but slight modification from the
-time of their branching from the parent stem, and may thus be taken
-as the living representatives of our common ancestors in the various
-successive stages of their advancement.
-
-Many examples of this immobility on the part of savages and
-semi-civilized races may be given.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE VI.]
-
-Throughout the entire continent of Australia the weapons and implements
-are alike, and of the simplest form, and the people are of the lowest
-grade. The spear, the waddy, and the boomerang, with some stone
-hatchets, are their only weapons; but amongst these it has been noticed
-that, like the implements of the drift, there are minute differences,
-scarcely apparent to Europeans, but which enable a native to determine
-at a glance to what tribe a weapon belongs.[15] This, whilst it
-proves a tendency to vary their forms, shows at the same time either
-an incapacity, or, what answers the same purpose, a retarding power
-or prejudice, which prevents their effecting more than the smallest
-appreciable degree of change. In the island of Tahiti, Captain Cook
-was unable to make the natives (a superior race to the Australians)
-appreciate the uses of metal, until he had caused his armourer to
-construct an iron adze (Plate VI, fig. 1 _a_)[16] of precisely the
-same form as their own adzes of basalt (Fig. 1 _b_). After that, metal
-tools came into general use amongst them, though their old forms are
-in a great measure preserved to this day. When, during the American
-War, the English endeavoured to utilize the Indians by arming them,
-they were compelled to construct for them tomahawks after their own
-pattern, having a pipe in the handle (Fig. 2). When the Purus Indians
-of South America receive a knife from Europeans they break off the
-handle, and fashion the knife according to their own ideas, placing the
-blade between two pieces of wood, and binding it round tight with a
-sinew.[17] The natives of Samoa now use iron adzes, constructed after
-the exact pattern of their ancient stone ones.[18] The Fiji Islanders,
-though they have now the means of obtaining good blades and chisels
-from Sheffield, and axes from America, prefer plane irons to any other
-form of implement, because they are able to fix them by lashing them
-on to their handles in the same fashion as the ancient stone adzes of
-their own manufacture, which they resemble.[19] The Andaman Islanders
-use the European metal that falls into their hands, only to grind it
-down into spear- and arrow-heads of the same form as their stone ones.
-The same applies to the whole of the Aborigines of North and South
-America, which have stood by, for nearly three centuries, passive
-spectators of the arts of Europeans, without attempting to copy them.
-Crawfurd, in his _History of the Indian Archipelago_,[20] comments
-on the obstinate adherence of the Javanese to ancient customs, in
-accounting for the kris having been retained by them long after the
-causes which produced that peculiar weapon had ceased to operate.
-Tylor, in his account of the Anahuac, observes upon the preservation
-of old types amongst the present inhabitants of Mexico, which have
-remained almost unchanged from generation to generation, enabling
-the historian to distinguish clearly those which are of Aztec from
-those which are of Spanish origin.[21] Herodotus describes the spears
-carried by the Ethiopians in the army of Xerxes as being armed with the
-sharpened horn of the antelope.[22] Consul Petherick found still in
-use by the Djibba negroes, more than two thousand years after, these
-identical spears, armed with the straightened and sharpened horn of the
-antelope, and their other weapons also resembled in character those
-described by Herodotus, although they had passed from the stone weapons
-then used, into an age of metal.[23] The Scythian bow (Plate VI, fig.
-3) is the bow still used by the whole of the Tartar races (Fig. 4).
-The celt of the Tartar, and the celt and sword of the Negro (Fig. 5)
-are still the celt and sword of the European bronze period (Fig. 6),
-and this resemblance is not confined to the general outline of the
-weapons, but extends to the style and patterns of ornamentation. The
-same identity of form exists between the 'manillas' (Fig. 7) used as a
-medium of exchange in the Eboe country of West Africa and the so-called
-penannular rings or ring money (Fig. 8) of gold and bronze which are
-found in Ireland, and which, with some modifications, belong also to
-Germany and the Swiss Lakes. The corrugated iron blade of the Kaffir
-assegai, a section of which is shown in Fig. 9, and which is used also
-in Central and West Africa, is identical with those found in the Saxon
-graves (Fig. 10), and is intended to give a spiral motion to these
-missiles. Chevalier Folard observes that the Gauls were remarkable for
-the tenacity with which they clung to their ancient customs, while the
-Romans, their conquerors, are mentioned by all historians as peculiar
-in their time for the facility with which they adopted the customs of
-others, and developed their own.[24] In modern Europe, the Gipsies have
-also been noticed as being distinguished from the Europeans in all
-the various localities in which they are found, for their remarkable
-adherence to especial arts, savouring of an extinct civilization.
-Amongst the Chinese and Hindoos, the conservatism which has caused them
-to remain for ages in nearly the same condition is too well known to
-require comment. It will, however, be remembered (in illustration of
-the fact that customs of minor importance often survive great political
-changes, and serve to keep up the continuity that would otherwise be
-broken), that after the Manchu Tartars had conquered and established
-themselves in the Chinese territory, they were nearly driven again
-from the country, on account of their forcing upon the subject people
-the custom of wearing pigtails, after the fashion of their conquerors;
-showing how difficult it is to ingraft, upon an alien race, customs
-that are not indigenous.
-
-These, and many other notices of a similar character that are to
-be found in the pages of travel, establish it as a maxim, that the
-existing races, in their respective stages of progression, may be
-taken as the bona fide representatives of the races of antiquity;
-and, marvellous as it may appear to us in these days of rapid
-progress, their habits and arts, even to the form of their rudest
-weapons, have continued in many cases, with but slight modifications,
-unchanged throughout countless ages, and from periods long prior to
-the commencement of history. They thus afford us living illustrations
-of the social customs, the forms of government, laws, and warlike
-practices, which belonged to the ancient races from which they remotely
-sprang, whose implements, resembling, with but little difference,
-their own, are now found low down in the soil, in situations, and
-under circumstances in which, alone, they would convey but little
-evidence to the antiquary, but which, when the investigations of the
-antiquary are interpreted by those of the ethnologist, are teeming with
-interesting revelations respecting the past history of our race; and
-which, in the hands of the anthropologist, in whose science that of
-antiquity and ethnology are combined with physiology and geology, are
-no doubt destined to throw a flood of light, if not eventually, in a
-great measure, to clear up the mystery, which now hangs over everything
-connected with the origin of mankind.
-
-That such a combination of the sciences should have been brought about
-so opportunely in our days, appears to me to be one of those many
-indications of an overruling power directing in the aggregate the minds
-of men, which must, at all times, strike even the most superficial
-observer of nature; for there can be little doubt that in a few years
-all the most barbarous races will have disappeared from the earth, or
-will have ceased to preserve their native arts.
-
-The law which consigns to destruction all savage races when brought
-in contact with a civilization much higher than their own, is now
-operating with unrelenting fury in every part of the world. Of the
-aborigines of Tasmania, not a single individual remains; those of New
-Zealand are fast disappearing. The Australian savage dies out before
-the advancing European. North and South America, and the Polynesian
-Islands, all tell the same tale. Wherever the generous influences of
-Christianity have set foot, there they have been accompanied by the
-scourge. Innumerable and often unseen causes combine in effecting the
-same purpose; diseases which are but little felt by Europeans, act as
-plagues when introduced into uncivilized communities, and cause them
-to fall before their ravages, like wheat before the sickle; and the
-vices of civilization, taking a firmer hold of the savages than its
-virtues, aid and abet in the same work. The labours of the missionary,
-if they have produced no other benefit, have been useful in teaching
-us the great truth, that notwithstanding the philanthropic efforts
-of the intruding race, the law of nature must be vindicated. The
-savage is morally and mentally an unfit instrument for the spread of
-civilization, except when, like the higher mammalia, he is reduced to
-a state of slavery; his occupation is gone, and his place is required
-for an improved race. Allowing for the rapidly increasing ratio in
-which progress advances, it is not too much to assume, that in half a
-century from the present time, savage life will have ceased to have a
-single true representative on the face of the globe, and the evidence
-which it has been the means of handing down to our generation will have
-perished with it.
-
-When we find that the condition of the aboriginal man must have
-been one of such complete inanity as to render him incapable of
-spontaneously initiating even the most rudimentary arts, it follows
-as a matter of course that in the earliest stages of his career, he
-must, like children of our own day, have been subject to compulsory
-instruction. And in looking to nature for the sources from which such
-early instruction must have been derived, we need not, I think, be long
-in coming to the conclusion, that the school of our first parent must
-be sought for in his struggles for mastery with the brute creation,
-and that, consequently, his first lessons must have been directed to
-attaining proficiency in the art of war.
-
-Hence it follows that it is to the lower animals that we must look
-for the origin of all those branches of primitive warfare which it is
-the object of this lecture to trace out. Nor indeed shall we fail to
-find abundant evidence that there is hardly a single branch of human
-industry which may not reasonably be attributed to the same source.
-
-The province of war extends downward through the animal kingdom,
-showing unmistakable evidence of its existence in forms, offensive
-and defensive, differing but little from those of the human era,
-through the unnumbered ages of the geological periods, long prior to
-man's advent; proving, beyond the possibility of doubt, that from the
-remotest age in which we find evidence of organized beings, war has
-been ordained to an important function in the creative process.
-
-Judging by results, which I apprehend is the only true method of
-investigating the phenomena of life, three primary instincts appear
-to have been implanted in nearly all the higher animals[25]:
-alimentiveness, for the sustenance of life; amativeness, for the
-propagation of species; and combativeness, for the protection of
-species, and the propagation by natural selection of the most energetic
-breeds; on which latter subject much important information has been
-given to the world by Mr. Darwin, in his celebrated work on the origin
-of species.
-
-Much might, I believe, be said on the connexion which subsists between
-these functions, all of which are, in some form or other, necessary to
-a healthy condition. Suffice, however, to observe, that as regards the
-dawn of an Utopia, in which some men who think themselves practical
-appear to indulge; whether we study the subject by observing the
-uses to which animals apply the various and ingeniously constructed
-weapons with which Providence has armed them, or whether we view it in
-relation to the prodigious armaments of all the most civilized nations
-of Europe, we find no more evidence in nature, of a state of society
-in which wars shall cease, than we do of a state of existence in which
-we shall support life without food, or propagate our species by other
-means than those which nature has appointed.
-
-The universality of the warlike element is shown in the fact, that the
-classifications of the weapons of men and animals are identical, and
-may be treated under the same heads.
-
-Many constructive arts are brought to greater perfection in animals
-by the development of faculties, especially adapting them to the
-peculiar implements with which nature has furnished them, than can be
-attained by man, and especially by the aboriginal man, whose particular
-attribute appears, by all analogy of savage life, to have been an
-increase of that imitative faculty which, in the lower creation, is
-found only in a modified degree in apes.
-
-The lower creation would thus furnish man not only with the first
-element of instruction, but with examples for the improvement of the
-work commenced, or, to use the words of Pope:--
-
- From the creatures thy instructions take,
- Thy arts of building from the bee receive;
- Learn from the mole to plough, the worm to weave;
- Learn from the little nautilus to sail,
- Spread the thin oars, and catch the driving gale;
- Here, too, all forms of social reason find,
- And hence let reason late instruct mankind.[26]
-
-In the art of war, as we shall see, he would not only derive his first
-instruction from the beasts, but he would improve his means of offence
-and defence from time to time by lessons derived from the same source.
-
-It therefore appears desirable that, before entering upon that branch
-of the subject which relates to the _progress_ and _development_ of
-the art of war, I should point out briefly the analogies which exist
-between the weapons, tactics, and stratagems of savages and those of
-the lower creation, and show to what extent man appears to have availed
-himself of the weapons of animals for his own defence.
-
-In so doing the subject may be classified as follows:--
-
-_Classification of the Weapons of Animals and Savages._
-
- Defensive. Offensive. Stratagems.
- Hides. Piercing. Flight.
- Solid plates. Striking. Concealment.
- Jointed plates. Serrated. Tactics.
- Scales. Poisoned. Columns.
- Missiles. Leaders.
- Outposts.
- Artificial defences.
- War cries.
-
-Firstly, with respect to the combative principle itself. The identity
-of this instinct in men and animals may be seen in the widely-spread
-custom of baiting animals against each other, a practice which is not
-derived from any one source, but is indigenous in the countries in
-which it prevails, and arises from the inherent sympathy which exists
-between men and animals in the exercise of this particular function.
-
-In the island of Tahiti, long before the first European vessel was seen
-off their shores, the inhabitants were accustomed to train and fight
-cocks, which were fed with great care, and kept upon finely-carved
-perches.[27] Cock-fighting also prevails amongst the Malays, Celebes,
-and Balinese. The Javanese fight their cocks like the Mahommedans
-of Hindustan, without spurs; the Malays, Bugis, and Macassars with
-artificial spurs shaped like a scythe.[28] It also prevails in Central
-Africa, Central America, and Peru. The Sumatrans fight their cocks for
-vast sums; a man has been known to stake his wife and children, son,
-mother, or sister on the issue of a battle, and when a dispute occurs,
-the owners decide the question by an appeal to the sword. In like
-manner Adrastus, the son of Midas, King of Phrygia, is said to have
-killed his brother in consequence of a quarrel which took place between
-them in regard to a battle of quails.
-
-When Themistocles led the Greeks out against the Persians, happening
-to see two cocks fight, he showed them as an example to his soldiers.
-Cock-fighting was afterwards exhibited annually in presence of the
-whole people, and the crowing of a cock was ever after regarded as a
-presage of victory.[29]
-
-The Javanese also fight hogs and rams together. The buffalo and
-tiger are matched against each other. In Butan the combat is between
-two bulls. Combats of elephants took place for the amusement of the
-early Indian kings. The Chinese and Javanese fight quails, crickets,
-and fish. The Romans fought cocks, quails, and partridges, also the
-rhinoceros. In Stamboul two rams are employed for fighting. The
-Russians fight geese, and the betting runs very high upon them.[30]
-We find horses, elephants, and oxen standing side by side with man in
-hostile array, and dogs were used by the Gauls for the same purpose.
-Amongst the ancients, the horse, the wolf, and the cock were offered on
-the altar of Mars for their warlike qualities.
-
-Who can doubt with these examples before us, that an instinct so widely
-disseminated and so identical in men and animals, must have been
-ordained for special objects?
-
-The causes which give rise to the exercise of the function, vary with
-the advance of civilization. We have now ceased to take delight in the
-mere exhibition of brute combats, but the profession of war is still
-held in as much esteem as at any previous period in the history of
-mankind, and we bestow the highest honours of the State upon successful
-combatants.
-
-This, however, leads to another subject, viz. the causes of war amongst
-primitive races, which is deserving of separate treatment.
-
-
-_Defensive Weapons._
-
-We may pass briefly over the defensive weapons of animals and savages,
-not by any means from the analogy being less perfect in this class of
-weapons, but rather because the similarity is too obvious to make it
-necessary that much stress should be laid on their resemblance.
-
-_Hides._ The thick hides of pachydermatous animals correspond to the
-quilted armour of ancient and semi-civilized races. Some animals, like
-the rhinoceros and hippopotamus, are entirely armed in this way; others
-have their defences on the most vulnerable part, as the mane of the
-lion, and the shoulder pad of the boar.[31] The skin of the tiger is of
-so tough and yielding a nature, as to resist the horn of the buffalo
-when driven with full force against its sides.[32] The condor of Peru
-has such a thick coating of feathers, that eight or ten bullets may
-strike without piercing it.[33]
-
-[Illustration: PLATE VII.]
-
-According to Thucydides, the Locrians and Acarnanians, being professed
-thieves and robbers, were the first to clothe themselves in armour.[34]
-But as a general rule it may be said, that the opinions of ancient
-writers upon the origin of the customs with which they were familiar,
-are of little value in our days. There is, however, evidence to show
-that the use of defensive armour is not usual amongst savages in the
-lowest stages of culture. It is not employed, properly speaking, by
-the Australians, the Bushmen, the Fuegians, or in the Fiji or Sandwich
-Islands. But in other parts of the world, soon after men began to
-clothe themselves in the skins of beasts, they appear to have used the
-thicker hides of animals for purposes of defence. When the Esquimaux
-apprehends hostility, he takes off his ordinary shirt, and puts on
-a deer's skin, tanned in such a manner as to render it thick for
-defence, and over this he again draws his ordinary shirt, which is
-also of deer-skin, but thinner in substance. The Esquimaux also use
-armour of eider drake's skin.[35] The Abipones and Indians of the Grand
-Chako arm themselves with a cuirass, greaves, and helmet, composed
-of the thick hide of the tapir, but they no longer use it against the
-musketry of the Europeans.[36] The Yucanas also use shields of the same
-material. The war-dress of a Patagonian chief from the Museum of the
-Institution is exhibited (Plate VII, figs. 11, 12); it is composed of
-seven thicknesses of hide, probably of the horse, upon the body, and
-three on the sleeves. The chiefs of the Musgu negroes of Central Africa
-use for defence a strong doublet of the same kind, made of buffalo's
-hide with the hair inside.[37] The Kayans of Borneo use hide for
-their war-dress, as shown by a specimen belonging to the Institution
-(Fig. 13). The skin of the bear and panther is most esteemed for this
-purpose.[38] The inhabitants of Pulo Nias, an island off the western
-coast of Sumatra, use for armour a 'baju' made of leather. In some
-parts of Egypt a breastplate was made of the back of the crocodile
-(Fig. 14). In the island of Cayenne, in 1519, the inhabitants used a
-breastplate of buffalo's hide.[39] The Lesghi of Tartary wore armour
-of hog's skin.[40] The Indians of Chili, in the seventeenth century,
-wore corselets, back and breast plates, gauntlets, and helmets of
-leather, so hardened, that it is described by Ovalle as being equal
-to metal.[41] According to Strabo (p. 306), the German Rhoxolani wore
-helmets, and breastplates of bull's hide, though the Germans generally
-placed little reliance in defensive armour. The Ethiopians used the
-skins of cranes and ostriches for their armour.[42]
-
-[Illustration: PLATE VIII.]
-
-We learn from Herodotus that it was from the Libyans the Greeks derived
-the apparel and aegis of Minerva, as represented upon her images, but
-instead of a pectoral of scale armour, that of the Libyans was merely
-of skin.[43] According to Smith's _Dict. of Gr. and Roman Antiquities_
-(s.v. _lorica_), the Greek 'thorax', called ~stadios~, from its standing
-erect by its own stiffness, was originally of leather, before it was
-constructed of metal. In Meyrick's _Ancient Armour_, there is the
-figure of a suit, supposed formerly to have belonged to the Rajah of
-Guzerat (Plate VIII, fig. 15). The body part of this suit is composed
-of four pieces of rhinoceros hide, showing that, in all probability,
-this was the material originally employed for that particular class of
-armour, which is now produced of the same form in metal, a specimen of
-which, from the Museum of the Institution, taken from the Sikhs, is now
-exhibited (Fig. 16).
-
-[Illustration: PLATE IX.]
-
-In more advanced communities, as skins began to be replaced by woven
-materials, quilted armour supplied the place of hides. In those parts
-of the Polynesian Islands in which armour is used, owing probably
-to the absence of suitable skins, woven armour appears to have been
-employed in a comparatively low state of society. Specimens of this
-class of armour from the Museum of the Institution are exhibited; they
-are from the Kingsmill Islands, Pleasant Island, and the Sandwich
-Islands. A helmet from the latter place (Pl. VIII, fig. 17) much
-resembles the Grecian in form, while the under tippet, from Pleasant
-Island (Pl. VII, fig. 18), may be compared to the pectoral of the
-Egyptians (Fig. 19, _a_ and _b_), which, as well as the head-dress (Pl.
-VIII, fig. 20), was of a thickly quilted material. The Egyptians wore
-this pectoral up to the time of Xerxes, who employed their sailors,
-armed in this way, during his expedition into Greece. Herodotus says
-that the Indians of Asia wore a thorax of rush matting.[44] In 1514,
-Magellan[45] found tunics of quilted cotton, called 'laudes', in
-use by the Muslims of Guzerat and the Deccan. An Indian helmet of
-this description from my collection (Fig. 21) is exhibited; in form
-it resembles the Egyptian, and an Ethiopian one (Fig. 22), composed
-of beads of the same form, brought from Central Africa by Consul
-Petherick, is exhibited. Fig. 23 shows that the same form, in India,
-was subsequently produced in metal. A suit of quilted armour formerly
-belonging to Koer Singh, and lately presented to the Institution by Sir
-Vincent Eyre, is also exhibited (Plate VII, fig. 24). The body armour
-and helmet found upon Tippoo Sahib at his death, which are now in the
-Museum of the Institution (Plate IX, fig. 25, _a_, _b_, and _c_), were
-thickly quilted. Upon the breast, this armour consists of two sheets
-of parchment, and nine thicknesses of padding composed of cocoons of
-the _Saturnia mylitta_, stuffed with the wool of the _Eriodendron
-anfractuosum, D.C._, neatly sewn together, as represented in fig. 25
-_b_.[46] The Aztecs and Peruvians also guarded themselves with a wadded
-cotton doublet.[47] Quilted armour or thick linen corselets were used
-by the Persians, Phoenicians, Chalybes, Assyrians, Lusitanians, and
-Scythians, by the Greeks, and occasionally by the Romans.[48] By the
-Persians it was used much later; and in Africa to this day, quilted
-armour, of precisely the same description, is used both for men and
-horses by the Bornouese of Central Africa, and is described by Denham
-and Clapperton[49] (Plate VIII, fig. 26). Plate VII, fig. 27, is a suit
-of armour in the Institution, from the Navigator Islands, composed of
-coco-nut fibre coarsely netted. Fig. 28 is part of a Chinese jacket of
-sky-blue cotton, quilted with enclosed plates of iron; it is precisely
-similar to the 'brigandine jacket' used in Europe in the sixteenth
-century, which was composed of 'small plates of iron quilted within
-some stuff', and 'covered generally with sky-blue cloth'.[50] This
-class of armour may be regarded as a link connecting the quilted with
-the scale armour, to be described hereafter.
-
-As a material for shields, the hides of animals were employed even more
-universally, and up to a later stage of civilization. In North America
-the majority of the wild tribes use shields of the thickest parts of
-the hides of the buffalo.[51] In the New Hebrides the skin of the
-alligator is used for this purpose, as appears by a specimen belonging
-to the Institution. In Africa the Fans of the Gaboon employ the hide of
-the elephant for their large, rectangular shields.[52] The Wadi, the
-Wagogo, and the Abyssinians in East Africa, have shields of buffalo's
-hide, or some kind of leather, like the Ethiopians of the time of
-Herodotus. The ox-hide shields of the Greeks are mentioned in Homer's
-_Iliad_; that of Ajax was composed of seven hides with a coating of
-brass on the outside. The spear of Hector is described as piercing six
-of the hides and the brass coating, remaining fixed in the seventh
-hide.[53] The Kaffirs, Bechuanas, Basutos, and others in South Africa,
-use the hide of the ox.[54] The Kelgeres, Kelowi, and Tawarek, of
-Central Africa, employ the hide of the Leucoryx antelope.[55] Shields
-of the rhinoceros hide, from Nubia, and of the ox, from Fernando Po,
-are exhibited. In Asia the Biluchi carry shields of the rhinoceros
-horn, and the same material is also used in East Africa. A specimen
-from Zanzibar is in the Institution. In the greater part of India the
-shields are made of rhinoceros and buffalo's hide, boiled in oil, until
-they sometimes become transparent, and are proof against the edge of a
-sabre.[56]
-
-In a higher state of civilization, as the facilities for constructing
-shields of improved materials increased, the skins of animals were
-still used to cover the outside. Thus the negroes of the Gold Coast
-made their shields of osier covered with leather.[57] That of the
-Kanembu of Central Africa is of wood covered with leather,[58] and very
-much resembles in form that of the Egyptians, which, as we learn from
-Meyrick and others, was also covered with leather, having the hair on
-the outside like the shields of the Greeks.[59] The Roman 'scutum' was
-of wood covered with linen and sheepskin. According to the author of
-_Horae Ferales_, the Saxon shield was of wood covered with leather; the
-same applies to the Scotch target, and leather was used as a covering
-for shields as late as the time of Henry VIII.
-
-_Head Crests._ The origin of the hairy crests of our helmets is clearly
-traceable to the custom of wearing for head-dresses the heads and hair
-of animals. The Asiatic Ethiopians used as a head-covering, the skin
-of a horse's head, stripped from the carcase together with the ears
-and mane, and so contrived, that the mane served for a crest, while
-the ears appeared erect upon the head (Hdt. vii. 70). In the coins
-representing Hercules, he appears wearing a lion's skin upon the head.
-These skins were worn in such a manner that the teeth appeared grinning
-at the enemy over the head of the wearer (as represented in Plate
-VIII, fig. 29, which is taken from a bronze in the Blacas collection),
-a custom which seems also to have prevailed in Mexico.[60] Similar
-head-dresses are worn by the soldiers on Trajan's Column. The horns
-worn on the heads of some of the North American Indians (Fig. 30), and
-in some parts of Africa[61], are no doubt derived from this practice
-of wearing on the head the skins of animals with their appendages.
-The helmet of Pyrrhus, King of Epirus, was surmounted by two goat's
-horns. Horns were afterwards represented in brass, on the helmets of
-the Thracians (Fig. 31), the Belgic Gauls, and others. Fig. 32 is an
-ancient British helmet of bronze lately found in the Thames, surmounted
-by straight horns of the same material.[62] Horned helmets are figured
-on the ancient vases. Fig. 33 is a Greek helmet having horns of brass,
-and traces of the same custom may still be observed in heraldry.[63]
-
-The practice of wearing head-dresses of feathers, to distinguish the
-chiefs from the rank and file, is universal in all parts of the world,
-and in nearly every stage of civilization. Amongst the North American
-Indians the feathers are cut in a particular manner to denote the rank
-of the wearer, precisely in the same manner that the long feathers
-of our general officers distinguish them from those wearing shorter
-feathers in subordinate ranks. This custom, Mr. Schoolcraft observes,
-when describing the head-dresses of the American Indians, may very
-probably be derived from the feathered creation, in which the males, in
-most of the cock, turkey, and pheasant tribes, are crowned with bright
-crests and ornaments of feathers.[64]
-
-_Solid Plates._ It has often struck me as remarkable that the shells of
-the tortoise and turtle, which are so widely distributed and so easily
-captured, and which would appear to furnish shields ready made to the
-hand of man, should seldom, if ever, in so far as I have been able
-to learn, be used by savages for that purpose. This may, however, be
-accounted for by the fact that _broad_ shields of that particular form,
-though common in more advanced civilizations, are never found in the
-hands of savages, at least in those localities in which the turtle, or
-large tortoise, is available.
-
-It will be seen subsequently, in tracing the history of the shield,
-that in the rudest condition of savage life, this weapon of defence has
-a history of its own; that both in Africa and Australia it is derived
-by successive stages from the stick or club, and that the broad shield
-does not appear to have been developed until after mankind had acquired
-sufficient constructive skill to have been able to form shields of
-lighter and more suitable materials than is afforded by the shell of
-the turtle. It is, however, evident that in later times the analogy
-was not lost sight of, as the word 'testudo' is a name given by the
-Romans to several engines of war having shields attached to them, and
-especially to that particular formation of the legionary troops, in
-which they approached a fortified building with their shields joined
-together, and overlapping, like the scaly shell of the imbricated
-turtle, which is a native of the Mediterranean and Asiatic seas.
-
-_Jointed Plates._ In speaking of the jointed plates, so common to all
-the crustacea, it is sufficient to notice that this class of defence in
-the animal kingdom, may be regarded as the prototype of that peculiar
-form of armour which was used by the Romans, and to which the French,
-at the commencement of the seventeenth century, gave the name of
-'écrevisse', from its resemblance to the shell of a lobster. The fluted
-armour, common in Persia, and in the middle ages of Europe, is also
-constructed in exact imitation of the corrugated shell defences of a
-large class of the Mollusca.
-
-_Scale Armour._ That scale armour derived its origin from the scales of
-animals, there can be little doubt. It has been stated on the authority
-of Arrian (_Tact._ 13. 14), that the Greeks distinguished scale armour
-by the term ~lepidôtos~, expressive of its resemblance to the scales of
-fish; whilst the jointed armour, composed of long flexible bands, like
-the armour of the Roman soldier, and the 'écrevisse' of the middle
-ages, was called ~pholidôtos~ from its resemblance to the scales of
-serpents. The brute origin of scale armour is well illustrated by the
-breastplate of the Bugo Dyaks, a specimen of which, from the Museum
-of the Institution, is represented in Plate IX, fig. 34. The process
-of its construction was described in a notice attached to a specimen
-of this armour in the Exhibition of 1862. The scales of the Pangolin
-are collected by the Bugis as they are thrown off by the animal, and
-are stitched on to bark with small threads of cane, so as to overlap
-each other in the same manner that they are arranged on the skin of
-the animal. When the front piece is completely covered with scales, a
-hole is cut in the bark for the head of the wearer. The specimen now
-exhibited appears, however, to be composed of the entire skin of the
-animal. Captain Grant, in his _Walk across Africa_, mentions that the
-scales of the armadillo are in like manner collected by the negroes of
-East Africa, and worn in a belt 'three inches across', as a charm.[65]
-
-It is reasonable to suppose that the use of scale armour, in most
-countries, originated in this manner by sewing on to the quilted armour
-before described, fragments of any hard material calculated to give
-it additional strength. Plate VIII, fig. 35, is a piece of bark from
-Tahiti, studded with pieces of coco-nut stitched on. The Sarmatians and
-Quadi are described by Ammianus Marcellinus as being protected by a
-'lorica', composed of pieces of horn, planed and polished, and fastened
-like feathers upon a linen shirt.[66] Pausanias also, who is confirmed
-by Tacitus, says that the Sarmatians had large herds of horses, that
-they collected the hoofs, and after preparing them for the purpose,
-sewed them together, with the nerves and sinews of the same animal,
-so as to overlap each other like the surface of a fir cone, and he
-adds, that the 'lorica' thus formed was not inferior to that of the
-Greeks either in strength or elegance. The Emperor Domitian had, after
-this model, a cuirass of boar's hoofs stitched together.[67] Fig. 36
-represents a fragment of scale armour made of horn, found at Pompeii.
-A very similar piece of armour (Fig. 37), from some part of Asia, said
-to be from Japan, but the actual locality of which is not known, is
-figured in Meyrick's _Ancient Armour_, pl. iii. 1. It is made of the
-hoofs of some animal, stitched and fastened so as to hold together
-without the aid of a linen corselet. An ancient stone figure[68]
-(Plate IX, fig. 38), having an inscription in a character cognate to
-the Greek, but in an unknown language, and covered with armour of this
-description, is represented in the third volume of the _Journal of the
-Archaeological Association_. The Kayans, inhabiting the eastern coast
-of Borneo, form a kind of armour composed of little shells placed one
-overlapping the other, like scales, and having a large mother-of-pearl
-shell at the end. This last portion of the armour is shown in the
-figure of the Kayan war-dress already referred to (Plate VII, fig. 13).
-Plate VIII, fig. 39, is a back- and breast-piece of armour from the
-Sandwich Islands, composed of seals' teeth, set like scales, and united
-with string.
-
-Similar scales would afterwards be constructed in bronze and iron.
-It was thus employed by the Egyptians (Plate IX, fig. 40), two scales
-of which are shown in Fig. 41; also by the Persians, Assyrians,
-Philistines, Dacians, and most ancient nations.
-
-The armour of Goliath is believed to have been of scales, from the
-fact of the word 'kaskassim', used in the text of 1 Sam. xvii,
-being the same employed in Leviticus and Ezekiel, to express the
-scales of fish.[69] Amongst the Romans, scale armour was regarded as
-characteristic of barbarians, but they appear to have adopted it in the
-time of the Emperors. A suit of Japanese armour in my collection shows
-four distinct systems of defence, the back and breast being of solid
-plates, the sleeves and leggings composed of small pieces of iron,
-stitched on to cloth, and united with chain, whilst other portions are
-quilted with enclosed pieces of iron (Fig. 42, _a_ and _b_). Fig. 43,
-_a_ and _b_, is a suit of Chinese armour, in the Museum, having large
-iron scales on the inside (Fig. 44). This system was also employed in
-Europe. Fig. 45 is the inner side of a suit of 'jazerine' armour of the
-fifteenth or sixteenth century, in my collection. Fig. 46 represents
-a similar suit in the Museum of the Institution, probably of the same
-date, having large scales of iron on the outside. A last vestige of
-scale armour may be seen in the dress of the Albanians, which, like the
-Scotch and ancient Irish kilt, and that formerly worn by the Maltese
-peasantry, is a relic of costume of the Greek and Roman age. In the
-Albanian jacket the scales are still represented in gold embroidery.[70]
-
-
-_Offensive Weapons of Men and Animals._
-
-[Illustration: PLATE X.]
-
-_Piercing Weapons._ The Gnu of South Africa, when pressed, will attack
-men, bending its head downwards, so as to pierce with the point of
-its horn.[71] The same applies to many of the antelope tribe. The
-rhinoceros destroys the elephant with the thrust of its horn, ripping
-up the belly (Plate X, fig. 47). The horn rests on a strong arch formed
-by the nasal bones; those of the African rhinoceros, two in number,
-are fixed to the nose by a strong apparatus of muscles and tendons,
-so that they are loose when the animal is in a quiescent state, but
-become firm and immovable when he is enraged, showing in an especial
-manner that this apparatus is destined for warlike purposes.[72] It
-is capable of piercing the ribs of a horse, passing through saddle,
-padding, and all.[73] Mr. Atkinson, in his Siberian travels, speaks of
-the tusk of the wild boar, which in those parts is long, and as sharp
-as a knife, and he describes the death of a horse which was killed
-by a single stroke from this animal, delivered in the chest.[74] The
-buffalo charges at full speed with its horn down.[75] The bittern, with
-its beak, aims always at the eye.[76] The walrus (Fig. 48) attacks
-fiercely with its pointed tusks, and will attempt to pierce the side
-of a boat with them.[77] The needle-fish of the Amazons is armed
-with a long pointed lance.[78] The same applies to the sword-fish of
-the Mediterranean and Atlantic (Fig. 49), which, notwithstanding its
-food is mostly vegetable, attacks the whale with its spear-point on
-all occasions of meeting. There is an instance on record, of a man,
-whilst bathing in the Severn near Worcester, having been killed by the
-sword-fish.
-
-The weapon of the sword-fish is used as a spear-head by the wild tribes
-of Cambodia, and some idea may be formed of its efficiency for this
-purpose, and of the confidence with which it is used, by the following
-account of an attack on a rhinoceros with this weapon, by Mons.
-Mouhot.[79] He says:--
-
-'The manner in which the rhinoceros is hunted by the Laotians is
-curious, on account of its simplicity and the skill they display....
-They had bamboos, with iron blades, something between a bayonet and a
-poignard. The weapon of the chief was the horn of a sword-fish, long,
-sharp, strong, supple, and not likely to break. Thus armed, we set
-off into the thickest part of the forest, with all the windings of
-which our leader was familiar, and could tell with tolerable certainty
-where we should find our expected prey. After penetrating nearly two
-miles into the forest, we suddenly heard the crackling of branches, and
-rustling of the dry leaves. The chief went on in advance, signing to us
-to keep a little way behind, but to have our arms in readiness. Soon
-our leader uttered a shrill cry, as a token that the animal was near;
-he then commenced striking against each other two bamboo canes, and the
-men set up wild yells to provoke the animal to quit his retreat.
-
-'A few minutes only elapsed before he rushed towards us, furious at
-having been disturbed. He was a rhinoceros of the largest size, and
-opened a most enormous mouth. Without any sign of fear, but on the
-contrary of great exultation, as though sure of his prey, the intrepid
-hunter advanced, lance in hand, and then stood still, waiting for the
-creature's assault. I must say I trembled for him, and loaded my gun
-with two balls; but when the rhinoceros came within reach, and opened
-his immense jaws to seize his enemy[80], the hunter thrust his lance
-into him to a depth of some feet, and calmly retired to where we were
-posted.' After the animal was dead, the chief withdrew his sword-fish
-blade, and presented it to Mons. Mouhot.
-
-The narwhal has a still more formidable weapon of the same kind (Pl.
-X, fig. 50). It attacks the whale, and occasionally the bottoms of
-ships, a specimen of the effect of which attack, from the Museum of
-the Institution, is represented in Fig. 51. The Esquimaux, who, in
-the accounts which they give of their own customs, profess to derive
-much experience from the habits of the animals amongst which they
-live, use the narwhal's tusk for the points of their spears. Fig.
-52 represents a 'nuguit' from Greenland, of the form mentioned by
-Cranz[81]; it is armed with the point of the narwhal's tusk. Fig. 53,
-from my collection, has the shaft also of narwhal's tusk; it is armed
-with a metal blade, but it is introduced here in order to show the
-association which existed in the mind of the constructor between his
-weapon and the animal from which the shaft is derived, and for the
-capture of which it is chiefly used. The wooden shaft, it will be seen,
-is constructed in the form of the fish, and the ivory fore-shaft is
-inserted in the snout in the exact position of that of the fish itself.
-At Kotzebue Sound, Captain Beechey[82] found the natives armed with
-lances composed of a walrus tooth fixed to the end of a wooden staff
-(Fig. 54). They also employ the walrus tooth for the points of their
-tomahawks (Fig. 55). The horns of the antelope are used as lance-points
-by the Djibba negroes of Central Africa, as already mentioned (p. 52),
-and in Nubia also by the Shillooks and Dinkas.[83] The antelope's
-horn is also used in South Africa for the same purpose.[84] The argus
-pheasant of India[85], the wing-wader of Australia[86], and the plover
-of Central Africa[87], have spurs on their wings, with which they
-fight; the cock and turkey have spurs on their feet, used expressly
-for offence. The white crane of America has been known to drive its
-beak deep into the bowels of a hunter.[88] The Indians of Virginia, in
-1606, are described as having arrows armed with the spurs of the turkey
-and beaks of birds.[89] In the Christy collection there is an arrow,
-supposed to be from South America, which is armed with the natural
-point of the deer's horn (Fig. 56). The war-club of the Iroquois,
-called GA-NE-U´-GA-O-DUS-HA, or 'deer-horn war-club', was armed with
-a point of the deer's horn (Fig. 57), about 4 inches in length; since
-communication with Europeans, a metal point has been substituted
-(Fig. 58). It appears highly probable that the 'martel-de-fer' of the
-fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, which is also used in India and
-Persia, may have been derived, as its form indicates, from a horn
-weapon of this kind. Horn points suitable for arming such weapons have
-been found both in England and Ireland, two specimens of which are
-in my collection.[90] The weapon of the sting-ray, from the method of
-using it by the animal itself, should more properly be classed with
-serrated weapons, but it is a weapon in general use amongst savages for
-spear or arrow points (Fig. 59), for which it has the particular merit
-of breaking off in the wound. It causes a frightful wound, and being
-sharply serrated, as well as pointed, there is no means of cutting
-it out. It is used in this way by the inhabitants of Gambier Island,
-Samoa[91], Otaheite[92], the Fiji Islands[93], Pellew Islands[94], and
-many of the Low Islands. Amongst the savages of tropical South America,
-the blade of the ray, probably the _Trygon histrix_, is used for
-arrow-points.[95]
-
-In the _Balistes capriscus_ (Fig. 60 _a_), a rare British fish, the
-anterior dorsal is preceded by a strong erectile spine, which is
-used for piercing other fishes from beneath. Its base is expanded
-and perforated, and a bolt from the supporting plate passes freely
-through it. When this spine is raised, a hollow at the back receives a
-prominence from the next bony ray, which fixes the spine in an erect
-position, as the hammer of a gun-lock acts at full-cock, and the spine
-cannot be forced down till this prominence is withdrawn, as by pulling
-the trigger. This mechanism may be compared to the fixing and unfixing
-of a bayonet; when the spine is unfixed and bent down, it is received
-into a groove on the supporting plate, and offers no impediment to the
-progress of the fish through the water. These fishes are also found in
-a fossil state, and, to use the words of Professor Owen, from whose
-work this description of the _Balistes_ is borrowed, exemplify in a
-remarkable manner the efficacy, beauty, and variety of the ancient
-armoury of that order.[96] The stickleback is armed in a similar
-manner, and is exceedingly pugnacious. The _Cottus diceraus, Pall._
-(Fig. 60 _b_), has a multi-barbed horn on its back, exactly resembling
-the spears of the Esquimaux, South American, and Australian savages.
-The _Naseus fronticornis, Lac._ (Fig. 60 _c_), has also a spear-formed
-weapon. The Yellow-bellied Acanthurus is armed with a spine of
-considerable length upon its tail.
-
-The Australians of King George's Sound use the pointed fin of the
-roach to arm their spears[97]; the inhabitants of New Guinea also arm
-their arrows with the offensive horn of the saw-fish, and with the
-claw of the cassowary. The sword of the Limulus, or king-crab, is an
-offensive weapon; its habits do not appear to be well understood, but
-its weapon is used in some of the Malay islands for arrow-points (Fig.
-61). The natives of San Salvador, when discovered by Columbus, used
-lances pointed with the teeth of fish.[98] The spine of the Diodon is
-also used for arrow-points (Fig. 62). Amongst other piercing weapons
-suggested by the horns of animals may be noticed the Indian 'kandjar'
-composed of one side of the horn of the buffalo, having the natural
-form and point (Fig. 63). In later times a metal dagger, with ivory
-handle, was constructed in the same country (Fig. 64), after the exact
-model of the one of horn, the handle having one side flat, in imitation
-of the half-split horn, though of course that peculiar form was no
-longer necessitated by the material then used. The same form of weapon
-was afterwards used with a metal handle (Fig. 65). The sharp horns of
-the 'sasin', or common antelope, often steel pointed, are still used
-as offensive weapons in India (Figs. 66, 67, 68). Several examples
-of these are in the Museum of the Institution. Three stages of this
-weapon are exhibited, the first having the natural point, the second a
-metal point, and the third a weapon of nearly the same form composed
-entirely of metal. The Fakirs and Dervishes, not being permitted by
-their profession to carry arms, use the pointed horn of the antelope
-for this purpose. Fig. 69 is a specimen from my collection; from its
-resemblance to the Dervishes' crutch of Western Asia, I presume it
-can be none other than the one referred to in the _Journal of the
-Archaeological Association_, from which I obtained this information
-respecting the Dervishes' weapon.[99] Mankind would also early derive
-instruction from the sharp thorns of trees, with which he must come
-in contact in his rambles through the forests; the African mimosa, the
-Gledischia, the American aloe, and the spines of certain palms, would
-afford him practical experience of their efficacy as piercing weapons,
-and accordingly we find them often used by savages in barbing their
-arrows.[100]
-
-_Striking Weapons._ Many animals defend themselves by blows delivered
-with their wings or legs; the giraffe kicks like a horse as well as
-strikes sideways with its blunt horns; the camel strikes with its
-fore legs and kicks with its hind legs; the elephant strikes with its
-proboscis and tramples with its feet; eagles, swans, and other birds
-strike with their wings; the swan is said to do so with sufficient
-force to break a man's leg; the cassowary strikes forward with its
-feet; the tiger strikes a fatal blow with its paw; the whale strikes
-with its tail, and rams with such force, that the American whaler
-_Essex_ is said to have been sunk by that animal.[101] There is no
-known example of mankind in so low a state as to be unacquainted
-with the use of artificial weapons. The practice of boxing with the
-fist, however, is by no means confined to the British Isles as some
-people seem to suppose, for besides the Romans, Lusitanians[102], and
-others mentioned in classical history, it prevailed certainly in the
-Polynesian islands[103] and in Central Africa.[104]
-
-_Serrated Weapons._ This class of weapons in animals corresponds to the
-cutting weapons of men. Amongst the most barbarous races, however, as
-amongst animals, no example of a cutting weapon is found[105]: although
-the Polynesian islanders make very good knives of the split and
-sharpened edges of bamboo, and the Esquimaux, also, use the split tusk
-of the walrus as a knife, these cannot be regarded, nor, indeed, are
-they used, as edged weapons. These, strictly speaking, are confined to
-the metal age, and their place, in the earliest stages of civilization,
-is supplied by weapons with serrated, or saw-like edges.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XI.]
-
-Perhaps the nearest approach in the animal kingdom to an edged weapon
-is the fore-arm of the mantis, a kind of cricket, used by the Chinese
-and others in the East for their amusement. Their combats have been
-compared to that of two soldiers fighting with sabres. They cut and
-parry with their fore-arms, and, sometimes, a single stroke with these
-is sufficient to decapitate, or cut in two the body of an antagonist.
-But on closer inspection, these fore-arms are found to be set with a
-row of strong and sharp spines, similar to those of all other animals
-that are provided with this class of weapon. The snout of the saw-fish
-is another example of the serrated weapon. Its mode of attacking the
-whale is by jumping up high in the air, and falling on the animal, not
-with the point, but with the sides of its formidable weapon, both edges
-of which are armed with a row of sharp horns, set like teeth, by means
-of which it rasps a severe cut in the flesh of the whale. The design
-in this case is precisely analogous to that of the Australian savage,
-who throws his similarly constructed spear so as to strike, not with
-the bone point, but with its more formidable edges, which are thick set
-with a row of sharp-pointed pieces of obsidian, or rock-crystal. The
-saw-fish is amongst the most widely distributed of fishes, belonging
-to the arctic, antarctic, and tropical seas. It may, therefore, very
-possibly have served as a model in many of the numerous localities in
-which this character of weapon is found in the hands of savages. The
-snout itself is used as a weapon by the inhabitants of New Guinea, the
-base being cut and bound round so as to form a handle. Plate XI, fig.
-70, is a specimen from the Museum of the Institution. The weapon of
-the sting-ray, though used by savages for spear-points, more properly
-belongs to this class, as the mode of its employment by the animal
-itself consists in twisting its long, slender tail round the object of
-attack, and cutting the surface with its serrated edge.[106] The teeth
-of all animals, including those of man himself, also furnish examples
-of serrated weapons.
-
-When we find models of this class of weapon so widely distributed
-in the lower creation, it is not surprising that the first efforts
-of mankind in the construction of trenchant implements, should so
-universally consist of teeth or flint flakes, arranged along the edges
-of staves or clubs, in exact imitation of the examples which he finds
-ready to his hand, in the mouths of the animals which he captures,
-and on which he is dependent for his food. Several specimens of
-implements, edged in this manner with sharks' teeth, from the Museum
-of the Institution, are represented in Plate XI, figs. 71, 72, 73,
-74. They are found chiefly in the Marquesas, in Tahiti, Depeyster's
-Island, Byron's Isles, the Kingsmill Group, Radak Island[107], and
-the Sandwich Islands[108], also in New Zealand (Fig. 75). They are of
-various shapes, and are used for various cutting purposes, as knives,
-swords, and glaives. Two distinct methods of fastening the teeth to
-the wood prevail in the Polynesian Islands; firstly, by inserting them
-in a groove cut in the sides of the stick or weapon; and secondly, by
-arranging the teeth in a row, along the sides of the stick, between
-two small strips of wood on either side of the teeth, lashed on to the
-staff, in all cases, with small strings, composed of plant fibre. The
-points of the teeth are usually arranged in two opposite directions on
-the same staff, so that a severe cut may be given either in thrusting
-or withdrawing the weapon.[109]
-
-A similarly constructed implement, also edged with sharks' teeth,
-was found by Captain Graah on the east coast of Greenland, and is
-mentioned in Dr. King's paper on the industrial arts of the Esquimaux,
-in the _Journal of the Ethnological Society_.[110] The teeth in this
-implement were secured by small nails, or pegs of bone; it was also
-used formerly on the West Coast. A precisely similar implement (Fig.
-76), but showing an advance in art by being set with a row of chips of
-meteoric iron, was found amongst the Esquimaux of Davis Strait, and is
-now in the department of meteorolites in the British Museum. Others,
-of the same nature, from Greenland, are in the Christy collection
-(Fig. 77). The 'pacho' of the South Sea Islands appears to have been a
-sort of club, armed on the inner side with sharks' teeth, set in the
-same manner.[111] The Tapoyers, of Brazil, used a kind of club, which
-was broad at the end, and set with teeth and bones, sharpened at the
-point.[112]
-
-Hernandez gives an account of the construction of the Mexican
-'maquahuilt' or Aztec war-club, which was armed on both sides with a
-row of obsidian flakes, stuck into holes, and fastened with a kind
-of gum (Fig. 78).[113] Herrera, the Spanish historian, also mentions
-these as swords of wood, having a groove in the fore part, in which
-the flints were strongly fixed with bitumen and thread.[114] In 1530,
-according to the Spanish historians, Copan was defended by 30,000 men,
-armed with these weapons, amongst others[115]; and similar weapons
-have been represented in the sculptures of Yucatan.[116] They are
-also represented in Lord Kingsborough's important work on Mexican
-antiquities, from which the accompanying representations are taken
-(Figs. 78, 79, 80). One of these swords, having six pieces of obsidian
-on each side of the blade, is to be seen in a Museum in Mexico.
-
-In the burial mounds of Western North America, Mr. Lewis Morgan, the
-historian of the Iroquois,[117] mentions that rows of flint flakes have
-been found lying, side by side, in order, and suggesting the idea that
-they must have been fastened into sticks in the same manner as those of
-Mexico and Yucatan.
-
-Throughout the entire continent of Australia the natives arm their
-spears with small sharp pieces of obsidian, or crystal, and recently of
-glass, arranged in rows along the sides near the point, and fastened
-with a cement of their own preparation, thereby producing a weapon
-which, though thinner in the shaft, is precisely similar in character
-to those already described (Figs. 81 and 82). Turning again to the
-northern hemisphere, we find in the Museum of Professor Nilsson, at
-Lund, in Sweden, a smooth, sharp-pointed piece of bone, found in that
-country, about six inches long, grooved on each side to the depth of
-about a quarter of an inch, into each of which grooves a row of fine,
-sharp-edged, and slightly-curved flints were inserted, and fixed with
-cement. The instrument thus armed was fastened to the end of a shaft
-of wood, and might either have been thrown by the hand or projected
-from a bow (Fig. 83). Another precisely similar implement (Fig. 84) is
-represented in the illustrated Catalogue of the Museum at Copenhagen,
-showing that in both these countries this system of constructing
-trenchant implements was employed. In Ireland, although there is no
-actual evidence of flints having been set in this manner, yet from the
-numerous examples of this class of weapon that are found elsewhere, and
-the frequent occurrence of flint implements of a form that would well
-adapt them to such a purpose, the author of the Catalogue of the Royal
-Irish Academy expresses his opinion that the same arrangement may very
-possibly have existed in that country, and that the wood in which they
-were inserted may, like that which, as I have already said, is supposed
-to have held the flints found in the graves of the Iroquois, have
-perished by decay.
-
-_Poisoned Weapons._ It is unnecessary to enter here into a detailed
-account of the use of poison by man and animals. Its use by man as a
-weapon of offence is chiefly confined to those tropical regions in
-which poisonous herbs and reptiles are most abundant. It is used by the
-Negroes, Bushmen, and Hottentots of Africa; in the Indian Archipelago,
-New Hebrides, and New Caledonia. It appears formerly to have been used
-in the South Seas. It is employed in Bootan; in Assam; by the Stiens
-of Cambodia; and formerly by the Moors of Mogadore. The Parthians and
-Scythians used it in ancient times; and it appears always to have been
-regarded by ancient writers as the especial attribute of barbarism.
-The Italian bravoes of modern Europe also used it. In America it is
-employed by the Darian Indians, in Guiana, Brazil, Peru, Paraguay, and
-on the Orinoco. The composition of the poison varies in the different
-races, the Bushmen and Hottentots using the venomous secretions of
-serpents and caterpillars,[118] whilst most other nations of the world
-employ the poisonous herbs of the different countries they inhabit,
-showing that in all probability this must have been one of those arts
-which, though of very early origin, arose spontaneously and separately
-in the various quarters of the globe, after the human family had
-separated. This subject, however, is deserving of a separate treatment,
-and will be alluded to elsewhere.
-
-In drawing a parallel between the weapons of men and animals used
-in the application of poison for offensive purposes, two points of
-similitude deserve attention.
-
-Firstly, the poison gland of many serpents is situated on the upper
-jaw, behind and below the eyes. A long excretory duct extends from
-this gland to the outer surface of the upper jaw, and opens above
-and before the poison teeth, by which means the poison flows along
-the sheath into the upper opening of the tooth in such a manner as
-to secure its insertion into the wound. The hollow interior of the
-bones with which the South American and other Indians arm the poisoned
-arrows secures the same object (Fig. 85); it contains the poisonous
-liquid, and provides a channel for its insertion into the wound. In
-the bravo's dagger of Italy, a specimen of which from my collection
-is shown in Fig. 86, a similar provision for the insertion of the
-poison is effected by means of a groove on either side of the blade,
-communicating with two rows of small holes, into which the poison
-flows, and is retained in that part of the blade which enters the
-wound. Nearly similar blades, with holes, have been found in Ireland,
-of which a specimen is in the Academy's Museum, and they have been
-compared with others of the same kind from India, but I am not aware
-that there is any evidence to show that they were used for poison. Some
-of the Indian daggers, however, are constructed in close analogy with
-the poison apparatus of the serpent's tooth, having an enclosed tube
-running down the middle of the blade, communicating with a reservoir
-for poison in the handle, and having lateral openings in the blade
-for the diffusion of the poison in the wound. Similar holes, but
-without any enclosed tube, and having only a groove on the surface
-of the blade to communicate with the holes, are found in some of the
-Scotch dirks, and in several forms of _couteau de chasse_, in which
-they appear to have been used merely with a view of letting air into
-the wound, and accelerating death (Figs. 87 _a_ and _b_). The Scotch
-dirk, here represented, has a groove running from the handle along
-the back of the blade to within three and a half inches of the point.
-In the bottom of this groove ten holes are pierced, which communicate
-with other lateral holes at right angles, opening on to the sides of
-the blade. Daggers are still made at Sheffield for the South American
-market, with a small hole drilled through the blade, near the point, to
-contain the poison; and in my collection there is an iron arrow-point
-(Fig. 88), evidently formed of the point of one of these daggers,
-having the hole near the point.
-
-It often happens that forms which, in the early history of an art,
-have served some specific object, are in later times applied to other
-uses, and are ultimately retained only in the forms of ornamentation.
-This seems to have been the case with the pierced work upon the blades
-of weapons which, intended originally for poison, was afterwards used
-as air-holes, and ultimately for ornament only, as appears by a plug
-bayonet of the commencement of the eighteenth century in the Tower
-Armoury, No. 390 of the official Catalogue, for a drawing of which, as
-well as that of the Scotch dirk, I am indebted to Captain A. Tupper, a
-member of the Council of this Institution.
-
-The second point of analogy to which I would draw attention is that of
-the multi-barbed arrows of most savages to the multi-barbed stings of
-insects, especially that of the bee (Fig. 89), which is so constructed
-that it cannot usually be withdrawn, but breaks off with its poisonous
-appendage into the wound. An exact parallel to this is found in
-the poisoned arrows of savages of various races, which, as already
-mentioned, are frequently armed with the point of the sting-ray, for
-the express purpose of breaking in the wound. In the arrows of the
-Bushmen, the shaft is often partly cut through, so as to break when it
-comes in contact with a bone, and the barb is constructed to remain in
-the wound when the arrow is withdrawn (Fig. 90). The same applies to
-the barbed arrows used with the Malay blowpipe (Fig. 91), and those
-of the wild tribes of Assam (Fig. 92), which are also poisoned. The
-arrow-points of the Shoshones of North America (Fig. 93), said to
-be poisoned, are tied on, purposely, with gut in such a manner as to
-remain when the arrow is withdrawn. The arrows of the Macoushie tribe
-of Guiana (Fig. 94) are made with a small barbed and poisoned head,
-which is inserted in a socket in the shaft, in which it fits loosely,
-so as to detach in the wound. This weapon appears to form the link
-between the poisoned arrow and the fishing arrow or harpoon, which is
-widely distributed, and which I propose to describe on a subsequent
-occasion. Mr. Latham, of Wilkinson's, Pall Mall, has been kind
-enough to describe to me a Venetian dagger of glass, formerly in his
-possession; it had a tube in the centre for the poison, and the blade
-was constructed with three edges. By a sharp wrench from the assassin,
-the blade was broken off, and remained in the wound.
-
-It has also been supposed that from their peculiar construction most of
-the triangular and concave-based arrow-heads of flint that are found in
-this country, and in Ireland, were constructed for a similar purpose
-(Fig. 95).
-
-The serrated edges of weapons, like those of the bee and the sting-ray,
-when used as arrow-points, were likewise instrumental in retaining the
-poison and introducing it into the wound, and this form was copied with
-a similar object in some of the Florentine daggers above mentioned, a
-portion of the blade of one of which, taken from Meyrick's _Ancient
-Arms and Armour_, is shown in Fig. 96.[119]
-
-Although the use of poison would in these days be scouted by all
-civilized nations as an instrument of war, we find it still applied to
-useful purposes in the destruction of the larger animals. The operation
-of whaling, which is attended with so much danger and difficulty, has
-of late been greatly facilitated by the use of a mixture of strychnine
-and 'woorali', the well-known poison of the Indians of South America.
-An ounce of this mixture, attached to a small explosive shell fired
-from a carbine, has been found to destroy a whale in less than eighteen
-minutes, without risk to the whaler.[120]
-
-When we consider how impotent a creature the aboriginal and
-uninstructed man must have been, when contending with the large and
-powerful animals with which he was surrounded, we cannot too much
-admire that provision of nature which appears to have directed his
-attention, during the very earliest stages of his existence, to the
-acquirement of the subtile art of poisoning. In the forests of Guiana
-there are tribes, such as the Otomacs, apparently weaponless, but
-which, by simply poisoning the thumb-nail with 'curare' or 'woorali',
-at once become formidable antagonists.[121] Poison is available for
-hunting as well as for warlike purposes: the South American Indians
-eat the monkeys killed by this means, merely cutting out the part
-struck,[122] and the wild tribes of the Malay peninsula do not even
-trouble themselves to cut out the part before eating.[123] The Bushmen,
-and the Stiens of Cambodia, use their poisoned weapons chiefly against
-wild beasts and elephants.
-
-Thus we see that the most noxious of herbs and the most repulsive of
-reptiles have been the means ordained to instruct mankind in what,
-during the first ages of his existence, must have been the most
-useful of arts. We cannot now determine how far this agent may have
-been influential in exterminating those huge animals, the _Elephas
-primigenius_ and _Rhinoceros tichorhinus_, with the remains of which
-the earliest races of man have been so frequently associated, and
-which, in those primaeval days, before he began to turn his hand to
-the destruction of his own species, must have constituted his most
-formidable enemies.
-
-_Missiles._ Amongst the offensive weapons of animals, the use of
-missiles cannot be altogether excluded, although the examples of
-their use by the lower creation are extremely rare. Some species of
-cuttle-fish have the power of ejecting water with a good aim.[124]
-The Toxotes, or archer-fish, obtains its name from its faculty of
-projecting drops of water at insects some three or four feet from
-the surface of the water; which it seldom fails to bring down. The
-llama has a habit of ejecting its saliva, but I am not aware of the
-object of this singular practice. I only know from experience that its
-manners are offensive, and that it has the power of spitting with a
-good aim and for some distance. The porcupine has the power of throwing
-its quills, and is said to do so with effect, although it is not now
-believed to dart them with any hostile intention. The Polar bear is
-described in Captain Hall's recent publication as an animal capable of
-capturing the walrus by missile force.[125] It is said that the bear
-will take advantage of an overhanging cliff, under which its prey is
-seen asleep upon the ice, to throw down, with its paws, large stones,
-and with such good aim as to hit the walrus on the head, after which,
-running down to the place where the animal lays stunned, it will take
-the stone to beat out its brains. That animals are instinctively
-acquainted with the force of gravitation is evident by their avoiding
-precipices that would endanger them, and it certainly requires a slight
-(but at the same time most important) advance upon this knowledge,
-to avail themselves of large stones for such purposes as are here
-attributed to the bear; but as the story only rests on the authority of
-the Esquimaux, it must, I think--although they certainly are careful
-observers of the habits of animals--be rejected, until confirmed by
-the direct testimony of white men. It has even been doubted whether
-the alleged habit of monkeys, in throwing coco-nuts at their pursuers,
-has not arisen from the mistake of the hunter in supposing that fruit
-accidentally detached from their stalks by the gambols of these animals
-in the trees, may have been intended as missiles; but it appears now
-to be clearly established that monkeys have the intelligence, not only
-to throw stones, but even to use them in breaking the shells of nuts.
-Major Denham, in his account of his travels in Central Africa, near
-Lake Tshad, says: 'The monkeys, or as the Arabs say, men enchanted,
-"Beny Adam meshood," were so numerous, that I saw upwards of 150
-assembled in one place in the evening. They did not at all appear
-inclined to give up their ground, but perched on the top of a bank,
-some 20 feet high, made a terrible noise, and rather gently than
-otherwise, pelted us as we approached within a certain distance.' This,
-I think, is clear evidence of a combined pelting on the part of these
-untutored animals.
-
-The monkey thus furnishes us with the only example of the use of
-any external substance for offensive purposes, by any member of the
-animal kingdom. All others, except, perhaps, the missile fishes above
-described, use, for offence and defence, the weapons with which nature
-has furnished them, and which are integral parts of their persons. It
-is this which so essentially distinguishes man from the lower creation.
-Man is the tool-using animal. We have no knowledge of man, in any state
-of existence, who is not so; nor have we (with the exception of the
-ape, the link indirectly connecting him with the lower creation, in the
-same manner that the savage connects the civilized with the aboriginal
-man, both being branches from the same stem) any knowledge of animals
-that employ tools or weapons. Herein lies the point of separation,
-which, in so far as the material universe is concerned, marks the
-dawn of a new dispensation. Hitherto Providence operates directly
-on the work to be performed, by means of the living, animated tool.
-Henceforth, it operates indirectly on the progress and development of
-creation, first, through the agency of the instinctively tool-using
-savage, and by degrees, of the intelligent and reasoning man.
-
-
-DESCRIPTION OF PLATES VI-XI
-
-[_Revised and abridged from the 'Description' appended to the original
-text. The roman numeral refers to the Plate on which the figure is
-printed._]
-
- 1. _a._ Adze of iron, constructed by Captain Cook's armourer for
- the use of the natives of Tahiti, _b._ Adze of stone, Tahitian,
- used as model in making the above. Meyrick (Skelton), _Engraved
- Illustrations of Ancient Arms and Armour_ (1830), vol. ii. pl.
- cxlix.
-
- PLATE VI.
-
- 2. _a._ Pipe-handled Tomahawk, of European manufacture, constructed
- for the use of North American Indians. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
- Meyrick (Skelton), l. c., vol. ii. pl. cxlix. _b._ Pipe and
- Tomahawk of pipe-stone, used by the Dacotas of N. America.
- Schoolcraft, _Information concerning the History, &c., of the
- Indian Tribes of the United States_, vol. ii. pl. lxix.
-
- VI.
-
- 3. Maeotian, or Scythian Bow, from a vase-painting. Hamilton,
- _Etruscan Antiquities_, vol. iv. pl. cxvi; Meyrick, _Critical
- Enquiry into Ancient Armour_ (1824) vol. i. pl. ii. 14; Rawlinson,
- _Herodotus_ (1862), vol. iii. pp. 3, 35.
-
- VI.
-
- 4. Bow of the Tartar tribes on the borders of Persia. (Mus. R. U.
- S. Inst.) Meyrick (Skelton), l. c., vol. ii. pl. cxliv.
-
- VI.
-
- 5. Iron Sword (_minus_ the wooden handle) and War-Axe of native
- manufacture, constructed by the Fans of the Gaboon country, West
- Africa. (Author's Collection; similar spec. in Mus. R. U. S.
- Inst.) The patterns of ornamentation are taken partly from the Fan
- War-Axe, and partly from iron knives brought from Central Africa by
- Mr. Petherick. (Author's Coll.)
-
- VI.
-
- 6. Leaf-shaped Bronze Sword (_minus_ the handle), from Ireland
- (Author's Coll.); and a Bronze Celt (Mainz Mus.), Lindenschmit,
- _Die Alterthümer unserer heidnischen Vorzeit_ (1864 ff.). The
- patterns of ornamentation are taken partly from Lindenschmit,
- l. c., pl. iii.; partly from Irish bronze-work in Sir W. Wilde,
- _Catalogue of the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy_ (1863),
- Bronze, pp. 389-90.
-
- VI.
-
- 7. 'Manilla,' or ring-money of copper and iron, used in the Eboe
- country, W. Africa. (Author's Coll.) In 1836, a ship laden with a
- quantity of these 'manillas', made in Birmingham, after the pattern
- in use in Africa (the spec. here figured forming part of the
- cargo), was wrecked on the coast of co. Cork. By this means their
- exact resemblance to the gold and bronze 'penannular rings' found
- in Ireland (Fig. 8) attracted the attention of Mr. Sainthill, of
- Cork, by whom the subject was communicated to the _Ulster Journal
- of Archaeology_, No. 19 (July, 1857).
-
- VI.
-
- 8. 'Penannular Ring,' found in Ireland. Wilde, l. c., Bronze,
- p. 570, Gold, p. 53. Similar forms are found in England and on
- the Continent. Lindenschmit, pl. iv; Keller, _Lake Dwellings of
- Switzerland_ (tr. Lee, 1866), pl. lii _a_, fig. 9.
-
- VI.
-
- 9. Kaffir Assegai-head of iron, of native manufacture, with section
- of blade. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- VI.
-
- 10. Saxon Spear-head of iron, having the same section as fig. 9;
- from a Saxon grave. Neville, _Saxon Obsequies_ (London, 1852), pl.
- xxxv; Akerman, _Saxon Pagandom_ (London, 1855), Introd., p. x.
-
- VI.
-
- 11. War-dress of a Patagonian Chief, composed of seven thicknesses
- of hide on the body part, and three on the sleeves. (Mus. R. U. S.
- Inst.)
-
- VII.
-
- 12. Section of the above, upon the breast, showing how the seven
- thicknesses are united at the top.
-
- VII.
-
- 13. Kayan Cuirass of untanned hide, with the hair outside; and
- Helmet of cane wickerwork. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; pres. by Capt. D.
- Bethune, R.N.)
-
- VII.
-
- 14. Egyptian Breast-plate, made of a crocodile's back. Meyrick
- (Skelton), l. c., vol. ii. pl. cxlviii.
-
- VII.
-
- 15. Suit of Armour, supposed to have formerly belonged to the Rajah
- of Guzerat. The four breast- and back-pieces are of rhinoceros
- hide, having an inscription upon them, beginning with an invocation
- to Ali. The remaining portions are of black velvet, ornamented with
- brass studs, and padded. Meyrick (Skelton), l. c., vol. ii. pl.
- cxli.
-
- VIII.
-
- 16. Four Plates of steel (Sikh), of similar form to those of
- rhinoceros hide in fig. 15, ornamented with patterns of inlaid
- gold. They are fastened with straps over a coat of chain-armour,
- and are called in Persian 'char aineh,' i.e. 'the four mirrors.'
- (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 17. Helmet of basket-work, from the Sandwich Islands, resembling
- the Grecian in form. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; presented by H. Shelley,
- Esq.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 18. Suit of Armour of coco-nut fibre, from Pleasant Island, in
- the Pacific. It is probable that the under tippet, which is now
- attached to the back- and breast-piece at the top, may originally
- have been intended to be worn round the loins, like a kilt. (Mus.
- R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- VII.
-
- 19. _a._ Quilted Pectoral of the Egyptians. Meyrick, l. c., vol.
- i. pl. i. _b._ shows the manner in which it was worn. Rawlinson,
- _Herodotus_ (1862), vol. iv. p. 47, No. iii. 3 (but this figure is
- Kheta, not Egyptian.--ED.).
-
- VII.
-
- 20. Quilted Head-dress of the Egyptian soldiers. Meyrick, l. c.,
- vol. i. pl. i.
-
- VIII.
-
- 21. Quilted Helmet of nearly the same form as fig. 20, from India.
- (Author's Coll.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 22. Head-dress of nearly the same form as figs. 20, 21, from the
- Nouaer tribe of Negroes, inhabiting both banks of the Nile from
- 8° to 10° N. latitude; brought to England by Mr. Petherick. It
- resembles the Egyptian very closely, and is composed of cylindrical
- white beads of European manufacture, fastened together with a kind
- of string. (Author's Coll.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 23. Helmet of the same form as fig. 21, composed of united mail
- and plate, formerly belonging to the Body-guard of the Moguls.
- (Author's Coll.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 24. Suit of Quilted Armour, taken in action from Koer Singh, the
- famous Rajpoot Chief, of Jugdespore in Behar, on August 12, 1857,
- by Major Vincent Eyre, commanding the field force that relieved
- Arrah. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; presented by the captor.)
-
- VII.
-
- 25. _a._ Suit of Quilted Armour, found upon the body of Tippoo
- Sahib at his death, in the breach of Seringapatam. (Mus. R. U. S.
- Inst.)
-
- IX.
-
- _b._ Portion of one of the nine thicknesses of quilting, of the
- above, showing construction (see p. 62): reduced to 1/6.
-
- IX.
-
- _c._ Helmet of the above suit. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- IX.
-
- 26. Quilted Armour of the Bornouese Cavalry. Denham and Clapperton,
- _Travels in Northern and Central Africa_ (1826), p. 328 (Denham).
-
- VIII.
-
- 27. Suit of Armour from the Navigator Islands, composed of coco-nut
- fibre, coarsely netted. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; presented by Sir W.
- Burnett, M.D.) Similar armour is used in the Kingsmill Group.
-
- VII.
-
- 28. Part of a Chinese 'Brigandine Jacket' of cotton, quilted, with
- enclosed plates of metal. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- VII.
-
- 29. Head-dress of Hercules wearing the Lion's Skin, from a Bronze
- in the Blacas Collection. (British Museum.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 30. Head-dress of a North American Chief. Schoolcraft, l. c., vol.
- iii. p. 68. pl. x. 2.
-
- VIII.
-
- 31. Thracian Helmet of brass [?], with horns of the same. Meyrick,
- l. c., vol. i. pl. iii.
-
- VIII.
-
- 32. Ancient British Helmet of bronze, with straight horns of the
- same, found in the Thames. (British Museum.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 33. Greek Helmet, having horns of brass [?]. Meyrick, l. c., vol.
- i. pl. iv.
-
- VIII.
-
- 34. Back-plate and Breast-plate of the Bugo Dyaks, armed with the
- scales of the Pangolin. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- IX.
-
- 35. Piece of Bark from Tahiti, studded with pieces of coco-nut
- shell. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 36. Fragment of Scale-Armour of horn found at Pompeii. [_Pictorial
- Gallery of Arts_, vol. i. figs. 10, 61.]
-
- VIII.
-
- 37. Piece of Scale-Armour, made of the hoofs of some animal, from
- some part of Asia; said to be from Japan. Meyrick, l. c., vol. i.
- pl. iii.
-
- VIII.
-
- 38. An ancient Stone Figure in Scale Armour. Cuming, _Journ.
- Archaeol. Assoc._, vol. iii. p. 31.
-
- IX.
-
- 39. Back-piece and Breast-piece of Armour from the Sandwich
- Islands, composed of seals' teeth. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; pres. by
- H. Shelley, Esq.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 40. Egyptian Suit of Scale-Armour. Rawlinson, _Herodotus_ (1862),
- vol. ii. p. 65, fig. iii; Wilkinson (Birch), _Manners and Customs
- of the Ancient Egyptians_ (1878), fig. 53 _a_.
-
- IX.
-
- 41. Two Scales of Egyptian Armour, enlarged. Rawlinson, l. c., fig.
- iv.
-
- IX.
-
- 42. Japanese Armour, composed of chain, plate, and enclosed quilted
- plates. (_a_) Left arm; (_b_) Greaves. (Author's Coll.)
-
- IX.
-
- 43. _a._ Chinese Suit of Armour, of cotton, having iron scales
- attached to the inside, _b._ Iron Helmet of the same suit (Mus. R.
- U. S. Inst.; presented by Capt. Sir E. Belcher. R.N.)
-
- IX.
-
- 44. A portion of the iron scales attached to the inner side of the
- above suit.
-
- IX.
-
- 45. Breast-piece of 'Jazerine' Armour of iron scales, xv-xvi cent.;
- inner side. (Author's Coll.) Cf. Grose, _Treatise on Ancient
- Armour_ (London, 1786), p. 15, 'Jazerant': cf. pl. xxxiii. 3;
- Meyrick. vol. ii. pl. lvi.
-
- IX.
-
- 46. 'Brigandine' composed of large iron scales on the outside,
- probably of the same date as the above; left by the Venetians in
- the armoury of Candia on the surrender of the island to the Turks
- in 1715. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; presented by Lt.-Col. Patrick
- Campbell, R.A.)
-
- IX.
-
- 47. Horn of the Rhinoceros. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 48. Skull and Tusks of the Walrus. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 49. Weapon of the Sword-Fish; scale 1/2 inch to a foot. (Author's
- Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 50. Spear of the Narwhal; scale 1/2 inch to a foot. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 51. Section, showing part of the timber of the ship _Fame_, where
- it was pierced by the narwhal in the South Seas, through 2-1/2-inch
- oak. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; presented by Lt. A. T. Tulloch, R.A.)
-
- X.
-
- 52. Esquimaux Spear, from Greenland, armed with the spear of the
- narwhal. 1/50. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- X.
-
- 53. Esquimaux Spear in the form of a fish, having fore-shaft
- composed of a narwhal-tusk, inserted so as to represent the tusk of
- the animal; scale 1/2 inch to a foot. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 54. Esquimaux Lance, pointed with a walrus-tooth. 1/20. (Mus. R. U.
- S. Inst.)
-
- X.
-
- 55. Esquimaux Tomahawk or Pickaxe, headed with a walrus-tooth.
- 1/20. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- X.
-
- 56. Arrow-head, probably from South America, headed with the point
- of a deer's horn. (British Museum, Christy Collection.)
-
- X.
-
- 57. War-club of the Iroquois, called _Ga-ne-ú-ga-o-dus-ha_ or
- 'Deer-horn War-Club.' Lewis Morgan, _League of the Iroquois_
- (Rochester, N.Y., 1851), p. 363.
-
- X.
-
- 58. Club of the North American Indians, with a point of iron. 1/20.
- (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; presented by T. Hoblyn, Esq.)
-
- X.
-
- 59. Arrow, from S. America, armed with the weapon of the ray,
- probably _Trygon hystrix_. 1/2. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- X.
-
- 60. _a._ Spine of _Balistes capriscus, Cuv._, erect. Yarrell,
- _British Fishes_ (2nd ed., London, 1841), vol. ii, p. 472. _b._
- Horn of _Cottus diceraus, Pall_. Cuvier, _Animal Kingdom_ (1827),
- s. v. _c._ Horn of _Naseus fronticornis, Lac._ Cuvier, l. c.
-
- X.
-
- 61. Spear of the _Limulus_ or 'King Crab.'
-
- X.
-
- 62. Arrow, armed with the spine of the _Diodon_. 1/4. (Author's
- Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 63. 'Khandjar' or Indian Dagger, composed of the horn of the
- buffalo, having the natural form and point. 1/10. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 64. 'Khandjar' of the same form, with metal blade and ivory handle.
- 1/10. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 65. 'Khandjar' of the same form, having both blade and handle of
- iron. The handle is ornamented with the figures of a bird and some
- small quadruped. 1/10. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 66. Dagger formed of the horn of the 'sasin,' or common antelope.
- 1/10. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 67. Dagger like fig. 66, but with the points armed with metal. 1/10
- (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- X.
-
- 68. Dagger like figs. 66, 67, but composed entirely of metal, with
- a shield for the hand. Similar shields are sometimes attached to
- daggers like those in figs. 66, 67. 1/12. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- X.
-
- 69. Weapon composed of the horn of the antelope; steel-pointed;
- supposed to be that used by the Fakirs in India. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 70. Sword formed of the serrated blade of the saw-fish from New
- Guinea. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- XI.
-
- 71-74. Weapons from the Pacific, edged with sharks' teeth. The
- teeth near the point are placed points forward; the remainder with
- the points towards the handle. Two methods of fastening the teeth
- are shown: _a._ in grooves; _b._ lashed between two strips of wood.
- (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- XI.
-
- 75. Implement from New Zealand, armed with sharks' teeth. (British
- Museum.)
-
- XI.
-
- 76. Esquimaux Knife, from Davis Strait, armed with pieces of
- meteoric iron, (British Museum.)
-
- XI.
-
- 77. Knife, from Greenland, armed with pieces of iron along the
- edge. (British Museum, Christy Collection.)
-
- XI.
-
- 78-80. Mexican 'Maquahuitl.' Lord Kingsborough, _Antiquities of
- Mexico_ (1830-48), vol. i (numerous examples on pl. x-xv: fig. 79 =
- No. 1478).
-
- XI.
-
- 81-82. Spear and Knife, from Australia, armed with pieces of
- obsidian, or rock-crystal. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- XI.
-
- 83. Arrow-point of bone, armed with a row of sharp flint flakes on
- each side. (Museum of Prof. Nilsson, at Lund, in Sweden.) Reduced
- to 1/2 from the figure in Wilde, l. c., 'Animal Materials,' p. 254.
-
- XI.
-
- 84. Arrow-point like fig. 83. (Copenhagen Museum.) _Illustr. Cat.
- of the Copenhagen Museum._
-
- XI.
-
- 85. Arrow-point of hollow bone, from S. America, the hollow of the
- bone being filled with poison. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 86. Dagger of an Italian Bravo, with grooves and holes to contain
- poison; the handle represents a monk in the act of supplication.
- (Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 87 _a._ Scottish Dirk, pierced with holes along the back and sides.
- Along the back of the blade runs a groove eight inches long, in
- which holes are pierced that communicate with lateral holes on the
- side of the blade. (Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 87 _b._ 'Couteau-de-Chasse,' with two grooves on each side near the
- back of the blade, which is pierced through with holes. (Author's
- Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 88. Arrow-head, of iron, with a hole near the point for poison;
- from S. America. (Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 89. Sting of the Bee, serrated or multi-barbed: after F. Huber in
- _Jardine's Naturalist's Library_, Entomology vi. _Bees_ (Edinb.,
- 1840), p. 40.
-
- XI.
-
- 90. Point of Bushman's Arrow, barbed with an iron head, which is
- constructed to come off in the wound. (Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 91. Malay Blowpipe-arrow, iron-headed; similarly constructed. 1/4.
- (Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 92. Arrow of the wild tribes of Assam, copper-headed, and similarly
- constructed. 1/4. (Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 93. Arrow-head of the Shoshones of North America, of flint;
- constructed to come off in the wound. Schoolcraft, l. c., vol. i.
- pp. 212-3, pl. lxxvi. 5.
-
- XI.
-
- 94. Arrow-point of the Macoushie Indians of S. America; similarly
- constructed. 1/4. (Author's Coll.; pres. by Rev. J. G. Wood.)
-
- XI.
-
- 95. Arrow-heads of flint, from the north of Ireland. 1/4. (Author's
- Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 96. Part of the Blade of an Italian Dagger, serrated and pierced.
- Full size. Meyrick (Skelton), l. c., vol. ii. pl. cxiii. 14.
-
- XI.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[13] A Lecture delivered at the Royal United Service Institution,
-Friday, June 28, 1867; illustrated by specimens from the Museum of the
-Institution: and published in the _Journal of the R. U. S. Inst._ xi
-(1867).
-
-[14] Beechey, _Voyage to the Pacific_ (London, 1831), vol. i. p. 298;
-Oldfield, 'Aborigines of Australia,' _Trans. Ethno. Soc._, N. S.
-(London, 1865), vol. iii. p. 227.
-
-[15] Oldfield, 'On the Aborigines of Australia,' _Trans. Ethno. Soc._,
-N.S., vol. iii. pp. 261-7.
-
-[16] Meyrick (Skelton), _Engraved Illustrations of Ancient Arms_, &c.
-(1830), vol. ii. pl. cxlix. 11.
-
-[17] Klemm, _Werkzeuge und Waffen_ (Sondershausen, 1858), p. 159.
-
-[18] Turner, _Nineteen Years in Polynesia_ (London, 1861), p. 262.
-
-[19] Williams, _Fiji and the Fijians_ (London, 1858), vol. i. pp. 78-9.
-
-[20] Crawfurd, _History_ (Edinburgh, 1820), vol. i. p. 224.
-
-[21] Tylor, _Anahuac_ (London, 1861), p. 70.
-
-[22] Hdt. vii. 69: Rawlinson, _Herodotus_, vol. iv (2nd ed., 1862, p.
-55).
-
-[23] Petherick, _Egypt, the Soudan, and Central Africa_ (Edinb. and
-London, 1861), p. 360.
-
-[24] Le Sieur de Folard, _Nouvelles Découvertes sur la Guerre_ (Paris,
-1724), p. 48.
-
-[25] In adopting the nomenclature of phrenology, I am not to be
-understood as advocating strictly the localization of the faculties
-which phrenology prescribes. The mind doubtless consists of a congeries
-of faculties, and phrenology affords the best classification of them
-that has yet been devised.
-
-[26] Pope, _Essay on Man_, Epistle iii. 172-80.
-
-[27] Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_ (London, 1829), vol. i. pp. 302-3.
-
-[28] Crawfurd, _History of the Indian Archipelago_ (1820), vol. i. pp.
-113-4.
-
-[29] Beckman, _History of Inventions_ (London, 1814), pp.
-503-4.--Cock-fighting.
-
-[30] Stanley, _History of Birds_ (London, 1848), p. 389.
-
-[31] Darwin, _Origin of Species_ (London, 1859), p. 88.
-
-[32] Williamson, _Oriental Field Sports_ (London, 1807), p. 94.
-
-[33] Swainson, _Habits and Instincts of Animals_ (London, 1840), p. 142.
-
-[34] Thuc. i. 5 (but what Thucydides says is, that they were the last
-to discard it.--ED.).
-
-[35] Beechey, _Voyage to the Pacific_ (London, 1831), vol. i. p. 248.
-
-[36] Dobrizhoffer, _An Account of the Abipones_ (from the Latin;
-London, 1822), vol. i. p. 262; ii. 361.
-
-[37] Barth, _Travels and Discoveries in North and Central Africa_
-(London, 1857), vol. iii. p. 198.
-
-[38] Low, _Sarawak_ (London, 1848), p. 328.
-
-[39] Pigafetta's _Voyage Round the World_, Pinkerton, vol. ix. p. 349.
-
-[40] William de Rubruquis, _Travels into Tartary and China in 1253_;
-Pinkerton (London, 1811), vol. viii. p. 89.
-
-[41] _An Historical Relation of the Kingdom of Chile_, by Alonso de
-Ovalle, of the Company of Jesus, 1649 (London, 1752), p. 71.
-
-[42] Herodotus, vii. 70; Meyrick's _Ancient Armour_, vol. i. Introd. p.
-iv.
-
-[43] Herodotus, iv. 189; Meyrick's _Ancient Armour_, vol. i. Introd. p.
-iii.
-
-[44] Herodotus, vii. 65 ~heimata ... apo xylôn pepoiêmena~.
-
-[45] Duarte Barbosa, _The Coasts of East Africa and Malabar_,
-translated from the Spanish, by the Hon. H. E. Stanley (Hakluyt
-Society, 1866), p. 55. Since publication, the translator has
-ascertained that the authorship of this work should be ascribed to
-Magellan.
-
-[46] The _Saturnia mylitta_ is the caterpillar from which the
-Tusseh-silk is obtained; the cocoon is of an oval shape when suspended
-upon the tree, and of exceedingly firm texture; it is figured in Sir
-Wm. Jardine's _Naturalist's Library_ (Edinb. 1841), _Entomology_, vol.
-vii. pl. xiv. 2, pp. 146-53. The _Eriodendron anfractuosum, D.C._,
-is an Indian Bombax. The woolly cotton which envelops the seed is
-remarkable for its softness, and is much and deservedly esteemed for
-making cushions and bedding, owing to its freedom from any tendency to
-become lumpy and uneven by getting impacted into hard knots. Various
-attempts have been made to fabricate it into cloth, but hitherto
-without success, except as a very loose material, fit only for quilting
-muffs, for which it is superior to cotton or woollen stuffs, the
-looseness of its texture rendering it an excellent non-conductor,
-whilst at the same time it is extremely light.--Wight, _Illustrations
-of Indian Botany_ (Madras, 1840), vol. i. p. 68; Roxburgh, _Flora
-Indica_ (Serampore, 1832), vol. iii. p. 165 (= _Bombax pentandrum_).
-Both the caterpillar and the plant are found in the jungle in the
-neighbourhood of Seringapatam. For the identification of the vegetable
-substance, I am indebted to W. Carruthers, Esq., F.L.S., British Museum.
-
-[47] Schoolcraft, _Information concerning the History, &c., of the
-Indian Tribes of the U. S. A._ (Philadelphia, 1851-9), part iii. p. 69.
-
-[48] Meyrick, l. c., vol. i. Introduction.
-
-[49] Denham and Clapperton, _Travels in Northern and Central Africa_
-(London, 1826), p. 328 (Denham).
-
-[50] See _Critical Enquiry into Ancient Armour_, by Sir Samuel R.
-Meyrick, vol. iii. p. 21, and pl. lxviii.
-
-[51] Bollaert, 'Observations on the Indian Tribes of Texas,' _Journ.
-Ethno. Soc._, vol. ii. pp. 262-83.
-
-[52] Du Chaillu, _Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial Africa_
-(London, 1861), p. 80.
-
-[53] Homer, _Iliad_, vii. 244-8.
-
-[54] Casalis, _The Basutos_ (London, 1861), pp. 135-6.
-
-[55] Barth, l. c., vol. i. p. 355.
-
-[56] Meyrick (Skelton), l. c, pl. cxli (text).
-
-[57] Bosman, _Guinea_, Pinkerton (1811), vol. xvi. p. 414.
-
-[58] Barth, l. c., vol. ii. pp. 410, 526; ii. 116 (plate); Denham and
-Clapperton, l. c., p. 166 (Denham).
-
-[59] Meyrick, l. c., vol. i. Introd. pp. i-ii.
-
-[60] Meyrick, l. c., vol. i. Introd. p. xxiv.
-
-[61] At Fernando Po.--Cuming, 'Weapons and Armour of Horn,' _Journal of
-Archaeological Association_ (London, 1848), vol. iii. p. 30.
-
-[62] Fig. 32 is from a rough sketch taken about two years ago, and has
-no pretension to accuracy of detail.
-
-[63] Meyrick, l. c, vol. i. pl. iv. 10.
-
-[64] Schoolcraft, _Information concerning the History, &c., of the
-Indian Tribes of the U. S. A._ (Philadelphia, 1851-9), vol. iii. p. 67.
-
-[65] Grant, _Walk across Africa_ (London, 1864), p. 47.
-
-[66] Smith, _Dict. of Gr. and Rom. Antiq._, s. v.; Meyrick, l. c., vol.
-i. Introd. p. xiv; Amm. Marc. xvii. 12. 2; Pausanias, i. 21. 6; Tac.
-_Hist._ i. 79 (_praeduro corio_).
-
-[67] Kitto, _Pictorial Bible_ (London, 1838-9), note to 1 Sam. xvii.
-
-[68] Cuming, _Journal of the Archaeological Association_, vol. iii. p.
-31.
-
-[69] Kitto, _Pictorial Bible_, note to 1 Sam. xvii.
-
-[70] Skene, 'On the Albanians,' _Journ. Ethno. Soc._, vol. ii. pp.
-159-81.
-
-[71] Casalis, _The Basutos_ (London, 1861), p. 172.
-
-[72] Maunder, _Treasury of Natural History_ (London, 1862), p. 573.
-
-[73] Williamson, _Oriental Field Sports_ (London, 1807), p. 46.
-
-[74] Atkinson, _Oriental and Western Siberia_ (London, 1858), p. 495.
-
-[75] Williamson, _Oriental Field Sports_ (London, 1807), p. 94.
-
-[76] Thompson, _Passions of Animals_ (1851), p. 225. The American
-hunter avails himself of this peculiarity to entrap the crane by
-presenting the barrel of his firelock to the animal; supposing it to be
-an eye, the crane immediately strikes at the hole, and fixes its beak
-firmly in the muzzle.
-
-[77] Beechey, _Voyage to the North Pole_ (London, 1843), pp. 93-4.
-
-[78] Bates, _Naturalist on the Amazons_ (3rd ed. London, 1873), p. 230.
-
-[79] _Travels in the Central Parts of Indo-China, Siam, Cambodia, and
-Laos in 1858-9_, by the late M. Henri Mouhot (London, 1864), vol. ii.
-p. 147.
-
-[80] It is to be observed that this is not the rhinoceros's usual mode
-of attack.
-
-[81] Cranz, _Historie von Grönland_ (2nd ed. Barby and Leipzig, 1770),
-p. 196, pl. v. 8.
-
-[82] Beechey, _Voyage to the North Pole_ (London, 1843), p. 252.
-
-[83] Cuming, _Journal of the Archaeological Association_, vol. iii. p.
-25.
-
-[84] Ibid., p. 26.
-
-[85] Swainson, _Habits and Instincts of Animals_ (London, 1840), p. 141.
-
-[86] Gregory, 'Expedition to the North-west Coast of Australia,' _Royal
-Geographical Society's Journal_, vol. xxxii (1862), p. 417.
-
-[87] Denham and Clapperton, _Travels_ (1826), p. 20 (Denham).
-
-[88] Hind, _Narrative of the Canadian Exploring Expedition_ (London,
-1860), vol. i. p. 316.
-
-[89] Captain John Smith, _Sixth Voyage to Virginia_ (1606); Pinkerton
-(1811), vol. xii. p. 35.
-
-[90] Cuming, _Journal of the Archaeological Association_, vol. iii. p.
-27.
-
-[91] Turner, _Nineteen Years in Polynesia_ (London, 1861), p. 276.
-
-[92] Beechey, _Voyage to the Pacific_ (London, 1831), vol. i. p. 143.
-
-[93] Williams, _Fiji and the Fijians_ (London, 1858), vol. i. p. 57.
-
-[94] Wilson, _Pellew Islands_ (ed. Keate, London, 1788), pl. v, fig. 1,
-p. 310.
-
-[95] Klemm, _Werkzeuge und Waffen_ (1858), p. 50.
-
-[96] Owen, _Comp. Anatomy and Physiology of Vertebrates_ (1846), vol.
-ii. 1. p.
-
-[97] Klemm, l. c., p. 31 ('die Schwanzstachel eines Roches,' i.e. 'the
-caudal spine of a ray.'--ED.).
-
-[98] Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. p. 146.
-
-[99] Cuming, _Journal of the Archaeological Association_, vol. iii. p.
-26.
-
-[100] The probability of the aboriginal man having derived his first
-lessons from this source may be judged of by the accounts given by
-travellers of the effects produced by the large thorns of trees in
-South Africa, of which there is a good account in Routledge's _Natural
-History of Man_, by Rev. J. G. Wood (1868-70), vol. i. p. 235. Large
-animals are said to be frequently destroyed, and even to have impaled
-themselves, upon the large, strong spines of the thorny Acacia.
-Throughout Central Africa a pair of tweezers for extracting thorns is
-an indispensable requisite in the equipment of every native.
-
-[101] Beechey, _Voyage to the Pacific_ (London, 1831), vol. i. pp. 47-8.
-
-[102] Strabo, p. 155.
-
-[103] Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_ (London, 1829), vol. i. chap. viii.
-
-[104] Clapperton, _Travels_, p. 58.
-
-[105] I exclude from this category all nippers, cross-bills, and
-prehensile implements.
-
-[106] Jardine's _Naturalist's Library_ (Edinb. 1843): _Ichthyology_
-(Hamilton), vol. vi, part 2, p. 335.
-
-[107] Choris, _Voyage Pictoresque autour du Monde_ (Paris, 1822),
-'Isles Radak,' pl. ii. 1 and 4.
-
-[108] Cook, _Third Voyage_ (London, 1842), vol. ii. p. 251.
-
-[109] Klemm, l. c., pp. 63-4; Wilkes, _United States Exploring
-Expedition_ (Philadelphia, 1845), vol. v. ch. ii. pp. 49, 79.
-
-[110] King, 'The Industrial Arts of the Esquimaux,' _Journ. Ethno.
-Soc._ (1848), vol. i. p. 290.
-
-[111] Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, vol. ii. p. 497.
-
-[112] Nieuhoff, 'Travels in Brazil'; Pinkerton (1813), vol. xiv. p. 874.
-
-[113] Tylor, _Anahuac_, p. 332, Appendix.
-
-[114] Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (1862), vol. i. pp. 226, 227.
-
-[115] Lloyd Stephens, _Incidents of Travel in Central America_, p. 59.
-
-[116] Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (1862), vol. i. pp. 226, 227.
-
-[117] Lewis Morgan, _The League of the Ho-De-No-Sou-Nee or Iroquois_
-(Rochester, N.Y., 1851), p. 359.
-
-[118] Thunberg, _Travels in Europe, Africa, and Asia_, 1770-9 (3rd ed.,
-London, 1795), vol. i. p. 156; ii. p. 162; Livingstone, _Missionary
-Travels and Researches in South Africa_ (London, 1857), p. 171.
-
-[119] Meyrick (Skelton), _Ancient Arms and Armour_, vol. ii. pl. cxiii,
-fig. 14, cf. fig. 13.
-
-[120] _Times_ newspaper, Dec. 24, 1866.
-
-[121] Humboldt, _Aspects of Nature_ (London, 1849), vol. i. pp. 25,
-203-4.
-
-[122] Klemm, l. c., p. 53.
-
-[123] 'On the Wild Tribes in the Interior of the Malay Peninsula,' by
-Père Bourien. _Trans. Ethno. Soc._, N.S., vol. iii (1865), p. 78.
-
-[124] Darwin, _Journal of Researches into Nat. Hist. and Geology_
-(London, 1845), p. 8.
-
-[125] Hall, C. F., _Life with the Esquimaux_ (London, 1864), vol. ii.
-pp. 329-30.
-
-
-
-
-PRIMITIVE WARFARE
-
-II
-
-ON THE RESEMBLANCE OF THE WEAPONS OF EARLY MAN, THEIR VARIATION,
-CONTINUITY, AND DEVELOPMENT OF FORM.[126]
-
-
-_General Remarks._
-
-In June, 1867, I had the honour of reading a paper at this Institution,
-which has since been published in the _Journal_, the object of which
-was to point out the resemblance which exists between the weapons of
-savages and early races and the weapons with which nature has furnished
-animals for their defence.
-
-In continuation of the same subject, my present communication will
-relate to the resemblance to each other of the weapons of races
-sometimes widely separated, and of which the connexion, if it ever
-existed, has long since been consigned to obscurity. I shall endeavour
-to show, how in these several localities, which are so remote from
-one another, the progress of form has been developed upon a similar
-plan, and, though to all appearance independently, yet that under like
-conditions like results have been produced; and that the weapons and
-implements of these races will sometimes be found to bear so close a
-resemblance to each other, as often to suggest a community of origin,
-where no such common origin can have existed, unless at the very
-remotest period.
-
-We shall thus be brought to the consideration of the great problem of
-our day, viz. the origin of mankind, or rather the origin of the human
-arts; for the question of man's origin, whether he was himself created
-or developed from some prior form, whether since the period of his
-first appearance he has by variation separated into distinct races,
-or whether the several races of mankind were separately created, are
-questions which, however closely allied, do not of necessity form part
-of our present subject. It has to deal solely with the origin of the
-arts, and more particularly with the art of war, which in the infancy
-of society belonged to a condition of life so constant and universal
-as to embrace within its sphere all other arts, or at least to be so
-intimately connected with them as to require the same treatment; the
-tool and the weapon being, as I shall presently show, often identical
-in the hands of the primaeval savage.
-
-These prefatory remarks are necessary because it will be seen that the
-general observations I am about to offer on the subject are fully as
-applicable to the whole range of the industrial arts of mankind as to
-the art of war. My illustrations, however, will be taken exclusively
-from weapons of war.
-
-Is not the world at the present time, and has it not always been, the
-scene of a continuous progress? Have not the arts grown up from an
-obscure origin, and is not this growth continuing to the present day?
-
-This is the question which lies at the very threshold of our subject,
-and we must endeavour to treat it by the light of evidence alone, apart
-from all considerations of a traditional or poetic character.
-
-I do not propose here to enter into a disquisition upon the functions
-of the human mind. But it must I think be admitted, that if man
-possessed from the first the same nature that belongs to him at the
-present time, he must at the commencement of his career in this world
-have been destitute of all creative power. The mind has never been
-endowed with any creative faculty. The only powers we possess are those
-of digesting, adapting, and applying, by the intellectual faculties,
-the experience acquired through the medium of the senses. We come into
-the world helpless and speechless, possessing only in common with the
-brutes such instincts as are necessary for the bare sustenance of
-life under the most facile conditions; all that follows afterwards is
-dependent purely on experience.
-
-Whether we afterwards become barbarous or civilized, whether we follow
-a hunting, nomadic, or agricultural life, whether we embrace this
-religion or that, or attain proficiency in any of the arts, all this
-is dependent purely on the accident of our birth, which places us in a
-position to build upon the experience of our ancestors, adding to it
-the experience acquired by ourselves. For although it is doubtless true
-that the breeds of mankind, like the breeds of our domestic animals,
-by continual cultivation during many generations, have improved, and
-that by this means races have been produced capable of being educated
-to a higher degree than those which have remained uncivilized, this
-does not alter the fact that it is by experience alone, conscious or
-unconscious, self-imposed or compulsory, and by a process of slow and
-laborious induction, that we arrive at the degree of perfection to
-which, according to our opportunities and our relative endowments, we
-ultimately attain.
-
-The amount, therefore, which any one individual or any one generation
-is capable of adding to the civilization of their age must be
-immeasurably small, in comparison with what they derive from it.
-
-I could not perhaps appeal to an audience more capable of appreciating
-the truth of these remarks than to the members of an Institution, the
-object of which is to examine into the improvements and so-called
-inventions which are from time to time effected in the machinery and
-implements of war.
-
-How often does any proposal or improvement come before this Institution
-which after investigating its antecedents is found to possess
-originality of design? Is it not a fact that even the most ingenious
-and successful inventions turn out on inquiry to be mere adaptations of
-contrivances already existing, or that they are produced by applying
-to one branch of industry the principles or the contrivances which
-have been evolved in another. I think that no one can have constantly
-attended the lectures of this or any similar Institution, without
-becoming impressed, above all things, with the want of originality
-observable amongst men, and with the great calls which, even in this
-age of cultivated intellects and abundant materials to work upon, all
-inventors are obliged to make upon those who have preceded them.
-
-Since, then, we ourselves are so entirely creatures of education, and
-derive so little from our own unaided resources, it follows that the
-first created man, if similarly constituted, having no antecedents from
-which to derive instruction, could not, without external aid, have made
-any material or rapid advance towards the initiation of the arts.
-
-So fully has the truth of this been recognized by those who are not
-themselves advocates for the theory of development, that in order to
-account for the very first stages of human progress they have found
-it necessary to assume the hypothesis of supernatural agency: such
-we know was the belief of the classical pagan nations, who attributed
-the origin of many of the arts to their gods; such we know to be the
-tradition of many savage and semi-civilized nations of modern times
-that have attained to the first stages of culture. But we have already
-disposed of this hypothesis at the commencement of these remarks, by
-deciding that our arguments should be based solely upon evidence. We
-are, therefore, under the necessity of assuming, in the absence of any
-evidence to the contrary, that none but the agencies which help us
-now were at the disposal of our first ancestors, and the alternative
-to which we must have recourse is that of supposing that the progress
-of those days was immeasurably slower than it is at present, and that
-vast ages must have elapsed after the first appearance of man before he
-began to show even the first indications of a settled advance.
-
-Yet the complex civilization of our own time has been built on the
-foundations that were laid by these aborigines of our species, while
-the brute creation may be said to have produced little more than was
-necessary to their own wants or those of their immediate offspring.
-Man has been the agent employed in a work of continuous progression.
-Generation has succeeded generation, and race has succeeded race, each
-contributing its quota to the fabrication of the edifice, and then
-giving place to other workmen. But the progress of the edifice itself
-has never ceased; it has gone on, I maintain (contrary to the opinion
-of some writers of our day), always in fulfilment of one vast design.
-It is a work of all time.
-
-To study it comprehensively, we must devote ourselves to the
-contemplation of the edifice itself, and set aside the study of mankind
-for separate treatment, for it is evident that man has been fashioned,
-not as the designer, but simply as the unconscious instrument of its
-erection. Each individual has been impelled by what--viewed in this
-light--may be regarded as instincts sufficient to stimulate him to
-labour, but falling immeasurably short of a comprehensive knowledge of
-the great scheme, towards which he is an unconscious contributor. Of
-this he knows no more than the earthworm knows it to be its function
-to cover the crust of the earth with mould, or the small coral polypus
-knows that it is engaged in the erection of a barrier reef. No
-comprehensive scheme of progress need be searched for in the pigmy
-intellect of man, and if we are ever destined to acquire any knowledge
-of the laws which influence the growth of civilization, we must look
-for them in an investigation of the phenomenon itself, by studying its
-phases and the sequence of its mutations. In short we must apply to the
-whole range of human culture, to the arts, whether of peace or war, the
-same method which has already been applied with some success to the
-history of language.
-
-It has been shown that the speech of our own day has been the work
-of many generations and of innumerable distinct races; its roots are
-traceable in the utterances of the untutored savage. No nation ever
-consciously invented a grammar, and yet language has been shown to be
-capable of being treated as a science of natural growth, having its
-laws of mutation and development, never dreamt of by any of the many
-myriads of individuals that have unconsciously contributed to the
-formation of it. May not all the products of human intellects in the
-aggregate be made amenable to the same treatment, and, like language,
-be found to be influenced by laws of evolution and progress?
-
-That these remarks are not merely speculative, that the progress of
-civilization has been continuous and connected, while the races which
-have been engaged in the formation of it, like individuals, have had
-their periods of birth, maturity, and decay, is sufficiently proved by
-history.
-
-In Egypt and in Assyria, we see the remains of ancient and formerly
-populous cities, where now the nomadic Arab pitches his tent or wanders
-with his flocks, thus showing that relapses of civilization must have
-occurred in those particular localities where such phenomena are
-observed. But we know also from history that the civilization which
-once flourished in those countries did not expire there, but was
-transferred thence to other places; that the culture of Assyria and
-of Egypt passed into Greece and developed there; that from Greece it
-extended to Rome, and in the hands of a new people passed through fresh
-phases; that after the destruction of the Roman Empire it lay dormant
-for many ages, only to rise again on its original basis, extended
-and fertilized by the introduction of fresh blood; that we ourselves
-are the inheritors of the same arts, customs, and institutions,
-modified and improved; and finally, that civilization, expanding in
-all directions, as it continues to move westward, is now in process of
-being received back by those ancient countries in which it originated,
-in a condition far more varied and diversified than it could ever have
-become, had it been confined to a single people or country.
-
-Passing now from the known to the unknown, we come to the study of
-prehistoric times, prepared to find that every fresh discovery helps us
-to trace backwards the arts of mankind in unbroken continuity towards
-their source.
-
-Commencing with the Saxon and the Celt, and passing from these to
-the lake dwellers, and on to the inhabitants of caves, races whose
-successive periods of existence are determined chiefly by the animals
-with which their remains are associated, we find that, according
-to their antiquity, they appear to have lived in a lower and lower
-condition of culture, until in the drift period, coeval with the
-extinct mammoth and the woolly haired rhinoceros, we find the earliest
-traces of man, scanty and unsatisfactory though they be, yet sufficient
-to show that he must have existed in a state so rude, as to have
-devised no better implements than flints pointed at one end, and held
-in the hand.
-
-These successive prehistoric stages of civilization have been divided
-into the stone, the bronze, and the iron ages of mankind. The evidence
-upon which this classification is based, has been so ably set forth
-in the works of Sir John Lubbock and others, that I need not refer
-to it further than to state that, in my treatment of the origin and
-development of the weapons of war, I shall in a great measure follow
-the same arrangement. But I shall endeavour to trace the development of
-_form_ rather than the _material_ of weapons, and to show by examples
-taken from various distinct periods, and especially by illustrations
-taken from existing savages, the various agencies which appear to have
-operated in causing progression during the earliest ages of mankind.
-
-Of these, the first to be considered is undoubtedly the utilization and
-imitation of natural forms. Nature was the only instructor of primaeval
-man.
-
-In my previous paper, I discussed this subject at some length, giving
-many examples in which the weapons of animals have been employed by
-man. But besides these weapons derived from animals, primaeval man must
-no doubt at first have employed the natural forms of wood and bone,
-and of stones either fractured by the frost, or rolled into convenient
-forms upon the seashore.
-
-This principle of the utilization and imitation of natural forms
-appears to bear precisely the same relationship to the development of
-the arts, that, in the science of language, onomatopoeia has been shown
-to bear to the growth and development of articulate speech. In the
-attempt to trace language to its origin, onomatopoeia, or the imitation
-of the sounds of animals and of nature, appears not only to have been
-the chief agent in _initiating_ the growth of language, but it has also
-served to enrich it from time to time, so that even to this day, poetry
-and eloquence in a great measure depend on the employment of it. But
-apart from this, language has had an independent and systematic growth
-of its own.
-
-So, in like manner, men not only drew upon nature for their ideas
-in the infancy of the arts, but we continue to copy the forms and
-contrivances of nature with advantage to this day. But apart from
-this, we must look for an independent origin and growth, in which form
-succeeded form in regular continuity. Many a lesson has still to be
-learnt from the book of nature, the pages of which are sealed to us
-until, by the natural growth of knowledge, we acquire the power of
-reading and applying them. Imitation therefore, though an important
-element in the initiation of the arts, would not alone be sufficient to
-account for the phenomenon of progress.
-
-The next principle which we shall have to consider, is that of
-variation. Amongst all the products of the most primitive races of man,
-we find endless variations in the forms of their implements, all of
-the most trivial character. A Sheffield manufacturer informed me, that
-he had lately received a wooden model of a dagger-blade from Mogadore,
-made by an Arab, who desired to have one of steel made exactly like
-it. Accordingly my informant, thinking that he had found a convenient
-market for the sale of such weapons, constructed some hundreds of
-blades of exactly the same pattern. On arriving at their destination,
-however, they were found to be unsaleable. Although precisely of the
-type in general use about Mogadore, all of which to the European eye
-would be considered alike, their uniformity rendered them unsuited
-to the requirements of the inhabitants, each of whom piqued himself
-upon possessing his own particular pattern, the peculiarity of which
-consisted in having some almost imperceptible difference in the curve
-or breadth of the blade.
-
-In the earliest stages of art, men would of necessity be led to the
-adoption of such varieties by the constantly differing forms of the
-materials in which they worked. The uncertain fractures of flint, the
-various curves of the trees out of which they constructed their clubs,
-and the different forms of bones, would lead them imperceptibly towards
-the adoption of fresh tools. Occasionally some form would be hit upon,
-which in the hands of its employer would be found more convenient for
-use, and which, by giving the possessor of it some advantage over
-his neighbours, would commend itself to general adoption. Thus by a
-process, resembling what Mr. Darwin, in his late work, has termed
-'unconscious selection', rather than by premeditation or design,
-men would be led on to improvement. By degrees some forms would be
-found best adapted to one pursuit, and some to another; one would
-be used for grubbing up roots, another for breaking shells, another
-for breaking heads; modes of procedure, accidentally hit upon in one
-class of occupation, would suggest improvements in another, and thus
-analogy, coming to the aid of accidental variation, would give an
-impulse to progress. Thus would commence that ramification of the
-arts, occupations, and sciences which, developing simultaneously and
-assisting each other, has borne fruit in the civilization of our own
-times.
-
-I am aware that it will be found extremely difficult to realize a
-condition of human existence so low as that which I am supposing,
-and that many persons will deny the possibility of mankind having
-ever existed in a condition so helpless as to have been incapable of
-designing the simple weapons which we find in the hands of savages
-at the present day. It is as difficult to place one's self in the
-position of a being infinitely one's inferior, as of a being greatly
-one's superior in intellect. 'Few persons,' says Professor Max Müller,
-'understand children, still fewer antiquity.' Our own experience cannot
-save us in estimating the powers of either, for, long before the
-period of which we have the earliest recollection, we had ourselves
-undergone a course of unconscious education in the arts of a civilized
-community; our very first utterances were in a language which was in
-itself the complex growth of ages, and the improvement of our natural
-faculties, resulting from the continued cultivation of our race,
-enhances the difficulty we find in appreciating the condition of our
-first parents.
-
-Another fertile source of variation arises from errors in successive
-copies. At a time when men had no measures or other appliances to
-assist them in copying correctly, and were guided only by the eye, an
-implement would soon be made to assume a very different appearance. Mr.
-Evans has shown in his work on the 'Coins of the Ancient Britons' (p.
-167) how the head of Medusa, copied originally from a Greek coin, was
-made to pass through a series of apparently meaningless hieroglyphics,
-in which the original head was quite lost, and was ultimately converted
-into a chariot and four. We must not, however, attribute all variation
-to this cause, for I quite agree with a remark made by Mr. Rawlinson in
-his 'Five Great Monarchies', that such varieties are more frequently
-noticed in cases where the contrivance is of home growth, than in those
-which are derived from strangers.
-
-The third point which we shall have to consider in relation to
-continuity, is the retarding element. Under this head, incapacity must
-at all times, and especially in the infancy of society, have played the
-chief part. But as civilization progressed, other agencies would come
-in to influence the same result; prejudice, force of habit, principles
-of conservatism in which we have been told by Mr. Mill that all the
-dull intellects of the world habitually ensconce themselves, a thousand
-interests of a retarding tendency, rise up at the same time as those
-having a progressive influence, and prevent our advancing by other than
-well-measured paces.
-
-The resultant of these contending forces is continuity. If we could but
-put together the missing links; if we could revive contrivances that
-have died at their birth, and expose piracies; if we could penetrate
-the haze that is so often thrown over continuity by great names,
-absorbing to themselves the credit of contrivances that belong to
-others, and thereby causing it to appear that progress has advanced
-with great strides, where creeping was in reality the order of the day;
-we should find that there is not a single work of man's hand which has
-not its history of slow and continuous development, capable of being
-traced back, like branches of a tree, to its junction with others,
-and so on until the roots of all are found to lie in the simplest
-contrivances of primaeval man.
-
-But we must not expect that we shall be able, in the existing state of
-knowledge, to trace this continuity from first to last, for the links
-that are lost far exceed in number those which remain. The task may
-be compared to that of putting together the fragments of a tree that
-has been cut up for firewood, and of which the greater part has been
-burnt. It is only here and there, after diligent search, that we may
-expect to find a few pieces fitting in such a manner as to prove that
-they belonged to the same branch. We do not, on that account, abandon
-our conviction that the tree once grew, that every large branch was
-once a small twig, and that every limb developed by a natural process
-into the form in which we find it. The difficulty we have to contend
-with is precisely that which the geologist experiences in tracing his
-palaeontological sequence. But it is far greater, for natural history
-has been long studied, and the materials upon which Mr. Darwin founds
-his celebrated hypothesis have been in process of collection for many
-generations. But continuity, in relation to the arts, can scarcely
-yet be said to be established as a science. The materials for the
-science have not yet been even classified, and classification is a
-process which must always precede continuity in the study of nature.
-Classification defines the margin of our ignorance; continuity results
-from the extension of knowledge, by bridging over the distinction
-of classes. Travellers, for the most part, have been in the habit
-of bringing home, as curiosities, the most remarkable specimens of
-weapons and implements, without much regard to their history or the
-evidence they convey; and their descriptions of them, as a general
-rule, have been extremely meagre. Until quite recently, the curators
-of our ethnographical museums have aimed more at the collection of
-unique specimens, serving to exhibit well-marked differences of form,
-than such as by their resemblance enable us to trace out community
-of origin. The arrangement of them has been almost universally bad,
-and has been calculated rather to display the several articles to
-advantage, on the principle of shop windows, than to facilitate the
-deductions of science. The antiquities of savage races, moreover, have
-as yet been almost wholly unstudied.
-
-Notwithstanding these difficulties, we are able to catch glimpses of
-evidence, here and there, which, when put together systematically, and
-when the vestiges of antiquity are illustrated by the implements of
-existing savages, will, I trust, be found sufficient to warrant the
-principles for which I contend.
-
-
-_Combination of Tool and Weapon._
-
-In the earliest ages of mankind, when all men were warriors, and before
-the division of labour, consequent on civilization, had separated
-the arts of peace and war into distinct professions, we must expect
-to find the same implement frequently employed in the capacity of
-both tool and weapon. Even long after the very earliest ages of which
-we have any historical or archaeological record, we often find a
-combination of tool and weapon in the same forms, especially amongst
-those semi-civilized and savage races of our own times, whom we regard
-as the representatives of antiquity. The battles of liberty, from the
-age of the Jews and Philistines down to the time of the last Hungarian
-revolution, have always been fought by the subject people with weapons
-made out of the implements of husbandry. We read in the first of
-Samuel, chapter xiii, 'Now there was no smith found in all the land of
-Israel: for the Philistines said, Lest the Hebrews make them swords
-or spears: but all the Israelites went down to the Philistines, to
-sharpen every man his share' (the blade of the ploughshare), 'and his
-coulter' (a kind of knife), 'and his ax, and his mattock' (a kind of
-pickaxe).... 'So it came to pass, in the day of battle, that there was
-neither sword nor spear found in the hand of any of the people that
-were with Saul and Jonathan.' In the revolts of the German peasantry,
-in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the bands of insurgents armed
-themselves with threshing flails and scythe blades. In 1794 and 1831,
-the Polish peasantry were similarly armed[127]; and it was from such
-implements of husbandry that weapons like the military flail, the
-bill, and the yataghan, derived their origin. In the recent outbreak
-in Jamaica (which, had it not been ably and powerfully put down, would
-have led to the destruction of the whole white population) the negroes
-armed themselves with weapons of husbandry. In the proclamation of Paul
-Bogle, he says: 'Every one of you must leave your house, take your
-guns; who don't have guns, take cutlasses.' The cutlasses here referred
-to were the implements used for cutting the sugar-cane, sharp on the
-concave edge, and are the same which, having been used as weapons by
-the negroes in their own country, have continued to be employed by them
-ever since. In like manner, we learn from Symes's 'Embassy to Ava in
-1795',[128] that the Burmese use the sabre both for warlike purposes,
-as well as for cutting bamboos, felling timber, &c.; it is the constant
-companion of the inhabitants for all purposes, and they never travel
-without it. In Borneo, the peculiar sword-like weapon, called the
-'parangilang', is used both as a weapon, and also for felling trees,
-and the axe of this country is constructed so that, by turning it on
-the helve, it can be used either as a weapon or as a carpenter's axe.
-In like manner, the Kaffir axe-blade, by simply altering its position
-in the handle, is used either as a weapon, or for tilling the ground.
-The North American Indian tomahawk, like the Kaffir axe, is used for
-many different purposes; the spear-head of the Kaffir assegai is the
-knife that is used for all purposes of manufacture, and Captain Grant
-says that the Watusi of East Central Africa make all their baskets with
-their spear-heads.[129] The weapons edged with sharks' teeth, to which
-I referred in my former paper, are used in the Marquesas and other of
-the South Sea Islands, as much for cutting up fish and carcasses as for
-warlike purposes.[130] Dr. Klemm, in his valuable work on savage and
-early weapons, describes the wooden pick used by the inhabitants of
-New Caledonia both as a weapon, and also for tilling the ground,[131]
-and he gives reasons for supposing[132] that in Egypt and many other
-parts of the world, the form of the plough was originally derived
-from that of the hatchet or hoe, used for tilling purposes. The hoe
-used in East Central Africa, which also, like the Kaffir axe, serves
-as a medium of exchange in lieu of money, evidently derived its form
-from that of a spear or arrow head. The spade, formerly used in this
-country, and represented in old pictures, which is still used as a
-shovel in Ireland, is a pointed spear-like instrument, and the 'loy'
-or spade still used in all parts of Ireland is hafted exactly in the
-same manner as the bronze celt of prehistoric times. Dr. Klemm (l. c.,
-p. 119) gives an illustration of an axe used by the Norwegian peasants
-both as a tool and weapon. Speke describes the Usoga tribe[133] as
-being armed with huge short-handed spears, adapted rather for digging
-than for war; and Barth describes the Bornouese troops in Central
-Africa digging holes with their spears, and employing them in searching
-for water.[134] The Australian 'dowak', a kind of club with a flint
-attached, combines the purposes of a tool and weapon. We know from the
-short sticks upon which the small arrow-heads of quartz found in the
-Peruvian tombs are mounted, that they must have been used as knives as
-well as for missile purposes. Professor Nilsson says that flint-barbed
-arrow-heads, of precisely the same form, are used by the inhabitants
-of Tierra del Fuego as knives,[135] and Mr. Stephens, in his travels
-in Central America, shows reason for supposing that the large stone
-idols in Copan were carved with similar arrow-points,[136] no other
-instrument capable of being used for such a purpose having been found
-in the neighbourhood.
-
-Examples of this class of evidence might be multiplied _ad infinitum_;
-but enough has already been said to afford good grounds for believing
-that many of the implements of stone and bronze which are found in the
-soil, may have been used for a great variety of purposes, and that,
-especially in the earliest stages of culture, we must be careful how we
-attribute especial purposes to tools and weapons because they appear
-to differ from each other slightly in form. This is more especially so
-when, as is almost invariably the case, the several distinct types are
-found--when a sufficient number of them are collected and arranged--to
-pass almost imperceptibly into each other by connecting links; showing
-that the differences observable between any two implements of the same
-class, when brought together and contrasted, are rather due to the
-operation of a law of variation and development in the fabrication of
-the tool itself, than to an intention on the part of the constructor
-to adapt it to particular purposes, and that its application to
-such especial purposes must have followed, rather than itself have
-influenced, the development of the tool.
-
-
-_Transition from the Drift to the Celt Type._
-
-My first illustration must of necessity be taken from the flint
-implements of the drift, the earliest records of human workmanship that
-the researches of science have as yet revealed to us. These, to use the
-words of Sir Charles Lyell, 'were probably used as weapons both of war
-and the chase, to grub roots, cut down trees, or scoop out canoes.'[137]
-
-I will not attempt during the brief time allotted to me on the present
-occasion, any detailed account of the evidence of the antiquity of
-these weapons, assuming that the works of Sir Charles Lyell, and Sir
-John Lubbock, will have rendered this subject more or less familiar to
-most persons at the present day, but I will confine myself to pointing
-out the indications of variation and of improvement observable in the
-implements themselves.
-
-I have arranged upon diagram No. 1 (Plate XII) a series of specimens of
-the same type from nearly every part of the globe.
-
-All the figures given in these diagrams are traced from the implements
-themselves, and reduced by photography; they may therefore be regarded
-as facsimiles, a point of great importance when our subject has to
-deal with the minute gradations of difference observable between them.
-Figures 1 to 11 are of the drift type. Casts of the originals of some
-of them, and specimens of the implements themselves, are also upon the
-table for comparison.
-
-I may here acknowledge the great obligation I am under to Mr. Franks
-for the facilities he has afforded me in drawing many of these
-specimens in the Christy Collection; to Dr. Watson for a similar
-permission in regard to the valuable collection of arms in the India
-Museum; and also to Dr. Birch of the British Museum. A large proportion
-of my illustrations are taken from the excellent Museum of this
-Institution, and others are from my own collection.
-
-Of the drift specimens which I have selected to illustrate the
-diagrams, five are from the gravel beds of St. Acheul, in order that
-we might have an opportunity of observing the variation in implements
-derived from the same locality, and probably belonging to the same or
-nearly the same period--chips in fact from the same workshop.
-
-It has been usual to classify these drift implements in two divisions;
-the spear-head form, and the oval form. Of the first or spear-head
-form, figures 2 to 4 are typical examples; of the oval form, figure
-8 is the best illustration. I venture, however, to think that a
-distinction more clearly embodying a principle of progress may be made
-by dividing them differently, and by placing in the first class those
-which are either left rough or rounded at one end and pointed at the
-other, of which figures 1 to 7 are examples; and in the second class,
-such as are chipped to an edge all round, of which figures 8 to 11 are
-types. My reason for preferring this classification to one dependent
-on outline is this. The first class having the natural outside coating
-of the flint or a roughly rounded surface on one side, appears to be
-in every way adapted to be held in the hand; whereas the second class,
-of which a beautiful specimen in the Christy Collection from St.
-Acheul is represented in a front and side view in figure 10, could not
-conveniently be used in the hand as a tool or weapon, without injury to
-the hand from the sharp edge with which its periphery is surrounded on
-all sides. If, therefore, we see reason for supposing that one class of
-implements was employed in handles, whilst the other may have been used
-in the hand, I think this constitutes a more important distinction,
-and one more obviously implying progress, than a classification which
-merely involves a modification of outline, which may have resulted from
-no more significant cause than a difference in the form of the flint
-nodule out of which the implement was made.[138]
-
-Another important distinction between these drift implements as thus
-arranged, arises from the different purposes to which they may have
-been put by the fabricators. The first class, figures 1 to 7--it
-will be seen by the side view of them--could have been used only as
-spears, picks, or daggers, the pointed or small end being employed for
-that purpose, whereas the latter class, figures 8 to 11, are equally
-available for use as axes with the sharp and broad end. It is quite
-possible therefore, that we may see here, in these vestiges of the
-first tools of mankind (specimens of all varieties of which are found
-in the same beds at St. Acheul), the point of divergence between the
-two distinct classes, which must certainly be regarded as the two most
-constant and universal weapons of mankind in all ages and countries of
-the world, viz. the spear and the axe; the small end developed into the
-spear and into all that class of tools for which a point is required;
-and from the broad end we obtained the axe and all those tools which
-either as chisels, choppers, gouges, or battle-axes, have continued in
-use with an endless continuity of development and modification, and
-a world-wide history up to the present time. I am aware that in the
-St. Acheul implements, as well as in those of similar form from the
-laterite beds of Madras, we find occasionally specimens in which the
-small end is made broader, as if indicating the gradual development
-of an edge on that side, but upon the whole I think the balance of
-evidence is in favour of the broad end having originated the axe form.
-
-Nothing, it will be seen, can be more primitive than these tools, or
-more gradual than their development. They are perfectly consistent
-with the idea that the fabricators of them were in a condition closely
-verging upon that of the brutes. Apes are known to use stones in
-cracking the shells of nuts. The advantage to be derived from a pointed
-form, when it accidentally fell into the hand, would suggest itself
-almost instinctively to any being capable of profiting by experience
-and retaining it in the memory. Accidental fractures, producing a sharp
-edge, would lead to fractures of design, and thus we may easily suppose
-that such implements as are represented in the first few figures of
-our diagram must necessarily have resulted from the very earliest
-constructive efforts of primaeval man.
-
-From the very first, a peculiar mode of fabrication appears to have
-been adopted, which consisted of chipping off flakes from alternate
-sides of the flint, and the facets thus left upon the flint produce
-the wavelike edge which you will see in the side views of all the
-implements here represented. This method continued to be employed
-throughout the entire stone age, in all parts of the universe, and is
-characteristic not merely of the drift, but of the cave, pfahlbauten,
-and surface periods.
-
-The numerous intermediate gradations of form, whether between the
-oval and the spear-head form, or between the thick and the sharpened
-form, have been noticed by Sir Charles Lyell (l. c., p. 164). By
-selecting specimens, and arranging them in order from left to right,
-I have endeavoured to trace the transition from the drift type to the
-almond-shaped celt type, which latter is common to the stone age of
-mankind, whether ancient or modern, in all parts of the world.
-
-Had the discovery of drift implements been confined to one locality
-or to one district, it is probable it would have attracted but little
-notice. As early as the first year of the present century the attention
-of the Society of Antiquaries had been drawn by Mr. Frere to the
-existence of these implements, in conjunction with the remains of the
-elephant and other extinct animals at Hoxne in Suffolk. An illustration
-of the specimens from this locality is given in figure 4. Mr. Frere
-described them as 'evidently weapons of war, fabricated and used by a
-people who had not the use of metals'. But little or no attention was
-paid to the subject until the discovery by M. Boucher de Perthes of
-precisely similar implements associated with the same class of remains,
-in the drift gravel of St. Acheul, near Amiens, in 1858.[139] Since
-then many other discoveries have been made, and still continue to be
-made, by Mr. Prestwich, Mr. Evans, Mr. Flower, Mr. Bruce Foote, and
-others, not only in this country but also in Asia and Africa, showing,
-in so far as the discoveries have hitherto gone, that this drift type,
-like the almond celt type, is common to the earliest ages in all
-parts of the world, and that everywhere the drift type preceded the
-almond-shaped celt type, and is found in beds of earlier formation.
-
-Figure 5 is a drift-shaped implement from the laterite beds of Madras,
-of exactly the same form as those found in England. Figure 6 is an
-implement of the same class from the Cape of Good Hope, found fourteen
-feet from the surface. In America, implements of the drift type have
-not yet been discovered, but stone spear-heads have been found in
-Missouri in connexion with the elephant and other extinct animals.
-Figure 11 is from a mound of sun-dried bricks at Abou Sharein, in
-Southern Babylonia, obtained by Mr. J. E. Taylor, British Consul at
-Basrah; it is a chipped flint; in form it is of the drift type, and
-its outline is precisely that of some of the Carib celts found in the
-West India Islands; it also closely resembles in form others from the
-Pacific[140]; its edge was evidently at the broad end. Another of
-the same type was found at Mugeyer in Babylonia, and a third closely
-resembling the two former was found in a cave in Bethlehem.
-
-The celt type has not as yet been found in the French caves of the
-reindeer period, but it is common in the 'pile dwellings' of the Swiss
-lakes. Some of the French cave specimens, however, closely approach
-the drift form, and in place of the celt, we have a peculiar kind of
-tool trimmed to a cutting edge on one side and having the other round
-for holding in the hand. As, however, these do not fall into the
-direct line of development, but may be regarded as a branch variety, I
-have not figured them in my diagram, but pass at once, though almost
-imperceptibly as regards form, from the drift to the surface type.
-
-Figure 12 formed part of a large find of flint implements, discovered
-by myself in the ancient British camp of Cissbury, near Worthing--an
-account of this discovery was communicated by me to the Society of
-Antiquaries at the commencement of the present year.[141] The period of
-these Cissbury implements must be fixed at a very much more modern date
-than those of the drift, with which they are associated in my diagram,
-having been found in conjunction with the earliest traces of domestic
-animals, such as the Bos longifrons, Capra hircus, and Sus; they may,
-however, be classed with the stone age, no trace of metal having been
-discovered with them, although from 500 to 600 flint implements were
-found in the camp. The peculiarity of the Cissbury find, however,
-consists in the discovery (in the same pits in which celts of the
-type represented in figure 12 were found) of a few flints closely
-approaching the drift type, being thick at the broad end, and also of
-a large number resembling those found in the French caves, trimmed
-to an edge on one side, and adapted to be held in the hand. So that
-the Cissbury find, although belonging to what is usually called the
-surface period, contains specimens affording every link of connexion
-between the drift and the almond-shaped celt type. This discovery must,
-I think, be regarded as a step in knowledge of prehistoric antiquity,
-and a decided accession to the science of continuity, for Sir John
-Lubbock has told us in his preface to the work of Professor Nilsson,
-lately published[142], that the Palaeolithic, i. e. the drift types,
-'have never yet been met with in association with the characteristics
-of a later epoch.' I shall therefore be interested to know whether,
-after an examination of the Cissbury specimens, which I have presented
-to the Christy Collection, Sir John Lubbock may be induced to alter
-his opinion on that point; for I think it is entirely consistent with
-all that is known of early races of mankind, that early types should
-be retained in use long after the introduction of others that have
-been developed from them. However this may be, I think that in casting
-the eye from left to right along the upper row of diagram No. 1 (Plate
-XII), it will puzzle the acutest observer to determine where the drift
-type ends, and that of the celt begins. If it is contended, as I am
-aware it will be contended by some, that the typical characteristic
-of the celt consists in its being sharp at the broad end, while those
-of the drift are blunt at the broad end, I reply that many of the
-drift specimens are also sharpened at the broad end, more especially
-those represented in figures 9 and 10 from the drift of St. Acheul.
-Many specimens from Thetford which I have seen, as, for example, Fig.
-17 _b_, from a cast in the collection of the Society of Antiquaries,
-presented by Mr. Flower, approach equally closely to the celt type,
-as do some of those from the laterite beds of Madras, and though they
-are of rare occurrence in all these localities, and are certainly a
-variation from the normal type of drift implements, still they are
-found in sufficient numbers to serve as links in connecting the forms
-of the earliest, with those of the later period.
-
-I have dealt somewhat at length upon this part of my subject, owing
-to the circumstance of its presenting some features of novelty in
-the study of flint implements, and being therefore open to criticism
-on the part of those who are more favourable to the principles of
-classification than of continuity, with all the important concomitants,
-of division _versus_ unity, which those principles involve.
-
-I may now pass briefly over the remaining figures in the diagram.
-Figure 13 is a specimen found by Mr. Evans at Spienne, near Mons; its
-very close resemblance to figure 12 from Cissbury will be noticed; in
-fact the whole of the Spienne specimens resemble very closely those
-discovered in Cissbury, except that the Spienne implements of this
-class are associated with others of polished flint, which gives them
-a more advanced character than those derived from Cissbury, in which
-place only one fragment of a polished implement was discovered, and
-that in a part of the intrenchment which renders it very doubtful
-whether it ought to be associated with the Cissbury find. Figures
-15, 16, and 17 are from Denmark, Ireland, and Yorkshire;--this type,
-however, is rare in Denmark, most of the flint implements from that
-country being of a more advanced character, and having usually a
-rectangular cross-section.
-
-The lower row of the diagram consists of specimens derived, either from
-what has been termed the neolithic or polished stone age of Europe, or
-from savages who are still in a corresponding stage of progression in
-various parts of the world at the present time.
-
-To the former or neolithic stone age of Europe belong figure 21 from
-France, figure 25 from the bed of the Clyde in Scotland, figure 27 from
-the Swiss lake-dwellings, figure 29 from the caves in Gibraltar, figure
-30 from Sweden, figure 36 from Portugal, figure 37 from the bed of the
-Thames, figure 38 from Ireland, figure 39 from Jelabonga, in Russia.
-Precisely identical forms are also found in Germany, Italy, and the
-Channel Isles. Amongst the specimens derived from the ancient stone age
-of other parts of the world, and belonging to an age of civilization
-that is now extinct, may be enumerated figure 22 from Peru, figure 40
-from Mexico, figure 24 from Central India, figure 41 from Japan, figure
-42 from Mugeyer, in Babylonia. Nearly similar ones, but flattened at
-the side, like those common in Denmark, have been obtained from China
-and Pegu. Figure 43 is from Algeria, from the collection of Mr. Flower.
-
-The following are examples of the same class of implements, used by
-savages of our own, or of comparatively modern times:--Figures 18 and
-19 from Australia; these are generally used in a handle, formed by a
-withe twisted round them in the manner still used by blacksmiths in
-this country. Sometimes, however, I am informed by an eye-witness, the
-Australians use these celts in the hand without any handle at all.
-Although polished on the surface, these Australian celts have been
-compared by Sir Charles Lyell (l. c., p. 79) to the oval forms of the
-drift represented in figure 7. The art of polishing appears to have
-preceded the development of form in this country. Figure 20, from New
-Zealand, is a specimen in Mr. Evans's collection, of which he has been
-so kind as to allow me to take an outline; this form, however, is
-extremely rare in New Zealand, the usual shape of the stone celts from
-that country being flat-sided, like the specimens from Denmark, already
-noticed. Figure 23 is from the Pacific; figure 26, from Pennsylvania;
-these were used by the American Indians, previously, and for some time
-after the immigration of Europeans. Figures 31 and 32 are Carib celts
-from my collection, beautifully polished. Figure 33, from St. Domingo,
-is in the Cork Museum. Figure 34, from the Antilles, is in the Christy
-Collection; both of these have a human face engraved upon them. Figure
-35 is of jade, from New Caledonia, in my own collection.
-
-
-_Hafting._
-
-The method of hafting these implements, employed by savages, shows that
-they were used for a variety of purposes; in some, the edge is fastened
-at right angles to the handle, to be used as an adze, whilst in others
-the same tool is fastened with the blade in a line with the handle,
-to be used as a chopper or battle-axe. In some it is fastened with a
-withe, passed round the stone, as in the specimen from Australia (fig.
-44, from this Institution) and some parts of North America; figure 45
-is a stone axe from the Ojibbeway Indians, from my collection. At
-other times it is inserted in the side of a stick or club. A specimen
-in my collection from Ireland (fig. 46), one of the few that have ever
-been found with handles, shows that this was the method employed in
-that country.[143] Others are inserted in the end of a bent stick (fig.
-47), a mode of hafting common in the Polynesian Islands, in Africa,
-Ancient Egypt, Mexico, North America, and New Caledonia; it is employed
-by the Kalmucks and others, and was used during the bronze age. Some
-of the Australian axes were fastened to their handles by a peculiar
-preparation of gum manufactured for that purpose.
-
-Dr. Klemm, in his 'Werkzeuge und Waffen', supposes the first lessons
-in hafting to have been derived from nature, by observing the manner
-in which stones are often firmly grasped by the roots of trees growing
-round them, and he gives several woodcuts of specimens of Nature's
-hafting, which he has collected from various sources; one of these,
-extracted from his work (l. c., p. 14), is represented in figure 48.
-I have placed upon the table, in illustration of this idea, an iron
-mediaeval axe-head (fig. 49), which has furnished itself with a handle
-in this manner, whilst buried beneath the surface; it is said to have
-been found in Glemham Park, Suffolk, eleven feet from the surface. Even
-to this day, when a peasant in Brittany discovers one of these stone
-celts upon the ground, he is in the habit of splitting the branch of a
-young tree and inserting the celt into the cleft; in the course of a
-year or two it becomes firmly fixed, and he then cuts off the branch,
-and uses the implement thus hafted by nature as a hammer for driving
-nails. In the 'Antiquités Celtiques et Antédiluviennes,' vol. i (Paris,
-1847), p. 327, M. Boucher de Perthes mentions the discovery of two
-ancient stone hammer-heads, which appeared to have been furnished with
-handles by passing the hole over the bough of a tree and allowing it to
-fill up the aperture by its natural growth, until it became fixed as a
-handle.[144]
-
-It might be interesting, if space permitted, to follow up the
-development of the stone axe-head through its various phases until,
-in the latest stages, when bronze had already come into general use
-for weapons, we find it furnished with a hole through the middle
-for the insertion of the handle. It may, I think, be safely said
-that--although nature furnishes numerous examples, in many classes of
-rocks, and especially in flints, of stones perforated with holes, and
-although they appear to have attracted the notice of the aborigines of
-many countries by the peculiar superstitious reverence which is often
-found to be attached to such stones when found in the soil--this mode
-of fastening stone implements in their handles did not come into use
-until late in the stone age, and that even in the bronze age it was but
-little employed.
-
-
-_Transition from Oval to Rectangular Forms._
-
-Whether the stone celts having a square or rectangular section (such
-as are found principally in Denmark, New Zealand, Mexico, and Pegu),
-were coeval, or of subsequent development, to those of the almond-shape
-type, may be a matter for conjecture; the small flint hatchets found
-in the Kitchenmiddens of Denmark appear to approach closely to the
-rectangular type. It is certain, that in the Swiss Lakes both forms
-are found fully developed, and it may be mentioned, as an instance of
-the constant tendency to variation that is everywhere observable in
-the weapons of the early races of mankind, that of the whole of the
-celts found at Nussdorf, in the Lake of Constance, though all might be
-traced to the same normal type as regards their general outline, no two
-were alike; and Dr. Keller gives sections, showing every conceivable
-gradation from the square and rectangular to the oval and circular
-section[145]. It may, however, be affirmed, that convex forms, as a
-general rule, preceded those having a rectangular or concave surface;
-it is so in the forms of nature; the habitations of animals are
-almost invariably convex. Dr. Livingstone mentions[146] that he found
-it impossible even to teach the natives of South Africa to build a
-square hut; when left to themselves for a few minutes, they invariably
-reverted to the circle. All the earliest habitations of prehistoric
-times are found to be circular or oval; even the sophisticated infant
-of modern civilization, when he plays with his bricks, will invariably
-build them in a circular form, until otherwise instructed.
-
-
-_Development of Spear and Arrow-head Forms._
-
-We must now turn to the development of the second great class of
-weapons--the spear and arrow. These may be classed together, the
-arrow being merely the diminutive of the spear; and it may be taken
-as a general rule, applicable to all the arts of prehistoric times,
-that when a given form has once been introduced, it will speedily be
-repeated in every possible size that can be applied to any of the
-various purposes for which such a form is capable of being used. Size,
-in the arts of the earliest ages, is no indication of progress. In the
-same way it may be said of the development of the animal or vegetable
-kingdom, size is no indication of improved organism.
-
-In the same beds in which the drift-type implements are found, flakes,
-either struck off in the formation of such tools, or especially
-flaked off from a core in a particular manner, indicating that they
-were themselves intended for use as tools, are found in considerable
-numbers. No more useful tool could have been used during the stone age
-than the plain, untouched flint flake, which, from the sharpness of
-the edge, is capable of being used for a variety of purposes. Those,
-for example, formed of obsidian are so sharp that it is recorded,
-by the Spanish historians, that the Mexicans were in the habit of
-shaving themselves with such flakes. As my present subject has to
-deal exclusively with war weapons, I will not enter into a detailed
-description of these flakes, further than to observe that they are
-found, together with the cores from which they were struck off, in
-every quarter of the globe in which flint, obsidian, or any other
-suitable material has been found, and that everywhere the process of
-flaking appears to have been the same.
-
-Now, the fracture of flint is very uncertain; by constant habit,
-the ancient flint-workers appear to have been able to command the
-fracture of the flint in a manner that cannot be imitated, even by
-the most skilful forgers of those implements in modern times; but,
-notwithstanding this, the varieties of the forms of the flakes thus
-struck off must have been very considerable, and these varieties must,
-from the very first, have suggested some of the different forms of
-tools that were made out of them.
-
-I cannot, perhaps, explain this point better than by exhibiting a
-number of flakes, found by myself in the bed of the Bann at Toom, in
-Ireland, at the spot where that river flows out of Lough Neagh. This
-was a place originally discovered by Mr. Evans, where probably, in
-a habitation built upon the river, they formerly manufactured flint
-implements; and the bed of the river for the space of a hundred yards
-or more is covered with the flakes. It will be seen on examining
-these flakes, that some of them came off in a broad leaf-shaped form,
-and these, with a very little additional chipping, have been formed
-into spear-heads. Others longer and thicker have been chipped into
-something like picks, and others thinner and narrower than the two
-former, have been used probably as knives; others for scraping skins.
-We see from this that certain forms would naturally suggest themselves
-through the natural fracture of the flint, and this may to a certain
-extent account, though it does not, I think, entirely account, for the
-remarkable resemblance of form and unity of development observable in
-the spear and arrow heads, derived from localities so remote from each
-other as almost to preclude the possibility of their having ever been
-derived from a common source.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XIII.
-
-_Diagram 2._
-
-DEVELOPMENT OF SPEAR & ARROW-HEAD FORMS.]
-
-I have arranged in tabular form, on diagram No. 2 (= Plate XIII),
-representations of spear and arrow heads from all the different
-localities from which I have been able to obtain them in sufficient
-number to show fairly the numerous varieties which each country
-produces. On the top of the diagram, from left to right, the several
-forms are arranged in the order that appears most truly to indicate
-progression; but it must not be supposed that this arrangement is
-absolutely correct, for the several forms, such for example as the
-tang and the triangular form, were most probably derived from a common
-centre. The specimens from each locality ought therefore, in order
-to display their progression properly, to be arranged in the form of
-a tree, branching from a common stem. On the left of the diagram are
-written the different periods and localities, from which the specimens
-are derived. Commencing with the drift--the oldest of which we have
-any knowledge--which is coeval with the elephant and rhinoceros in
-Europe, we have the peculiar thick form already described. The examples
-of the drift period here shown, from their small size, must evidently
-have been used with a shaft, as they are scarcely large enough to have
-served as hand tools. None of the lozenge, tang, or triangular forms,
-have ever been found in the drift.
-
-The next line represents specimens from the French caves of the
-reindeer period, which are taken from the _Reliquiae Aquitanicae_,
-chiefly from Dordogne.[147] It will be seen that in these caves the
-first rude indications of the lozenge and tang form are represented,
-but no perfect specimens of either class. No example of the triangular
-form has been discovered. The leaf-shape form, however, is well
-represented.
-
-In the ancient habitations of the Swiss Lakes, which belong to a later
-period, all varieties, except those of the drift type, are represented,
-but none of them in their most fully developed form; the tangs, it will
-be seen, are long, and the barbs comparatively short; the triangular
-form, which I consider to be the latest in the order of development, is
-mentioned by Dr. Keller, from whose work these specimens are taken, as
-being extremely rare. The comparative rarity of flint implements in the
-Lakes may, however, in some measure be accounted for, by the absence of
-flint in the district, necessitating the importation of this material
-from a distance.
-
-The specimens from Yorkshire, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark, Italy, and
-Germany, may be considered to carry the development of these forms up
-to the latest period, viz. the late stone, and early bronze age; for
-there can be no doubt from the number of arrow-heads found in these
-countries, in connexion with implements of bronze, that they were
-used for missile purposes long after the _armes blanches_ had been
-constructed of metal.
-
-In all these localities it will be seen that the various gradations of
-form are identical; but as I have been able to collect a much larger
-number of arrow-heads from Ireland than elsewhere, the development of
-form is more apparent in the specimens selected from that country.
-
-From the leaf-shape, it will be observed, there is every link of
-transition into the perfect lozenge type, and the latter is as a
-general rule, both in Ireland and in Yorkshire, much rarer, and more
-carefully constructed, than the leaf-shaped type, showing that there is
-every probability of the lozenge having been an improved form.
-
-The tang form is represented, at first, by a few rude chips on each
-side of the base of the original flake, narrowing that part in such a
-manner as to admit of its being inserted, into a handle or shaft, and
-bound round with a sinew. This is superseded by the gradual formation
-of barbs on each side, and these barbs are lengthened by degrees, until
-they reach to the line of the base of the tang; the tang subsequently
-shortens, leaving the barbs with a semicircular aperture between them,
-and thus approaching some of the forms represented in the triangular
-column. These latter barbed specimens are usually more finished, and
-chipped with greater care than the long-tanged ones, which are rougher,
-more time-worn, and probably of earlier date.
-
-The triangular form is seen at first, with a straight base; gradually
-a semicircular aperture appears, and this deepens by degrees until, in
-some of the more carefully formed specimens, it approaches the form
-of a Norman arch. This last variety is especially well represented in
-Denmark.
-
-Sir William Wilde's arrangement, in his _Catalogue of the Royal Irish
-Academy_,[148] differs in some respects from this; he considers the
-triangular an early form, and he assigns the final perfection of the
-art of fabricating flint spear-heads, to the large lozenge-shape form;
-grounding his opinion on the circumstance of many of this form, of the
-larger size, having been found polished, whilst those of the leaf,
-triangular, and tang shape are not usually carried further than the
-preliminary process of chipping. But it is evident that these larger
-forms may have been used for spears, the lozenge shape being especially
-adapted for this purpose, as enabling the owner of it to withdraw it
-from the wound, after slaying his adversary; while those of the barbed
-and triangular form being lighter, and calculated to stick in the
-wound, would be better adapted for arrow-heads: and it is unlikely
-that the same amount of labour would be expended on a weapon intended
-to be cast from a bow, as upon one designed to be held in the hand. I
-consider the polishing of these particular weapons therefore to be no
-criterion of age, but merely to indicate that they were used as _armes
-d'hast_, and not as missiles.
-
-It appears highly probable, however, that all the several varieties,
-if not developed simultaneously, were used at the same time; for we
-find amongst the Persians, the Esquimaux, and many other nations, that
-a great variety of arrow-heads are carried in the same quiver, and are
-used either indiscriminately or for different purposes[149].
-
-In the eighth row from the top, I have arranged a series of similar
-forms from America, obtained chiefly from Pennsylvania, but they
-are also found in other parts of the continent, and some few of the
-illustrations here given (Plate XIII, figs. 131, 132, and 133) are
-from Tierra del Fuego. Their forms enable them to be arranged under
-precisely the same divisions as those from the continent of Europe,
-and in each division the same development is observable. The tang or
-barbed form, however, differs sufficiently from the European forms of
-the same class to show that they arose independently, and were not
-derived from a common source. The tang of the American arrow-heads, it
-will be seen, is broader, at least in the later forms, and it appears
-to have originated in a notch on the sides of the blade, intended to
-hold the sinew with which it is attached to the shaft or handle. This
-notch appears to have been constructed lower and lower on the sides
-of the blade, until at last it comes down quite into the base of the
-flint, and it then closely resembles the European in form; compare, for
-example, figures 94 and 136; except that the tang is broader, and has a
-lateral projection on each side, so as to render it firmer in the shaft
-when bound by the sinew.
-
-Notches at the side of the blade are extremely rare in Ireland, but
-from Sweden Professor Nilsson gives a drawing of an arrow-head, which
-I have copied into my diagram (figure 96). It is precisely identical,
-in its peculiar form, to one here figured from America (figure 139),
-and they both have a concave base, in addition to the side notch; thus
-apparently representing a transition form between the tang and the
-triangular, which I have never noticed, except in the two specimens
-here referred to, and which must be regarded in Europe as extremely
-rare.
-
-To illustrate the mode of fixing these instruments in their shafts, I
-have here figured several examples from my collection; two of these
-(figures 163 and 164) were derived from the Esquimaux, between Icy Cape
-and Point Barrow, the person from whom I purchased them having brought
-them himself from that locality. Figures 165, 166, and 167, are from
-California.
-
-Burton says that the Indians between the Mississippi and the Pacific
-use the barbed form only for war[150]; and Schoolcraft, in the
-_Archives of the Aborigines of America_,[151] gives illustrations of
-two methods of fastening, one for war and the other for the chase, the
-former being loosely tied on, so as to come off when inserted in the
-wound.
-
-But, in addition to their use as arrow-points, we have reason to
-suppose that they were used also as knives. I have represented in
-the diagram (figures 168 and 169) two short-handled instruments
-from Peru, which are now in the British Museum, into which similar
-arrow-points are inserted. These, from the shortness and peculiar
-shape of their shafts, could hardly have been used as darts. The only
-weapon peculiar to those regions from which such an instrument could
-have been projected, is the blow-pipe, and they are entirely different
-from the darts used with the blow-pipe either in South America, the
-Malay Peninsula, or Ceylon, in which countries the blow-pipe is used.
-There is reason to believe, from the manner in which they are placed in
-the graves, unaccompanied by any bow or other weapon from which they
-could have been projected[152], that they were employed as knives, and
-this is confirmed by the fact, already mentioned, of the inhabitants
-of Tierra del Fuego using their arrow-points for knives. The great
-numbers in which they are found in Ireland, in Yorkshire, and other
-localities appertaining to the late stone age, in which places they
-form the greater part of the relics collected, and are always the most
-highly finished implements discovered--the other stone implements
-associated with them being either celts, flint-discs, picks, or rough
-or partially worked flakes, that are capable of being wrought into
-arrows--the fact that the peculiar modification of form observable at
-the base of these implements appears to have been designed rather to
-facilitate the attachment of them to their wooden shafts or handles,
-than for the special purposes of war; and the frequent marks of use, as
-if by rubbing, that are found on the points of many of them, especially
-in the specimens from Ireland; all these circumstances favour the
-supposition that in Europe, as well as in America, these arrow-head
-forms were used for many other purposes besides war and the chase; and
-that, like the assegai of the Kaffir, and the many other examples of
-tool-weapons already enumerated, we may regard them as having served to
-our primaeval ancestors the general purposes of a small tool available
-for carving, cutting, and for all those works for which a fine edge and
-point was required. On the other hand the celt undoubtedly provided
-them with a large tool capable of being applied to all the rougher
-purposes, whether peaceful or warlike, for which it was adapted in the
-simple arts of an uncivilized people.
-
-In the ninth row I have arranged, under their respective classes, the
-whole of the specimens of flint arrow-heads that are given in Siebold's
-atlas of Japanese weapons.[153] It will be seen that they present the
-same variety of form as those already described. A similar collection
-of flint arrow-heads has lately been added to the British Museum by Mr.
-Franks, and described by him. They formed part of a Japanese collection
-of curiosities, and are labelled in the Japanese character, showing
-that this remote country not only passed through the same stone period
-as ourselves, but that, as their culture improved and expanded, they,
-like ourselves, have at last begun to make collections of objects to
-illustrate the arts of remote antiquity.
-
-
-_Implements composed of Perishable Materials._
-
-It is now time that I should say a few words respecting weapons
-constructed of more perishable materials; for it is not to be assumed
-that, because we find nothing in the drift-gravels but weapons of
-flint and stone, the aborigines of that age did not also employ wood
-and other materials capable of being more easily worked. If man was
-at that time, as he is now, a beast of prey, he must also have become
-familiar, in the very first stages of his existence, with the uses of
-bone as a material for fabricating into weapons. In the French caves, a
-large number of bone implements have been found, and their resemblance,
-amounting almost to identity, with those found in Sweden, amongst the
-Esquimaux, and the inhabitants of Tierra del Fuego, has been noticed by
-Sir John Lubbock, Professor Nilsson, and others.
-
-But, in dealing with the subject of continuity and development, it is
-necessary to confine our remarks to those countries from which we have
-had an opportunity of collecting large varieties of the same class of
-implement; we must therefore have recourse to the Australian, the New
-Zealander, and those nations with which we are more frequently brought
-in contact.
-
-
-_Transition from Celt to Paddle, Spear, and Sword Forms._
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XIV.
-
-_Diagram 3._
-
-TRANSITION FROM CELT TO PADDLE SPEAR & SWORD FORMS.]
-
-The almond-shape celt form, as I have already demonstrated, is one so
-universally distributed and of such very early origin, that we may
-naturally expect to find many of the more complicated forms of savage
-implements derived from it. [See diagram No. 3, reproduced in Plate
-XIV.] In a paper in the _Ulster Journal of Archaeology_ (Belfast, 1857,
-vol. v, pp. 125-27) a writer draws attention to the occurrence in
-the bed of the Bann, and elsewhere in the north of Ireland, of stone
-clubs, formed much upon the general outline of the celt, but narrowed
-at the small end, so as to facilitate their being held in the hand
-like a bludgeon. Fig. 50 is copied from the illustration given in the
-paper referred to, and fig. 51 is another in my collection, also from
-Ireland, of precisely the same form; the original is upon the table,
-and it will be seen that it is simply a celt cut at the small end,
-so as to adapt it to being held in the hand. Fig. 52 is an implement
-in common use among the New Zealanders, called the 'pattoo-pattoo',
-of precisely the same shape; it is of jade, and its form, as may be
-seen by the thin sharp edge at the top, is evidently derived from that
-of the stone celt. Fig. 53 is a remarkably fine specimen, from the
-Museum of this Institution; the handle part in this specimen is more
-elaborately finished. These weapons are used as clubs to break heads,
-and also as missiles, and the fact of their having been derived from
-the celt is shown by the manner in which they are used by the New
-Zealanders. I am informed by Mr. Dilke, who derived his information
-from the natives whilst travelling in New Zealand, that the manner of
-striking with these weapons is not usually with the side, but with the
-sharp end of the pattoo-pattoo, precisely in the same manner that a
-celt would be used if held in the hand. The spot selected for the blow
-is usually above the ear, where the skull is weakest. If any further
-evidence were wanting to prove the derivation of this weapon from the
-stone celt, it is afforded by fig. 54, which is a jade implement lately
-added to the British Museum from the Woodhouse Collection. It was, for
-some time, believed to have been found in a Greek tomb, but this is now
-believed by Mr. Franks to be a mistake; it is, without doubt, a New
-Zealand instrument. The straight edge shows unmistakably that the end
-was the part employed in using it, while the rounded small end, with a
-hole at the extremity, shows that, like the pattoo-pattoo, it was held
-in the hand. It is, in fact, precisely identical with the hand celts
-from Ireland, above described, and forms a valuable connecting link
-between the celt and pattoo-pattoo form. Now it may be regarded as a
-law of development, applicable alike to all implements of savage and
-early races, that when any form has been produced symmetrically, like
-this pattoo-pattoo, the same form will be found either curved to one
-side, or divided in half; the variation, no doubt, depending on the
-purposes for which it is used. The pattoo-pattoo, having been used at
-first, like its prototype the celt, for striking with the end, would
-naturally come to be employed for striking upon the side edge.[154]
-The other side would therefore be liable to variation, according to
-the fancy of the workman. Figs. 55, 56, and 57, are examples of these
-implements, in which the edge is retained only on one side and at the
-end, the other side being variously cut and ornamented. This weapon
-extended to the west coast of America, and there, as in New Zealand,
-they are found both of the symmetrical and of the one-sided form. Fig.
-58 is one believed to be from Nootka Sound, in my collection. Fig. 59
-is also from Nootka, in the Museum of this Institution. Fig. 60 is an
-outline of one from Peru, which is figured in Dr. Klemm's work (l. c.,
-fig. 46, p. 26), and I am informed that a nearly similar club has been
-derived from Brazil.
-
-The same form as the pattoo-pattoo, in Australia, has been developed
-in wood. Fig. 61 is from Nicol Bay, North-West Australia, and is in
-the Christy Collection described as a sword. Fig. 62 is of the same
-form, also of wood, but of cognate form, from New Guinea. In fig. 63,
-which is also from New Guinea, we see the same form developed into a
-paddle. In the larger implements of this class we see the same form,
-modified in such a manner as to diminish the weight; thus, the convex
-sides become either straight or concave. I have arranged upon the walls
-a variety of clubs and paddles, from the Polynesian Islands, figs.
-64 to 67, all of which must have been derived from a common source.
-The New Zealand steering-paddle, fig. 64, it will be seen, is simply
-an elongated celt form. Those from the Marquesas (fig. 65), Society
-Isles, Fiji, and Solomon Isles, &c., are all allied. In the infancy of
-the art of navigation, we may suppose that the implements of war, when
-constructed of wood, may have frequently been used as paddles, or those
-employed for paddles have been used in the fight, and this may perhaps
-account for the circumstance that, throughout these regions, the club,
-sword, and paddle pass into each other by imperceptible gradations.
-In the Friendly Isles we may notice a still further development of
-this form into the long wooden spear, specimens of which, from this
-Institution, are exhibited (figs. 68, 69, and 70).
-
-We must not expect to find all the connecting links in one country or
-island. We know that the same race has at different times spread over
-a very wide area; that the Polynesians, New Zealanders, and Malays are
-all of the same stock, speaking the same or cognate languages. The same
-race spread to the shores of America on the one side, and to Madagascar
-on the other, carrying with them their arts and implements, and we may,
-therefore, naturally expect that the links which are missing in one
-locality may be supplied in another.
-
-
-_Development of the Australian Boomerang._
-
-We now turn to the Australians, a race which, being in the lowest stage
-of cultivation of any with whom we are acquainted, must be regarded as
-the best representatives of aboriginal man.
-
-I have transferred the Australian sword, Plate XIV (diagram 3), fig.
-61, to Plate XV (diagram 4), fig. 72, in order that from it we may
-be able to trace the development of a weapon supposed by some to be
-peculiar to this country, but one which in reality has had a very wide
-range in the earliest stages of culture; I allude to the boomerang.[155]
-
-The Australians, in the manufacture of all their weapons, follow the
-natural grain of the wood, and this leads them into the adoption of
-every conceivable curve. The straight sword would by this means at
-once assume the form of the boomerang, which, it will be seen by the
-diagram, is constructed of every shade of curve from the straight line
-to the right angle, the curve invariably following the natural grain of
-the wood, that is to say, the bend of the piece of a stem or branch out
-of which the implement was fabricated.
-
-All savage nations are in the habit of throwing their weapons at the
-enemy. The desire to strike an enemy at a distance, without exposing
-one's self within the range of his weapons, is one deeply seated in
-human nature, and requires neither explanation nor comment. Even apes,
-as I have already noticed, are in the habit of throwing stones. The
-North American Indian throws his tomahawk; the Indians of the Grand
-Chako, in South America, throw the 'macana', a kind of club. We
-learn from the travels of Mr. Blount,[156] in the Levant in 1634,
-that at that time the Turks used the mace to throw, as well as for
-striking. The Kaffirs throw the knob-kerry, as did also the Fidasians
-of Western Africa.[157] The Fiji Islanders are in the habit of throwing
-a precisely similar club. The Franks are supposed to have thrown the
-'francisca'.[158] The New Zealander throws his 'pattoo-pattoo', and the
-Australian throws the 'dowak' and the waddy, as well as his boomerang.
-All these weapons spin of their own accord when thrown from the hand.
-In practising with the boomerang, it will be found that it does not
-require that any special movement of rotation should be imparted to it,
-but if thrown with the point first it must inevitably rotate in its
-flight. The effect of this rotation, it will hardly be necessary to
-remind those acquainted with the laws of projectiles, is to preserve
-the axis and plane of rotation parallel to itself, upon the principle
-of the gyroscope. By this means the thin edge of the weapon would be
-constantly opposed to the atmosphere in front, whilst the flat sides,
-if thrown horizontally, would meet the air opposed to it by the action
-of gravitation; the effect, of course, would be to increase the range
-of the projectile, by facilitating its forward movement, and impeding
-its fall to the earth. This much, all curved weapons of the boomerang
-form possess as a common property.
-
-If any large collection of boomerangs from Australia be examined, it
-will be seen that they vary not only in their curvature, but also in
-their section; some are much thicker than others, some are of the same
-breadth throughout, whilst others bulge in the centre; some are heavier
-than others, some have an additional curve so as to approach the form
-of an S, some have a slight twist laterally, some have an equal section
-on both sides, while others are nearly flat on one side and convex on
-the other.
-
-As all these varieties continued to be employed, it would soon be
-perceived that peculiar advantages were derived from the use of the
-flatter class of weapon, especially such as are flat on the under
-side, for by throwing these in such a manner as to catch the air on
-the flat side, instead of falling to the ground they would rise in
-the air, precisely in the same manner that a kite, (fig. 71), when
-the boy runs forward with the string, rises and continues to rise as
-long as it is kept up by the action of the air beneath. In like manner
-the boomerang, as long as the forward movement imparted to it by the
-thrower continues, will continue to rise, and the plane of rotation,
-instead of continuing perfectly parallel to its original position,
-will be slightly raised by the action of the atmosphere on the forward
-side. When the movement of transition ceases, the boomerang will
-begin to fall, and its course in falling will be by the line of least
-resistance, which is in the direction of the edge that lies obliquely
-towards the thrower; it will therefore fall back in the same manner
-that a kite, when the string is suddenly broken, is seen to fall
-back for a short distance; but as the kite has received no movement
-of rotation to cause it to continue in the same plane of descent,
-it soon loses its parallelism, and falls in a series of fantastic
-curves towards the ground. The boomerang will do the same thing if it
-loses its movement of rotation; but as long as this continues, which
-it usually does after the forward movement has ceased, it continues
-to fall back upon the same inclined plane by which it ascended, and
-finally reaches the ground at the feet of the thrower. There are
-various ways of throwing the boomerang, but the principles here
-enunciated will explain the course of its flight in whatever manner it
-may be thrown.
-
-Now it is evident that this peculiar mode of flight would be of great
-advantage to the savage, for as we learn from a paper in _Trans.
-Ethnological Society_ (N.S. iii. pp. 264-5), by Mr. Oldfield, who
-speaks from experience, the natives usually employ this weapon against
-large flocks of ducks or wild-fowl in rivers or marshes; the weapon
-after striking or missing the prey would return to the thrower,
-instead of being lost in the morass; its use, therefore, would give
-to the individual or tribe possessing it a great advantage over their
-neighbours in the struggle for life.
-
-But it is evident that the principles of the flight of the boomerang,
-such as I have described it, according to the recognized law of
-projectiles, must have been entirely unknown to the savage; he can no
-more be said to have _invented_ the boomerang than he can be said to
-have _invented_ the art of sustaining life by nourishment. Instinct
-prompts him to eat; little better than instinct would enable him to
-select from amongst his weapons such as are found most suitable for
-obtaining food; and we have already seen how he may have been led to
-the adoption of such an instrument as the boomerang, purely through
-the laws of accidental variation, guided by the natural grain of the
-material in which he worked.
-
-The boomerang, though used chiefly for game, is used also as a weapon,
-and Mr. Oldfield says that it is capable of inflicting a wound several
-inches in depth.
-
-A further movement is effected in the flight of the boomerang by giving
-the arms a slight lateral twist, by means of which it is caused to rise
-by virtue of its rotation, screwing itself up in the air precisely in
-the same manner that a boy's flying top rises to the ceiling. By means
-of this addition, the weapon is sometimes made to strike an object in
-its fall to the ground, behind the thrower, but the twist is not by
-any means invariable, as any one may see by examining a collection of
-these weapons. Nor is it essential to ensure a return fall, which I
-have frequently ascertained by practising with a boomerang that was
-perfectly flat.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XV.
-
-_Diagram 4_
-
-AUSTRALIA.
-
-TRANSITION FROM THE MALGA TO THE BOOMERANG.
-
-_Diagram 6_
-
-INDIAN BOOMERANGS
-
-_Diagram 5_
-
-AUSTRALIA.
-
-TRANSITION FROM HATCHET TO THE BOOMERANG
-
-_Diagram 7_
-
-AFRICAN BOOMERANGS.]
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XVI.
-
-_Diagram 8_
-
-AUSTRALIAN THROWING STICKS.
-
-AUSTRALIAN CLUBS
-
-AFRICAN CLUBS
-
-_Diagram 9_
-
-AUSTRALIAN SHIELDS.
-
-_Diagram 10_
-
-AFRICAN SHIELDS.]
-
-In examining Plate XV (diagram 4), it will be seen that the boomerang
-passes by imperceptible gradations from the straight sword, fig. 72,
-on the one hand, into the 'malga', a kind of pick, fig. 89, used for
-war purposes, on the other[159], and this Australian malga closely
-resembles a weapon of the same kind from New Caledonia, figs. 90 and
-91, which, as already mentioned, is used both as a weapon and for
-tilling the ground. In Plate XV (diagram 5), figs. 92 to 100, I have
-also arranged the links of connexion between the boomerang and a kind
-of hatchet or chopper called the waddy. A slight swell or projection
-is seen to grow out of one end of the concave side of the boomerang,
-and this develops into the form of a chopper. In those specimens of
-this class in which the projection is only slightly developed, as in
-figs. 94 and 95, the sides of the implement are flat, and the weapon
-is obviously designed for throwing, but in some of those in which
-the projection is more fully developed, as in fig. 96, the shaft is
-quite round, and the head becomes thick and heavy, so as to render it
-totally unsuited to the purposes of a missile. We see, therefore, in
-this diagram, the transition, by minute gradations, from a missile to
-a hand weapon, or vice versa. The boomerang, the sword, the malga,
-and the waddy, are thus seen to be allied in such a manner as to make
-it difficult to determine which of the four was the original weapon,
-and, if properly arranged to display their development, they should be
-distributed in branch lines, starting from a common centre, exactly in
-the same manner that I have suggested the various forms of spear and
-arrow-heads ought to be arranged in the natural order of progression.
-[See, for example, Plate III, and pp. 37-8, above.]
-
-
-_Indian Boomerangs._
-
-In Plate XV (diagram 6), figs. 101-5, I have arranged a series of
-boomerangs from India. Figures 101 and 102 are specimens of the
-'katureea' or boomerang of Goojerat, from the Indian Museum; they
-are used by the coolies, according to the ticket in the Museum, 'for
-whirling at hares, boars, and other wild animals, and disabling
-them'. It is of 'raen' wood, thicker and heavier than the Australian
-specimens, and therefore not adapted to rise in the air and return. The
-section is equal on both sides, but in other respects it is precisely
-identical with the Australian weapon, and appears to have been roughly
-chipped into form. Figures 103 and 104 are of an improved form, from
-Madras, called the 'collery', also of wood, but having a knob at the
-handle end; they are from the Museum of this Institution. Figure 105
-is precisely the same form in steel, from the India Museum. It is
-probable that this weapon led to the use of the steel 'chakra' or war
-quoit (fig. 106) of which I have given an illustration from the Museum
-of this Institution. The principle of its flight is precisely that of
-the boomerang, in so far as regards the increase of range and velocity
-produced by the rotation preserving the thin edge in the line of its
-forward motion. The earliest mention of this instrument is in the
-description of the Malabar Coast, by Magellan, about 1512, translated
-by Mr. Stanley, for the Hakluyt Society. The author describes amongst
-the arms used in the kingdom of Dely, certain wheels called chacarani,
-'two fingers broad, sharp outside like knives, and without edge inside,
-and the surface of these is of the size of a small plate, and they
-carry seven or eight of these each, put on the left arm, and they take
-one and put it on the finger of the right hand, and make it spin round
-many times, so that they hurl it at their enemies, and if they hit
-any one on the arm or neck, it cuts through all, and with these they
-carry on much fighting, and are very dexterous.'[160] These weapons
-are usually worn on the head, but the circumstance here mentioned of
-their being worn on the arm, reminds us very much of the peculiar
-weapon worn by the Djibba negroes of Central Africa as a bracelet; this
-is represented in figure 107; it is of iron, sharp on the outside and
-blunt on the inside, which touches the arm; the edge is usually covered
-with a strip of hide to prevent injury to the person. I am not aware
-that this weapon of the negroes is ever used as a missile, but the
-occurrence of two such singular weapons, similarly carried, is worthy
-of notice, more particularly as we have clear evidence of a connexion
-between the metal-workers of the whole continent of Africa and the hill
-tribes of Central India.
-
-It is possible that many links of connexion may be supplied when the
-subject of continuity comes to be more carefully studied in these
-countries. It would appear extremely probable that the small Koorkeree
-and Goorkah knife, though now used only for hand fight, may have had
-their origin in these missile weapons, which they resemble in form,
-especially the large Goorkah knife. It would be interesting to know
-if they are ever thrown. I have heard stories of this having been the
-case, but no authentic account of such a practice. The Spaniards throw
-their long clasp-knives with effect for a considerable distance.
-
-
-_African Boomerangs._
-
-Turning to Africa (Plate XV, diagram 7), we find the boomerang well
-represented in many parts of that continent. Figure 108 is an ancient
-Egyptian boomerang of wood, in the British Museum. It was obtained from
-the collection of James Burton, Jr., Esq., which was formed by him in
-Egypt, and is described as 'an instrument for fowling, for throwing at,
-or knocking down birds, as is continually represented on the walls of
-the tombs'. It is of hard but light wood, the section is symmetrical
-on both sides, and not flat on one side, like some of the Australian
-boomerangs; it is somewhat broader at the ends than in the middle
-of the blade. Figures 100, 110, and 111, are taken from Rosellini's
-_Egyptian Monuments_,[161] and show how this instrument was used by the
-ancient Egyptians. Sir Samuel Baker has described the weapon called the
-'trombash', used in those parts of Abyssinia which he traversed.[162]
-It is of hard wood, resembling the Australian boomerang, about two feet
-in length, and the end turns sharply at an angle of 30°; they throw
-this with great dexterity, and inflict severe wounds with the hard
-and sharp edge, but, unlike the boomerang, it does not return to the
-thrower. Figure 113 is a wooden instrument, in the Christy Collection,
-said to be used by the Djibba negroes for throwing at birds. Figure 114
-is the Nubian sword, which in form exactly resembles the boomerang.
-They have a great variety of curves, some of them, especially those of
-the same form used in Abyssinia, bending nearly in a right angle. I am
-not aware that this instrument is ever thrown by the Nubians; they,
-however, are in the habit of throwing their curved clubs with great
-dexterity. Figure 115 is an iron implement of native workmanship, used
-as a missile by the inhabitants of Central Africa; it was brought from
-that region by Consul Petherick, at whose sale I purchased it. Like
-the majority of the succeeding figures represented in this diagram, it
-resembles the Australian boomerang, in being flat on the under side,
-that is to say, upon the side which would be undermost, if thrown from
-the right hand with the point first; the weight, however, would prevent
-such a weapon from rising in the air, or returning to the thrower.
-Figure 116 is used by the Mundo tribe of Africa; like the last, it is
-flat on the under side; in form it resembles the falchion, represented
-in the Egyptian sculptures as being held in the hand by Rameses and
-other figures, when slaying their enemies. The small knob on one side
-of the blade is used to attach it to the person in carrying it. Figure
-117, from Central Africa, is clearly a development of the preceding
-figure. Figure 118 is a weapon of the same class, from Kordofan,
-obtained near the cataracts of Assouan, Upper Nile, and now in the
-Museum of this Institution; though of the same character as the other
-missiles, its section is equal on both sides, and therefore it is not
-calculated to range far in its flight. Figure 119 is also from the
-Museum of this Institution; it is flat on the under side. Figures 120
-and 121 are from illustrations in Denham and Clapperton's _Travels
-in Northern and Central Africa_ (Pl. xli. 3, 4), of the missile
-instruments, called 'hunga-mungas', used by the negro tribes, south of
-Lake Tchad. One of these is of very peculiar form; in the course of the
-innumerable variations which this weapon appears to have undergone, the
-constructor appears to have hit upon the idea of representing the head
-and neck of a stork. Figure 122 is from a sketch, in Barth's _Travels_,
-of one of these weapons, belonging to the Marghi, a negro tribe in the
-same region; it is called 'danisco', and he says that the specimen here
-represented is of particularly regular shape, thereby inferring that
-numerous varieties of form are in use among these people. In another
-place, he describes the 'goliyo' of the Musgu and the 'njiga' of the
-Bagirmi, as weapons of the same class, the name of the latter differing
-from the word for spear only in a single letter; he says this weapon is
-common to all the pagan, i.e. negro tribes, that he came across.[163]
-Figure 123 is from East Central Africa, presented to the Christy
-Collection by the Viceroy of Egypt; it is described as a cutting
-instrument, from the country of the Dinkas and Shillooks, capable of
-being thrown to a great distance. Mr. Petherick met with these tribes
-in his travels on the White Nile.[164] Figure 124, from my collection,
-is described as a battle-axe of the Dor tribe, between the equator and
-the 6th or 7th degree of north latitude. It was brought to England
-by Mr. Petherick, who obtained it in his travels in 1858; it is used
-also for throwing. Figure 125 is from an illustration in Du Chaillu's
-work,[165] of the missile tomahawk, used by the Fans in the Gaboon, in
-West Central Africa; he says that the thrower aims at the head, and,
-after killing his victim, uses the round edge of the axe to cut off
-the head. We see from this, that notwithstanding the innumerable and
-apparently meaningless variations which this weapon has undergone, the
-different parts of it are sometimes applied to especial uses. Figure
-126 is another missile, used by the Neam-Nam tribes, East Central
-Africa. Mr. Petherick says, that the Baer tribe carry a different kind
-of iron missile from the Neam-Nams. Figures 126 to 129 are different
-varieties of Neam-Nam weapons, in which, as they are all derived from
-the same people, the gradual transition of form is more perceptible
-than in those isolated specimens derived from different tribes. If,
-however, we had specimens of all the varieties used by each tribe, we
-should without doubt be able to trace the progression of the whole
-of them from a common form. As it is, the connexion is sufficiently
-obvious when the details are examined, throughout the whole region in
-which they are found, extending from Egypt and the Nile in the East, to
-the Gaboon on the West Coast. In all, the principle of construction is
-the same, the divergent lateral blades serving the purpose of wings,
-like the arms of the Australian boomerang, to sustain the weapon in
-the air when spun horizontally. The variations are such as might
-have resulted from successive copies, little or no improvement being
-perceivable in the principle of construction throughout this region,
-notwithstanding the innumerable forms through which it must have passed
-during its transmission from its original source; the locality of
-which we shall probably be unable to determine, until the antiquities
-of the country have been more carefully described and studied. As,
-however, it is everywhere found in the hands of the negro aborigines of
-the country, it must probably have had the same origin as the art of
-smelting and fabricating iron, which is everywhere identical throughout
-this region, and is, without doubt, of the remotest antiquity, dating
-long prior to any historical record of the continent of Africa.
-
-
-_Cateia._
-
-The possible employment of the boomerang in Europe has been made the
-subject of occasional speculation amongst antiquarian writers. Having
-been used in Egypt, and perhaps in Assyria, there is no good reason for
-doubting that it may have spread from thence to the north-west. In a
-learned paper on the subject in the _Transactions of the Royal Irish
-Academy_, vol. xix (1843), § 'Literature,' p. 22, Pl. i, ii, Mr. Samuel
-Ferguson endeavours to prove that the 'cateia' mentioned by classical
-authors was the boomerang. He quotes several passages, and amongst
-them one from Virgil (_Aeneid_ vii. 741), in which mention is made of
-a people accustomed to whirl the 'cateia' after the Teutonic manner.
-In the _Punica_ of Silius (iii. 327), one of the Libyan tribes which
-accompanied Hannibal to Italy is described as being armed with a bent
-or crooked 'cateia'. Isidore, Bishop of Seville, a writer of the end of
-the sixth and beginning of the seventh century, described the 'cateia'
-as 'a species of bat, which, when thrown, flies not far, by reason
-of its weight, but where it strikes, it breaks through with extreme
-impetus, and if it be thrown with a skilful hand, it returns back again
-to him who dismissed it' (_Origines_, xviii. 7. 7).
-
-Strabo also (pp. 196-7) describes the Belgae of his time, as using
-'a wooden weapon of the shape of a grosphus, which they throw out of
-hand ... which flies farther than an arrow, and is chiefly used in the
-pursuit of game'.
-
-
-_General Conclusions relative to the Boomerang._
-
-Those who desire further information relative to its supposed use
-in Europe, cannot do better than refer to the paper from which I
-have quoted. Meanwhile, enough has been said to show:--(1) that
-the boomerang was used in many different countries at a very early
-period, and in a very primitive condition of culture, and that it was
-everywhere employed chiefly in the pursuit of game; (2) that it was
-everywhere constructed of wood, before it was copied in metal; (3) that
-in Australia it originated as a variety of the almond- or leaf-shaped
-sword, and was suggested by the natural curvature of the material out
-of which it was formed; (4) that the subsequent improvements by which
-its return flight was ensured, arose from a practical selection of
-suitable varieties, and was not the result of design, and (5) that the
-form of the boomerang passes by minute gradations into at least three
-other classes of weapons in common use by the same people, and may
-therefore be regarded as a branch variety of an original normal type
-of implement, used by the most primitive races as a general tool or
-weapon.
-
-
-_Development of the Club._
-
-Amongst other implements used for war, the form of which appears to be
-derived from the same common source as those already described, may
-be included the Australian club, and the wamera or throwing stick. I
-have arranged in Plate XVI, diagram 8, figs. 130 to 137, a series of
-Australian clubs, showing a transition from the plain stick, of equal
-size throughout, to one having a nearly round knob at one end. Nearly
-similar forms to some of these, from Africa, figs. 138 to 140, are also
-represented on the same diagram.
-
-
-_Contrivances for Throwing the Spear._
-
-Amongst the Australian 'wameras', there are so many varieties, that it
-is next to impossible to speculate upon the priority of any particular
-form, unless the plain stick, with a projecting peg at one end, may be
-regarded as certainly the simplest, and therefore the earlier form.
-The 'wamera' is held in the right hand, and the projecting peg at the
-end is fitted into a cavity at the end of the spear, which latter is
-held in the left hand, in the required direction, until just before the
-moment of throwing. The spear is then impelled to its destination by
-the wamera, which gives great additional impetus to the arm. Fig. 147
-is a wamera from Nicol Bay, of exactly the same general outline as the
-sword already figured from that locality, figs. 61 and 62, except that
-one of the faces at the end of which the peg is fastened, is concave,
-and the other convex; this specimen is in the Christy Collection. The
-wamera assumes a great variety of forms; some, as for example fig.
-142, resemble on a small scale the New Zealand paddle, the broad end
-being held in the hand, and the peg inserted in the small end; others,
-broad and flat, figs. 148 to 150, bulge out in the middle by successive
-gradations, until they approach the form of a shield. No reasonable
-cause that I am aware of, can be assigned for these different forms;
-beyond caprice, and the action of the law of incessant variation, which
-is constant in its operation amongst all the works of the aborigines.
-
-The wamera is found on the north-west[166] and south-west[167] coasts
-of Australia, and Major Mitchell describes it in the east and central
-parts of the continent.[168]
-
-That the wamera preceded the bow, appears probable from the fact that
-no bow is ever used in Australia, unless occasionally upon the north
-coast, where it is derived from the Papuans. The bow is not indigenous
-in New Zealand, or in any of those islands of the Pacific which are
-peopled by the Polynesian race; it belongs truly to the Papuans, and
-where it is used elsewhere in the Pacific Islands as a toy, it may
-very probably have been derived from their Papuan neighbours. The
-throwing stick is used in New Zealand, in which country Mr. Darwin
-describes the practice with them. 'A cap,' he says, 'being fixed at
-30 yards distance, they transfixed it with the spear delivered by
-the throwing stick, with the rapidity of an arrow from the bow of a
-practised archer.'[169] In New Guinea, Captain Cook saw the lance
-thrown 60 yards, as he believed, by the throwing stick.[170] I saw
-the Australians, now exhibiting on Kennington Common (1868), throw
-their spears with the wamera nearly 100 yards extreme range, but as
-they practised only for range, I had no opportunity of observing the
-accuracy of flight. Mr. Oldfield says that their practice has been much
-exaggerated by the European settlers, in order to justify acts on their
-part, which would otherwise appear cowardly. He says, that a melon
-having been put up at a distance of 30 yards, many natives practised
-at it for an hour without hitting it, after which an European, who had
-accustomed himself to the use of this weapon, struck it five times
-out of six with his spear. Klemm, on the other hand, has collected
-several accounts of their dexterity in the use of it; he says, that the
-range is 90 yards, and mentions that Captain Phillip received a wound
-several inches deep at 30 paces. At 40 paces, he says, the aborigines
-are always safe of their mark (l. c., p. 32). A sharp flint is usually
-fixed with gum into the handle of the wamera, which they use for
-sharpening the points of their spears.
-
-The throwing stick (fig. 151) is used by the Esquimaux throughout
-the regions they inhabit. Frobisher[171] mentions it on the east,
-Captain Beechey on the north-west, and Cranz describes its use in
-Greenland.[172] Klemm says (l. c., p. 39), that the throwing stick used
-in the Aleutian Isles, differs from that of the Greenlander in having a
-cavity, to receive the end of the spear, instead of a projecting tang.
-The Esquimaux stick generally differs from the Australian in form,
-and has usually holes cut to receive the fingers, which by this means
-secure a firm grasp of the instrument. The custom of forming holes or
-depressions in an implement to receive the fingers was very widely
-spread in prehistoric times. I have specimens of stones so indented,
-used probably as hammers, from Ireland, Yorkshire, Denmark, and Central
-India. In the Christy Collection there is one precisely similar from
-the Andaman Isles.
-
-The only other race that is known to make use of the throwing stick is
-the Purus-Purus Indians of South America, inhabiting a tributary of the
-Amazon. These people have no bow, and in many other respects resemble
-the Australians in their habits. Their throwing stick is called
-'palheta'; it has a projection at the end, to fit into the end of the
-spear, and is handled exactly in the same manner as the Australian
-'wamera'.[173]
-
-Another kind of spear-thrower, consisting of a loop for the finger and
-a thong by which it is fastened to the spear, is used in New Caledonia,
-and Tanna, New Hebrides (fig. 152). On ordinary occasions this is
-carried by being suspended to an armlet on the left arm, but, when
-preparing for war, they fasten it on to the middle of their spears. I
-exhibit here, fig. 153, a precisely similar contrivance from Central
-Africa, from my collection. Judging by the spiral ferrule, at the end
-of the lance to which it is attached, it appears to be derived from
-Central or East Central Africa. This mode of increasing the range of
-the dart or javelin was well known to the ancients, and was called by
-the Greeks ~ankylê~, and by the Romans 'amentum'; it is represented on
-the Etruscan vases, and is figured in Smith's _Dictionary of Greek
-and Roman Antiquities_, from which the drawing given in fig. 154 is
-taken.[174] One of the effects produced by this contrivance was,
-doubtless, to give the weapon a rotary motion, and thereby to increase
-the accuracy of its flight, upon the same principle as the rifling of a
-bullet; but the range and velocity were also increased, by enabling the
-thrower, the tip of whose forefinger was passed through the loop of the
-'amentum', to press longer upon the spear, and thus impart a greater
-velocity to it, in the same manner that the effect of the Australian
-wamera may be said to increase the length of the thrower's arm. The
-Emperor Napoleon, who, as we all know, has paid great attention to
-these weapons of the ancients, caused experiments to be conducted,
-under his own personal supervision, at Saint Germain, the result of
-which showed that the range of a spear was increased from 20 to 80
-meters by the use of this accessory.[175]
-
-
-_Transition from Club to Shield (Australia)._
-
-My next example of variation of form is taken from the Australian
-'heileman', or shield. It may, on the first cursory consideration of
-the subject, appear fanciful to suppose that so simple a contrivance
-as the shield could require to have a history, or that the plain round
-target, for example, so common amongst many savage nations, could be
-the result of a long course of development. Surely, it may be said,
-the shells of tortoises or the thick hides of beasts would, from the
-first, have supplied so simple a contrivance. But the researches in
-palaeoethnology teach us that such was not the case; man came into the
-world naked and defenceless, and it was long before he acquired the
-art of defending himself in this manner. His first weapon, as I have
-already said, was a stone or a stick, and it is from one or other of
-these, that we must trace all subsequent improvements. The stick became
-a club, and it is to this alone that many of the earliest races trust
-for the defence of their persons. The Dinkas of East Central Africa
-have no shields, using the club, and a stick, hooked at both ends (Pl.
-XVI, fig. 170), to ward off lances.[176] The Shoua and the Bagirmi
-of Central Africa rarely carry shields, and they use a foreign name
-for it.[177] The Khonds, hill tribes of Central India, have never
-adopted the shield.[178] The inhabitants of Tahiti use no shield.[179]
-The Sandwich Islanders use no shield or weapon of defence, employing
-the javelin to ward off lances: like the Australians, and, like the
-Bushmen, they are very expert in dodging the weapons of their enemies.
-In Samoa the club is used for warding off lances, and the warriors
-frequently exercise themselves in this practice. The 'kerri' sticks of
-the Hottentots are used for warding off stones and assegais.[180]
-
-The club head formed by the divergent roots of a tree (Pl. XVI,
-fig. 155), offers great advantages in enabling the warrior to catch
-the arrows in their flight, and this led to the use of the jagged
-mace-head form of club, which is here represented from many different
-localities. Fig. 155 is from Fiji, fig. 157 from Central Africa, fig.
-156 from Australia, fig. 158 from New Guinea, and fig. 159 from the
-Friendly Isles. The curved clubs, of which a great variety are found
-in the hands of savages in every part of the world, are exceedingly
-well adapted to catch and throw off the enemy's arrow. The Australian
-'malga', or 'leowel', as it is called by the Australians now in this
-country, and already described (pp. 125-6), is used in this manner.
-
-By degrees, instead of using the club as a general weapon, offensive
-and defensive, especial forms would be used for defence, whilst
-others would be retained for offensive purposes; but the shield for
-some time would continue to be used merely as a parrying instrument.
-Such it is in Australia. In its most primitive form, it is merely a
-kind of stick with an aperture cut through it in the centre for the
-hand. The fore part varies with the shape of the stem out of which it
-was made; in some it is round, in others flat. This form appears to
-have branched off into two varieties; one developed laterally, and
-at last assumed the form of a pointed oval, as represented in Plate
-XVI, figs. 165 to 169; these are frequently scored on the front with
-grooves to catch the lance points. The other variety appears to have
-assumed a pointed form in front, so as to make the spear glance off
-to one side, as represented in figs. 160 to 164. The Australians are
-exceedingly skilful in parrying with these shields. One of the feats
-of the Australians now in this country, consists in parrying cricket
-balls thrown with full force by three persons at the same time. The
-'heileman' is cut out of the solid tree and, like all their other
-weapons, invariably follows the grain of the wood.
-
-In 1861, Mr. Oldfield, when engaged in collecting specimens of timber
-for the International Exhibition, came upon one of these shields,
-nearly finished, and abandoned, but only requiring a few strokes to
-detach it from the growing tree; and he noticed the immense time and
-labour it must have cost the native to construct it, not less than 30
-cubic feet of wood having been removed in digging it out of the tree
-with no better tool than a flint fixed to the end of a stick. Trees
-of sufficient size for these shields are not found in all parts of
-Australia, and in those places where they are wanting, the natives
-only obtain them by traffic with other tribes. The same cause may
-also account, in some measure, for the varieties of their form, yet,
-notwithstanding these numerous varieties, they never leave the normal
-type throughout the continent, and you might as well expect to see the
-Australian using a firelock of native manufacture, as to find in his
-hands the circular flat shield which is common in Africa, America, and
-ancient Europe.
-
-
-_Transition from Club to Shield (Africa)._
-
-In Africa, the development of the shield appears to have followed
-precisely the same course, commencing with the plain stick or club,
-Pl. XVI, fig. 170, and passing through the varieties represented in
-figs. 171, 172, and 173, which are scarcely distinguishable from the
-Australian 'heileman', to the oval shield of the Kaffirs, fig. 174,
-and of the Upper Nile, figs. 175 and 176, which are of ox hide, but
-show their origin by a stick passing down the centre and grasped in
-the hand; with this stick they parry and turn off the lances of the
-assailant precisely in the same manner that the Australian employs the
-projecting point at the end of his oval shield. Judging by the side
-views represented in the Egyptian and Assyrian sculptures, similar
-shields were used by the ancients, and we may especially notice the
-Assyrian shield, of small dimensions, fig. 178, mentioned by Mr.
-Rawlinson as being represented in the Assyrian sculptures, and having
-projecting spikes on the fore part, to catch and throw off the enemy's
-weapons (_Five Great Monarchies_ (1864), vol. ii. p. 51).
-
-
-_Development of the Shield._
-
-All these antique shields have one other feature in common with the
-shields of existing aborigines, viz. that they are held by a handle
-in the centre. It was only in a more advanced age, when armies began
-to fall into serried ranks, that the broad shield was introduced
-and held upon the left arm, a mode of carrying it ill adapted to
-the requirements of the light-armed combatants. Besides the oval,
-the shield took other forms, but appears always to have been narrow
-in its earliest developments: fig. 176 from the Upper Nile closely
-resembles in outline fig. 177 from the New Hebrides. Livy describes
-the shields of the Gauls in the attack of Mount Olympus, B.C. 189, as
-being too narrow to defend them against the missiles of the Romans,
-and he also describes them as brandishing their shields in a peculiar
-manner practised in their original country.[181] This must without
-doubt have been connected with the operation of parrying. Sir Walter
-Scott describes the Scotch parrying with their shields. Shields in the
-form of a figure 8 are met with in various countries; Captain Grant
-describes the Unyamwezi as carrying a shield of this form.[182] Fig.
-179 from this Institution is from Central Africa, of a very primitive
-form. Fig. 180 is of the same shape from New Guinea, and the beautiful
-bronze shield, fig. 181[183], of the late Celtic period, in the British
-Museum, found in the Thames, appears to be of an allied form. Fig.
-182 is an ox-hide shield of the Basutos; it is allied to that of the
-Kaffirs, Fig. 174, by having a stick at the back, and the peculiar
-wings with which it is furnished connect it with that of the Fans of
-the Gaboon, on the West Coast, fig. 183, which latter is of elephant
-hide and has no stick at the back. No connexion that I am aware of is
-known to have existed between these remote tribes, which are of totally
-different races, but the forms of their shields here represented must,
-I think, have been derived from a common source.
-
-
-_Concluding Remarks._
-
-It would be quite impossible within the space of a single lecture to
-produce more than a very small portion indeed of the evidence which is
-available in support of my arguments. If the principles which I have
-enunciated are sound, they must be applicable to the whole of the arts
-of mankind and to all time. If it can be proved that a single art,
-contrivance, custom, or institution, sprang into existence in violation
-of the law of continuity, and was not the offspring of some prior
-growth, it will disprove my theory. If in the whole face of nature
-there is undoubted evidence of any especial fiat of creation having
-operated capriciously, or in any other manner than by gradual evolution
-and development, my principles are false.
-
-It would be a violation of the law of continuity, for example, if the
-principles which I am now advocating, in common with many others at the
-present time, opposed as they are to many preconceived notions, were
-suddenly to receive a general and widespread acceptance. This also,
-like other offsprings of the human mind, must be a work of development,
-and it will require time and the labours of many individuals to
-establish it as the truth, if truth it be.
-
-Meanwhile it may be well that I should briefly sum up the several
-points which I have endeavoured to prove on the present occasion.
-
-I have endeavoured to prove in the first place, though I must here
-repeat that I have produced only a very small portion of the evidence
-on the subject, that all the implements of the stone age are traceable
-by variation to a common form, and that form the earliest; that their
-improvement spread over a period so long as to witness the extinction
-of many wild breeds of animals; that it was so gradual as to require
-no effort of genius or of invention; and that it was identical in all
-parts of the world.
-
-I have shown in the second place, that all the weapons of the
-Australians which I have described, are traceable by variation to
-the same common form, or to forms equally as primitive as those of
-the stone age of Europe; that it is perfectly consistent with the
-phenomena observed, that these variations may have resulted, or at
-least may have in a great measure been promoted by accidental causes,
-such as the grain of the wood influencing the shape of the weapon;
-that they were not invented or designed for especial purposes, but
-that their application to such purposes may have resulted from a
-selection of the implements already in hand; and that by this process,
-the natives of Australia, during countless ages, may have crept on,
-almost unconsciously, from the condition of brutes, to the condition of
-incipient culture in which they are now found.
-
-I have compared these weapons of the Australians with others of the
-same form in various parts of the world, showing grounds for believing
-that whenever we shall be able to collect a sufficient variety of
-specimens to represent the continuous progression of each locality, the
-_modus operandi_ will be found to have been everywhere the same.
-
-Lastly, I have alluded cursorily to the analogy which exists between
-the development of the arts and the development of species. It may be
-better to postpone any comprehensive generalization on this subject
-until a much larger mass of evidence has been collected and arranged.
-Sir Charles Lyell has devoted a chapter in his work on the _Antiquity
-of Man_ to a comparison of the development of languages and the
-development of species. 'We may compare,' he says, 'the persistency of
-languages, or the tendency of each generation to adopt without change
-the vocabulary of its predecessor, to the force of inheritance in the
-organic world, which causes the offspring to resemble its parents. The
-inventive power which coins new words or modifies old ones, and adapts
-them to new wants and conditions as often as they arise, answers to
-the variety-making power in the animal creation.' He also compares
-the selection of words and their incorporation into the language of a
-people, with the selection of species, resulting in both cases in the
-survival of the fittest (4th ed., 1873, p. 503).
-
-Whilst, however, we dwell upon the analogy which exists between the
-phenomena of the organic world and the phenomena of human culture,
-we must not omit to notice the points of difference. The force of
-inheritance may resemble in its effects the principle of conservatism
-in the arts and culture of mankind, but they are totally dissimilar
-causes.
-
-The variety-making power may resemble the inventive power of man;
-nothing, however, can be more dissimilar, except as regards results.
-
-When, therefore, we find that like results are produced through the
-instrumentality of totally dissimilar causes, we must attribute the
-analogy to some prior and more potent cause, influencing the whole
-alike.
-
-It might be premature to speculate upon the course of reasoning which
-this class of study is likely to introduce; this much, however, we may,
-I think, safely predict as the result of our investigation, that we
-shall meet with no encouragement to deify secondary causes.
-
-Another subject to which we must necessarily be led by these
-investigations, although, as I before said, it does not fall actually
-within the scope of my paper, is the question of the unity or plurality
-of the human race.
-
-The ethnologist and the anthropologist who has not studied the
-prehistoric archaeology of his own country compares the present
-condition of savages with that of the Europeans with whom they are
-brought in contact. He notices the vast disparity of intellect between
-them. He finds the savage incapable of education and of civilization,
-and evidently destined to fall away before the white man whenever the
-races meet, and he jumps at the conclusion that races so different in
-mental and physical characteristics, must have had a distinct origin,
-and be the offspring of separate creations. But the archaeologist
-traces back the arts and institutions of his own people and country
-until he finds that they once existed in a condition as low or lower
-than that of existing savages, having the same arts, and using
-precisely the same implements and weapons; and he arrives at the
-conclusion that the difference observable between existing races is
-one of divergence, and not of origin; that owing to causes worthy of
-being carefully studied and investigated, one race has improved, while
-another has progressed slowly or remained stationary.
-
-In this conclusion he is borne out by all analogy of nature, in which
-he finds frequent evidences of difference produced by variation, but no
-one solitary example of independent creation. Are not all the branches
-of a young tree parts of the same organism; and yet one will be seen to
-throw up its shoots with a vigorous and rapid growth, whilst another
-turns towards the ground and ultimately decays? Not to mention the
-variations produced by the breeding of animals, with which we are
-all more or less familiar, we see under our own eyes families of men
-diverging in this manner. One branch, owing to causes familiar to us in
-everyday life, will become highly cultivated, whilst another continues
-to live on in a low condition of life, so that in the course of a few
-years the disparity, mental and physical, between these two branches,
-bearing the same name, will be greater, in proportion to the time of
-separation, than that which, in the course of countless ages, has
-separated the black from the white man.
-
-At the present time there is a tendency to rectify these inequalities,
-whether in regard to our own or to other races, and there can be little
-doubt that in the course of time, all that remains of the various races
-of mankind will be brought under the influence of one civilization. But
-as this progressive movement is often led by men who have not made the
-races of mankind their study, they are perpetually falling into the
-error of supposing, that the work of countless ages of divergence, is
-to be put to rights by Act of Parliament, and by suddenly applying to
-the inferior races of mankind laws and institutions for which they are
-about as much fitted as the animals in the Zoological Gardens.
-
-In conclusion, I have only a few words to say upon the defects of our
-ethnographical collections generally. It will be seen that in order to
-exhibit the continuity and progression of form, I have been obliged to
-collect and put together examples from many different museums; and,
-as it is, it will have been noticed that many links of connexion are
-evidently wanting. This is owing, in a great measure, to the very short
-period during which the arts and customs of primaeval races have been
-made the subject of scientific investigation; but it also arises from
-the absence of system on the part of travellers and collectors, who in
-former times appear to have had but little knowledge of the evidence
-which these specimens of the industry of the aborigines are destined
-to convey, and who have, therefore, neglected to bring home from the
-various regions they visited all the varieties of the several classes
-of implements which each country is capable of affording, thinking that
-one good example of a tool or weapon might be taken as a sample of all
-the rest.
-
-I am not so presumptuous as to suppose that the particular arrangement,
-which I have adopted, may not require frequent modification as our
-evidence accumulates; but I trust that I shall at least have made it
-apparent to those who have followed the course of my argument, that
-without the connecting links which unite one form with another, an
-ethnographical collection can be regarded in no other light than a mere
-toy-shop of curiosities, and is totally unworthy of science.
-
-Owing to the wide distribution of our Army and Navy, the members of
-which professions are dispersed over every quarter of the globe and
-have ample leisure for the pursuit of these interesting studies, this
-Institution possesses facilities for forming a really systematic
-collection of savage weapons, not perhaps within the power of any
-other Institution in the world. The time is fast approaching when
-this class of prehistoric evidence will no longer be forthcoming. The
-collection is already what, for this country, must be regarded as a
-good one, and if I may venture to hope that the remarks I have now the
-honour of making will be of service in collecting the materials for the
-improvement of it, I trust it may be thought that my labours and your
-patience will not have been thrown away.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[126] A Lecture delivered at the Royal United Service Institution on
-June 5, 1868, and printed in the _Journal of the R. U. S. Inst._, vol.
-xii (1868), pp. 399-439, pl. xvii-xxi (= Plates XII-XVI herewith).
-
-[127] Klemm, l. c., p. 147.
-
-[128] Pinkerton (1811), vol. ix. p. 501.
-
-[129] _Walk across Africa_, p. 78.
-
-[130] Klemm, l. c., p. 62.
-
-[131] l. c., p. 78.
-
-[132] l. c., pp. 123-6.
-
-[133] Speke, _Journal of the Discovery of the Source of the Nile_
-(London, 1863), p. 460.
-
-[134] _Barth_, Travels, vol. iii. p. 162.
-
-[135] Nilsson, _The Primitive Inhabitants of Scandinavia_, edited by
-Sir John Lubbock (3rd ed., London, 1868), p. 44.
-
-[136] Lloyd Stephens, _Incidents of Travel in Central America_ (London,
-1854), p. 94.
-
-[137] Lyell, _Antiquity of Man_ (London, 1873), p. 161.
-
-[138] I am informed by an eye-witness, that the Australian savages, in
-climbing trees, use implements nearly similar to these, to cut notches
-for their feet. The implement is held in the hand, without any handle.
-Others are used in handles, either fastened with gum, or consisting of
-a withe passed round the stone and tied underneath.
-
-[139] Mr. Frere's first discovery was in 1797 (_Archaeologia_,
-xiii. p. 204). (M. Boucher de Perthes began work in 1837 (_De la
-Création_, Paris, 1838), and published his _Antiquités Celtiques et
-Antédiluviennes_ (vol. i) in 1847. His discoveries were, however, not
-verified and accepted by the British observers till 1858-9.--ED.)
-
-[140] See figures 23 and 32, as well as figure 17 _a_ from Central
-India.
-
-[141] March 5, 1868. _Proc. Soc. Ant. Lond._ 2nd Ser. iv. p. 85:
-_Archaeologia_, xlii.
-
-[142] Nilsson, _The Primitive Inhabitants of Scandinavia_, edited by
-Sir John Lubbock (London, 1868), Editor's Introduction, p. xxiv.
-
-[143] The handle, since its discovery, has been fractured in four
-places, and has shrunk a good deal from its original size.
-
-[144] Cf. Kemble, _Horae Ferales_ (London, 1863), p. 134.
-
-[145] Keller, _The Lake Dwellings of Switzerland_, transl. by J. E. Lee
-(2nd ed. London, 1878), vol. i. pp. 111-3.
-
-[146] Livingstone, _Missionary Travels and Researches in S. Africa_
-(1857), p. 40.
-
-[147] Lartet and Christy, _Reliquiae Aquitanicae_ (London, 1865-75,
-passim).
-
-[148] Wilde, _Catalogue of the Antiquities of the Museum of the Royal
-Irish Academy_ (Dublin, 1863), vol. i. pp. 19-23.
-
-[149] After having witnessed the process of fabricating flint
-arrow-heads, as re-discovered by Mr. Evans, I am able to understand why
-it is that the leaf-shaped form is of more frequent occurrence, and why
-this and the long-tanged forms are so often rougher and less finished
-than the other forms, the deep barbs and hollow base requiring much
-greater skill than the former.
-
-[150] Burton, _The City of the Saints_ (London, 1861), p. 146.
-
-[151] Schoolcraft, _Information concerning ... the Indian Tribes of the
-U.S.A._ (Philadelphia, 1851-9), vol. i. p. 212.
-
-[152] In the museum belonging to the Cork College, there is a Peruvian
-mummy, with which, amongst other articles, two of these arrow-pointed
-knives were found.
-
-[153] Siebold, _Nippon_ (Leiden, 1832-52), vol. i. pt. ii (Alte
-Waffen), Tab. xi.
-
-[154] Evidence of this transition may be seen by examining any number
-of pattoo-pattoos. Some are sharp at the end; others are blunt at the
-end, but sharp at the side near the broadest part.
-
-[155] Since this paper was read to the Royal United Service
-Institution, Sir John Lubbock has delivered a remarkably interesting
-series of lectures on savages, in the course of which he took exception
-to my classification of the Indian, African, and Australian boomerangs,
-under the same head; giving as his reason that the Australian boomerang
-has a return flight, whilst those of other nations have not that
-peculiarity. If it could be shown that the Australian weapon had been
-_contrived_ for the purpose of obtaining a return flight, I should
-then agree with him in regarding the difference as generic. But the
-course of my investigations tends to show that this was probably an
-application of the weapon accidentally hit upon by the Australians, and
-that it arose from a modification of weight and form, so trivial as
-to prevent our regarding it as generically distinct from the others.
-I therefore consider the Australian weapon to be a mere variety of
-the implement which is common to the three continents. The difference
-between us on this point, though one of terms, is nevertheless
-important as a question of continuity. I am much gratified, however,
-to find my opinions on many other points supported by Sir John's high
-authority.
-
-[156] Henry Blount, _Voyage into the Levant_, 1634 (London, 1671), p.
-91.
-
-[157] Bosman, _Guinea_, Pinkerton (1811), vol. xvi. pp. 505-6.
-
-[158] Kemble, _Horae Ferales_ (1863), p. 65.
-
-[159] This weapon is called 'leowel' by the Australians now in this
-country (1868).
-
-[160] Duarte Barbosa, _A Description of the Coasts of East Africa and
-Malabar_ (by Magellan), translated by the Hon. H. E. Stanley: Hakluyt
-Society, xxxv (1866), pp. 100-1.
-
-[161] Rosellini, _Monumenti dell' Egitto e della Nubia_ (Pisa, 1834),
-Monuments Civiles, pl. cxvii. 3; cxix. 1.
-
-[162] Baker, _Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia_ (London, 1867), p. 511.
-
-[163] Barth, l. c., vol. iii. pp. 231, 451, &c., &c.
-
-[164] Petherick, _Egypt, the Soudan, and Central Africa_ (1861), p. 456.
-
-[165] Du Chaillu, _Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial Africa_
-(London, 1861), p. 79.
-
-[166] Gregory's account of his expedition in 1861, _Journal of the
-Royal Geographical Society_, vol. xxxii (1862), p. 378.
-
-[167] Oldfield, 'On the Aborigines of Australia,' _Trans. Ethnol.
-Soc._, vol. iii. pp. 261-2.
-
-[168] _Expedition to the Interior of Eastern Australia_, by Major T.
-L. Mitchell, Surveyor-General, _Journal of the Royal Geographical
-Society_, vol. ii. pp. 325-6.
-
-[169] [Darwin, _Journal_.] (But the quotation (from Darwin, _Journal of
-Researches_ (London, 1845) pp. 433-4) refers to _Australia_, not New
-Zealand.--ED.)
-
-[170] Cook, _Third Voyage_ (London, 1842), vol. i. p. 273.
-
-[171] Frobisher, _The Three Voyages of Martin Frobisher_, ed. Collinson
-(Hakluyt Society, 1867), p. 283.
-
-[172] Cranz, _Historie von Grönland_^2 (1770), pp. 195-6, pl. v. 2 _f._
-
-[173] Markham, _Tribes of the Valley of the Amazon_.--_Trans. Ethnol.
-Soc._, N.S., vol. iii. p. 183.
-
-[174] Smith, _Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities_ (s. v. Hasta).
-
-[175] Desor, _Les Palafittes ou Constructions Lacustres du Lac de
-Neuchâtel_ (Paris, 1865), p. 87.
-
-[176] Petherick, _Egypt, the Soudan, and Central Africa_ (1861), p. 391.
-
-[177] Barth, l. c., vol. iii. p. 450.
-
-[178] Campbell, _Thirteen Years amongst the Wild Tribes of Khondistan_
-(London, 1864), p. 40.
-
-[179] Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_ (1829), vol. ii. p. 489.
-
-[180] Kolb, _Reise an das Capo du Bonne Esperance_ (Nürnberg, 1719),
-pp. 477-8.
-
-[181] Livy, Book xxxviii. ch. 17 and 21.
-
-[182] Grant, _Walk across Africa_, p. 69.
-
-[183] Kemble, _Horae Ferales_ (1863), p. 190, pl. xiv.
-
-
-
-
-PRIMITIVE WARFARE
-
-III
-
- ON THE RESEMBLANCES OF THE WEAPONS OF EARLY RACES; THEIR
- VARIATIONS, CONTINUITY AND DEVELOPMENT OF FORM: METAL PERIOD.[184]
-
-
-Having in two previous lectures upon 'Primitive Warfare', delivered at
-this Institution, spoken of the general principles to be observed in
-studying the development of the weapons of savages and early races,
-I need not preface the remarks I am about to offer by any detailed
-allusion to the generalizations which I have already ventured to make,
-but I will proceed at once to lay before you some additional facts
-which I have collected in continuation of the same subject.
-
-This I do the more readily, because I hold strongly to the opinion that
-the value of a communication of this kind may, in a great degree, be
-measured by the attention which is paid to the accumulation of facts,
-and to the comparative brevity and simplicity of that portion of it
-which relates to theory. Without general principles, however, we should
-have no incentive to collect and systematize our facts, and they are
-therefore valuable even where they involve--and in a new field of
-study, such as I am now treating, with very scanty materials as yet at
-our disposal to assist conjecture, I can hardly hope they should not
-involve--a certain amount of error.
-
-Before entering upon the subject of the origin of metal implements, I
-must, however, revert to one part of my former communication, in order
-to show that a statement I then made in reference to the geographical
-distribution of the boomerang has since had some light thrown upon it
-by the researches of one of our most eminent men of science. It will,
-perhaps, be remembered by those who did me the honour of reading my
-last lecture, which was printed in vol. xii of the _Journal_, that,
-in describing the weapons of the Australians, I showed, by means of
-numerous illustrations of the varieties of each class of weapon from
-that country, that they all passed one into the other by connecting
-links, so that where a sufficient number of them are arranged in such
-a manner as to exhibit their continuity, it is often impossible to
-determine any definite line of separation between them. I also showed
-that the form of each weapon was determined by the form of the stem or
-branch of the tree out of which it was made, the outline of all these
-implements conforming to the grain of the wood; and the inference which
-I drew from this was, that it showed a very low state of intellect on
-the part of the constructors, the several classes of implements not
-having been designed originally for their respective purposes, but
-produced accidentally, and then applied during subsequent ages to the
-several uses to which in practice they appeared most suited.
-
-As we have no reason to suppose that the Australian continent was
-peopled at a later date than other parts of the world, and as there
-is no evidence upon that continent of the people inhabiting it having
-ever been in a higher state of civilization than they are at present,
-we have grounds for supposing that they must have remained stationary,
-or have progressed very slowly, while the inhabitants of other parts
-of the globe advanced more rapidly, and that their existing arts
-and implements, simple and primitive though they be, nevertheless
-represent the highest development of constructive power to which these
-people have ever attained. Hence it follows, that if the inhabitants
-of any other portions of the globe can be traced to a common origin
-with the Australians, viewing the persistency of type observable as a
-characteristic of the arts of these people, and of all other people
-in a primitive state of culture, we must expect to find some traces
-of similar implements in use amongst all such people to whom a common
-origin can be assigned.
-
-In my last lecture I mentioned that there were three countries in
-which the boomerang is either still used, or is known to have been
-used in ancient times, viz. Australia, the Deccan of India, and Egypt,
-and I also showed some grounds for believing that the same weapon,
-or something allied to it, may have spread from those countries over
-Europe, as it is known to have done over a great part of Northern and
-Central Africa.
-
-Although the comparison of weapons from various parts of the globe
-can have no other object than to trace out an original connexion,
-I did not venture to build upon the coincidence of this weapon in
-these regions, any argument for the common origin of the people by
-whom it was used. Nor do I think that I should have been justified
-in assuming such origin upon the grounds of the identity of a single
-weapon. Such identity may have arisen in three ways:--(1) it may have
-arisen independently by the spontaneous development of like weapons
-under similar conditions of life; (2) the weapon itself may have been
-communicated from some primal source; (3) the races using it may have
-been themselves derived from a common origin. Of these, the first
-view, viz. the independent origin of the weapon, would perhaps strike
-any one at first sight, before having studied the conservatism and
-persistency of type which is so especially characteristic of savages,
-as the most probable; it appears so exceedingly simple in its form and
-uses to our trained and educated minds, that it seems hardly necessary
-to account for it in any other way; besides which, there are slight
-differences between the Indian and Australian boomerangs, which have
-been considered by some to distinguish the two weapons.
-
-I will not here revert to the arguments which I have used to combat
-this opinion. Suffice to say, that I have since been favoured with
-much valuable information on the subject by Sir Walter Elliot, who
-has frequently accompanied the natives of India in their hunting
-expeditions with this weapon. He says that it is formed on the grain
-of the wood, like the Australian boomerang, the curve varying with the
-bend of the stem; it is whirled horizontally, with the end foremost,
-like the Australian practice, and is used by two tribes in the Deccan,
-viz. the Kolis of Guzerat and the Marawárs of Madura, but more
-especially in its simplest form by the former, who are of the Dravidian
-or black race of the Deccan. In a letter to me he says, speaking of
-these tribes:--'I have seen both, and, indeed, served ten years in the
-latter district (Southern Mahratta), where the crooked stick is used
-by all the lower orders every Sunday during the hot season, when all
-agricultural labour is at a stand. The villagers turn out in large
-numbers, and scour the jungle armed with these sticks. Everything that
-rises is knocked over; deer, hares, birds, even the wild hog and the
-tiger are occasionally (though rarely, of course) included in the bag.
-I have seen a line of upwards of 100 men and boys, and the boomerang
-whirling about in such numbers, and with such precision, that even
-birds on the wing are brought down. I never met with any regularly
-formed specimens, except in the South; those in the North were mere
-angular sticks, of very various form, as natural branches occurred; the
-favourite form was a rather obtuse angle--nearly a right angle.' Thus,
-whether we regard the purposes for which it is used, the material of
-which it is constructed, the manner of throwing, or the varieties of
-its form, the Indian and Australian boomerang is virtually the same
-weapon; and I think those who dispute their identity appear rather to
-have had in view the 'collery stick' of Madras and of the Marawárs than
-the boomerang of the Kolis.
-
-We may therefore, I think, fairly consider the causes which may have
-led to the adoption of this weapon as sprung from a common source.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XVII.]
-
-Since my last communication to this Institution, Professor Huxley has
-given to the world, in a paper read at the meeting of the International
-Congress of Prehistoric Archaeology--of which I had the honour to be
-general secretary--in August, 1868, his views 'on the distribution of
-the races of mankind, as bearing on their antiquity'.[185] The paper
-created a considerable sensation in the scientific world, owing to the
-boldness of the generalizations contained in it, and, it may be added,
-a certain amount of opposition. The accompanying map (Plate XVII) is
-taken from one drawn by Professor Huxley himself for the Ethnological
-Society, to illustrate this subject (_Journ. Ethno. Soc._ (1870) N. S.
-ii. 404-12).
-
-Basing his distribution of the human race on the principle that the
-characters of the hair and complexion are more permanent, and of
-greater value as a means of classification, than the bony structure
-of man, Professor Huxley traces back the numerous varieties of tribes
-and races into what, for the present, may be regarded as four primary
-groups.
-
-Commencing, for the convenience of my present subject, with the
-highest, or those which have shown themselves most capable of
-development--which, in all probability, is the wrong end of the scale
-to begin with, if we regarded them in their natural succession--the
-first of these groups is what he terms Xanthochroid type (the
-distribution of which is marked [shading] in the map), a people
-characterized by yellow hair and fair complexions, with blue eyes, who
-form a strong element in the composition of the population of this
-country and a great part of Europe, extending from thence through
-Scandinavia and Central Europe eastward into Northern India. Next to
-these he classes the great Mongoloid race (marked by various shades
-of [shading] on the map), with yellow-brown complexions and black
-hair and eyes, of which the Kalmucs and Tartars represent the purest
-types, occupying the whole of Northern Europe and Asia, from Lapland
-to Behring Strait, and down to the southernmost parts of China;
-including also the Esquimaux, the Polynesians, and the whole of the
-inhabitants of the two continents of America. Thirdly, the Negro race
-(marked [shading] and [shading] in the map), long headed, with woolly
-hair, which has its head quarters in all that part of Africa south of
-the Sahara, but has outlying branches widely detached, and occupying
-a broken line of islands extending in a belt, from the Andaman Isles
-in the Bay of Bengal, to the peninsula of Malacca, New Guinea, New
-Caledonia, and the adjoining isles, and having its southmost limits in
-the distant island of Tasmania. Lastly, we come to the Australioid race
-(marked [shading]), distinguished by dark chocolate complexions and
-black eyes, with long heads and soft wavy hair; these the Professor,
-upon physiological grounds, and after intimate acquaintance with these
-people in the distant regions in which they are found, traces in
-three distinct portions of the globe, viz. Australia, the Deccan of
-India, and Egypt; the three identical countries, it will be observed,
-in which, unconscious of Professor Huxley's distribution of races, I
-had traced the occurrence of the boomerang. I think, therefore, it is
-not an unreasonable conjecture, assuming the correctness of Professor
-Huxley's premises, that this peculiar weapon may be a relic of the
-original Australioid stock, which having been originally an effective
-weapon for all purposes amongst the aborigines of this race, and
-continuing still to be used as such in Australia, survived in India
-and in ancient Egypt merely as an implement for the chase and for
-amusement, much in the same way that, in Europe, bows and arrows have
-survived amongst children to the present day.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XIX.]
-
-In the remarks which I made (p. 127) upon the varieties of the African
-boomerang, I drew attention to the peculiarly curved form of the Nubian
-and Abyssinian sword, and I ventured an opinion that its form may have
-been originally derived from that of the boomerang, of which weapon a
-variety, constructed of wood, is still in use by the inhabitants of
-the country; and I see no reason to doubt that the Abyssinian sword
-may have been the prototype of those numerous allied forms of iron
-weapons, the 'hunga-munga', &c., which throughout Africa are still used
-as missiles, and thrown with a rotatory motion like the boomerang. My
-conjecture on this subject appears to receive some confirmation from
-the very peculiar construction of one of these swords, which has lately
-been added to the museum of this Institution, and which is represented
-in Plate XIX, figure 1. The angular form of the blade, swelling in the
-middle, presents such a close affinity to the Australian boomerang, as
-to strike even those who have not been led, by the considerations I
-have mentioned, to look for a coincidence in these weapons. I noticed
-at the same time the very great resemblance between the rudimentary
-shields of the Australians and those of some of the inhabitants of the
-valley of the Upper Nile, which may also perhaps be accounted for in
-the same way. With a view of further connecting this primitive form
-of shield with similar defensive weapons in India, it is worthy of
-notice that the hand-shield, having antelopes' horns projecting from
-it, a representation of which was given in my first lecture, Plate X,
-figs. 66, 67_a_, and 69 (many of which are furnished with a small iron
-shield, or guard for the hand, though some are without this accessory),
-is used--Sir Walter Elliot now informs me--precisely in the same way
-as the Australian and African parrying-shields, viz. by catching the
-arrows and darts of the assailant, and parrying them off with the
-horns, thus favouring the conjecture that I ventured to put forward,
-that the square, oblong, and circular targets are defensive weapons of
-comparatively recent origin, being represented in a primitive stage of
-culture by a simple parrying-stick, derived originally from the club.
-The club is, as a general rule, the only defensive guard employed by
-races in the lowest stages of culture. These seem to have been replaced
-by parrying-sticks, held in the centre, and subsequently hollowed to
-receive the hand, or furnished with hand-guards, forming rudimentary
-shields; of which stage in the development of the weapon we are now
-able to establish connected traces in the three countries under
-consideration.
-
-If the comparisons which I have made, and the conclusions I have
-ventured to draw from them, are found to stand the test of further
-investigation, as it appears to me reasonable to hope they will, the
-importance of studying the forms and uses of these primitive weapons in
-connexion with other sociological and biological phenomena, as a means
-of tracing back the early history of mankind, will be well established.
-Of this, however, we may feel certain, that if a connexion formerly
-existed between the inhabitants of India, Australia, and Egypt, the
-evidence of such connexion will not be limited either to the colour
-of the hair and skin, or to the resemblance of their weapons, but
-will be found in other customs and institutions which they brought
-with them from their fatherland. The important generalizations of
-Professor Huxley, whether or not they ultimately hold good, have had
-the good effect of drawing attention to a comparison of the inhabitants
-of these countries; and though it would be foreign to my present
-purpose to anticipate the result of these investigations in other
-branches not immediately connected with my present subject, I may
-mention that officers acquainted with India and Australia have since
-pointed out resemblances in the hymeneal and other customs of those
-countries, which have not before been noticed, but which, when put
-together and compared, making all due allowance for the variations
-which are inevitable in the continuous development of all human arts
-and institutions, will, I doubt not, tend to give confirmation to the
-theory of races which the author of it has so ably advanced.
-
-Having strayed thus far into the geological and biological aspect of
-the question, it is necessary to go a step further in order to apply
-the subject more generally to the origin of weapons, and at the same
-time to point out some difficulties which stand in the way of accepting
-this theory of races--difficulties of which Professor Huxley himself
-appears by his paper to be fully sensible.
-
-The detached portions of the Australioid race are separated from each
-other by seas of considerable depth, and the same thing applies to the
-Negroid race. The Australians, he points out, though possessing ample
-materials for the construction of canoes, have never learnt to make
-any that are capable of traversing the great seas which separate them
-from their apparent kindred in other lands, and it is unlikely they
-should have forgotten the art of navigation if they had once known it.
-It is inconceivable, therefore, that they should have migrated from
-Australia to the Deccan, and to Egypt, during the existing geographical
-arrangement of sea and land, more especially as no trace of such
-migration is found upon intervening isles. He points out, however, that
-great geographical changes have probably taken place, and that those
-changes, in so far as our knowledge of them goes, are of a nature to
-account for the phenomena observed.
-
-The region of the negro race in Africa is separated from Northern
-Africa and from Europe by the desert of Sahara, of which there is
-geological evidence to show that it was sea at a recent geological
-period. The same applies to the Deccan of India, which is separated
-from the Himalaya by the great alluvial plains of the Indus and the
-Ganges, which, having probably formed a strait before the miocene
-epoch, may have divided the black men inhabiting the Deccan from the
-Xanthochroid and Mongoloid races to the north. At the same time large
-tracts now occupied by the sea may then have been land, uniting or
-connecting by a chain of easily accessible islands the regions in which
-men of the same colour and physical peculiarities are now found. But it
-will be seen by the map that the lines of distribution of two of the
-races, the Negroid and the Australioid, cross each other, and this,
-according to the theory of migration by land, appears to involve a
-succession of submersions and upheavals during the human period, which
-it is difficult to account for.
-
-The distribution of races, according to supposed original distinctions
-of colour and complexion, will be seized upon by polygenists as an
-argument in their favour; for it will be said that, according to this
-theory, the distinctions of race in the earliest times must have been
-as great, or greater, than they are at present.
-
-There are three ways in which it has been attempted to account for
-these early distinctions of colour and persistency of type--(1) by
-supposing the several races of man to have been separately created
-upon distinct continents of land; (2) by assuming that on each
-primaeval continent, man was evolved from the anthropoid apes of that
-continent;[186] or (3), by supposing that these divisions of race,
-remotely and immeasurably distant though they be, nevertheless carry us
-only a short way back into the history of man, and that still earlier
-ages, if we could penetrate them, would show the races of man united.
-
-Now, with respect to the first assumption, that of creation, though
-we are not, of course, in a position to deny the possibility of it,
-I confess it appears to me unwarranted by any of the phenomena of
-nature. We have no knowledge of the special creation of any organized
-being; and how can we scientifically assume as probable, that, for the
-probability of which there is no sort of evidence of a nature that
-inductive science would be warranted in building upon? Continuity and
-development are seen to be the order of the universe. Man is seen to
-be, both mentally and physically, amenable to that law; and on what
-grounds can we assume that he was ever an exception to it? I cannot
-conceive how those who believe geological changes to have been brought
-about by causes which are still in operation in our own day, and who
-make great calls upon time in order to reconcile those causes to the
-phenomena observed, can, in treating biological phenomena, advocate
-belief in so great a break in the observed order of the universe as is
-implied by the special creation of man. Still less willing am I, in
-the absence of more cogent argument than has ever yet been advanced
-in support of it, to assent to hypotheses of the separate development
-of races, which appears to me equally at variance with nature. There
-can be no doubt that all the existing races of man, whatever their
-colour and physical peculiarities, have greater affinity to each other
-than any of them have to the apes, or to any other class of animals.
-The tendency of progress is from simplicity to complexity, from unity
-to diversity, and it would be a complete inversion of the order of
-nature that animals so various as the apes should independently
-produce animals so much resembling each other as the races of man.
-The recognized law that, with certain variations, like begets like,
-appears to me to negative this assumption as fully as it would do
-the notion, if it were put forward, that because the horse and some
-other classes of the mammalia, say the rhinoceros, for instance, have
-some affinities in their bony structure, therefore the black horse is
-descended from the African rhinoceros, and the white horse from that
-of India. Moreover, all the races of mankind interbreed, and I am at a
-loss to understand how a circumstance like this, which throughout the
-animal kingdom is regarded as a proof of unity of species, should be
-discarded in its application to humanity. If, then, it is true that
-diversity of colour is as old as the very earliest traces of man, and
-there is evidence that the several coloured races were inhabitants of
-distinct continents, which have disappeared through geological changes
-dispersing and mixing the races, blending the colours and obliterating
-the traces of their formerly isolated homes; then to the same causes,
-which produced the mixing and the blending, we must also attribute the
-original separation. According to the view I hold, we must ask for more
-time, and still further geological changes, to bring them together
-again in the primaeval cradle of the human race.
-
-Now, to apply this reasoning to the origin of weapons. The only
-vestiges of the primaeval tools of mankind now left to us are those
-constructed of stone; others of the more perishable materials have
-decayed, and their representatives only have remained in some few
-cases as survivals. In my last lecture I showed how uniform in shape
-and in development these stone implements are found to be in all parts
-of the world, whether derived from the northern or southern continent
-of America, from Siberia, Australia, India, Africa, or the surface
-soils and river gravels of Europe. This uniformity of shape has been
-used as an argument that mankind must have independently designed the
-same forms of tools in various parts of the world, and that under
-like conditions, like forms will be produced by men, however remotely
-separated. I am not prepared to deny the possibility of some of these
-forms having had an independent origin; but if the proof of it is to be
-based upon the separation of continents, we see how entirely groundless
-such an argument is when applied to the earliest ages of humanity. For
-if, as has been conjectured, the races of man may have been dispersed
-by geographical changes of land and sea, it is obvious they may have
-carried with them, from some primal source, the art of manufacturing
-stone weapons; the resemblance of which is far more satisfactorily
-accounted for by this means[187] than by supposing such singular and
-invariable coincidence in design to be the result of independent
-discovery. As we contemplate man in his lower and lowest conditions,
-we find the imitative faculty stands out more and more prominently by
-the absence of those higher qualities which characterize civilized
-races; and whatever power of originality for the invention of new arts
-may have been possessed by the earliest inhabitants of the globe, its
-results appear to have been spread over so vast a lapse of time that it
-can scarcely be accounted at all as an element in the mental attributes
-of primaeval man.
-
-I now pass to what has been announced as the subject proper of my
-present communication, viz. the origin and development of metal tools.
-I use the word _metal_ intentionally, in preference to specifying
-bronze, because, although we have good reason for supposing that in
-Europe, Egypt, Assyria, and the central parts of America, bronze
-preceded iron as a material for weapons, it is not so certain that this
-was the case in all parts of Asia; and in Africa we know that iron was
-the first metal employed by the negroes.
-
-Perhaps no subject has given rise to so much difference of opinion
-amongst archaeologists as this question of the origin of metal
-implements, or has been accompanied with such uncertain results,
-owing to the great mass of conflicting evidence to be dealt with,
-and the great doubt which rests upon much of it, whether in regard
-to the casual mention of the subject in ancient authors, or to the
-often ill-directed researches of modern times. It would be hopeless,
-in the brief time allotted me on the present occasion, to attempt
-to throw fresh light on this intricate subject, even if I possessed
-the materials for so doing. All I shall endeavour to do is, to put
-together, in as intelligible a form as possible, some of the more
-salient points upon which archaeologists are divided, and trace the
-continuity observable in passing from the stone to the metal age.
-
-We have already seen, in speaking of the implements of the stone age,
-a gradual improvement in form and fabrication, developing itself in
-proportion as the wild animals which were contemporaneous with the
-first traces of man in Europe became extinct, partly, no doubt, through
-the efforts of man himself in exterminating them, and partly, as
-there seems reason to suppose, owing to an alteration of temperature,
-rendering the climate unsuited to the constitution and habits of
-those animals, which therefore migrated by degrees, and the majority
-of which are now found chiefly, though not exclusively, in arctic
-regions. Thither they have been accompanied by races of men whose
-arts and implements show them to be very nearly in a corresponding
-stage of civilization to the early races, the relics of which are
-found associated with the same animals in Europe. The simultaneous
-migration of races of men in the hunting stage of civilization, with
-the animals, the pursuit of which forms the almost sole occupation of
-their lives, is well shown in the case of the North American Indians,
-whose geographical distribution is now almost identical with that of
-the buffalo. This forms a strong point in the arguments of those who
-are disposed to attribute all the changes in the world's civilization
-to the influx and extermination of antagonistic races. But it must
-be remembered that progress advances in an increasing ratio, and the
-phenomenon now seen in America and Australia of a highly civilized
-race constantly fed by steam-communication from the Old World, driving
-before it and rapidly exterminating other races so vastly its inferior
-as the Australians and American Indians, is one which could have had no
-parallel at the early period of which I am now speaking. We must here
-look for a slower process, though doubtless the operating causes may,
-to a great extent, have been the same.
-
-The fabrication of stone implements would of itself lead by degrees
-to a knowledge of the metals which are contained in stones. Thus, for
-example, I have here a specimen of a stone mace-head from Central
-America, figure 2, Plate XIX, composed of a nodule of haematite
-partially coated with micaceous iron ore, the particles of which are
-distinctly visible on its glittering surface. The weight of this
-implement, being nearly double that of a mace-head composed of ordinary
-stone, would at once attract the notice of the savage fabricator, and
-lead him to investigate the uses of metal.
-
-But, as a general rule, races engaged exclusively in hunting, who
-rarely turn their attention to the ground except to examine a trail
-or to search for water, would have little opportunity of profiting by
-the mineral wealth of the soil over which they roamed. Witness the
-Australians, who have continued for ages in ignorance of the gold and
-other mines which are now so attractive to Europeans; or the North and
-South American Indians, and the Esquimaux, amongst whom the art of
-smelting metal has never been found associated with those races who are
-in a purely hunting stage of existence; the wrought metals used by such
-races to point their weapons being invariably derived from civilized
-sources.
-
-From hunting wild animals, the savage, in the natural sequence of
-progress, would turn his attention to their capture and domestication,
-and thus he creeps gradually into the pastoral life; and as the bones
-of animals under domestication, through want of exercise and good
-living, become smoother and of finer texture, the experienced anatomist
-is thereby afforded the means of distinguishing, amongst the vestiges
-of antiquity, the remains of domesticated animals from those derived
-from the chase, and of observing to what extent the domestication
-of animals was contemporaneous with other changes in the social
-condition of the people.[188] Still, however, in the pastoral state,
-the barbarian is not necessarily brought in contact with metals; and
-hence we should expect in many cases to find the traces of domesticated
-animals associated with people who are still in the stone age. This was
-notably the case amongst the ancient inhabitants of the Swiss lakes,
-where the sheep and horse have been found at Moosseedorf, and other
-lake habitations which are proved to belong to the stone age, though
-not in such abundance as in the settlements belonging to the bronze
-age.[189]
-
-From the pastoral life, the barbarian, hampered by his flocks and
-herds, and no longer obliged to wander in search of food, settles down
-to a more stationary life, and by degrees takes to agriculture. Then,
-for the first time, he digs into the soil, and becomes acquainted
-with its mineral treasures. It has been proved by the discovery of
-quantities of carbonized grains of wheat, lumped together, in the Swiss
-lake-habitations of the stone age, together with the materials for
-preparing it for food, that a knowledge of agriculture preceded the
-general employment of bronze in that region,[190] whilst in Britain,
-and in Denmark also, bronze is almost invariably associated with
-evidence of domestication and agriculture.
-
-The metals first employed would be those that are most attractive.
-Copper, in Europe, from the bright colour of its ores, would be noticed
-more readily than iron, which is often scarcely distinguishable from
-the soil, and requires greater temperature and more skilled labour to
-render it available than could be expected of a people emerging out
-of the savage state. It is not, therefore, surprising that in Europe,
-copper first, and subsequently its alloy, bronze, should have been
-employed before iron as a material for weapons. But in those countries
-where iron is found upon the surface in an attractive form, and in a
-condition to be easily wrought, we must for the same reason suppose
-that it would be used instead of copper in the earliest ages of
-metallurgy.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XVIII.
-
-DEVELOPMENT OF FORM IN CELTS OF COPPER, BRONZE AND IRON.]
-
-It is natural to suppose that, in the ordinary course of development,
-an age of pure copper must have intervened between the ages of stone
-and bronze. But implements of pure copper are comparatively rare,
-bronze being the metal almost invariably found following immediately
-upon the age of stone.[191] Notwithstanding the comparative rarity of
-copper tools, however, there is reason to believe that this metal was
-used in a pure state before the discovery of the alloy. According
-to Professor Max Müller, copper was the metal spoken of by Hesiod
-and Homer as the material generally employed for weapons in their
-time.[192] Mr. Rawlinson, in his _Five Ancient Monarchies_, says that
-the metallurgy of the early Chaldeans was of a very rude character,
-indicating a nation but just emerging from an almost barbaric
-simplicity, and that copper often occurs pure.[193] Copper implements,
-of a very early form, beaten into shape, occur not unfrequently in
-Ireland, as may be seen by specimens represented in Class A, Plate
-XVIII. They have also been found in Mecklenburg and in Denmark, and
-Klemm[194] says that they occur in Greece, Italy, Spain, Egypt, and
-Hindustan. At Maurach, in Switzerland, a copper celt was found in a
-lake dwelling, which Dr. Keller, notwithstanding this circumstance,
-attributes to the stone age.[195] In the lake dwelling of Peschiera,
-on the lake of Garda, several copper implements were discovered,[196]
-and in certain localities in Hungary copper implements are said to
-be as plentiful as those of bronze.[197] An axe of pure copper was
-discovered in Ratho Bog, near Edinburgh, under 20 feet of stratified
-sand and clay, and Dr. Wilson mentions that others have been found in
-Scotland.[198] Copper implements occur in Peru, to prove that, in the
-central parts of America also, the manufacture of bronze was preceded
-by the use of copper in a pure state; and in the ancient mines of Lake
-Superior we have distinct evidence of a stage of early metallurgy in
-which copper was used simply as a malleable stone, and beaten out into
-the form of implements without the aid of any alloy or a knowledge of
-the process of casting.[199] (See Plate XIX, figures 3, 4, 5, and 6.)
-When it is considered that without the admixture of a small portion
-of alloy of zinc or tin, copper is very difficult to melt, and can
-only be used by a laborious process of beating into form, and also
-what a great superiority bronze has over copper as a cutting material,
-whilst at the same time the process of fabrication is actually in some
-degree facilitated by the addition of tin, it is not surprising that
-on the first discovery of the advantages of this mixture, all the old
-implements of copper, wherever procurable, should have been taken to
-the melting-pot for conversion into bronze, and we should thus be left
-with such scanty evidence of the existence of an age of copper.
-
-Up to this point we meet with no difficulty in supposing that
-the use of metal may have been at first adopted by many nations
-independently, without intercourse one with another. But when we find
-in both hemispheres of the globe a very wide diffusion of weapons of
-bronze, consisting of a mixture of the same metals, which, though
-varying slightly in its proportions, as we shall afterwards see,
-is nevertheless, for the most part, constant in its adherence to a
-standard of about nine parts copper to one of tin in all parts of the
-world, the question arises whether the knowledge of this mixed metal
-could have been arrived at independently in different countries, or
-whether it must have been diffused all over the universe from a common
-source. It is true that copper and tin materials are sometimes found
-in the same locality, as, for instance, in Cornwall, the locality
-which, from the remotest time up to the present, has afforded the
-most plentiful supply of both metals perhaps in the world. We have
-evidence, also, that in ancient copper mines fire was employed by the
-miners for softening the metal and detaching it from the matrix,[200]
-and it is, therefore, highly probable that the admixture of the two
-metals occurring so close together, and a knowledge of the advantages
-accruing therefrom, may have been brought about accidentally in the
-process of mining.[201] But this connexion of the metals in a state
-of nature is not common, and in those countries, such as Denmark and
-Scandinavia, where bronze implements occur, and in which neither metal
-is found native, it is most improbable that the inhabitants should have
-discovered the merits of these particular ingredients, unless they had
-derived the knowledge of them from without.
-
-Hence we find archaeologists as much divided in their opinions upon
-what I may call the monogenesis or polygenesis of bronze, as biologists
-and anatomists are upon the monogenesis or polygenesis of the human
-race. The same question repeats itself again and again in dealing
-with the vestiges of the early history of man, and we may therefore
-divide the consideration of this question of the origin of bronze under
-pretty nearly the same heads to which I have adverted when speaking
-of the distribution of races, and of the age of stone (pp. 147-54).
-The questions to be considered may be numbered as follows:--(1) that
-bronze was spread from a common centre by an intruding and conquering
-race, or by the migration of tribes; (2) that the inhabitants of each
-separate region in which bronze is known to have been used discovered
-the art independently, and made their implements of it; (3) that the
-art was discovered, and the implements fabricated, on one spot, and
-the implements disseminated from that place by means of commerce; (4)
-that the art of making bronze was diffused from a common centre, but
-that the implements were constructed in the countries in which they are
-found.
-
-Amongst the advocates for the first hypothesis, viz. introduction by
-the intrusion of fresh races, are to be found chiefly the Scandinavian
-archaeologists, amongst whom may be especially mentioned Professors
-Worsaae, of Copenhagen[202], and Nilsson, of Stockholm. Both metals
-are foreign to the soil of Denmark, and must, therefore, have been
-imported. In the graves, bronze weapons are in Denmark invariably
-found with burials by cremation, while those of the stone age are
-by inhumation, the former being recognized, in an early stage of
-civilization, as a later process than burial by inhumation. Bronze is
-here markedly associated with traces of agriculture, the evidence
-of which is wanting in the stone age. The age of bronze, it is
-asserted by these antiquaries, was ushered in in Denmark by the
-employment of implements showing the highest perfection of art, and
-at a later period, when they are associated with weapons of iron,
-they are inferior in the quality of their workmanship. The weapons of
-bronze have remarkably small handles, denoting a smaller race, and
-hypothetically an eastern origin, small handles being to this day the
-characteristic of weapons from India. Some of the bronze spear-heads in
-Denmark have been found with nails driven into them, a practice which
-still exists in India, each nail denoting a victim; and in the Asiatic
-islands the custom of boring a hole in the weapon for each victim is
-found to the present time.[203] The peculiar ornamentation so often
-found on the bronze swords of Denmark, known as the spiral ornament,
-is said, though I think erroneously, to be of Phoenician origin. To
-these and other arguments for the introduction by intruding races,
-Professor Nilsson adds, that in the countries of the north, where
-bronze implements are found in greatest abundance, the graves in which
-they occur are usually situated in groups, proving that bronze was
-introduced, not by isolated individuals, merchants, or travellers, but
-by tribes or colonies more or less numerous, occupying especial tracts
-of country.
-
-The theory of race-origin is also not without its adherents in this
-country. Dr. Thurnam, who has excavated a large number of barrows in
-the south of England, divides them--as, indeed, they have been divided
-by former antiquaries--into several classes, amongst which we may
-chiefly distinguish two principal types, viz. the long and the round
-barrows. The former he attributes to the stone age, containing usually
-implements of that material, whilst implements of bronze are almost
-invariably found in the round barrows. He also gives it as the result
-of his researches, extending over some years of exploration--and Canon
-Greenwell, in so far as his experience of long barrows in the north
-of England goes, confirms the statement--that the long barrows are
-generally associated with dolichocephalic, or long skulls, whilst in
-the round barrows brachycephalic, or round skulls, are found, thus
-leading to the supposition that the long-headed people of the stone
-age who erected the long barrows may have been succeeded by another
-race with round heads importing bronze, and burying their dead in
-round barrows. But after having heard Dr. Thurnam's last papers
-on this subject, read before the Society of Antiquaries and other
-societies[204], I confess, although he has no doubt established a
-sequence, that he does not appear to me to have determined a clear
-line of separation between the two classes of interments; the long
-barrows pass by intermediate links into the round ones, and the long
-skull, although no doubt it may be considered characteristic of an
-earlier period, and therefore connected with an earlier form of
-barrow, also passes by gradations into the round skull, the variations
-of form being considerable. Then, with respect to the implements,
-although the absence of bronze in the long barrows of the earlier
-period appears to be determined, yet it is notorious to all those who
-have paid attention to the subject--and is not by any means denied
-by the learned antiquaries whose names I have mentioned--that the
-transition from stone to bronze in this country was gradual, and
-extended over a long period, flint weapons being found in nearly all
-the barrows of the bronze age in such positions as to show they were
-used contemporaneously by the same people; and from discoveries which
-have been made both by myself and others[205], there seems good reason
-to suppose that flint weapons continued to be used by some of the
-inhabitants of this country even during the Roman era. This distinction
-of long heads in long barrows, and round heads in round barrows, is
-one so easily remembered, that it is liable on this account, perhaps,
-to receive greater attention than it really deserves as a criterion
-of race. The difficulty of distinguishing in all cases the primary
-from the secondary interments in the barrows--it being an established
-fact that these barrows were used as places of burial by successive
-generations, and even perhaps by successive races, including also
-the Anglo-Saxons--the possible distortion of some of the crania by
-time and pressure, and the other facts of the case, as I believe I
-have correctly stated them, are, I think, sufficient to justify us in
-withholding for the present our entire acceptance of the theory of the
-introduction of bronze into this country by intruding races, as drawn
-from any evidence derived from the graves.
-
-From amongst those who have advocated the totally independent origin
-of bronze, the opinion of Professor Daniel Wilson may be selected,
-as affording a most ingenious argument derived from an analysis of
-the metals.[206] He quotes some experiments conducted by Dr. George
-Pearson, and communicated by him to the Royal Society of London
-in 1796, to ascertain the results of various proportions of the
-ingredients of tin and copper in bronze. 'Having fused these metals
-in various united proportions, commencing with 1 part of tin to 20
-parts of copper, which produced a dark-coloured bronze, he reduced
-the proportion gradually to 15 parts of copper to 1 of tin, when the
-colour was materially affected, and the red copper hue was no longer
-seen, but an alloy of greater strength was produced. The experiments
-were continued with 12, 10, 9, 8, and 7 parts of copper to 1 of
-tin, and when the last fusion of the metals was tested, increased
-hardness and brittleness of the metals became very apparent. The same
-characteristics were still more marked on successively reducing the
-proportions of copper to 6, 5, 4, and 3; and when alloy was made of 2
-parts of copper to 1 of tin, it was, according to Dr. Pearson's report,
-as brittle as glass.'
-
-From the result of these experiments we see that the best average
-proportions, of about 9 parts of copper to 1 of tin, would invariably
-show itself by a practical experience in the use of these ingredients,
-and it is therefore unnecessary to assume that these particular
-proportions, when found in the bronzes of different countries, must
-necessarily have been communicated.
-
-Dr. Wilson then proceeds to give the results of analyses of ancient
-bronzes discovered in Europe, America, and elsewhere, contained in the
-accompanying tables. And he concludes his observations on the subject
-as follows:--
-
-'From the varied results which so many independent analyses disclose,
-varying, as they do, from 79 to 94 per cent, of copper, or more than
-the total amount of the supposed constant ratio of tin, besides the
-variations in the nature, as well as the quantity of their ingredients'
-(a proportion of lead will be seen in some of the analyses of European
-bronzes, the small proportion of iron being probably accidental), 'it
-is abundantly obvious that no greater uniformity is traceable than
-such as might be expected to result from the experience of isolated
-and independent metallurgists, very partially acquainted with the
-chemical properties of the standard alloy, and guided for the most
-part by practical experience derived from successive results of their
-manufacture.' The comparison of the two tables here given, from
-Professor Wilson's work, also shows a smaller average amount of tin in
-the American bronze (Table I) than in that of ancient Europe (Table II).
-
-
-TABLE I.--ANALYSES OF ANCIENT AMERICAN BRONZES
-
- --------------------------+---------+-----------------+-------+-----+-----+
- Object. |Locality.| Observer. |Copper.| Tin.|Iron.|
- --------------------------+---------+-----------------+-------+-----+-----+
- 1 Chisel from Silver Mines|Cuzco |Humboldt |94.0 |6.0 | |
- 2 Chisel " " |Cuzco |Dr. J. H. Gibbon |92.385 |7.615| |
- 3 Knife " " |Atacama |J. H. Blake, Esq.|97.870 |2.130| |
- 4 Knife | | Ditto |96.0 |4.0 | |
- 5 Crowbar |Chili |Dr. T. C. Jackson|92.385 |7.615| |
- 6 Knife |Amaro |Dr. H. Croft |95.664 |3.965|0.371|
- 7 Perforated Axe | | Ditto |96.0 |4.0 | |
- 8 Personal Ornament |Truigilla|T. Ewbank, Esq. |95.440 |4.560| |
- 9 Bodkin from Female Grave| | Ditto |96.70 |3.30 | |
- --------------------------+---------+-----------------+-------+-----+-----+
-
-
-TABLE II.--ANALYSES OF ANCIENT EUROPEAN BRONZES
-
- ----------------+--------------+----------------+-------+-----+-----+-----
- Object. | Locality. | Observer. |Copper.|Tin. |Lead.|Iron.
- ----------------+--------------+----------------+-------+-----+-----+-----
- 1 Lituus |Lincolnshire |Dr. G. Pearson, | 88.0 |12.0 | |
- | | F.R.S., Phil. | | | |
- | | Trans. | | | |
- 2 Anglo-Roman | | Ditto ditto | 86.0 |14.0 | |
- Patellae | | | | | |
- 3 Spear-Head | | Ditto ditto | 86.0 |14.0 | |
- 4 Scabbard |Danish? | Ditto ditto | 90.0 |10.0 | |
- 5 Axe-Head |Ireland | Ditto ditto | 91.0 | 9.0 | |
- 6 Axe-Palstave |Cumberland | Ditto ditto | 91.0 | 9.0 | |
- 7 Axe-Head | | Ditto ditto | 88.0 |12.0 | |
- 8 Bronze Vessel|Cambridgeshire|Professor Clark,| 88.0 |12.0 | |
- | | M.D. | | | |
- 9 Sword |France |Mongez, Mémoires| 87.47 |12.53| |
- | | de l'Institut | | | |
- 10 Caldron |Berwickshire |G. Wilson, M.D.,| 92.89 | 5.15| 1.78|
- | | Prehist. | | | |
- | | Ann. Scot. | | | |
- 11 Sword |Duddingstone | Ditto ditto | 88.51 | 9.30| 2.30|
- 12 Kettle |Berwickshire | Ditto ditto | 88.22 | 5.63| 5.88|
- 13 Axe-Head |Mid-Lothian | Ditto ditto | 88.5 |11.12| 0.78|
- 14 Caldron |Duddingstone | Ditto ditto | 84.8 | 7.19| 8.53|
- 15 Palstave |Fifeshire | Ditto ditto | 81.19 |18.31| 0.75|
- 16 Sword |Ireland |Professor Davy, | 88.63 | 8.54| 2.83|
- | | Prehist. | | | |
- | | Ann. Scot. | | | |
- 17 Sword | | Ditto ditto | 83.50 | 5.15| 8.35| 3.0
- 18 Sword |Thames |J. A. Phillips, | 89.69 | 9.58| | 0.33
- | | F.G.S., &c. | | | |
- 19 Sword |Ireland | Ditto | 85.62 |10.02| | 0.44
- 20 Celt | | Ditto | 90.68 | 7.43| 1.28|
- 21 Axe-Head | | | 90.18 | 9.81| |
- 22 Axe-Head | | Ditto | 89.33 | 9.19| | 0.33
- 23 Celt | | Ditto | 83.61 |10.79| 3.20| 0.58
- 24 Celt |King's County,|Dr. Donovan, | 85.23 |13.11| 1.14|
- | Ireland | Chem. Gazette | | | |
- 25 Drinking-Horn| | | 79.34 |10.87| 9.11|
- 26 Bronze Vessel|Ireland |Mr Gibbon, | 88.0 |12.0 | |
- | | U.S. Mint | | | |
- 27 Wedge | | Ditto | 94.0 | 5.9 | | 0.1
- ----------------+--------------+----------------+-------+-----+-----+-----
-
-This argument, however, is defective when taken to determine the
-question of the origin of bronze in favour of independent discovery,
-for we have already seen, in speaking of the stone age,--and I have
-endeavoured to show that it is a peculiarity observable in the works of
-all savage and barbarous races,--that being devoid of rule or measure,
-and having very imperfect means of securing adherence to a uniform
-standard, their productions are characterized by incessant variations,
-even in cases where the first idea is known to have been derived from
-a common source. The variations here shown to exist in the composition
-of bronze are no greater than are capable of being accounted for by
-the universal prevalence of a law of variation, resulting from many
-causes, and amongst others from want of precision, and carelessness,
-which is a defect common alike to all tyros in their art, whether
-ancient or modern. It is a fault we have many of us to complain of
-almost daily in our cooks. A batter pudding is composed of milk, flour,
-and eggs, in proper proportions, but a careless cook will constantly
-vary her proportions, and will fail in adjusting her quantities to
-the total amount; but we must not, on that account, assume that each
-cook has invented the art of making batter puddings independently.
-So, in like manner, it is quite consistent with the facts observed
-even in America, to suppose that the first knowledge of bronze, and of
-those many features in the civilization of the Mexicans and Peruvians
-which present such striking analogies to the civilization of Egypt,
-may have been originally communicated by some casual wanderer or some
-shipwrecked castaway from the then centres of Eastern culture (for the
-theory of geographical changes is, of course, out of the question when
-speaking of the origin of bronze), and that they have varied in their
-development on American soil no more than might naturally be expected
-from their introduction to an entirely new and partially civilized
-race. Such an assumption, though difficult to account for, and wanting
-in evidence, is more in accordance with the well-known traditions of
-the Mexicans and Peruvians, who attribute their civilization to the
-advent of a god; or with that of the natives of Nootka Sound, on the
-north-west, who state that an old man entered the bay, in a copper
-canoe, with paddles of copper, and that the Nootkans by that means
-acquired a knowledge of that metal.
-
-As illustrations of the modern metal-work of the natives of Nootka
-Sound and its neighbourhood, several examples are given in Plate
-XIX, figs. 7 to 11. Figures 7 and 8 represent two sides of an iron
-dagger in the Museum of the Royal United Service Institution. The
-ornamentation on the handle is that of the natives of the country, but
-the workmanship of the blade, which is ribbed on one side, appears
-to indicate foreign manufacture. Figures 9 and 10 are two sides of a
-copper dagger of the same form; this specimen is now in the Belfast
-Museum, in which it was deposited in the year 1843 by Mr. A. Thompson,
-who brought it from the north-west coast of America, and described it
-as having been fabricated by the Flathead Indians; it is undoubtedly
-of native workmanship; in both these weapons one side of the blade and
-handle is concave, the other convex, a form which appears to denote
-that it was originally taken from some similar weapon of bone or cane.
-The nearest approach to the form of this weapon in bone, that I am
-aware of, is that of the Indian 'kandjar', a figure of which was given
-in my first lecture on Primitive Warfare, Plate X, fig. 63. This weapon
-has also one concave and one convex side, derived from the natural
-curvature of the bone out of which it is made.
-
-But putting aside American civilization, which, it must be admitted,
-does in the existing state of our knowledge present great difficulties
-in the way of those who advocate the theory of a common origin for
-bronze, and turning our attention to the eastern hemisphere, we find
-the evidence on this point more satisfactory. We may observe, in
-the first place, that the area over which bronze has been used for
-implements appears, in so far as we have at present been able to trace
-it, to be continuous, extending over the greater part of Europe, Egypt,
-Assyria, and some parts of Siberia, India, and China, from which latter
-country some few bronze weapons have lately been added to the British
-Museum. Mr. Theobald, of the Geological Survey of India, also mentions
-in a paper read to the Bengal Asiatic Society,[207] that bronze axes
-are found in the valley of the Irrawaddy, where they are held in such
-veneration as rarely to be procurable; and Sir Walter Elliot has
-shown me some bronze implements which he found deep beneath the soil
-in cutting a canal in the valley of the Ganges. Bronze is wanting in
-Africa; in America, with the exception of Peru and Mexico; in the
-north of Sweden and Norway, and, I believe, in the greater part of
-the northern districts of Russia and Siberia, though with regard to
-Russian and Siberian bronzes, our information is still very deficient.
-And here I may observe that I speak only of bronze as applied to tools
-and weapons; its use for other purposes may have been introduced at
-any subsequent period of the world's history; but the presence of a
-bronze weapon implies either total ignorance, or at least an imperfect
-knowledge of the means of hardening the more useful metal for this
-purpose, iron.
-
-Those who wish for more detailed information as to the evidence upon
-which the succession of the stone, bronze, and iron ages has been
-determined, would do well to refer to Sir John Lubbock's remarks upon
-this subject in _Prehistoric Times_. It may, however, be useful to
-enumerate briefly some of the chief points which have been adduced
-in support of the opinion that the employment of these materials
-corresponds to successive stages in the development of civilization in
-Europe. (1) Not only do the Roman writers mention iron as being the
-metal used by them in their time, but they also speak of its employment
-by the barbarian nations of the north, with whom they came in contact,
-and the word 'ferrum', _iron_, was with the Romans synonymous with
-sword. (2) Although numerous finds of iron implements of the Roman
-period have been discovered in various parts of the world, there has
-been no authentic and undoubted instance of a weapon of bronze having
-been found associated with them, or with Roman pottery or coins. (3)
-Bronze implements are most abundant in Denmark and Ireland, countries
-which were never invaded by Roman armies, whilst they are exceedingly
-rare in Italy. (4) The ornamentation of the bronze implements is not
-Roman, but pre-Roman in character. (5) On the other hand, the numerous
-finds of bronze weapons which have been discovered have never been
-associated with iron, except in cases where the nature of the iron
-implements shows them to have belonged to a period of transition. (6)
-The pottery associated with bronze-finds is superior to that found
-with stone implements, but inferior to that of the iron age, and the
-potter's wheel was unknown during the stone and bronze ages. (7) Silver
-is found associated with iron, but rarely if ever with stone or bronze.
-(8) No coins or inscriptions of any kind have been found with bronze
-implements. (9) In the Swiss lakes, settlements associated with stone
-and bronze have been found near each other, as for instance Moosseedorf
-and Nidau, 15 miles apart; in the former, bronze is entirely absent;
-in the latter, it was used not only for articles of luxury, such as
-might denote a more wealthy class, but also for implements of common
-use, such as fish-hooks, pins, &c.; it is improbable that so marked
-a contrast in the civilization of two settlements so close to each
-other should have existed during the same period. (10) The implements
-and ornaments of the bronze-finds are more varied in form, showing
-an advance in art upon those appertaining to the stone age. (11) The
-bronze-finds are marked by an increase in the number of domesticated
-animals, and an entire absence of some of the wild animals of the
-earlier period, and they are also more clearly associated with traces
-of agriculture. (12) In the Danish peat bogs, successive strata are
-found overlying each other, denoting changes in the vegetation of the
-country; in the lowest and earliest are found the remains of pine
-trees, which now are foreign to the soil; above which are strata in
-which oak was the prevailing tree, and at the present time the oaks
-have been superseded by beeches. These successive strata correspond
-in a general way to successive stages in the civilization of the
-inhabitants; in the pine-bearing strata, implements of stone are found;
-with the oak trees, implements of bronze, and higher up, implements of
-iron. It has also been attempted to trace a somewhat similar succession
-of periods in the gravels and alluvium of the torrent of Tinière,
-in Switzerland; but the evidence in this case is not considered so
-satisfactory as in that of the Danish peat bogs.
-
-In Chaldea, the transition from stone to bronze has been traced by
-the relics found in the soil; iron being then used only in small
-quantities, and chiefly for ornaments, as amongst the ancient Britons
-in the time of Caesar.[208] In Egypt, where both bronze and iron
-weapons have been found in the tombs, the transition from bronze to
-iron is marked by the colour of the weapons in the paintings, and
-dates, according to Sir Gardner Wilkinson, about B.C. 1400. Hesiod
-speaks of an age of copper, when the 'black iron did not exist'. Homer
-also alludes frequently to copper or bronze implements, and when iron
-is mentioned always speaks of it as requiring much time and labour to
-fabricate it. Then we have the well-known passage from Lucretius, so
-often quoted in reference to this subject, in which the three ages of
-stone, bronze, and iron are mentioned;[209] and Strabo mentions the
-Lusitanians as being armed partly with copper or bronze weapons.[210]
-
-Many other quotations might be given from ancient authors to prove that
-the existence of a bronze age preceding the use of iron was known to
-the ancients, but I will not occupy your time further with this part
-of the subject, seeing that others far more competent to deal with
-it than myself have failed to derive much information of value from
-this source. There is often considerable difficulty in determining
-the exact meaning of the writers, when speaking of the material of
-which weapons are composed, the same word being sometimes used to
-express copper, bronze, and iron. In fact it may, I think, safely be
-said that, notwithstanding the large amount of useful information that
-may be obtained from the study of the early writers, there is no more
-fruitful source of error than the attempt to apply ancient history and
-tradition to the elucidation of prehistoric events. Modern science, and
-our fuller appreciation of the value of evidence, have thrown far more
-light on prehistoric times than ever fell to the lot of the ancients;
-and it is for us, therefore, to correct their errors, and not to be
-misled by them.
-
-Professor Max Müller, in the second series of his _Science of
-Language_, has, however, drawn some important conclusions on this
-subject, from the etymology of words representing metal, of which
-it may be useful here to give a brief abstract. Quoting Mr. E. B.
-Tylor's work on the Anahuac (p. 140), he says: 'The Mexicans called
-their own copper or bronze _tepuztli_, which is said to have meant
-originally _hatchet_; the same word is now used for iron, with which
-the Mexicans first became acquainted through their intercourse with
-the Spaniards. _Tepuztli_ then became a general name for metal, and
-when copper had to be distinguished from iron, the former was called
-red _tepuztli_, and the latter black _tepuztli_. The conclusion,'
-he says, 'which we may draw from this, viz. that Mexican was spoken
-before the introduction of iron into Mexico, is one of no great value,
-because we know it from other sources'; but applying the same line of
-reasoning to Greek, he says, 'here, too, _chalkós_, which at first
-meant copper, came afterwards to mean metal in general, and _chalkeús_,
-originally a copper-smith, occurs in the Odyssey (ix. 391) in the sense
-of a blacksmith, or worker of iron.' What does this prove? It proves
-that Greek was spoken before the introduction of iron. The name for
-copper is shared in common by Latin and the Teutonic languages, _æs_,
-Latin; _aiz_, Gothic; _êr_, old high German; _erz_, modern German;
-_âr_, Anglo-Saxon; and the same word is represented in our English
-word _ore_. But the words specifically used for iron differ in each
-of the principal branches of the Aryan family. At the same time the
-words originally representing copper come to be used for metal in
-general, and in some cases for iron. In Sanskrit, _ayas_, which is
-the same word as _æs_, came to be used for iron, a distinction being
-made between dark _ayas_ or iron, and bright _ayas_ or copper. _Æs_ in
-Latin, and _aiz_ in Gothic, came to be used for metal in general, but
-was never used for iron. _Aiz_, however, according to Grimm, gave rise
-to the Gothic word _eisarn_, meaning iron. In old high German _eisarn_
-is changed into _îsarn_, later to _îsan_, and lastly to the modern
-_eisen_, while the Anglo-Saxon _îsern_ is converted into _îren_, and
-ultimately to _iron_. The learned Professor sums up his researches on
-this subject as follows:--'We may conclude,' he says, 'that Sanskrit,
-Greek, Latin, and German were spoken before the discovery of iron, that
-each nation became acquainted with that most useful of all metals after
-the Aryan family was broken up, and that each of the Aryan languages
-coined its name for iron from its own resources, and marked it by its
-own national stamp, while it brought the names for gold, silver, and
-copper from the common treasury of their ancestral home'.[211]
-
-These remarks point to a very remote period, and to an Aryan origin for
-the first knowledge of copper and bronze, but on the other hand much
-has been written in favour of a Semitic origin, especially by Professor
-Nilsson, who believes that he has discovered traces of that people even
-on the coast of Norway.[212]
-
-The employment of war chariots, which are known to have been used by
-the Britons, and vestiges of which have been found in their graves,
-implies, it is said, Semitic influence. Much stress is also laid upon
-the resemblance of some of the ornaments found on the Danish and other
-bronzes to those in use by the Phoenicians; more especially the spiral
-ornaments, which Professor Nilsson traces to that source through the
-engravings on weapons in the bronze age tumuli. Against this, however,
-it may be urged that the spiral ornament has a very wide distribution,
-extending over modern Africa, ancient Egypt, Greece, China, New Guinea,
-Mexico, and South America, and even to New Zealand and the Asiatic
-Isles. In illustration of this I have arranged upon Plate XIX a series
-of illustrations of spiral ornament from various countries, showing
-how universally it is distributed over the globe. Fig. 12 is from a
-New Zealand canoe in my collection; Fig. 13, from a club brought from
-New Guinea by the commander of the 'Rattlesnake', in 1849, and now
-in my collection; Fig. 14, from China; Fig. 15, from ancient Egypt;
-Fig. 16, from Greece; Fig. 17, from a Danish bronze sword; Fig. 18,
-from an Irish bronze brooch in my collection; Fig. 19, from the Swiss
-lakes, figured in Dr. Keller's work; Fig. 20, an iron ornament in my
-collection from Central Africa; Fig. 21, an iron ornament on a club,
-from the Bight of Benin, West Africa, in the Christy Collection; Fig.
-22, an ornament on a wooden arrow-head, in the Christy Collection,
-probably from one of the Melanesian isles; Fig. 23, from Hallstatt;
-Fig. 24, a cane arrow-head from the Amazons, South America; Fig.
-25, a spindle-whirl from Mexico; Fig. 26, on a bronze shield from
-the Caucasus; Fig. 27, an ornament on a bracelet from Hindustan, in
-the British Museum; Fig. 28, an ornament carved upon the stones of
-New Grange, in Ireland; Fig. 29, from a New Zealand canoe. Compare
-the two last figures with Fig. 30, a stone weight in my collection,
-lately fished up on the coast of Kent, whilst dredging for whelks; the
-ornamentation so closely resembles the New Zealand pattern, and at
-the same time that of the stone carvings of the European tumuli, that
-considering the circumstance of its discovery, it is purely a matter
-for conjecture whether it is to be referred to the antiquities of
-this country, or has been dropped overboard by some vessel returning
-from our South Pacific colonies. We see from these examples that the
-spiral ornament cannot be regarded as belonging exclusively to any one
-race; it is a contrivance derived simply from the coil of string, the
-source from which, and also from straw plaiting, nearly all barbaric
-ornamentation had its origin; it is a proof merely of barbaric origin,
-an evidence of continuity from the earliest periods of art.
-
-Mr. Franks in his remarks at the Paris Meeting of the International
-Congress of Prehistoric Archaeology, has summarily disposed of the
-question of Phoenician ornamentation, by observing that the Phoenicians
-were copyists, taking their style from Egypt, Greece, or Rome,
-according to the fashion of the period, and that in point of fact a
-Phoenician style of art has never existed (_Compte Rendu, II^{me}
-Session_, Paris, 1868, p. 251).
-
-Amongst those who have upheld the theory of the origin of bronze from
-Phoenician sources, may be mentioned Mr. Howorth, in a paper lately
-published in the _Transactions of the Ethnological Society_ (1868,
-N.S., vol. vi. pp. 73-100); and Sir John Lubbock, though not committing
-himself to the same view as regards the origin of bronze, has
-nevertheless been at the pains of ably defending the ancient authors
-who speak of Phoenician intercourse with Britain from the attacks made
-upon them by Sir George Cornewall Lewis (_Prehistoric Times_, 1869, pp.
-59-69).
-
-This being the existing state of our knowledge in regard to the
-introduction of bronze, and the variety of opinion on the subject
-being, as we have seen, considerable, the task before us will be to
-ascertain as far as may be possible, from the implements themselves,
-the history of their origin, by examining carefully their construction
-in the various regions in which they occur, and by tracing the
-geographical distribution of those details of form which show evidence
-of connexion; thereby to determine, if possible, the sources from which
-they were derived. Whatever degree of veracity we may be disposed to
-attribute to early history, we must at least admit that the implements
-have this advantage over written testimony of any kind, that they
-cannot intentionally mislead us. If we draw wrong inferences from them,
-the fault is our own. We shall find the evidence very fragmentary as
-yet, but sufficient to prove that it affords a valuable source of
-information whenever sufficient materials are collected to enable us
-to work out the problem to its legitimate ends.
-
-On the present occasion I propose to confine my remarks to showing, by
-means of the accompanying table (Plate XVIII), the distribution of some
-of the commoner varieties of the copper and bronze celt, an instrument
-which, like its prototype in stone, appears to have been employed both
-as tool and as weapon for all the various purposes to which it was
-capable of being turned, and to have been used not merely as a hatchet
-and battle-axe, but also to have been sometimes hafted on the end of a
-straight handle, to be used as a spud or crowbar, and even perhaps, as
-some of the forms appear to indicate, as a spade in tilling the ground.
-
-The table is arranged upon the same plan as Plate XIII of my last
-lecture, and is intended to serve as a continuation of Plate XII of
-the same lecture, showing a further development of the same weapon.
-The successive developments are arranged, in order, by classes from
-left to right; the several localities are separated by horizontal
-dotted lines, by means of which are seen the various types prevalent in
-each locality, in so far as I have been able to obtain drawings from
-published sources; there can be no doubt, however, that the table is
-still very imperfect, and that considerable additions may be made to
-it hereafter. On the left, in Class A, will be found celts with convex
-surfaces, identical in form to those constructed of stone, the relative
-antiquity of which is shown by their being almost invariably of pure or
-nearly pure copper. It has been suggested that this form may have been
-adopted on account of its being more easily produced by beating the
-copper, and that its resemblance to the stone celts is not necessarily
-a proof of age; but there is no reason why Class B should not be as
-easily formed as Class A by this means, and many are so formed, as may
-be seen in the table. Moreover, Fig. 3 _a_ is a _bronze_ celt of the
-earlier form, taken from _Prehistoric Times_, and as this must have
-been cast in a mould, its peculiar shape can only be accounted for
-by supposing it to have been constructed in imitation of the stone
-celts. In passing from Class B, a gradual development of form may be
-traced, commencing with a slight stop or ridge across, and rudimentary
-flanges along the side of the shaft of the blade, developing in
-size and improving in form, no doubt, as the art of casting bronze
-became gradually perfected.[213] These stops and flanges are at first
-raised on the surface of the blade, but by degrees the same purpose
-is effected by sinking a groove in the blade to receive the handle,
-thereby economizing the metal, and producing a more symmetrical form;
-the flanges were at the same time bent over, and ultimately cast with
-a cavity on each side to receive the handle, and obviate the necessity
-for binding on the celt with thongs. This led by degrees to the
-ultimate perfection of the weapon, by the introduction of the socket
-type, which is associated with weapons of iron, and is sometimes itself
-constructed of that metal.
-
-The order of development here adopted is in the main that followed by
-Sir William Wilde, in his _Catalogue of the Museum of the Royal Irish
-Academy_, but I have omitted all mention of branch varieties, as they
-do not serve my purpose of illustrating the continuity of development,
-though they are valuable in showing the connexion between localities.
-
-Although the course of development appears to have followed the
-order here indicated, it is not unlikely the earlier forms may have
-continued in use, and may even have continued to be constructed at the
-same time as the later forms. The earlier and less complicated types,
-being easier of construction, and being equally serviceable for some
-purposes, would continue to be made, in the same way that smooth-bores
-and rifle-barrels, row-boats, sailing-vessels, and steam-packets,
-continue to be used simultaneously in our own time.
-
-The progress of development of this weapon will be better understood by
-a detailed reference to the figures.
-
-
-_Reference to the Figures in Plate XVIII._[214]
-
-COPPER, BRONZE, AND IRON CELTS.
-
-CLASS A.--Copper celts from various localities, having convex surfaces,
-in form resembling those of stone.--Figs. 1, 2, and 3, from Ireland,
-_in my collection_.--Fig. 3 _a_, a bronze celt of the same form, from
-Le Puy, France, _Prehistoric Times_, p. 27.--Fig. 4, copper celt
-found at Blengow, Mecklenberg-Schwerin Museum; _Horae Ferales_.--Fig.
-5, copper celt from the lake dwellings of Sipplingen, Switzerland,
-found embedded in a coating of clay (a mould?). See Keller, _The Lake
-Dwellings of Switzerland_, (transl. J. E. Lee, 1866), p. 121, Plate
-xxix.--Fig. 6, copper celt found in an Etruscan tomb, and now in the
-Berlin Museum. See _Catalogue of the Royal Irish Academy_, 'Bronze,'
-pp. 367, 395.
-
-CLASS B.--Copper and bronze celts from various localities, having flat
-concave sides, and a rectangular cross section, showing a gradual
-enlargement of the cutting edge.--Figs. 7 to 12, copper celts from
-Ireland, _in my collection_, showing a gradual enlargement of the
-cutting edge.--Figs. 13, 14, 15, ditto, _ditto_, of bronze, the
-sides more concave, and the cutting edge more expanded.--Fig. 16,
-bronze celt, of similar form, from Denmark (Madsen, _Afbildninger
-af Danske Oldsager og Mindesmærker_, Copenhagen, 1872, Heft iii,
-Fig. 1).--Fig. 17, copper celt from Steinfurt, in the collection of
-Professor Dieffenbach, at Friedberg, Lindenschmit, _Die Alterthümer
-unserer heidnischen Vorzeit_ (Mainz, 1864 ff.), Plate 3.--Fig. 18,
-ditto of copper, found near Mainz, Museum of Mainz, _Lindenschmit_,
-Plate 3.--Fig. 19, the same form of bronze, from near Mainz,
-_Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 20, the same form of bronze from Italy, _British
-Museum_.[215]--Figs. 21, 22, 23, the same form of copper from Hungary,
-_Keller_, p. 219, Plate lxviii.--Figs. 24, 25, 26, similar forms of
-bronze, with rectangular holes, from the Island of Thermia, Greek
-Archipelago, _British Museum_.
-
-CLASS C.--Bronze celts of the same outline as Class B, but having a
-cross ridge or stop on both faces, to prevent the blade from burying
-itself in the handle.--Figs. 27, 28, bronze celts from Ireland, _in my
-collection_; this form is common to the British Isles.
-
-CLASS D.[216]--Bronze celts, having four longitudinal ridges or
-flanges, one on each edge, but no cross stop. The flanges are for the
-purpose of fixing the blade in a bent handle; they exhibit a gradual
-development of the flange, and an expansion of the cutting edge, which
-latter takes a semicircular, and in some cases nearly a circular
-form.--Figs. 29, 30, from Ireland, _in my collection_, showing front
-view and section.--Fig. 31, from Versailles, _in my collection_, with
-section.--Fig. 32, from France; with side view; see _Matériaux pour
-l'Histoire de l'Homme_.--Fig. 33, from Loyette, Department of Isère,
-from _Horae Ferales_, front view.--Fig. 34, from the South of France,
-_British Museum_, the blade very circular.--Fig. 35, from Alps [Aps?],
-in Ardèche, _British Museum_, the circular form of the blade still
-more developed. This form appears peculiar to the neighbourhood of
-the Rhone, _Horae Ferales_.--Fig. 36, from France; with side view;
-_Matériaux_.--Fig. 37, from Denmark, _British Museum_, of copper; this
-form is rarely found in copper; with section.--Fig. 38, from Denmark,
-of bronze, from _Madsen_, Heft iii.--Fig. 39, from Denmark, with
-semicircular blade, _Madsen_, Heft iii.--Fig. 40, from Hessen, now in
-the collection at Hanover, _Lindenschmit_, Heft i, Taf. iii.--Fig. 41,
-from near Baltringen, _Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 42, from Neinheiligen, in
-Thuringia, _British Museum_; with section.--Fig. 43, from the Terramara
-Beds, Castione, Switzerland; with section; _Keller_, Plate lix.--Fig.
-44, from Unter Uhldingen; with section; _Keller_, Plate xxix.--Fig.
-45, from the Terramara Beds, Castione; with section; _Keller_, Plate
-lix.--Fig. 46, from the Terramara Beds, Castione; with section;
-_Keller_, Plate lix.--Fig. 47, from Hallstatt, in Austria, von Sacken,
-_Das Grabfeld von Hallstatt in Oberösterreich und dessen Alterthümer_
-(Vienna, 1868), Taf. vii; with side view.--Fig. 48, ditto, _ditto_,
-found with the body of a child.--Fig. 49, ditto, the shaft of bronze,
-and the blade of iron, from Hallstatt.--Fig. 50, the same form in iron,
-also from Hallstatt, _in Mr. John Evans' collection_.--Figs. 51 and
-52, similar forms, in bronze, from Italy, _British Museum_.--Fig. 53,
-the same form, from Telsch, Vilna, Russia, _British Museum_; with two
-sections.
-
-CLASS E.--Bronze celts having both the cross stop and the longitudinal
-flanges. In the earliest form, the cross stop and flanges are raised
-upon the faces of the blade, as in Class D. In the more improved form,
-the upper part of the shaft of the blade is hollowed so as to answer
-the same purpose and economize the metal. Figs. 54-8, from Ireland;
-Fig. 54, with rudimentary stop and flanges, _in my collection_. Figs.
-55 and 56, ditto, with rudimentary stop, the flanges more developed;
-_in my collection_. Fig. 57, showing a development of both stop and
-flange, ditto, _ditto_. Fig. 58, showing the stop and flange further
-developed, and the metal of the upper part of the blade slightly sunk,
-ditto, _ditto_. Fig. 59, a further development of the same, the metal
-of the upper part of the shaft of the blade reduced to a minimum.--Fig.
-60, the same form as Fig. 54, from Denmark, _Madsen_, Heft iii.--Fig.
-61, from near Mainz, _Lindenschmit_, Taf. iii.--Fig. 62, from the
-Museum at Wiesbaden, _Lindenschmit_, Taf. iii.--Fig. 63, from Altona,
-in Courland; this form has some affinity to Class G, but is introduced
-here on account of the expansion of the blade.--Figs. 64, 65, and 66,
-from Italy, _in the British Museum_, the metal of the shaft slightly
-sunk to produce a stop.--Fig. 67, from Fiesole, Italy, the metal part
-of the shaft further reduced.--Fig. 68, from Baron von Stackelberg's
-collection, _in the British Museum_, also described in Klemm,
-_Werkzeuge und Waffen_, p. 103, Fig. 180; said to be from Greece, but
-its close resemblance to those from Italy is remarkable.
-
-CLASS F.--The same form as Class E, but having the flanges bent by
-hammering over the stop; the flanges appear to have been cast upright,
-as in Class E, and to have been bent over the cleft handle after
-hafting; by this means the necessity for binding the blade on with
-thongs was obviated. This class forms a transition to the socket
-type.--Figs. 69, 70, 71, from Ireland, _in my collection_.--Fig.
-72, from the Royal Irish Academy collection, having a loop on the
-side. See _Catalogue R. I. A._, 'Bronze,' page 379. The introduction
-of the loop appears to be synchronous with the abandonment of the
-binding, the overlapping flanges answering that purpose by enclosing
-the bent portion of the handle, and requiring only that it should
-be fastened by the loop to prevent its falling off the end of the
-handle.--Fig. 73, from Denmark, _in my collection_.--Figs. 74, 75, from
-Denmark, _Madsen_, Heft iii.--Fig. 76, from the Museum at Hanover,
-_Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 77, from the Museum at Munich, _Lindenschmit_,
-Taf. iv.--Fig. 78, from Möringen, Switzerland, _Keller_, Plate
-xli.--Fig. 79, from Nidau-Steinberg, Switzerland, _Keller_, Plate
-xxxv.--Fig. 80, from Hallstatt; _Von Sacken_.--Fig. 81, from Italy,
-_British Museum_.
-
-CLASS G.--The pocket type. The bent portion of the handle in this ease
-was retained in its place by pockets cast on each side of the shaft
-of the blade; it seems doubtful whether this, or Class F, is to be
-regarded as the nearest approach to the socket type. In Class F the
-overlapping was produced by hammering the metal; but Class G is a
-further advance in the casting process.--Figs. 82 and 83, from Ireland,
-_in my collection_; the latter with loop; the pockets or pouches to
-receive the points of the bent handle are shown in the sections.--Fig.
-84, from France; see _Matériaux pour l'Histoire de l'Homme_.--Fig. 85,
-found twelve leagues south of Oviedo, Spain, _in the collection of the
-Society of Antiquaries_.--Fig. 86, from Andalusia, Spain, _British
-Museum_.--Fig. 87, from Denmark, _Madsen_, Heft iii.--Fig. 88, from the
-collection at Munich, _Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 89, from the collection at
-Hanover, _Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 89 _a_, an iron celt of the same form,
-still in use by the Kalmucs, Siberia, _Prehistoric Times_, p. 26.
-
-CLASS H.--The socket type. In some of the specimens of Class G, as for
-example Figs. 82 and 83, the metal portion of the shaft of the blade
-dividing the two pouches is reduced to a minimum. The next step was
-to do away with it altogether and enlarge the sides of the pouches so
-as to form a single socket. By this means the bent handle no longer
-required to be cleft to receive the blade, but was inserted whole into
-the socket, producing greater firmness, each blow of the axe serving to
-fix it more securely to its handle. The loops, seen only occasionally
-on Classes F and G, are almost invariably present in Class H.--Figs.
-90, 91, 92, 93, 94. Socket celts of bronze, from Ireland and England,
-_in my collection_; the form with square sides is very uncommon in
-Ireland; in Fig. 92 a representation of the overlapping flange of
-Class F is cast on the surface of the socket.--Fig. 94_a_, a socket
-celt of wrought iron with loop, from Merionethshire, _British Museum_;
-_Archaeologia Cambrensis_, vol. i, third series, p. 250.--Figs. 95 and
-96, the same forms from France. See _Matériaux, &c._ The square-sided
-celt is common in the north of France.--Fig. 97, from Alemquez,
-Portugal; _Coll. Société des Archit. Portugais_.--Fig. 98, from
-Denmark, _in my collection_.--Figs. 99, 100, Denmark, _Madsen_, Heft
-i.--Fig. 100 _a_, an iron socket celt, from the moss of Nydam, in
-Slesvik, of the iron period; Engelhardt, _Denmark in the Early Iron
-Age_ (1866), Pl. xv; believed, from the Roman coins found with it,
-to be of the third century A.D.[217]--Fig. 101, from the collection
-at Hanover, _Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 102, from the Museum at Mainz,
-_Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 103, socket celt of iron, from Golssen, _Klemm_,
-Fig. 195.--Fig. 104, socket celt of iron, from Thuringia, _Klemm_,
-Fig. 194.--Fig. 105, of bronze, from Unter Uhldingen, Switzerland;
-_Keller_, Pl. xxix.--Fig. 106, of iron, found near Marin, Switzerland,
-the socket formed by beating over the blade on one side only; the
-socket is not quite completed; see _Keller_, Pl. lxxi.--Fig. 107,
-the same form of iron, found near Marin; the socket is closed and
-completed all round, _Keller_, Pl. lxxi. These specimens in iron may
-be regarded as connecting links between Classes F and H. Viewing the
-occurrence of iron celts of this form, it appears not impossible
-that the introduction of the socket type and the sudden abolition of
-the central division may have been suggested by the use of the more
-malleable metal, by means of which the fabricator acquired the art of
-forming a socket by bending over the metal on one side; the inutility
-of the central division would thus become apparent.--Fig. 108, bronze
-socket celt with loop, from Hallstatt, _Von Sacken_.--Fig. 109, exactly
-the same form in iron, from Hallstatt; a portion of the wooden handle
-is still shown in this specimen.--Figs. 110 and 111, bronze socket
-celts, from Italy, of a variety peculiar to that country, _British
-Museum_.--Fig. 112, socket celt of copper, from Hungary, believed by
-the author to be the only known specimen of pure copper; _Keller_,
-Pl. lxxviii.--Fig. 113, bronze socket celt, from Hungary, _British
-Museum_.--Fig. 114, bronze socket celt, with two loops, from Kertch,
-_British Museum_.--Fig. 115, bronze socket celt, from the province of
-Viatka, Russia. See _Matériaux, &c._--Fig. 116, bronze socket celt with
-two loops, from the Ural, Russia.--Fig. 117, mode of hafting, Classes
-A, B, and C.--Fig. 118, mode of hafting, Classes D, E, F, and G.--Fig.
-119, mode of hafting, Class H.
-
-In a paper lately read to the Society of Antiquaries by Dr.
-Thurnam,[218] he has drawn attention to the fact that none but celts of
-the most primitive type, viz. those belonging to Classes B, C, D, and
-the most rudimentary form of Class E, have been found in the British
-tumuli. Scarcely a single instance of the more developed palstave or of
-the socketed celt has as yet been discovered; the only exceptions being
-a bronze socket celt found in a tumulus on Plumpton Plain, near Lewes,
-and a diminutive bronze socket celt found in a tumulus at Arras in the
-Yorkshire wolds. These Arras barrows are known, however, to belong to
-the iron age; having produced, amongst other articles composed of that
-metal, the iron tire of the wheel, and trappings of a war chariot. We
-learn from this that the discoveries in the tumuli confirm in point
-of time the order of development inferred from a consideration of the
-implements themselves.
-
- * * * * *
-
-From the foregoing detailed description of Plate XVIII we are enabled
-to draw the following conclusions, viz.:--(1) That in each of the
-divisions of Europe therein represented, traces of the development
-of the celt, from its simplest to its most complex form, have been
-discovered; the earliest forms being in imitation of those of stone,
-and being not unfrequently constructed of pure copper. Where some
-of the connecting links are wanting in the table there is reason to
-suppose the absence of those links may be the result of imperfect
-information, and does not necessarily imply a flaw in the continuity
-of development. (2) That, notwithstanding the simultaneous development
-which appears to have taken place in different countries, we may
-nevertheless observe slight differences in the details of construction,
-which are sufficient to give a distinctive character to the celts of
-each separate region. Thus, for instance, the celts from Ireland are,
-as a general rule, shorter and less elegant in form than those found on
-the Continent. Class C, consisting of stop celts without wings, though
-common in Great Britain and Ireland, is, so far as I have been able
-to ascertain, unknown on the Continent. On the other hand, Class D,
-having wings without stops, is rare in Ireland, but common in France,
-Denmark, Germany, and Switzerland. The development of this class of
-celt into a nearly circular edge, as represented in Figs. 34 and 35, is
-peculiar to the south of France, though traces of it are observable in
-the celts from Germany, Fig. 40. Class E, having both stop and flange,
-is found in a more rudimentary stage in Ireland than elsewhere. The
-palstaves of this form, having shoulders on the side of the blade, are
-peculiar to Italy and Switzerland, Figs. 66, 67, and 68. Class F, with
-overlapping wings, is but slightly developed in Ireland, but is fully
-so in Italy, Germany, and at Hallstatt. Class G, the double pocket
-variety, has its head quarters in the north-west of France, but is also
-known in Ireland, Denmark, Spain, and Germany; it is, in so far as I
-have been able to ascertain, unknown in Italy. Class H, the socket
-type, varies greatly in different countries; the square form, Figs. 93,
-94, 95, 96, 100, and 102, is exceedingly rare in Ireland, but common
-in France. The socket celts from Italy, Figs. 110 and 111, are of
-peculiar type, and evidently derive their form from the winged palstave
-of the same country, Fig. 67. Socket celts of iron have been found at
-Hallstatt, and in Switzerland, Denmark, Germany, and North Wales. The
-representation of the overlapping wings, cast on the surface of the
-socket celt, Figs. 92 and 101, is common in England and Germany, but
-exceedingly rare in Ireland. The double-looped socket celt, Figs. 97,
-114, and 116, appears to be especially characteristic of the Eastern
-provinces of Russia and Siberia, though found occasionally elsewhere.
-
-In attempting to account for the varieties, which I have described,
-in the details of construction, coupled with a general uniformity of
-design throughout the entire region of distribution of these weapons,
-we may, I think, draw an exact parallel between the development of
-bronze celts and the development of the forms of cannon between the
-fourteenth and the nineteenth centuries. From Europe to China we know
-that the form of cannon has developed upon the same plan. In the same
-way that the overlapping wings of the palstave were represented on the
-faces of the socket celt, so the rings of metal which bound together
-the bars of which the ancient bombard was composed, were represented
-on the surface of the cast bronze cannon which superseded it. In
-every country the general type of development of cannon has been the
-same, but the details of construction have varied in each. Even in
-our own time, the introduction of breech-loaders has been synchronous
-throughout Europe; but the French and English cannon are not perfectly
-identical. Now, the cause of this is sufficiently well known. There
-has been constant intercommunication between the several countries
-throughout the whole period of the development of this weapon. Each new
-improvement as it occurred has been communicated from one country to
-another, either by contact in war, or by peaceful intercourse; but each
-country has fabricated its own weapons, and has by that means contrived
-to give them a national character.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XX.
-
-CELT MOULDS.]
-
-So in like manner we must assume that the development of the bronze
-celt extended over a long period of time; that each new improvement
-was communicated from tribe to tribe and from nation to nation; but
-that each country manufactured its own implements, and varied in
-the construction of them. The proof that this was the case is found
-in the circumstance that moulds for casting them have been found in
-different countries. Plate XX, Fig. 31, represents a stone mould found
-at Ballynahinch, Co. Down, Ireland, and figured in the _Catalogue
-of the Royal Irish Academy_; it is adapted for casting celts of the
-Class B. Fig. 32 is a stone mould for Class G, found at Montaigu,
-near Valoignes, Normandy, and is taken from a cast in the Museum of
-the Society of Antiquaries. Fig. 33, a stone mould for Class H, from
-Kilkenny, Ireland. Fig. 34, two halves of a bronze mould for Class
-E, from Morges, Switzerland, figured in Keller, Plate xxxix. Fig.
-35, two halves of a bronze mould for Class H, found in the Forest of
-Bricquebec, Normandy, in the Museum of the Society of Antiquaries.
-Fig. 36, one-half of a bronze mould for Class H, from England, figured
-in the _Catalogue of the Royal Irish Academy_, 'Bronze,' page 393.
-In the three last specimens it will be seen that the mode of fitting
-the two halves together, so as to prevent the escape of the metal,
-is by means of a ridge on one half, fitting into a groove in the
-other. It is improbable that a contrivance so identical as this should
-have arisen independently in the three countries. Further proof of
-connexion is shown by the identity of the ribs in the interior of the
-sockets of celts belonging to Class H. Figs. 37 and 38 represent
-sections of socket celts from Ireland, the former showing three, the
-latter one, longitudinal rib of raised metal running from the bottom
-of the socket for some distance up the side of the interior of the
-socket. Fig. 39 is the section of a socket celt from Denmark, in my
-collection, having one rib of the same kind. It has been suggested
-that these ribs represent the interstices between slices of the core,
-by means of which the socket was formed in casting; if so, the cores
-must have been constructed of some hard material, cut in slices, in
-order to facilitate their removal from the socket when formed. Several
-objections may, however, be urged against this; in the first place, no
-such cores have ever been discovered, which tends to the supposition
-that the cores must, in all probability, have been constructed of clay;
-in the second place, it will be seen by reference to Fig. 20 that this
-celt has only one central rib; if, therefore, the rib was formed by the
-metal pressing into the interstices between the slices of the core, it
-is evident that the core in this case had only two slices; but it will
-be seen that the aperture of the socket expands towards the bottom, and
-it would have been impossible, therefore, to extract the core if it
-were divided into only two parts.
-
-The theory of core slices must, therefore, be abandoned, and we are
-driven to the conclusion that the ribs must have been intentional,
-either to give strength to the celt, which is unlikely from the great
-thickness of the metal, or to form channels for the passage of the
-metal in casting, or, what is more probable, to serve the purpose
-of gripping the portion of the wooden handle which fitted into the
-socket, and preventing its shifting with the blows of the weapon. Fig.
-39 represents cross ribs at the bottom of the socket of a celt from
-Denmark, in my collection. Whatever may have been the purpose for which
-the ribs were formed, their identity in the implements of the two
-countries serves us as an additional proof of intercourse between them.
-
-Although moulds for casting celts have not been found in Denmark, there
-is evidence to show, from vestiges of scoriae that have been found,
-that they were there cast in clay, as indeed they must probably have
-been to a great extent in other parts of Europe.
-
-It would be premature to speculate upon the primary sources of
-the bronze civilization of Europe, until we have examined carefully the
-distribution of the other weapons belonging to that period. This much
-may, however, I think, be said with respect to the geographical region
-of bronze celts, that they belong more especially to the north and west
-of Europe; they have never been found in any of those countries which
-were occupied by the Phoenicians, nor have we any sufficient reason
-for believing that they were common in Greece. We have, therefore, no
-evidence whatever for supposing that the north of Europe derived the
-first idea of these weapons from either of those nations. We certainly
-have only negative evidence as yet for affirming that they did not,
-but the burden of proof must rest with those who have attributed
-them to the Phoenicians. To what extent they were employed in Russia
-and Northern Siberia, is a point which we have not as yet sufficient
-evidence to determine. I think, however, I am justified in saying that
-those hitherto discovered in Siberia are of a late type, belonging
-chiefly to the socket variety, and that they are there often associated
-with weapons of iron. I trust, however, to have an opportunity of
-entering more fully into this subject on a future occasion, when
-treating of the weapons of the later bronze and early iron periods of
-Europe.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[184] A Lecture delivered at the Royal United Service Institution on
-June 18, 1869, and published in the _Journal of the R. U. S. Inst._,
-vol. xiii (1869), pp. 509-539, pl. xxxi-xxxiii (= Plates XVII-XX
-herewith).
-
-[185] _Trans. Int. Congr. Preh. Arch. at Norwich_, 1868 (London, 1869),
-p. 92 ff.
-
-[186] _Lectures on Man, his Place in Creation, and in the History of
-the Earth_, by Dr. Carl Vogt. Edited by James Hunt, Ph.D. (London,
-1864), p. 466 ff.
-
-[187] The fact mentioned both by the Baron de Bonstetten and Dr.
-Keller, of celts of jade and nephrite having been found in Switzerland,
-materials which, according to the latest investigations [1869], are not
-found in the Alps, but must have been imported from the East, proves
-that intercommunication and barter must have been carried on between
-distant countries at the time when such weapons were used.--Baron
-de Bonstetten, _Recueil d'Antiquités Suisses_ (Berne, 1855), p. 12;
-Keller, _The Lake Dwellings of Switzerland_ (1866), pp. 56, 68 (cf.
-1878, pp. 72, 195, 205, 215).
-
-[188] _Prehistoric Times_, by Sir John Lubbock, Bart., F.R.S., London
-(1865), p. 147.
-
-[189] _Prehistoric Times_, by Sir John Lubbock, Bart., F.R.S. (1865),
-pp. 142-3; _Results of the Investigation of Animal Remains from
-the Lake Dwellings_, by Prof. Rütimeyer; in _The Lake Dwellings of
-Switzerland_, by Dr. Ferdinand Keller, translated by J. E. Lee, F.S.A.,
-F.G.S., 1866, pp. 355-62 (1878, pp. 537-44).
-
-[190] _Moosseedorf_, Keller, l. c., p. 35; _Robenhausen_, Keller, l.
-c., p. 40.
-
-[191] (The first two sentences of this paragraph have been transposed,
-for clearness.--ED.)
-
-[192] Max Müller, _Science of Language_, second series (London, 1864),
-p. 230.
-
-[193] Rawlinson, _The Five Great Monarchies of the Ancient Eastern
-World_ (1864), vol. i. p. 123.
-
-[194] Klemm, _Werkzeuge und Waffen_ (Sondershausen, 1858), p. 96.
-
-[195] Keller, l. c., p. 116: (1878, p. 121).
-
-[196] Keller, l. c., p. 221, pl. lxvii: (1878, p. 362, pl. cxix).
-
-[197] Keller, l. c., pp. 218, 219, pl. lxviii: (1878, pp. 362-3, pl.
-cxx. 1-28).
-
-[198] Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. p. 282.
-
-[199] Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_, vol. i. pp. 231-79; Squier and Davis
-in _Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge_, vol. i. pp. 196-203, figs.
-81, 82, 84, 87.4, 87.1, from which work the illustrations are taken.
-
-[200] Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_, vol. i. p. 253.
-
-[201] Since the above was written, Sir John Lubbock has published in an
-Appendix to his second edition of _Prehistoric Times_ (1869), p. 595,
-letters from Dr. Percy, and from Messrs. Jenkin and Lefeaux, highly
-experienced assayers, expressing their opinions upon the theory of
-M. Wibel, that the ancient bronze was obtained, not by the fusion of
-copper and tin, but directly from ore containing the two metals. They
-are unanimously of opinion that this could not have been the case, none
-of the ores containing naturally a mixture of the metals in proper
-proportions. Although the opinions of these gentlemen appear decisively
-to negative the possibility of ancient bronze having been habitually
-produced for commercial purposes in this manner, they do not appear to
-me to discredit the supposition that the first imperfect knowledge of
-the mixture may have been brought about accidentally in the manner I
-have described.
-
-[202] Worsaae, _The Primeval Antiquities of Denmark_ (London, 1849),
-pp. 24, 40-45.
-
-[203] The custom of making a mark upon the weapon for each victim
-slain, is one of very usual occurrence among savage people.
-
-[204] Thurnam, _Ancient British Barrows_ (1869), pp. 168, 198;
-_Archaeologia_, vol. xlii; 'On the Two Principal Forms of Ancient
-British and Gaulish Skulls,' _Mem. Anthrop. Soc. Lond._, i. 120
-ff., 459 ff. (1865); iii. 41 ff. (1870); Davis and Thurnam, _Crania
-Britannica_ (London, 1865).
-
-[205] 'On some Flint Implements found associated with Roman Remains in
-Oxfordshire and the Isle of Thanet,' by Col. A. Lane Fox, _Journal of
-the Ethnological Society_ (1869), N.S., vol. i. p. 1 ff.
-
-[206] _Prehistoric Man_, by Daniel Wilson, LL.D. (London, 1869), vol.
-i. p. 308.
-
-[207] _Proceedings of the Asiatic Society of Bengal_, 1865, p. 126.
-
-[208] Rawlinson, _Five Great Monarchies_ (1864), vol. i. p. 120.
-
-[209]
-
- Arma antiqua manus, ungues, dentesque fuerunt
- Et lapides, et item sylvarum fragmina rami,
- Et flamma atque ignis postquam sunt cognita primum
- Posterius ferri vis est aerisque reperta,
- Et prior aeris erat quam ferri cognitus usus,
- Quo facilis magis est natura, et copia maior.--V. 1282.
-
-
-[210] Strabo, b. iii. c. iii. 6, p. 154.
-
-[211] Max Müller, _Science of Language_, 2nd Series (1864), pp. 229-37.
-
-[212] Nilsson, _The Primitive Inhabitants of Scandinavia_ (Lubbock, 3rd
-ed., 1868), p. 257.
-
-[213] Sir Richard Colt Hoare found four of these celts in the Wiltshire
-barrows, with rudimentary flanges along the side edges of the blade
-that had been formed by beating, and similarly formed flanges have
-also been noticed upon celts from Ireland, thereby leading to the
-supposition that Class B may have been converted into Class D in this
-way, before the casting process was applied to the formation of the
-flanges.--_The Ancient History of South Wiltshire_ (London, 1812), p.
-203, pl. xxi, xxvi, xxviii. 2, xxix.
-
-[214] (The greatly reduced scale of these figures makes exact
-verification of the references impracticable in all cases.--ED.)
-
-[215] I have been enabled to take drawings of these celts in the
-British Museum, through the kind permission of Mr. A. W. Franks.
-
-[216] The forms included in Classes D, E, F, and G, are commonly known
-under the name of _paalstab_ or _palstave_, a word of Scandinavian
-origin, said to have designated the weapons employed by some northern
-tribes for battering the shields of their enemies. Iron implements like
-the Irish _loy_, and called _paalstabs_, are still used in Iceland,
-either for digging in the ground or breaking the ice.--_Catalogue of
-the Museum of the R. I. Academy_, 'Bronze,' p. 361.
-
-[217] Lubbock, _Prehistoric Times_ (1869), p. 9.
-
-[218] Read in 1869, published in _Archaeologia_, xliii. p. 443: for
-Plumpton Plain, see _Sussex Arch. Coll._ ii. p. 268: for Arras, _Arch.
-Journ._ xviii. p. 156.
-
-
-
-
-EARLY MODES OF NAVIGATION[219]
-
-(1874)
-
-
-In the paper which I had the honour of reading to this Institute at
-Bethnal Green (pp. 1-19), I spoke of the general principles by which I
-was guided in the course of inquiries, of which the present paper forms
-a section. I need not, therefore, now refer to them further than to
-say that the materials for this paper were collected whilst writing a
-note to my _catalogue raisonné_ relating to the case of models of early
-forms of ships.[220]
-
-In inquiries of this nature it is always necessary to guard against the
-tendency to form theories in the first instance, and go in search of
-evidence to support them afterwards. On the other hand, in dealing with
-so vast a subject as Anthropology, including all art, all culture, and
-all races of mankind, it is next to impossible to adhere strictly to
-the opposite of this, and collect the data first, to the exclusion of
-all idea of the purpose they are to be put to in the sequel, because
-all is fish that comes into the anthropological basket, and no such
-basket could possibly be big enough to contain a millionth part of the
-materials necessary for conducting an inquiry on this principle. Some
-guide is absolutely necessary to the student in selecting his facts.
-The course which I have pursued, in regard to the material arts, is
-to endeavour to establish the sequence of ideas. When the links of
-connexion are found close together, then the sequence may be considered
-to be established. When they occur only at a distance, then they are
-brought together with such qualifications as the nature of the case
-demands. Other members of this Institute have followed the same course
-in relation to other branches of culture, the object being to lay the
-foundation of a true anthropological classification, without seeking
-either to support a dogma or establish a paradox. This is, I believe,
-the requirement of our time, and the necessary preliminary to the
-introduction of a science of Anthropology.
-
-Whilst, however, deprecating the influence of forgone conclusions,
-there are certain principles already established by science which we
-cannot afford to disregard, even at the outset of inquiries of this
-nature. It would be sheer moonshine, in the present state of knowledge,
-to study Anthropology on any other basis than the basis of development;
-nor must we, in studying development, fail to distinguish between
-racial development and the development of culture. The affinity of
-certain races for particular phases of culture, owing to the hereditary
-transmission of faculties, constitutes an important element of inquiry
-to be weighed in the balance with other things, just as the farmer
-weighs in the balance of probabilities the nature of the soil in which
-his turnips are growing; but when particular branches of culture do run
-in the same channel with the distribution of particular races, this
-is always a coincidence to be investigated and explained, each by the
-light of its own history. It would be just as reasonable to assume with
-the ancients, that the knowledge of every art was originally inculcated
-by the gods, as to assume that particular arts and particular ideas
-arise spontaneously and as a necessary consequence of the possession of
-particular pigments beneath the skin.
-
-Nobody doubts that there must be affinities and interdependencies
-between the race and the crop of ideas that is grown upon it; but the
-law, _ex nihilo nihil fit_, is as true of ideas as it is of races, and
-in the relations between them it is as true and has the same value,
-neither more nor less, as the statement that potatoes do spring out
-of the ground where no potatoes have been sown. To study culture is,
-therefore, to trace the history of its development, as well as the
-qualities of the people amongst whom it flourishes. In doing this
-it is not sufficient to deal with generalities, as, for example, to
-ascertain that one people employ bark canoes, whilst another use
-rafts. It is necessary to consider the details of construction,
-because it is by means of these details that we are sometimes able
-to determine whether the idea has been of home growth or derived from
-without. The difficulty is to obtain the necessary details for the
-purpose. Travellers do not give them, as a rule, especially modern
-travellers. The older books are more valuable, both because they deal
-with nations in a more primitive condition, and also because they are
-more detailed; books were fewer, and men took more pains with them; now
-the traveller writes for a circulating library, and for the unthinking
-portion of mankind, who will not be bothered with details. I have been
-careful to give the dates to the authors quoted. But we must endeavour
-to remedy this evil before it is too late. The _Notes and Queries
-on Anthropology_[221], published by the Committee of the British
-Association, are drawn up with this object. It is to be hoped that they
-will receive attention, but I fear not much, for the reasons already
-mentioned; the supply will be equal to the demand. As long as we have a
-large Geographical Society and a small Anthropological Society, so long
-travellers will bring home accurate geographical details, abundance of
-information about the flow of water all over the world, but the flow of
-human races and human ideas will receive little attention. With these
-preliminary remarks I pass on to the subject of my paper.
-
-
-_Modes of Navigation._
-
-Following out the principle adopted in Parts 1 and 2 of my Catalogue,
-of employing the constructive arts of existing savages as survivals
-to represent successive stages in the development of the same arts in
-prehistoric times, it may be advisable, in order to study the history
-of each part of a canoe or primitive sailing vessel, to divide the
-subject under seven heads, as follows: viz.--(1) Solid trunks or
-dug-out canoes, developing into (2) Vessels on which the planks are
-laced or sewn together, and these developing into such as are pinned
-with plugs of wood, and ultimately nailed with iron or copper; (3) Bark
-canoes; (4) Vessels of skins and wicker-work; (5) Rafts, developing
-into (6) Outrigger canoes, and ultimately into vessels of broader beam,
-to which may be added (7) rudders, sails, and contrivances which gave
-rise to parts of a more advanced description of vessel, such as the
-_oculus_, _aplustre_, _forecastle_, and _poop_.
-
-
-1. _Solid Trunks and Dug-out Canoes._
-
-It requires but little imagination to conceive an idea of the process
-by which a wooden support in the water forced itself upon the notice
-of mankind. The great floods to which the valleys of many large rivers
-are subject, more especially those which have their sources in tropical
-regions, sometimes devastate the whole country within miles of their
-banks, and by their suddenness frequently overtake and carry down
-numbers of both men and animals, together with large quantities of
-timber which had grown upon the sides of the valleys. The remembrances
-of such deluges are preserved in the traditions of many savage races,
-and there can be little doubt that it was by this means that the human
-race first learnt to make use of floating timber as a support for the
-body. The wide distribution of the word signifying ship--Latin _navis_;
-Greek ~naus~; Sanskrit _nau_; Celtic _nao_; Assam _nao_; Port Jackson,
-Australia, _nao_--attests the antiquity of the term. In Bible history
-the same term has been employed to personify the tradition of the first
-shipbuilder, _Noah_.
-
-It is even said, though with what truth I am not aware, that the
-American grey squirrel (_Sciurus migratorius_), which migrates in large
-numbers, crossing large rivers, has been known to embark on a piece of
-floating timber, and paddle itself across (Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_,
-1862, vol. i. p. 147).
-
-The North American Indians frequently cross rivers by clasping the left
-arm and leg round the trunk of a tree, and swimming with the right
-(Steinitz, _History of the Ship_, Pl. 2).
-
-The next stage in the development of the canoe would consist in
-pointing the ends, so as to afford less resistance to the water. In
-this stage we find it represented on the NW. coast of Australia.
-Gregory, in the year 1861, says that his ship was visited on this
-coast by two natives, who had paddled off on logs of wood shaped like
-canoes, not hollowed, but very buoyant, about 7 feet long, and 1 foot
-thick, which they propelled with their hands only, their legs resting
-on a little rail made of small sticks driven in on each side. Mr.
-T. Baines, also, in a letter quoted by the Rev. J. G. Wood, in his
-_Natural History of Man_ (vol. ii. p. 7), speaks of some canoes which
-he saw in North Australia as being 'mere logs of wood, capable of
-carrying a couple of men'. Others used on the north coast are dug out,
-but as these are provided with an outrigger, they have probably been
-derived from New Guinea. The canoes used by the Australians on the
-rivers consist either of a bundle of rushes bound together and pointed
-at the ends, or else they are formed of bark in a very simple manner;
-but on the south-east coast, near Cape Howe, Captain Cook, in his first
-voyage, found numbers of canoes in use by the natives on the seashore.
-These he described as being very like the smaller sort used in New
-Zealand, which were hollowed out by means of fire. One of these was of
-a size to be carried on the shoulders of four men.
-
-It has been thought that the use of hollowed canoes may have arisen
-from observing the effect of a split reed or bamboo upon the water. The
-nautilus is also said to have given the first idea of a ship to man;
-and Pliny, Diodorus, and Strabo have stated that large tortoise-shells
-were used by primitive races of mankind (Kitto, _Pictorial Bible_). It
-has also been supposed that the natural decay of trees may have first
-suggested the employment of hollow trees for canoes, but such trees are
-not easily removed entire. It is difficult to conceive how so great an
-advance in the art of shipbuilding was first introduced, but there can
-be no doubt that the agent first employed for this purpose was fire.
-
-I have noticed when travelling in Bulgaria that the gipsies and others
-who roam over that country usually select the foot of a dry tree to
-light their cooking fire; the dry wood of the tree, combined with the
-sticks collected at the foot of it, makes a good blaze, and the tree
-throws forward the heat like a fireplace. Successive parties camping on
-the same ground, attracted thither by the vicinity of water, use the
-same fireplaces, and the result is that the trees by degrees become
-hollowed out for some distance from the foot, the hollow part formed
-by the fire serving the purpose of a semi-cylindrical chimney. Such a
-tree, torn up by the roots, or cut off below the part excavated by the
-fire, would form a very serviceable canoe, the parts not excavated by
-the fire being sound and hard. The Andaman islanders use a tree in this
-manner as an oven, the fire being kept constantly burning in the hollow
-formed by the flames.
-
-One of the best accounts of the process of digging out a canoe by
-means of fire is that described by Kalm, on the Delaware river, in
-1747. He says that, when the Indians intend to fell a tree, for want
-of proper instruments they employ fire; they set fire to a quantity
-of wood at the roots of the tree, and in order that the fire might
-not reach further up than they would have it, they fasten some rags
-to a pole, dip them in water, and keep continually washing the tree a
-little above the fire until the lower part is burnt nearly through; it
-is then pulled down. When they intend to hollow a tree for a canoe,
-they lay dry branches along the stem of the tree as far as it must be
-hollowed out, set them on fire, and replace them by others. While these
-parts are burning, they keep pouring water on those parts that are not
-to be burnt at the sides and ends. When the interior is sufficiently
-burnt out, they take their stone hatchets and shells and scoop out
-the burnt wood. These canoes are usually 30 or 40 feet long. In the
-account of one of the expeditions sent out by Raleigh in 1584 a similar
-description is given of the process adopted by the Indians of Virginia,
-except that, instead of sticks, resin is laid on to the parts to be
-excavated and set fire to: canoes capable of holding twenty persons
-were formed in this manner.
-
-The Waraus of Guiana employ fire for excavating their canoes; and when
-Columbus discovered the Island of Guanahani or San Salvador, in the
-West Indies, he found [fire] employed for this purpose by the natives,
-who called their boats '_canoe_', a term which has ever since been
-employed by Europeans to express this most primitive class of vessel.
-
-Dr. Mouat says that, in Blair's time, the Andaman islanders excavated
-their canoes by the agency of fire; but it is not employed for that
-purpose now, the whole operation being performed by hand. Symes, in
-1800, speaks of the Burmese war-boats, which were excavated partly by
-fire and partly by cutting. Nos. 1276 and 1277 of my collection are
-models of these boats. In New Caledonia, Turner, in 1845, says that the
-natives felled their trees by means of a slow fire at the foot, taking
-three or four days to do it. In excavating a canoe, he says, they
-kindle a fire over the part to be burnt out, and keep dropping water
-over the sides and ends, so as to confine the fire to the required
-spot, the burnt wood being afterwards scraped out with stone tools.
-The New Zealanders, and probably the Australians also, employ fire for
-this purpose [Cook]. The canoes of the Krumen in West Africa are also
-excavated by means of fire.
-
-A further improvement in the development of the dug-out canoe consists
-in bending the sides into the required form after it has been dug out.
-This process of fire-bending has already been described on p. 87 of my
-_Catalogue_ (Parts i and ii), when speaking of the methods employed by
-the Esquimaux and Australians in straightening their wooden spears and
-arrow-shafts. The application of this process to canoe-building by the
-Ahts of the north-west coast of North America is thus described by Mr.
-Wood in his _Natural History of Man_, vol. ii. p. 732. The canoe is
-carved out of a solid trunk of cedar (_Thuja gigantea_). It is hollowed
-out, not by fire, but by hand, and by means of an adze formed of a
-large mussel-shell; the trunk is split lengthwise by wedges. All is
-done by the eye. When it is roughly hollowed it is filled with water,
-and red-hot stones put in until it boils. This is continued until the
-wood is quite soft, and then a number of cross-pieces are driven into
-the interior, so as to force the canoe into its proper shape, which
-it ever afterwards retains. While the canoe is still soft and pliant,
-several slight cross-pieces are inserted, so as to counteract any
-tendency towards warping. The outside of the vessel is then hardened
-by fire, so as to enable it to resist the attacks of insects, and also
-to prevent it cracking when exposed to the sun. The inside is then
-painted some bright colour, and the outside is usually black and highly
-polished. This is produced by rubbing it with oil after the fire has
-done its work. Lastly, a pattern is painted on its bow. There is no
-keel to the boat. The red pattern of the painting is obtained by a
-preparation of _anato_. For boring holes the Ahts use a drill formed by
-a bone of a bird fixed in a wooden handle.
-
-A precisely similar process to this is employed in the formation of
-the Burmese dug-out canoes, and has thus been described to me by Capt.
-O'Callaghan, who witnessed the process during the Burmese War in 1852.
-A trunk of a tree of suitable length, though much less in diameter
-than the intended width of the boat, is cut into the usual form, and
-hollowed out. It is then filled with water, and fires are lit, a short
-distance from it, along its sides. The water gradually swells the
-inside, while the fire contracts the outside, till the width is greatly
-increased. The effect thus produced is rendered permanent by thwarts
-being placed so as to prevent the canoe from contracting in width as
-it dries; the depth of the boat is increased by a plank at each side,
-reaching as far as the ends of the hollowed part. Canoes generally
-show traces of the fire and water treatment just described, the inner
-surface being soft and full of superficial cracks, while the outer is
-hard and close.
-
-It is probable that this mode of bending canoes has been discovered
-during the process of cooking, in which red-hot stones are used in many
-countries to boil the water in vessels of skin or wood, in which the
-meat is cooked. No. 1256 of my collection is a model of an Aht canoe,
-painted as here described. No. 1257 is a full-sized canoe from this
-region, made out of a single trunk; it is not painted, so that the
-grain of the wood can be seen.
-
-The distribution of the dug-out canoe appears to be almost universal.
-It is especially used in southern and equatorial regions. Leaving
-Australia, we find it employed with the outrigger, which will be
-described hereafter (pp. 218-9), in many parts of the Polynesian and
-Asiatic islands, including New Guinea, New Zealand, New Caledonia,
-and the Sandwich Islands. It was not used by the natives of Tasmania,
-who employed a float consisting of a bundle of bark and rushes, which
-will be described in another place (p. 203). Wilkes speaks of it in
-Samoa, at Manilla, and the Sooloo Archipelago. De Guignes in 1796 and
-De Morga in 1609 saw them in the Philippines, where they are called
-_pangues_, some carrying from two to three and others from twelve to
-fifteen persons. They are (or were) also used in the Pelew, Nicobar,
-and Andaman Isles. In the India Museum there is a model of one from
-Assam, used as a mail boat, and called _dâk nao_. In Burmah, Symes, in
-1795, describes the war-boats of the Irrawaddy as 80 to 100 feet long,
-but seldom exceeding 8 feet in width, and this only by additions to the
-sides; carrying fifty to sixty rowers, who use short oars that work
-on a spindle, and who row instead of paddling. Captain O'Callaghan,
-however, informs me that they sometimes use paddles (Nos. 1276 and
-1277). They are made of one piece of the teak tree. The king had
-five hundred of these vessels of war. They are easily upset, but the
-rowers are taught to avoid being struck on the broadside; they draw
-only 3 feet of water. On the Menan, in Siam, Turpin, in 1771, says
-that the king's _ballons_ are made of a single tree, and will contain
-150 rowers; the two ends are very much elevated, and the rowers sit
-cross-legged, by which they lose a great deal of power. The river
-vessels in Cochin China are also described as being of the same long,
-narrow kind. At Ferhabad, in Persia, Pietro della Valle, in 1614,
-describes the canoes as being flat-bottomed, hollow trees, carrying ten
-to twelve persons.
-
-In Africa, Duarte Barbosa, in 1514, saw the Moors at Zuama make use of
-boats, _almadias_, hollowed out of a single trunk, to bring clothes and
-other merchandise from Angos. Livingstone says the canoes of the Bayeye
-of South Africa are hollow trees, made for use and not for speed.
-If formed of a crooked stem they become crooked vessels, conforming
-to the line of the timber. On the Benuwé, at its junction with the
-[Yola], Barth, for the first time in his travels southward, saw what
-he describes as rude little shells hollowed out of a single tree; they
-measured 25 to 30 feet in length, 1 to 1-1/2 foot in height, and 16
-inches in width; one of them, he says, was quite crooked. On the White
-Nile, in Unyoro, Grant says that the largest canoe carried a ton and
-a half, and was hollowed out of a trunk. On the Kitangule, west of
-Lake Victoria Nyanza, near Karague, he describes the canoes as being
-hollowed out of a log of timber 15 feet long and the breadth of an
-easy-chair. These kind of canoes are also used by the Makoba east of
-Lake Ngami, by the Apingi and Camma, and the Krumen of the West African
-coast; of which last, No. 1272 of my collection is a model.
-
-In South America the Patagonians use no canoes, but in the northern
-parts of the continent dug-out canoes are common. One described by
-Condamine, in 1743, was from 42 to 44 feet long, and only 3 feet wide.
-They are also used in Guiana, and Professor Wilson says that the
-dug-out canoe is used throughout the West Indian Archipelago. According
-to Bartram, who is quoted by Schoolcraft, the large canoes formed out
-of the trunks of cypress trees, which descended the rivers of Florida,
-crossed the Gulf, and extended their navigation to the Bahama Isles,
-and even as far as Cuba, carrying twenty to thirty warriors. Kalm, in
-1747, gives some details respecting their construction on the Delaware
-river already referred to (p. 191), and says that the materials chiefly
-employed in North America are the red juniper, red cedar, white cedar,
-chestnut, white oak, and tulip tree. Canoes of red and white cedar are
-the best, because lighter, and they will last as much as twenty years,
-whereas the white oak barely lasts above six years. In Canada these
-dug-outs were made of the white fir. The process of construction on the
-west coast of North America has been already described (p. 192).
-
-In Europe Pliny mentions the use of canoes hollowed out of a single
-tree by the Germans. Amongst the ancient Swiss lake-dwellers at
-Robenhausen, associated with objects of the stone age, a dug-out canoe,
-or _Einbaum_, made of a single trunk 12 feet long and 2-1/2 wide, was
-discovered (Keller, _Lake Dwellings_, Lee^2, p. 45). In Ireland, Sir
-William Wilde says that amongst the ancient Irish dug-out canoes were
-of three kinds. One was small, trough-shaped, and square at the ends,
-having a projection at either end to carry it by; the paddlers sat
-flat at the bottom and paddled, there being no rowlocks to the boat. A
-second kind was 20 feet in length and 2 in breadth, flat-bottomed, with
-round prow and square stern, strengthened by thwarts carved out of the
-solid and running across the boat, two near the stem and one near the
-stern. The prow was turned up; one of these was discovered in a bog on
-the coast of Wexford, 12 feet beneath the surface. The third sort was
-sharp at both ends, 21 feet long, 12 inches broad, and 8 inches deep,
-and flat-bottomed. These canoes are often found in the neighbourhood
-of the crannoges, or ancient lake-habitations of the country, and
-were used to communicate with the land; also in the beds of the Boyne
-and Bann. Ware says, that dug-out canoes were used in some of the
-Irish rivers in his time, and to this day I have seen paddles used on
-the Blackwater, in the south of Ireland. Professor Wilson says that
-several dug-out canoes have been found in the ancient river-deposits
-of the Clyde, and also in the neighbourhood of Falkirk. In one of
-those discovered in the Clyde deposits, at a depth of 25 feet from the
-surface, a stone almond-shaped celt was found. Others have been found
-in the ancient river-deposits of Sussex and elsewhere, in positions
-which show that the rivers must probably have formed arms of the sea,
-at the time they were sunk.
-
-
-_2. Vessels in which the Planks are Stitched to each Other._
-
-All vessels of the dug-out class are necessarily long and narrow,
-and very liable to upset; the width being limited by the size of the
-tree, extension can only be given to them by increasing their length.
-In order to give greater height and width to these boats, planks are
-sometimes added at the sides and stitched on to the body of the canoe
-by means of strings or cords, composed frequently of the bark or leaves
-of the tree of which the body is made. In proportion as these laced-on
-gunwales were found to answer the purpose of increasing the stability
-of the vessel, their number was increased; two such planks were added
-instead of one, and as the joint between the planks was by this
-means brought beneath the water line, means were taken to caulk the
-seams with leaves, pitch, resin, and other substances. Gradually the
-number of side planks increased and the solid hull diminished, until,
-ultimately, it dwindled into a bottom-board, or keel, at the bottom of
-the boat, serving as a centre-piece on which the sides of the vessel
-were built. Still the vessel was without ribs or framework; ledges on
-the sides were carved out of the solid substance of each plank, by
-means of which they were fastened to the ledges of the adjoining plank,
-and the two contiguous ledges served as ribs to strengthen the boat;
-finally, a framework of vertical ribs was added to the interior and
-fastened to the planks by cords. Ultimately the stitching was replaced
-by wooden pins, and the side planks pinned to each other and to the
-ribs; and these wooden pins in their turn were supplanted by iron nails.
-
-In different countries we find representations of the canoe in all
-these several stages of development. Of the first stage, in which side
-planks were added to the body of the dug-out canoe, to heighten it,
-the New Zealand canoe, No. 1259 of my collection, is an example. Capt.
-Cook describes this as solid, the largest containing from thirty men
-upwards. One measured 70 feet in length, 6 in width, and 4 deep. Each
-of the side pieces was formed of an entire plank, about 12 inches wide,
-and about 1-1/2 inch thick, laced on to the hollow trunk of the tree by
-flaxen cords, and united to the plank on the opposite side by thwarts
-across the boat. These canoes have names given to them like European
-vessels.
-
-On the Benuwé, in Central Africa, Barth describes a vessel in this same
-early stage of departure from the original dug-out trunk. It consisted
-of 'two very large trunks joined together with cordage, just like the
-stitching of a shirt, and without pitching, the holes being merely
-stuffed with grass. It was not water-tight, but had the advantage,' he
-says, 'over the dug-out canoes used on the same river, in not breaking
-if it came upon a rock, being, to a certain degree, pliable. It was 35
-feet long, and 26 inches wide in the middle.' No. 1258 of my collection
-is a model of one of these. The single plank added to the side of the
-Burmese dug-out canoe has been already noticed (p. 193). Although my
-informant does not tell me that these side planks are sewn on, I have
-no doubt, judging by analogy, that this either is or was formerly the
-case.
-
-The Waraus of Guiana are the chief canoe-builders of this part of South
-America, and to them other tribes resort from considerable distances.
-Their canoe is hollowed out of a trunk of a tree, and forced into
-its proper shape partly by means of fire and partly by wedges, upon
-a similar system to that described in speaking of the Ahts of North
-America (p. 192) and the Burmese; the largest have the sides made
-higher by a narrow plank of soft wood, which is laced upon the gunwale,
-and the seam caulked. This canoe is alike at both ends, the stem and
-stern being pointed, curved, and rising out of the water; there is no
-keel, and it draws but a few inches of water. This appears to be the
-most advanced stage to which the built-up canoe has arrived on either
-continent of America, with the exception of Tierra del Fuego, where
-Commodore Byron, in 1765, saw canoes in the Straits of Magellan made
-of planks sewn together with thongs of raw hide; these vessels are
-considerably raised at the bow and stern, and the larger ones are 15
-feet in length by 1 yard wide. They have also been described by more
-recent travellers. Under what conditions have these miserable Fuegians
-been led to the employment of a more complex class of vessel than their
-more advanced congeners of the north?
-
-In order to trace the further development of the canoe in this
-direction, we must return to Africa and the South Seas. On the island
-of Zanzibar, Barbosa, in 1514, says that the inhabitants of this
-island, and also Penda and Manfia, who are Arabs, trade with the
-mainland by means of 'small vessels very loosely and badly made,
-without decks, and with a single mast; all their planks are sewn
-together with cords of reed or matting, and the sails are of palm
-mats.' On the river Yeou, near Lake Tchad, in Central Africa, Denham
-and Clapperton saw canoes 'formed of planks, rudely shaped with a
-small hatchet, and strongly fastened together by cords passed through
-holes bored in them, and a wisp of straw between, which the people
-say effectually keeps out the water; they have high poops like the
-Grecian boats, and would hold twenty or thirty persons.' On the Logon,
-south-east of Lake Tchad, Barth says the boats are built 'in the same
-manner as those of the Budduma, except that the planks consist of
-stronger wood, mostly _Birgem_, and generally of larger size, whilst
-those of the Budduma consist of the frailest material, viz. _Fogo_.
-In both, the joints of the planks are provided with holes, through
-which ropes are passed, overlaid with bands of reed tightly fastened
-upon them by smaller ropes, which are again passed through small holes
-stuffed with grass.' On the Victoria Nyanza, in East Central Africa,
-Grant speaks of 'a canoe of five planks sewn together, and having four
-cross-bars or seats. The bow and stern are pointed, standing for a yard
-over the water, with a broad central plank from stem to stern, rounded
-outside (the vestige of the dug-out trunk), and answering for a keel.'
-
-Thus far we have found the planks of the vessels spoken of, merely
-fastened by cords passed through holes in the planks, and stuffed with
-grass or some other material, and the accounts speak of their being
-rarely water-tight. Such a mode of constructing canoes might serve well
-enough for river navigation, but would be unserviceable for sea craft.
-Necessity is the mother of invention, and accordingly we must seek for
-a further development of the system of water-tight stitching, amongst
-those races in a somewhat similar condition of culture, which inhabit
-the islands of the Pacific and the borders of the ocean between it and
-the continent of Africa.
-
-The majority of those vessels now to be described are furnished with
-the outrigger; but as the distribution of this contrivance will be
-traced subsequently (p. 218 ff.), it will not be necessary to describe
-it in speaking of the stitched plank-work.
-
-In the Friendly Isles Captain Cook, in 1773, says 'the canoes are
-built of several pieces sewed together with bandage in so neat a
-manner that on the outside it is difficult to see the joints. All the
-fastenings are on the inside, and pass through _kants_ or ridges,
-which are wrought on the edges and ends of the several boards which
-compose the vessel.' At Otaheite he speaks of the same process,
-and says that the chief parts are formed separately without either
-saw, plane, or other tool. La Perouse gives an illustration of an
-outrigger canoe from Easter Island, the sides of which are formed
-of drift-wood sewn together in this manner. At Wytoohee, one of the
-Paumotu, or Low Archipelago, Wilkes, in 1838, says that the canoes
-are formed of strips of cocoa-nut tree sewed together. Speaking of
-those of Samoa, he describes the process more fully. 'The planks are
-fastened together with _sennit_; the pieces are of no regular size
-or shape. On the inside edge of each plank is a ledge or projection,
-which serves to attach the sennit, and connect and bind it closely
-to the adjoining one. It is surprising,' he says, 'to see the labour
-bestowed on uniting so many small pieces together, when large and
-good planks might be obtained. Before the pieces are joined, the gum
-from the husk of the bread-fruit tree is used to cement them close,
-and prevent leakage. These canoes retain their form much more truly
-than one would have imagined; I saw few whose original model had
-been impaired by service. On the outside the pieces are so closely
-fitted as frequently to require close examination before the seams
-can be detected. The perfection of workmanship is astonishing to
-those who see the tools with which it is effected. They consist now
-of nothing more than a piece of iron tied to a stick, and used as an
-adze; this, with a gimlet, is all they have, and before they obtained
-their iron tools, they used adzes made of hard stone and fish-bone.'
-The construction of the Fiji canoe, called _drua_, is described by
-Williams in great detail. A keel or bottom board is laid in two or
-three pieces, carefully scarfed together. From this the sides are built
-up, without ribs, in a number of pieces varying from three to twenty
-feet. The edges of these pieces are fastened by ledges, tied together
-in the manner already described. A white pitch from the bread-fruit
-tree, prepared with an extract from the coco-nut kernel, is spread
-uniformly on both edges, and a fine strip of _masi_ laid between.
-The binding of sennit with which the boards, or _vanos_, as they are
-called, are stitched together is made tighter by small wooden wedges
-inserted between the binding and the wood, in opposite directions.
-The ribs seen in the interior of these canoes are not used to bring
-the planks into shape, but are the last things inserted, and are for
-uniting the deck more firmly with the body of the canoe. The carpenters
-in Fiji constitute a distinct class, and have chiefs of their own.
-The Tongan canoes were inferior to those of Fiji in Captain Cook's
-time, but they have since adopted Fiji patterns. The Tongans are
-better sailors than the Fijians. Wilkes describes a similar method of
-building vessels in the Kingsmill Islands, but with varieties in the
-details of construction. 'Each canoe has six or eight timbers in its
-construction; they are well modelled, built in frames, and have much
-sheer. The boards are cut from the coco-nut tree, from a few inches to
-six or eight feet long, and vary from five to seven inches in width.
-These are arranged as the planking of a vessel, and very neatly put
-together, being sewed with sennit. For the purpose of making them
-water-tight they use a slip of pandanus leaf, inserted as our coopers
-do in plugging a cask. They have evinced much ingenuity,' he says, 'in
-attaching the uprights to the flat timbers.' It is difficult, without
-the aid of drawings, to understand exactly the peculiarities of this
-variety of construction, but he says they are secured so as to have all
-the motion of a double joint, which gives them ease, and comparative
-security in a seaway.
-
-Turning now to the Malay Archipelago, Wallace speaks of a Malay
-_prahau_ in which he sailed from Macassar to New Guinea, a distance
-of 1,000 miles, and says that similar but smaller vessels had not a
-single nail in them. The largest of these, he says, are from Macassar,
-and the Bugi countries of the Celebes and Boutong. Smaller ones sail
-from Ternate, Pidore, East Ceram, and Garam. The majority of these,
-he says, have stitched planks. No. 1268 of my collection is a model
-of a vessel employed in those seas. Wallace says that the inhabitants
-of Ke Island, west of New Guinea, are the best boat-builders in the
-archipelago, and several villages are constantly employed at the work.
-The planks here, as in the Polynesian Islands, are all cut out of
-the solid wood, with a series of projecting ledges on their edges in
-the inside. But here we find an advance upon the Polynesian system,
-for the ledges of the planks are pegged to each other with wooden
-pegs. The planks, however, are still fastened to the ribs by means of
-_rattans_. The principles of construction are the same as in those
-of the Polynesian Islands, and the main support of the vessel still
-consists in the planks and their ledges, the ribs being a subsequent
-addition; for he says that after the first year the rattan-tied ribs
-are generally taken out and replaced by new ones, fitted to the planks
-and nailed, and the vessel then becomes equal to those of the best
-European workmanship. This constitutes a remarkable example of the
-persistency with which ancient customs are retained, when we find each
-vessel systematically constructed, in the first instance, upon the old
-system, and the improvement introduced in after years. I wonder whether
-any parallel to this could be found in a British arsenal. The psychical
-aspect of the proceeding seems not altogether un-English.
-
-Extending our researches northward, we find that Dampier, in 1686,
-mentions, in the Bashee Islands, the use of vessels in which the planks
-are fastened with wooden pins. On the Menan, in Siam, Turpin, in 1771,
-speaks of long, narrow boats, in the construction of which neither
-nails nor iron are employed, the parts being fastened together with
-roots and twigs which withstand the destructive action of the water.
-They have the precaution, he says, to insert between the planks a
-light, porous wood, which swells by being wet, and prevents the water
-from penetrating into the vessel. When they have not this wood, they
-rub the chinks, by which the water enters, with clay. In the India
-Museum there is a model of a very early form of vessel from Burmah,
-described as a trading vessel. The bottom is dug out, and the sides
-formed of planks laced together. A large stone is employed for an
-anchor. Here we see that an inferior description of craft has survived,
-upon the rivers, in the midst of a higher civilization which has
-produced a superior class of vessel upon the seas.
-
-Turning westward, we have the surf-boat of Madras, called _massoola_,
-which, on account of its elasticity, is still used on the seashore.
-Its parts are stitched together in the manner represented in the
-model, No. 1267 of my collection. On the Malabar coast the ships of
-the Pardesy, who consisted of Arabs, Persians, and others who have
-settled in the kingdom of Malabar, are described by Barbosa in 1514.
-They build ships, he says, of 200 tons, which have keels like the
-Portuguese, but have no nails. They sew their planks with neat cords,
-very well pitched, and the timber very good. Ten or twelve of these
-ships, laden with goods, sail every year in February for the Red Sea,
-some for Aden and some for Jeddah, the port of Mecca, where they sell
-their merchandise to others, who transmit it to Cairo, and thence to
-Alexandria. The ships return to Calicut between August and October of
-the same year. The earliest description we have of these vessels in
-this part of the world, in historic times, is in the account of the
-travels of two Mahomedans in the ninth century. In these travels it is
-related that there were people in the Gulf of Oman who cross over to
-the islands that produce coco-nuts, taking with them their tools, and
-make ships out of it. With the bark they make the cordage to sew the
-planks together, and of the leaves they make sails; and having thus
-completed the vessel, they load it with coco-nuts and set sail. Marco
-Polo, at the commencement of the fourteenth century, confirms this,
-and says, speaking of the ships at Ormuz, in the Persian Gulf, that
-they do not use nails, but wooden pins, and fasten them with threads
-made of the Indian nut. These threads endure the force of the water,
-and are not easily corrupted thereby. These ships have one mast, one
-sail, _and one beam_, and are covered with but one deck. They are not
-caulked with pitch, but with the oil and fat of fishes. When they cross
-to India they lose many ships, because the sea is very tempestuous, and
-they are not strengthened with iron. In the Red Sea, Father Lobo, in
-1622, describes the vessels called _gelves_, which, he says, are made
-almost entirely of the coco-nut tree. The trunk is sawn into planks,
-the planks are sewn together with thread which is spun from the bark,
-and the sails are made of the leaves stitched together. They are more
-convenient, he says, than other vessels, because they will not split if
-thrown upon banks or against rocks.
-
-We have now arrived in the region which is usually regarded as the
-cradle of Western civilization, certainly the land in which Western
-culture first began to put forth its strong shoots; and we must expect
-to find that the art of shipbuilding advanced in the same ratio as
-other trades. But, unlike the Phoenicians, the Egyptians confined their
-navigation chiefly to the Nile, and had an abhorrence of Typhon, as
-they termed the sea, because it swallowed up the great river, which,
-being the chief source of their prosperity, they regarded as a god.
-
-Here it may be desirable to digress for one moment from the chain of
-continuity which we have been following, in order to say a few words
-about the most primitive form of vessel used on the Nile, viz. that
-mentioned by Isaiah (xviii. 2) as being of Ethiopian origin, the
-vessel of bulrushes to which the mother of Moses entrusted her infant
-progeny. What the coco-nut tree was to the navigators on the eastern
-seas, the papyrus was to the Egyptians, and from it every part of the
-vessel--rope, planks, masts, and sails--was constructed. Adverting to
-the earliest and simplest of these papyrus vessels, the common use for
-a bundle of faggots, for such it was, is not, perhaps, one of those
-coincidences which, viewed by the light of modern culture, we should
-select as evidence of connexion between distant lands. And yet there
-are peculiarities of form which make the bulrush float of the Egyptians
-worthy of comparison with those used in the rivers of Australia.
-
-The Australian float, as represented by a model in the British Museum,
-consisted of a bundle of bark and rushes, pointed and elevated at
-the ends, and bound round with girdles of the same material. The
-only vessel, according to Mr. Calder, used in Tasmania, on the west
-coast, is thus described by him in the _Journal of the Anthropological
-Institute_, iii. 22. 'It was of considerable size, and something
-like a whale-boat, that is, sharp-sterned, but a solid structure,
-and the natives, in their aquatic adventures, sat on the top of it.
-It was generally made by the buoyant and soft, velvety bark of the
-swamp tea-tree (_Melaluca_ sp.), and consisted of a multitude of small
-strips bound together.' Professor Wilson says that the Californian
-canoe consists of a mere rude float, made of rushes, 'in the form of
-a lashed-up hammock.' A woodcut in Sir Gardner Wilkinson's _Ancient
-Egypt_, No. 399 of his work, represents three persons making one of
-these papyrus floats. It is the _baris_, or Memphite bark, bound
-together with papyrus, spoken of by Lucan, and it is of precisely
-similar form to those above described, elevated and pointed at the
-ends, and the men are in the act of binding it round with girdles. This
-is the kind of boat in which Plutarch describes Isis going in search of
-the body of Osiris through the fenny country; a bark made of papyrus.
-Pliny attributes the origin of shipbuilding to these vessels (vii. 56);
-and speaks (vi. 22) of their crossing the sea and visiting the Island
-of Taprobane (Ceylon, according to Sir G. Wilkinson); but it seems
-probable that he must refer to a more advanced form of vessel than the
-mere bulrush float.
-
-The racial connexion between the Australians and the Egyptians, first
-put forward by Professor Huxley, has hardly met with general acceptance
-as yet; but, startling as it at first sight appeared, the more we look
-into the evidence bearing upon it, the less improbable, to say the
-least, it becomes, when viewed by the light of comparative culture.
-I have already shown, in another place,[222] how closely some of the
-Australian weapons correspond to some of those still used on the Upper
-Nile, and the remarkable resemblance here pointed out in a class of
-vessels which might well have been used in passing short distances
-from island to island of the now submerged fragments of land that are
-supposed to have formerly existed in parts of the southern hemisphere,
-is, at least, worthy of attention amongst other evidence of the same
-kind that may be collected, although I fully admit that it is not of a
-character to stand alone. I will not exceed my province by attempting
-to defend the theory of the Australioid origin of the Egyptians on
-physical grounds, preferring to leave the defence of that theory in the
-hands of its author, who is so well able to support his own views;
-but I may take this opportunity of commenting on some remarks made by
-Professor Owen in his valuable paper, published in the last number of
-our _Journal_, on the psychical evidence of connexion between them and
-the black races of the southern hemisphere. Adverting to the fresco
-painting, in the British Museum, of the ancient Egyptian fowler, who
-holds in his hand a stick, which he is in the act of throwing at a
-flock of birds, I am inclined to agree with Professor Owen in thinking
-there is nothing in its shape to denote that it is a boomerang. Other
-figures, however, in Rosellini's _Egyptian Monuments_, show the
-resemblance more clearly, and if these are not enough, the specimen
-of the weapon itself in the glass case in the Egyptian room of the
-British Museum proves the identity of the weapon beyond possibility of
-doubt. I have elsewhere stated at length,[223] that having made several
-facsimiles of this weapon from careful measurements, so as to obtain
-the exact size, form, and weight of the original, for the purpose
-of experiment, I found that it possessed all the properties of the
-Australian boomerang, rising in the air, and returning in some cases to
-within a few paces of the position from which it was thrown. In fact,
-it was easier to obtain the return flight from this weapon than from
-many varieties of the Australian boomerang, with which I experimented
-at the same time.
-
-But supposing the ancient Egyptian to be 'convicted of the boomerang',
-says the learned professor, 'common sense repudiates the notion of the
-necessity of inheritance in relation to such operations.' Against this
-I would urge, that the application of the general quality of common
-sense to the determination of questions of psychical connexion, between
-races so far removed from us, as the Australians or the predecessors
-of the earliest Egyptian kings, is inconsistent with all that we
-know of the phenomena of mental evolution in man, seeing that there
-must necessarily be many stages of disparity between them and any
-intelligent member of the Anthropological Institute to whose common
-sense this appeal was made.
-
-If the common sense of the nineteenth century does not repudiate the
-fact that the steam engine, the electric telegraph, vaccination, free
-trade, and a thousand other contrivances for the benefit of our race,
-have sprung from special centres, and have been inherited, or otherwise
-received, by the highly cultivated races to which they have spread
-in modern times, neither would the common sense of the Australian
-or prehistoric Egyptian, after its kind, bar the likelihood of such
-contrivances as the boomerang, the parrying-shield, or the 'baris'
-having been handed from one savage people to another in a similar
-manner. Wherever two or three concurrent chains of connexion, whether
-of race, language, or the arts, can be traced along the same channel,
-such evidence is admissible, and is indeed frequently the only evidence
-available in dealing with prehistoric times.
-
-The peculiar elevated ends of the papyrus floats are almost identical
-in form, but not in structure, with those now used in parts of India,
-especially on the Ganges; and the word _junk_ is said to be related
-to _juncus_, a bulrush. Somewhat similar rafts, but flat, turned up
-in front but not behind, and called _tankwa_, are described by Lieut.
-Prideaux as being still used on Lake Tsana, in Soudan, and they are
-also used by the Shillooks, who make them of a wood as light as cork,
-called _ambads_ (_Anemone mirabilis_). A paper by Mr. John Hogg, in
-the _Magazine of Natural History_ (1829, ii. p. 324 ff.), to which
-my attention has been kindly drawn by Mr. John Jeremiah, contains
-some useful information on the subject of Egyptian papyrus vessels.
-Denon describes and figures a very primitive float of this sort,
-consisting of a bundle of straw or stalks, pointed and turned up in
-front, and says that the inhabitants of the Upper Nile go up and down
-the river upon it astride, the legs serving for oars; they use also
-a short double-bladed paddle. It is worthy of notice that the only
-other localities, that I am aware of, in which this double paddle is
-used, are the Sooloo Archipelago and among the Esquimaux. Belzoni
-also describes the same kind of vessel. Mr. Hogg, in his paper, gives
-several illustrations of improved forms of these solid papyrus floats,
-derived from a mosaic pavement discovered in the Temple of Fortune at
-Praeneste. From these it seems that they were bound round with thongs,
-pointed, and turned up and over at both ends. But Bruce, in 1790,
-describes more particularly the class of vessel used in Abyssinia in
-his time, called _tankwa_, or, as he writes it, _tancoa_, and says
-that it corresponds exactly to the description of Pliny (_Nat. Hist._,
-xiii. 2, compare v. 9). His description appears possibly to indicate
-that there was a separate line of development of hollow vessels derived
-from the flat raft. A piece of acacia tree was put in the bottom
-to serve as a keel, to which plants were joined, being first sewed
-together, then gathered up at the ends and stern, and the ends of
-the plant tied fast there. On Lake Tsana they are only turned up in
-front: see above. Belzoni describes a similar kind of vessel on Lake
-Moeris, which seems clearly to be hollow. The outer shell or hulk was
-composed of rough pieces of wood, scarcely joined, and fastened by four
-other pieces wrapped together by four more across, which formed the
-deck; no tar, no pitch, either inside or out, and the only preventive
-against the water coming in was a kind of weed which had settled in the
-joints of the wood. The only other locality, that I know of, in which
-similar vessels to these are used, is Formosa, a description of which
-is given by Mr. J. Thomson (_The Straits of Malacca, Indo-China, and
-China_, London, 1875, p. 304), for the sight of which I am indebted
-to Mr. W. L. Distant. He says: 'We went ashore in a catamaran, a sort
-of raft made of poles of the largest species of bamboo. These poles
-are bent by fire, so as to impart a hollow shape to the raft, and are
-lashed together with rattan. There is not a nail used in the whole
-contrivance.'
-
-But the boats 'woven of' the papyrus, mentioned by Pliny, certainly
-refer to something more complex than the papyrus bundle above
-described. Lucan describes them as being sewn with bands of papyrus,
-and Herodotus describes them more fully. This passage has been
-variously translated by different authors, but the version given by Sir
-Gardner Wilkinson is as follows:--'they cut planks measuring about two
-cubits, and having arranged them like bricks, they build the boat in
-the following manner: they fasten the planks round firm long pegs, and,
-after this, stretch over the surface a series of girths, _but without
-any ribs_, and the whole is bound _within_ by bands of papyrus.' The
-exact meaning of this is obscure; but I would suggest, that as the
-'fastening within' clearly shows it was not a solid structure, the
-more reasonable interpretation of it is by supposing that the planks,
-arranged in brick fashion, were fastened on the inside by cords, in
-the manner practised in the South Sea Islands and elsewhere. What the
-long pins were is uncertain; but as Sir Gardner Wilkinson says that the
-models found in the tombs show that ribs were used at a time probably
-subsequent to this, these pins may have been rudimentary ribs of some
-kind, and they also may have been 'bound within' to the planks in the
-same manner. It seems not unlikely that these boats may have also been
-bound round on the outside to give them additional strength, after the
-manner of the papyrus floats above described.[224] With this vessel,
-which was called _baris_, they used a sort of anchor, consisting of a
-stone with a hole in it, similar to one on a Burmese vessel, of which a
-model is in the India Museum.
-
-The larger class of Egyptian vessels were of superior build, the planks
-being fastened with wooden pins and nails, and their construction
-somewhat similar to those still used on the Nile.
-
-Returning now to the link of the chain to which we have appended this
-digression, and carrying our inquiries further northward into the area
-of Western civilization, it is to be expected that we should lose all
-trace of this primitive mode of ship-building. The earliest vessels
-recorded in classical history were fastened with nails. In Homer's
-description of the vessel built by Odysseus, both nails and ribs were
-employed, and it had a round or a flat bottom (Smith's _Dict._). No
-trace of any earlier form of ship has been discovered in Europe, until
-we come to the neighbourhood of the North Sea. Here, in the Nydam Moss,
-in Slesvic, in 1863, was discovered a large boat, seventy-seven feet
-long, ten feet ten inches broad in the middle, flat at the bottom, but
-higher and sharper at both ends, having a prow at both ends, like those
-described by Tacitus as having been built by the Suiones, who inhabited
-this country and Sweden in ancient times. This vessel, from its
-associated remains, has been attributed to the third century A. D. The
-bottom consisted of a broad plank, about two feet broad in the middle,
-but diminishing in width towards each end. A small keel, eight inches
-broad and one deep, was carved on the under side of the plank, which
-corresponds to the bottom plank, which, in Africa and the Polynesian
-Islands, we have shown to be the vestige of the dug-out trunk. On to
-this bottom plank, five side planks, running the whole length of the
-vessel, were built, but they differed from those previously described
-in overlapping, being clinker-built, and attached to each other, not by
-strings or wooden pins, but by large iron bolts. The planks, however,
-resembled those of the southern hemisphere, in having clamps or ledges
-carved out of the solid on the inside; these ledges were perforated,
-and their position corresponded to rows of vertical ribs, to which,
-like the vessels at Ke Island, and elsewhere in the Pacific, they
-were _tied_ by means of cords passing through corresponding holes in
-the ribs. Each rib was carved out of one piece, and, like those of Ke
-Island in the Asiatic Archipelago, could easily have been taken out and
-replaced by others after the vessel was completed. In short, the vessel
-represented the particular stage of development which may be described
-as plank-nailed and rib-tied, or which might be characterized as having
-removable ribs; differing in this respect from the more advanced system
-of modern times, in which the ribs, together with the keel, form a
-framework to which the planks are afterwards bent and fastened.
-
-This mode of fastening the ribs to ledges carved out of the planking,
-Mr. Engelhardt, to whom we are indebted for the accurate drawings and
-description of this vessel,[225] remarks, is a most surprising fact,
-considering that the people who constructed the boat are proved by the
-associated remains to have been not only familiar with the use of iron,
-but to have been able to produce damascened sword-blades. But this
-fact, which, taken by itself, has been justly described as surprising,
-analogy leads us to account for, by supposing these particular parts
-of the vessel to have been survivals from a universally prevalent
-primitive mode of fastening, the nearest southern representative of
-which, at the present time, is to be found in the Red Sea and adjoining
-oceans. Nor can there be any reason to doubt, I think, that this
-mode of constructing vessels may have been used in the intervening
-countries, which have been the scene of the rise of Western
-civilization since the earliest times, but which have now lost all
-trace of the most primitive phases of the art of ship-building.
-
-Mr. Engelhardt, however, traces a connexion between this ancient
-vessel, found in the Nydam Moss, and the Northland boats now used on
-the coast of Norway and the Shetland Isles, the peculiar rowlocks of
-which, and also the clincher-nails by which the sides are fastened,
-correspond very closely to those of the Nydam boat. Here also, and
-in Finland and Lapland, we find survivals of a still earlier mode of
-ship-building, corresponding to the more primitive plank-stitched
-vessels, before described, in so many places in the southern
-hemisphere. Regnard, in 1681, describes the Finland boats as being
-twelve feet long and three broad. They are made of fir, and fastened
-together with the sinew of the reindeer; this makes them, he says, so
-light that one man can carry one on his shoulders; others are fastened
-together with thread made of hemp, rubbed with glue, and their cords
-are of birch bark or the root of the fir. Outhier, in 1736, confirms
-this account of the manner in which they are sewn together, and says
-that it renders them very flexible, and suitable for passing cataracts,
-on account of their lightness, and because they do not break when they
-are cast against a rock. The Lapland sledge called _pulea_ is also
-described by Regnard as being of the same construction--boat-shaped,
-and the parts sewn together with the sinew of the reindeer, without
-a single nail. I have not as yet been able to trace this mode of
-fastening vessels continuously in Russia; but Bell, in 1719, says that
-the long, flat-bottomed barks used on the Volga for carrying salt have
-not a single iron nail in their whole fabric; and Atkinson describes
-vessels on the Tchoussowaia which are built without nails, but these
-are fastened with wooden pins.
-
-
-3. _Bark canoes._
-
-The use of bark for canoes might have been suggested by the hollowed
-trunk; but, on the other hand, we find this material employed in
-Australia, where the hollowed trunk is not in general use. Bark is
-employed for a variety of purposes, such as clothing, materials for
-huts, and so forth. Some of the Australian shields are constructed of
-the bark of trees. The simplest form of canoe in Australia consists,
-as already mentioned (p. 203), of a mere bundle of reeds and bark
-pointed at the ends. It is possible that the use of large pieces of
-bark in this manner may have suggested the employment of the bark
-alone. Belzoni mentions crossing to the island of Elephantine, on
-the Nile, in a ferry-boat which was made of branches of palm trees,
-fastened together with cords, and covered on the outside with a mat
-pitched all over. The solid papyrus boats represented on the pavement
-at Praeneste, before mentioned, have evidently some other substance on
-the outside of them; and Bruce imagines that the junks of the Red Sea
-were of papyrus, covered with leather.[226] The outer covering would
-prevent the water from soaking into the bundle of sticks, and thus
-rendering it less buoyant. Bark, if used in the same manner, would
-serve a like purpose, and thus suggest its use for canoe-building.
-Otherwise I am unable to conceive any way in which bark canoes can have
-originated, except by imitation of the dug-out canoe.
-
-For crossing rivers, the Australian savage simply goes to the nearest
-stringy-bark tree, chops a circle round the tree at the foot, and
-another seven or eight feet higher, makes a longitudinal cut on each
-side, and strips off bark enough by this means to make two canoes. If
-he is only going to cross the river by himself, he simply ties the bark
-together at the ends, paddles across, and abandons the piece of bark
-on the other side, knowing that he can easily provide another. If it
-is to carry another besides himself, he stops up the tied ends with
-clay; but if it is to be permanently employed, he sews up the ends more
-carefully, and keeps it in shape by cross-pieces, thereby producing a
-vessel which closely resembles the bark canoe of North America (Wood,
-_Nat. Hist. of Man_, ii. 103). I have not been able to trace the use of
-the bark canoe further north than Australia on this side of the world,
-probably owing to its being ill adapted for sea navigation; nor do I
-find representatives of it in any part of Europe or Africa, although
-bark is extensively used, in the Polynesian Islands and elsewhere, for
-other purposes.
-
-It is the two continents of America which must be regarded as the home
-of the bark canoe.
-
-The Fuegian canoe has been described by Wilkes, Pritchard, and others.
-It is sewn with shreds of whalebone, sealskin, and twigs, and supported
-by a number of stretchers lashed to the gunwale; the joints are stopped
-with rushes, and, without, smeared with resin. In Guiana the canoe
-is made of the bark of the purple-heart tree, stripped off and tied
-together at the ends. The ends are stopped with clay, as with the
-Australians. This mode of caulking is not very effectual, however, and
-the water is sure to come in sooner or later.
-
-The nature of the material does not admit of much variety in the
-construction; suffice it to say that it is in general use in North
-America, up to the Esquimaux frontier. Its value in these regions
-consists in the facility with which it is taken out of the water and
-carried over the numerous rapids that prevail in the North American
-rivers. The Algonquins were famous for the construction of them. Some
-carry only two people, but the _canot de maître_ was thirty-six feet in
-length, and required fourteen paddlers. Kalm, in 1747, gives a detailed
-account of the construction of them on the Hudson river, and Lahontan,
-in 1684, gives an equally detailed description of those used in Canada.
-The bark is peeled off the tree by means of hot water. They are very
-fragile, and every day some hole in the bottom has to be stopped with
-gum.
-
-Mr. T. G. B. Lloyd, in an excellent paper descriptive of the Beothucs
-of Newfoundland, published in _Journ. Anthrop. Inst._ (vol. iv. pp.
-26-8), has described the remarkable bark canoe of these people. Its
-form is different from any other canoe of this or any other region
-that I have heard of, the line of the gunwale rising in the middle, as
-well as at the ends, and the vessel being V-shaped in section, with a
-straight wooden keel at the bottom. Its form is so singular, that the
-only idea of continuity which I can set up for it is, that it must
-have been copied from some European child's paper boat, capable, by
-a single additional fold, of being converted into a cocked hat; the
-central pyramidal portion of the paper boat having given the form to
-the pyramidal sides of the Beothuc vessel. If this be rejected, then
-its history has yet to be told, for no native tribe ever employed such
-a peculiar form unless by inheritance.
-
-Nos. 1248 and 1249 of my collection are South American bark canoes;
-Nos. 1250 to 1252 are bark canoes from North America.
-
-
-4. _Canoes of Wicker and Skin._
-
-As we approach the Arctic regions, the dug-out and bark canoes are
-replaced by canoes of skin and wicker. As we have already seen, in the
-case of the bow, and other arts of savages, vegetable materials supply
-the wants of man in southern and equatorial regions, whilst animal
-materials supply their place in the north.
-
-The origin of skin coverings has been already suggested when speaking
-of bark canoes. The accidental dropping of a skin bottle into the
-water might suggest the use of such vessels as a means of recovering
-the harpoon, which, as I have already shown elsewhere, was almost
-universally used for fishing in the earliest stages of culture. The
-Esquimaux lives with the harpoon and its attached bladder almost
-continually by his side. The Esquimaux _kayak_, Nos. 1253 and 1254 of
-my collection, in which he traverses the ocean, although admirable in
-its workmanship, and, like all the works of the Esquimaux, ingenious
-in construction, is in principle nothing more than a large, pointed
-bladder, similar to that which is lashed to the harpoon at its side;
-the man in this case occupying the opening which, in the bladder, is
-filled by the wooden pin that serves for a cork.
-
-This is, I believe, a very primitive form of vessel, although there
-can be no doubt that many links in the history of its development have
-been lost. Unlike the dug-out canoe, such a fragile contrivance as the
-wicker canoe perishes quickly, and no direct evidence of its ancestry
-can be traced at the present time. It is only by means of survivals
-that we can build up the past history of its development; and these
-are, for the most part, wanting.
-
-The skin of an animal, flayed off the body with but one incision,
-served, as I have elsewhere shown, a variety of purposes: from it
-the bellows was derived, the bagpipes, water-vessels, and pouches of
-various kinds; and, filled with air, it served the purpose of a float.
-Steinitz, in his _History of the Ship_, gives an illustration of an
-inflated ox skin, which in India is used to cross rivers; the owner
-riding upon the back of the animal and paddling with his hands, as if
-it had been a living ox.
-
-In the Assyrian sculptures there are numerous illustrations
-representing men floating upon skins of this kind, which they clasp
-with the left hand, like the tree trunks, already mentioned, that are
-used by the American Indians, and swim with the right. Layard says this
-manner of crossing rivers is still practised in Mesopotamia. He also
-describes the raft, composed of a number of such floats, made of the
-skins of sheep flayed off with as few incisions as possible; a square
-framework of poplar beams is placed over a number of these, and tied
-together with osier and other twigs. The mouths of the sheep-skins
-are placed upwards, so that they can be opened and refilled by the
-raft-men. On these rafts the merchandise is floated down the river to
-Baghdad; the materials are then disposed of and the skins packed on
-mules, to return for another voyage. On the Nile similar rafts are
-used, the skins being supplanted by earthen pots, which, like the skins
-on the Euphrates, serve only a temporary purpose, and after the voyage
-down the river are disposed of in the bazaars.
-
-This mode of floating upon skins I should conjecture to be of northern
-origin, and to be practised chiefly by nomadic races; but we find it
-employed on the Morbeya, in Morocco, by the Moors, who no doubt had it
-from the East. It is thus described by Lempriere, in 1789. A raft is
-formed of eight sheep-skins filled with air, and tied together with
-small cords; a few slender poles are laid over them, to which they
-are fastened, and that is the only means used at Buluane to convey
-travellers, with their baggage, over the river. As soon as the raft is
-loaded, a man strips, jumps into the water, and swims with one hand,
-whilst he pulls the raft after him with the other; another swims and
-pushes behind. This reminds us of the custom of the Gran Chaco Indians
-of South America, who, in crossing rivers, use a square boat or tub of
-bull's hide, called _pelota_. It is attached by a rope to the tail of
-a horse, which swims in front; or the rope is taken in the mouth of an
-expert swimmer.
-
-I have not traced the distribution of these rafts of inflated skins as
-continuously as, I have no doubt, they might be traced amongst nomadic
-and pastoral races, moving with their flocks and herds, the skins of
-which would be employed in this way; nor have I been able to trace
-the connexion which, I have no doubt, existed between the inflated
-skin and the open 'curragh' of wicker covered with skins. Where one is
-found, the other is often found with it. Herodotus describes the boats
-used by the people who came down the river to Babylon, and says they
-are constructed in Armenia, and in the parts above Assyria, thereby
-connecting them with the north. 'The ribs of these vessels,' he says,
-'are formed of willow boughs and branches, and covered externally with
-skin. They are round, like a shield, there being no distinction between
-head and stern. They line the bottom with reeds and straw, and taking
-on board merchandise, chiefly palm wine, float down the stream. The
-boats have two oars, one to each man: one pulls and the other pushes.
-They are of different dimensions, some having a single ass on board
-and others several. On their arrival at Babylon the boatmen dispose of
-their goods, and offer for sale the ribs and straw; _they then load
-the asses with the skins_, and return with them to Armenia, where they
-construct new boats'--just as is now done with the inflated skins of
-the rafts at Baghdad.
-
-In the Pictorial Bible an illustration is given from the Sassanian
-sculptures at Takht-i-Bostan of several of these round vessels,
-probably of wicker, covered with skins. In one of these the principal
-figure carries a composite bow, which, as I have elsewhere shown, is of
-northern origin. Mr. Layard discovered in Nimroud a sculpture in which
-one of these boats is represented. It is round, like those described
-by Herodotus; back and stern alike; carrying two people, one of whom
-pulls and the other pushes; and in the same sculpture are represented
-men swimming on the inflated sheep-skins. He says that these same
-round vessels are still used at Baghdad, built of boughs and timber
-covered with skins, over which bitumen is smeared to render it more
-water-tight. [Hamilton] also speaks of the same vessels (of reeds
-and bitumen) on the Euphrates, at the commencement of the eighteenth
-century.
-
-On the Cavery, in Mysore, Buchanan, in 1800, describes ferry-boats
-that are called _donies_, which are circular baskets covered with
-leather; but whether these vessels, like the composite bow used in the
-same region, can be traced to a northern origin I have not the means
-of determining, nor have I as yet sufficient materials to enable me
-to ascertain whether such vessels are employed in the north of Asia
-at the present time. What the inflated skin is to these circular
-vessels, the _kayak_ is to the _baidar_ of the Esquimaux. Throughout
-the whole region occupied by this race, these two kinds of vessels are
-used, differing only in minute varieties of detail in the different
-localities. According to Dr. King, whose valuable paper, 'On the
-Industrial Arts of the Esquimaux,' was published in the first volume of
-the _Journal of the Ethnological Society_ (1848), the varieties of the
-_kayak_ in the different localities consist merely in the elevation and
-shape of the rim of the hole in which the man sits. In Prince William
-Sound, on the NW. coast, the _kayak_ is frequently built with two or
-three holes to contain two or three men. The bow has two beaks, one of
-which turns up, according to Captain Cook, like the head of a violin,
-as represented in No. 1254 of my collection. This is also used in the
-Aleutian Isles. The meaning of this double beak I have not been able to
-ascertain. The _baidar_ used on this coast has also a double beak, as
-represented in No. 1255 of my collection.
-
-In the British Museum there is a _kayak_ with a single opening, from
-Behring Straits, which differs but little from another in the same
-museum from Greenland; the _kayak_ of Greenland has a knob of ivory at
-each end to protect the sharp point. The _baidar_ is used at Ochotsk
-and Kamtschatka, on the Asiatic coast, and all along the northern coast
-of America, eastward from Behring Strait. Models of both _baidar_ and
-_kayak_ are in the British Museum, from Kotzebue Sound. In Frobisher
-Strait, Frobisher, in 1577, says the boats are of two kinds of leather
-stretched on frames, the greater sort open, and carrying sixteen or
-twenty people (the _baidar_), and the lesser, to carry one man, covered
-over, except in one place where the man sits (the _kayak_). In Hudson's
-Straits and Greenland, where the larger vessels are called _oomiak_,
-they are flat-sided and flat-bottomed, about three feet high, and
-nearly square at the bow and stern, whereas this sort on the north-west
-coast is sometimes pointed at bow and stern. Kerguelen, in 1767,
-mentions both kinds in Greenland; and Kalm, in 1747, speaks of both,
-though not from personal observation, on the coast of Labrador. The
-Esquimaux canoe has been known to have drifted from Greenland across
-the north of Scotland, and has been picked up, with the man still alive
-in it, on the coast of Aberdeen (Wilson).
-
-In Britain the _coracle_ of osier, covered with skin, is mentioned
-by Caesar, and in Britain, Gaul, and Italy by Lucan (A.D. 39-65). In
-Scotland, Bellenden, in the sixteenth century, speaks of the _currock_
-of wands, covered with bulls' hide, as being in use in the sixteenth
-century, and its representative is still used in the west of Ireland.
-Sir William Wilde says that, under the name of _curragh_, it is still
-made of leather, stretched over a wooden frame, on the Boyne, and in
-Arran, on the west coast, of light timber, covered with painted canvas,
-which has superseded the use of leather. I have seen these vessels at
-Dingle, on the south-west coast, where they go by the name of _nevog_;
-they are there 23 feet in length by 4 in width, and 1 ft. 9 inches
-deep, made of laths, and covered with painted canvas; they are used,
-from Valentia, along the west coast as far as Galway. In the south
-they are larger than in the north, where they are called _curraghs_,
-and a single man can carry one on his back, as the ancient Briton did
-his _coracle_. Their continuance is caused by their cheapness, costing
-only £6 when new. Here also they were, until recently, constructed of
-leather. They have a small triangular sail, and, like the most ancient
-forms of vessels, they are guided, when sailing, by means of oars, one
-on each side.
-
-
-5. _Rafts._
-
-The trunks of trees, united by mutual attraction, as they floated down
-the stream, would suggest the idea of a raft. The women of Australia
-use rafts made of layers of reeds, from which they dive to obtain
-mussel-shells. In New Guinea the catamaran, or small raft formed of
-three planks lashed together with rattan, is the commonest vessel used.
-Others are larger, containing ten or twelve persons, and consist of
-three logs lashed together in five places, the centre log being the
-longest, and projecting at both ends.
-
-This is exactly like the catamaran used on the coast of Madras, a
-model of one of which is in the Indian Museum; they are also used on
-the Ganges, and in the Asiatic isles. At Manilla they are known by
-the name of _saraboas_; but the perfection of raft navigation is on
-the coast of Peru. Ulloa, in 1735, describes the _balzas_ used on the
-Guayaquil, in Ecuador, and on the coast as far south as Paita. They are
-called by the Indians of the Guayaquil _jungadas_, and by the Darien
-Indians _puero_. They are made of a wood so light that a boy can easily
-carry a log 1 foot in diameter and 3 or 4 yards long. They are always
-made of an odd number of beams, like the New Guinea and Indian rafts,
-the longest and thickest in the centre, and the others lashed on each
-side. Some are 70 ft. in length and 20 broad. When sailing, they are
-guided by a system of planks, called _guaras_, which are shoved down
-between the beams in different parts of the raft as they are wanted,
-the breadth of the plank being in the direction of the lines of the
-timbers. By means of these they are able to sail near the wind, and to
-luff up, bear away, and tack at pleasure. When a _guara_ is put down in
-the fore part of the raft, it luffs up, and when in the hinder part, it
-bears away. This system of steering, he says, the Indians have learnt
-empirically, 'their uncultivated minds never having examined into the
-_rationale_ of the thing.'
-
-It was one of these vessels which Bartolomew Ruiz, pilot of the second
-expedition for the discovery of Peru, met with; and which so astonished
-the sailors, who had never before seen any vessel on the coast of
-America provided with a sail. Condamine speaks of the rafts in 1743,
-on the Chinchipe, in Peru. They are also used on the coast of Brazil,
-where they are also called _jungadas_, from which locality there is
-a model of one in the British Museum, and another in the Christy
-collection. Professor Wilson thinks it was by means of these vessels,
-driven off the coast of America westward, that the Polynesian and Malay
-islands were peopled; and this brings us to the consideration of the
-peculiar class of vessel which is distributed over a continuous area
-in the Pacific and adjoining seas, viz. the outrigger canoe, which, I
-shall endeavour to show, was derived from the raft.
-
-
-6. _Outrigger-canoes._
-
-The sailing properties of the _balza_, or any other similar raft, must
-have been greatly impeded by the resistance offered to the water by the
-ends of its numerous beams. In order to diminish the resistance, the
-obvious remedy was to use only two beams, placed parallel to each other
-at a distance apart, with a platform laid on cross-poles between them.
-
-Of this kind we find a vessel used by the Tasmanians, and described
-by Mr. Bonwick, on the authority of Lieut. Jeffreys. The natives, he
-says, would select two good stems of trees and place them parallel to
-each other, but a couple of yards apart; cross-pieces of small size
-were laid on these, and secured to the trees by scraps of tough bark.
-A stronger cross-timber, of greater thickness, was laid across the
-centre, and the whole was then covered by wicker-work. Such a float
-would be thirty feet long, and would hold from six to ten persons
-(Herbert Spencer, _Descriptive Sociology_ (London, 1874), No. 3, Table
-V).
-
-In Fiji, Williams describes a kind of vessel called _ulatoka_, a raised
-platform, floating on two logs, which must evidently be a vessel of the
-same description as that used in Tasmania.
-
-From these two logs were derived the double canoe on the one hand, and
-the canoe with the outrigger on the other.
-
-A link between the catamaran and the outrigger canoe is seen in a model
-in the India Museum, from Madras. It consists of the usual catamaran,
-already described, of three beams lashed together, the longest being
-in the centre, across which are attached, their ends extending on one
-side, long outrigger poles, to the extremities of which, parallel, and
-at some distance from the catamaran, is fastened an outrigger log, of
-smaller size and length, pointed at both ends, and boat-shaped, exactly
-like those used with the outrigger canoes to be hereafter described.
-When the art of hollowing out canoes was introduced, then one canoe
-and one log, or two canoes, were employed, as the case might be. This
-I consider to be a more natural sequence than to suppose the outrigger
-invented as a means of steadying the dug-out canoe.
-
-The outrigger canoe, and its accompanying double canoe, is used over
-the whole of the Polynesian and Asiatic islands--from Easter Island
-on the east, to Ceylon and the Andamans on the west. Their varieties
-are also, in some cases, continuous; and I will endeavour to trace
-the distribution of each, commencing with the canoe with the single
-outrigger.
-
-Towards the eastern and northern extremities of the Polynesian Islands
-we find that the canoes have a single outrigger, and that the ends
-of the outrigger poles are attached directly to the outrigger log,
-instead of being connected with it by upright supports, as is the case
-elsewhere. As the outrigger log is on a lower level than the line of
-the gunwales of the canoe, across which the other ends of the outrigger
-poles are lashed, they are generally curved downwards to meet the
-outrigger.
-
-This is the form described by La Perouse in Easter Island. It is
-the same in the drawings of canoes from Marquesas; also in the one,
-figured by Wilkes, from Wytoohee or Disappointment Isle, in the Low
-Archipelago; and in the one from Tahiti, Society Isles; also in those
-of the Sandwich Isles and the Kingsmill Isles; and it reappears again
-on the extreme west of the group in Ceylon, No. 1265 of my collection.
-
-But whilst this peculiarity appears to be constant in the
-above-mentioned region, the form of the body of the canoe differs in
-each group of islands. In the Marquesas the bow turns up very much, in
-the Sandwich Islands only slightly (No. 1264); in Disappointment Isle
-there is a projecting part before and behind, by which they step into
-it; in Tahiti they have a similar projection over the stern only, which
-is used for a similar purpose.
-
-To the westward of these, in a group extending over the centre of the
-region in question, all the outriggers that I have seen described,
-either by means of models or drawings, have upright supports on the
-upper side, and on these the outrigger poles rest, so as to be on the
-level of the line of the gunwales. This is the case in Nuie or Savage
-Island; in Samoa (No. 1262); in the Caroline Isles; in Bowditch Island,
-one of the Union group; in Tonga and Fiji; in New Guinea; in the
-Louisiade Archipelago, and in North Australia.
-
-Another peculiarity in this central region deserves notice. The ends
-of the canoe are covered with a deck extending over about one-third of
-its length fore and aft, and on this deck there is a row of upright
-pegs, carved out of the same piece as the deck, and running down the
-centre of it. Each peg is surmounted by a white _Cypraea ovula_ shell
-tied on. The origin and meaning of this custom is unknown, but it was
-probably adopted originally as insignia of the rank of the owner. Its
-distribution is limited to a group of islands lying between about
-the 10th and 20th parallel of south latitude, and 170° and 180° west
-longitude. Cook, in 1773, speaks of it in the Friendly Isles; and
-Wilkes, in 1838, mentions it in Samoa, Fiji, and Bowditch Island.
-The canoes of the Solomon Isles and other islands are, however, also
-ornamented with shells in different parts.
-
-The canoe with the single outrigger is also used in [Garret Dennis
-Island], which is described by Dampier in 1686; in the Ladrones, by
-Pigafetta, 1519; in the Pelew Islands; in Borneo; in Ceylon; in the
-Nicobar and Andaman Islands.
-
-In Kingsmill and the Caroline Islands, to the north, the outrigger is
-somewhat smaller than elsewhere, its length not exceeding one-third of
-the length of the canoe. In the adjoining groups of the Kingsmill and
-Ladrone Islands we have a variety of this vessel in which the canoe, on
-the outrigger side, is nearly flat, having a belly only on the opposite
-side. This is described by Wilkes in 1838, and Dampier in 1686.
-
-The double canoe represents a variety in which both logs of the
-double-logged raft have developed into canoes. The two canoes are
-placed side by side, at a little distance apart, and transverse spars
-are lashed across the gunwales of both; a platform being built upon the
-cross spars; No. 1266 of my collection.
-
-Double canoes of this kind were used in New Zealand formerly, also in
-New Caledonia. Mr. Baines mentions it in North Australia, but I am not
-aware that it is used in New Guinea. Cook speaks of it in the Friendly
-Isles, Wilkes in Fiji. It was formerly used in Samoa, but Wilkes says
-it has been discontinued, and the single outrigger only is now used; in
-Tahiti; in the Low Archipelago, the inhabitants of which group are very
-expert sailors, steering by the stars, and seldom making any material
-error; in the Sandwich Isles; also in Ceylon, where it is called a
-_paddy boat_; in Burmah and in some of the Indian rivers; at Mosapore,
-where it goes by the name of _langardy_; and in Cochin, on the southern
-portion of the Malabar coast, where it is employed as a ferry-boat. It
-also appears, by a model in the India Museum, that it is used as high
-up as Patna, on the Ganges.
-
-In Fiji we find a connecting link between the double canoe and the
-canoe with the single outrigger. Here the outrigger consists of a boat,
-similar in construction to the large one to which it is attached,
-but smaller, and connected with the platform between them by upright
-supports.
-
-Contrivances for sailing near the wind with the single outrigger canoe
-have led to the introduction of several other varieties of this class
-of vessel. It is necessary that the outrigger should always be on the
-windward side. The outrigger acts as a weight on the windward side, to
-prevent the narrow canoe from being blown over on the opposite side.
-When it blows very hard, the men run out on to the outrigger, to give
-it the additional weight of their bodies. Wilkes says that whenever
-the outrigger gets to the leeward side, there is almost invariably an
-upset. The outrigger probably is pressed too deeply into the water,
-and meeting with too much resistance, breaks the poles. To meet this
-difficulty both the canoe and outrigger are, in some parts, made
-pointed at both ends. When they wish to tack, instead of luffing and
-coming about, they bear away, until the vessel gets on the opposite
-quarter, and then, by shifting the sail, they sail away again stern
-first. This system is pursued in Fiji, in parts of New Guinea, and
-northward, in Kingsmill Islands (Wilkes).
-
-Another mode of meeting this difficulty consists in having two
-outriggers, one on each side. This is employed in the Louisiade
-Archipelago (No. 1260), in parts of New Guinea, and to the north, in
-the Sooloo Archipelago. Yet another method remains to be described. In
-Samoa the canoes are built with bow and stern, and the outrigger is
-pointed towards the fore part only. As these vessels can only sail one
-way, the outrigger, in tacking, must necessarily be sometimes on the
-leeward side; to meet this, they rig out a platform corresponding to
-the outrigger platform on the opposite side; this, for distinction's
-sake, we may term a _weather platform_. It has no outrigger log, nor
-does it touch the water, but when the wind blows so heavily as to
-press the outrigger down on the lee side, they run out on the weather
-platform, and counterbalance the effect of the wind by their weight.
-This contrivance is used in some parts of New Guinea, where, it may
-be observed, the varieties of the outrigger canoe are more numerous
-than in most of the other islands. It is also used in the Solomon
-Isles, where the weather platform is of the same width as the outrigger
-platform; and probably in some of the other islands to the north.
-
-Finally we have, in the Asiatic Archipelago, a contrivance which may
-be said to be derived partly from the double outrigger, and partly
-from the weather platform last described. In proportion as the simple
-dug-out canoe began to be converted into a built-up vessel, and to
-acquire greater beam, they began to depend less and less on the
-support of the outrigger. The double outrigger necessarily presented
-considerable resistance to the water, but the vessel was still too
-narrow to sail by itself. A weather platform had, however, been
-found sufficient to balance the vessel on one side, and the next
-step was to knock off the outrigger log on the other side, thereby
-converting the outrigger platform into a weather platform; the two
-platforms projecting one on each side of the vessel, on the level of
-the gunwales, without touching the water, and thereby acting on the
-principle of the balancing-pole of a tight-rope dancer, whilst the
-resistance to the water was by this means confined to that of the hull
-of the vessel itself. These double weather-platform boats were also
-found more convenient in inland waters, in the canals in Manilla, and
-elsewhere.
-
-De Guignes, in 1796, mentions a contrivance of this sort in the
-Philippines, but from the account, it is not quite clear whether he
-refers to a double weather platform, or a vessel with an outrigger
-and a weather platform. He says that the boats at Manilla are very
-sharply built, and furnished with yards, which serve as _balances_,
-on the windward side of which, when the wind blows hard, the sailors
-place themselves to counterpoise the effect of the wind on the sails.
-This contrivance does not, however, always ensure safety, for at times
-the bamboos which form the balance break, in which case the boat
-founders and the crew are lost. Dampier, however, in 1686, clearly
-speaks of the double weather platform at Manilla. He says that the
-difference between these Manilla boats and those at Guam, in the
-Ladrones, is that, whereas at Guam there is a little boat, fastened to
-the outriggers, that lies in the water, the beams or bamboos here are
-fastened transverse-wise to the outlayers on each side, and touch not
-the water like boats, but one, three, or four feet above the water, and
-serve for the canoe-men to sit and row and paddle upon. He says, that
-when the vessel reels, the ends of the platform dip into the water,
-and the vessel rights itself. Still further north, at Rangoon, on the
-Irrawaddy, we find the same contrivance described by Symes in 1795.
-He says that the boats are long and narrow, sixty feet in length, and
-not more than twelve in the widest place; they require a good deal of
-ballast, and would have been in constant danger of upsetting, had they
-not been provided with outriggers which, composed of thin boards, or
-oftener of buoyant bamboos, make a platform that extends horizontally
-six or seven feet on the outside of the boat from stem to stern. Thus
-secure, he says, the vessel can incline no further than until the
-platform touches the surface of the water, when she immediately rights;
-on this stage the boatmen ply their oars.
-
-This constitutes one out of many points of evidence that might be
-mentioned, serving to show that the arts and culture of the Burmese,
-and of all this part of Asia, have been derived from the Malay
-Archipelago more probably than the reverse.
-
-The outrigger canoe itself has never, I believe, been known on the
-Irrawaddy within the memory of man, but, as already seen, it is used in
-the Nicobar and Andaman Isles and on the coast to the south.
-
-These outriggers, or balancing platforms, appear gradually to have
-diminished in size as the vessel increased in beam, and there can be
-little doubt that the rude stages or balconies outside the gunwales
-represented in the models of many of the larger vessels used in these
-seas are the last vestiges of the outrigger. No. 1278 of my collection
-is an example of this.
-
-
-7. _Rudders, Sails, and other Contrivances._
-
-All the various items of evidence which I have collected, and
-endeavoured to elucidate by means of survivals, whether in relation to
-modes of navigation or other branches of industry, appear to me to tend
-towards establishing a gradual development of culture as we advance
-northward. Although Buddhism and its concomitant civilization may have
-come from the north, there has been an earlier and prehistoric flow of
-culture in the opposite direction--northward--from the primaeval and
-now submerged cradle of the human family in the southern hemisphere.
-This, I venture to think, will establish itself more and more clearly,
-in proportion as we divest ourselves of the numerous errors which
-have arisen from our acceptance of the Noachian deluge as a universal
-catastrophe.
-
-As human culture developed northward from the equator toward the 40th
-parallel of latitude, civilization began to bud out in Egypt, India,
-and China, and a great highway of nations was established by means of
-ships along the southern margin of the land, from China to the Red Sea.
-
-Along this ocean highway may be traced many connexions in ship forms
-which have survived from the earliest times. The _oculus_, which,
-on the sacred boats of the Egyptians, represented the eye of Osiris
-guiding the mummy of the departed across the sacred lake, is still seen
-eastward--in India and China--converted into an ornamental device,
-whilst westward it lived through the period of the Roman and Grecian
-_biremes_ and _triremes_, and has survived to this day on the Maltese
-rowing-boats and the _xebecque_ of Calabria, or has been converted
-into a hawser-hole in modern European craft. The function of the
-rudder--which in the primitive vessels of the southern world is still
-performed by the paddlers, whilst paddling with their faces to the
-prow--was confided, as sails began to be introduced, to the rearmost
-oars. In some of the Egyptian sculptures the three hindermost rowers on
-each side are seen steering the vessel with their oars. Ultimately one
-greatly developed oar on each side of the stern performed this duty;
-the _loom_ of which was attached to an upright beam on the deck, as
-is still the case in some parts of India. In some of the larger Malay
-_prahaus_ there are openings or windows in the stern, considerably
-below the deck, by which the steersmen have access to two large
-rudders, one on each side; each rudder being the vestige of a side oar.
-
-Throughout the Polynesian Islands the steering is performed with
-either one or two greatly developed paddles. Both in the rudder of the
-Egyptian sculptures and in the _gubernaculum_ of the Roman vessels,
-we see the transition from the large double oar, one on each side,
-to the single oar at the stern. The ship of Ptolemaeus Philopator
-had four rudders, each thirty cubits in length (Smith's _Dict._, s.
-v. 'Navis'). The Chinese and Japanese rudder is but a modification
-of the oar, worked through large holes in the stern of the vessel;
-which large holes, in the case of the Japanese, owe their preservation
-to the orders of the Tycoon, who caused them to be retained in all
-his vessels, in order to prevent his subjects from venturing far to
-sea. The _buccina_, or shell trumpet, which is used especially on
-board all canoes in the Pacific, from the coast of Peru to Ceylon, is
-represented, together with the _gubernaculum_, in the hands of Tritons
-in Roman sculptures (Smith's _Dict._, s. v. 'Navis'), and the shell
-form of it was preserved in its metallic representatives.
-
-The sail, in its simplest form, consists of a triangular mat, with
-bamboos lashed to the two longer sides. In New Guinea and some of the
-other islands, this sail, which is here seen in its simplest form, is
-simply put up on deck, with the apex downwards and the broad end up,
-and kept up by stays fore and aft. When a separate mast was introduced,
-this sail was hauled up by a halyard attached to one of the bamboos,
-at the distance of about one-fifth of its length from the broad end,
-the apex of the bamboo-edged mat being fastened forward by means of
-a tack. By taking away the lower bamboo the sail became the _lateen_
-sail of the Malay pirate _proa_, the singular resemblance of which to
-that of the Maltese galley of the eighteenth century (a resemblance
-shared by all other parts of the two vessels) may be seen by two models
-placed side by side in the Royal United Service Institution. Professor
-Wilson observes that the use of the sail appears to be almost unknown
-on either continent of America, and the surprise of the Spaniards on
-first seeing one used on board a Peruvian _balza_ arose from this known
-peculiarity of early American navigation (p. 218). Lahontan, however,
-in 1684, says that the Canadian bark canoes, though usually propelled
-by paddles, sometimes carried a small sail. He does not, however, say
-whether the knowledge of these has been derived from Europeans. Mr.
-Lloyd also mentions small sails used with bark canoes in Newfoundland.
-
-The _crow's-nest_, which in the Egyptian vessels served to contain
-a slinger or an archer at the top of the mast, and which is also
-represented in the Assyrian sculptures, was still used for the same
-purpose in Europe in the fifteenth century, was modified in the
-sixteenth century, and became the mast-head so well known to midshipmen
-in our own time. The two raised platforms, which in the Egyptian
-vessels served to contain the man with the fathoming pole in the fore
-part, and the steersman behind, became the _prora_ and the _puppis_
-of the Romans, and the _forecastle_ and _poop_ of modern European
-vessels. The _aplustre_, which, in the form of a lotus, ornamented the
-stern of the Egyptian war-craft, gave the form to the _aplustre_ of the
-Greeks and Romans, and may still be seen on the stern of the Burmese
-war-boats at the present time.
-
- * * * * *
-
-All these numerous examples serve to show that where civilization has
-advanced the forms have been gradually changed; where, on the other
-hand, it has not advanced, they have remained unchanged. Sir Gardner
-Wilkinson and others have pointed out the striking resemblance between
-the boats of the ancient Egyptians and those of modern India. 'The
-form of the stern, the principle and construction of the rudder, the
-cabins, the square sail, the copper eye on each side of the head, the
-line of small squares at the side, like false windows, and the shape
-of the oars of boats used on the Ganges, forcibly call to mind,' he
-says, 'those of the Nile, represented in the paintings of the Theban
-tombs.' We have also seen (p. 214) that the inflated sheep-skin still
-serves to transport the Mesopotamian peasant across the Euphrates, as
-it did when Nimroud was a thriving city. The skin and wicker tub-shaped
-vessels still float down the Euphrates with their cargoes to Baghdad,
-are broken up, and the skins carried up the river again on mules, as
-they were in the time of Herodotus, upwards of 2,000 years ago. What
-is there to prevent our believing that the primitive vessels which we
-have been describing in the southern hemisphere, the representatives of
-some of which have been discovered in river deposits of the stone age
-in Europe, may have been in use in the countries in which they are now
-found, as long, and longer--far longer?
-
-What reason is there to doubt that the rude bark-float of the
-Australian, the Tasmanian, and the Ethiopian; the catamaran of the
-Papuan; the dug-out of the New Zealander; the built-up canoe of
-the Samoan; and the improved ribbed vessel of the Ke islander, are
-survivals representing successive stages in the development of the art
-of ship-building, not lapses to ruder methods of construction as the
-result of degradation; that each stage supplies us with examples of
-what was at one time the perfection of the art, inconceivable ages ago?
-Some, as we have seen, especially the more primitive kinds, spread
-nearly all over the world, whilst others had a more limited area of
-distribution. Taken together, they enable us to trace back the history
-of ship-building from the time of the earliest Egyptian sculptures to
-the commencement of the art.
-
-Nor does the interest of this inquiry confine itself to the development
-of ship-building. As affecting the means of locomotion, it throws light
-on the development of other branches of culture in early times. For
-even if we set aside exceptional instances in which individual canoes
-have been driven away to great distances--such as the case in which
-an Esquimaux in his kayak was picked up off the coast of Aberdeen, or
-that of a Chinese junk having been wrecked on the north-west coast of
-America, which might or might not have produced permanent results--and
-confine ourselves to those cases in which the distribution of like
-forms of vessels proves that there must probably have been frequent
-communication between shore and shore; and if we further assume, as I
-propose to do, that the existing means of communication in the Pacific
-in a great measure represents the amount of intercourse that took place
-across the sea in prehistoric times, that is to say, in times prior to
-the earliest Egyptian sculptures, we find no difficulty in accounting,
-by this means, for the striking similarity observable in the arts and
-ideas of savages in distant lands; for not only have these vessels
-been the means of conveying from place to place the material form of
-implements, such as celts, stone knives, and so forth, which, being
-imperishable, have been handed down to us unchanged, and the forms of
-which we know to have spread over large geographic areas; but also each
-voyage has conveyed a boat-load of ideas, of which no material record
-remains, in the shape of myths, religions, and superstitions, which
-have been emptied out upon the seashore, to seek affinity with other
-chatter that was indigenous to the place.
-
-Thus, by means of intercommunication, no less than by spontaneous
-development, have been formed those numerous combinations which so
-greatly puzzle the student of culture at the present time.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[219] A Paper read at the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain
-and Ireland on December 22, 1874, and published in the _Journal_ of
-the Institute, vol. iv (1875), pp. 399-435. (N.B.--This paper was
-not furnished by the author with either plates or references. The
-latter have been supplied, so far as possible, on pp. 229 ff.: for
-illustrations, reference should be made to the section on Navigation in
-the Pitt-Rivers Museum, Oxford.--ED.)
-
-[220] (The _Catalogue of the Anthropological Collection lent by Col.
-Lane Fox to Bethnal Green Museum_ (London, 1874, parts i and ii) only
-contains 'Weapons'; part iii was never issued.--ED.)
-
-[221] _Notes and Queries on Anthropology, for the Use of Travellers
-and Residents in Uncivilized Lands_, drawn up by a Committee appointed
-by the British Association for the Advancement of Science (1874); 3rd
-edition, 1899, published by the Anthropological Institute, 3 Hanover
-Square, W.
-
-[222] 'Primitive Warfare,' pp. 127-30, 148-51, above.
-
-[223] Address to the Anthropological Department at the Brighton meeting
-of the British Association, 1872. _Report Brit. Assoc._ (London, 1873),
-p. 161.
-
-[224] Since writing this I have seen the illustration in Sir H.
-Rawlinson's note to this passage, in which he gives it as his opinion
-that this is the meaning and use to be ascribed to these pins; and he
-says that this system is still employed in Egypt, where they raise an
-extra bulwark above the gunwale. Rawlinson, _Herodotus_ (1862), vol.
-ii. p. 132.
-
-[225] _Denmark in the Early Iron Age_, by Conrad Engelhardt (London,
-1866), p. 31.
-
-[226] 'On Vessels of Papyrus,' by John Hogg, Esq., M.A., F.L.S.;
-_Magazine of Nat. Hist._, vol. ii (1829), pp. 324-32: cf. p. 206, above.
-
-
-
-
-NOTES TO 'EARLY MODES OF NAVIGATION'
-
-
-P. 189. Steinitz, _The Ship: its Origin and Progress_ (London, 1849),
-Pl. ii (frontispiece): cf. pp. ix, 4.
-
- Gregory, 'Expedition to the NW. coast of Australia,' _Roy. Geogr.
- Soc. Journal_, xxxii. (1862) p. 376.
-
-P. 190. Cook, _Voyages_ (ed. London, 1842), vol. i. p. 204.
-
- Kitto, _Pictorial Bible_, note on 2 Sam. xix. 18.
-
- Pliny, ix. 10 (cf. vi. 24); Diodorus, iii. 21, 5; Strabo, p. 773;
- turtle-shell boats were in actual use among the 'Turtle-eaters'
- (_Chelonophagi_) of Carmania and the islands of the Red Sea.
-
-P. 191. Kalm, _Travels into North America_ (London, 1771), vol. ii. pp.
-38-9.
-
- Raleigh's Expedition; Amadas and Barlawe, _The First Voyage to the
- Coasts of America_ (= Pinkerton (1811), vol. xii. p. 567).
-
- Columbus, _The Journal of Christopher Columbus, &c._; transl.
- Markham (Hakluyt Society, 1893), p. 39, mentions dug-out canoes
- (cf. pp. 58, 94), but not the use of fire.
-
- Mouat, _Adventures and Researches among the Andaman Islanders_
- (London, 1863), pp. 315-6; only hand-hollowing in use in his time:
- no mention of Blair here: perhaps a verbal communication to the
- author.
-
- Symes, _An Account of an Embassy to the Kingdom of Ava_ in 1795
- (London, 1800), p. 320 (= Pinkerton (1811), vol. ix. p. 500).
-
- Turner, _Nineteen Years in Polynesia_ (London, 1861), pp. 425-6.
-
-P. 192. Wood, _Natural History of Man_ (London, 1868-70), vol. ii. p.
-732.
-
-P. 193. Wilkes, _United States Exploring Expedition_ (Philadelphia,
-1845), vol. ii. p. 150 (Samoa); vol. v. p. 322 (Manilla); vol. v. p.
-353 (Sooloo).
-
- De Guignes, _Voyages à Peking, Manille, et l'Ile de France_ (Paris,
- 1808), vol. iii. p. 402.
-
- De Morga, _The Philippine Islands_ (1609); transl. by Hon. H. E.
- Stanley (Hakluyt Society, 1868), p. 272; two types, (_a_) 'made
- of one very large tree'; (_b_) 'also _vireys_ and _barangays_ ...
- joined together with wooden bolts.'
-
- Symes, _An Account of an Embassy to the Kingdom of Ava_ in 1795
- (London, 1800), p. 320 (= Pinkerton (1811), vol. ix. p. 500).
-
-P. 194. Turpin, _Histoire de Siam_ (Paris, 1771), vol. i. pp. 34-6.
-
- Pietro della Valle, _Viaggi_ (Brighton, 1843), vol. i. pp. 602-3.
-
- Duarte Barbosa (Magellan), _A Description of the Coasts of East
- Africa and Malabar_ (1514); transl. by Hon. H. E. Stanley (Hakluyt
- Society, 1866), p. 9.
-
- Livingstone, _Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa_
- (London, 1857), p. 64.
-
- Barth, _Travels and Discoveries in North and Central Africa_
- (London, 1857), vol. ii. p. 469; the tributary is the _Faro_; Yola
- is the adjacent town.
-
- Grant, _Walk across Africa_ (London, 1864), p. 304.
-
- Condamine, M. de la, _Relation abrégée d'un voyage fait dans
- l'intérieur de l'Amérique méridionale_ (Paris, 1745), p. 63 (at
- Laguna).
-
-P. 195. Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. p. 169.
-
- Bartram, _Travels through N. and S. Carolina, Georgia, &c._
- (London, 1792), p. 225.
-
- Kalm, _Travels into N. America_ (London, 1771), vol. ii. pp. 240-2.
-
- Pliny, xvi. 40 _Germaniae praedones singulis arboribus cavatis
- navigant, quarum quaedam et triginta homines ferunt._
-
- Keller, _Lake Dwellings of Switzerland_ (transl. by J. E. Lee, 2nd
- ed., 1878), p. 45, Pl. x. 8.
-
- Sir W. Wilde, _Catalogue of the Antiquities of the Museum of the
- Royal Irish Academy_ (Dublin, 1863), vol. i. pp. 202-4.
-
- Ware, _The Antiquities and History of Ireland_ (London, 1705), p.
- 47.
-
- Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. pp. 153, 160.
-
-P. 197. Cook, _Voyages_ (London, 1842), vol. i. p. 193.
-
-P. 197. Barth, _Travels_ (London, 1857), vol. ii. p. 469.
-
- Byron, _An Account of the Voyages undertaken ... for making
- Discoveries in the Southern Hemisphere ... by Commodore Byron,
- &c._, by John Hawksworth (London, 1773), vol. i. p. 79.
-
-P. 198. Duarte Barbosa, _A Description_, &c. (Hakluyt Society, 1866),
-pp. 14-15.
-
- Denham and Clapperton, _Travels in Northern and Central Africa_
- (London, 1826), p. 60 (Denham).
-
- Barth, _Travels_ (London, 1857), vol. iii. p. 293.
-
- Grant, _Walk across Africa_ (London, 1864), p. 196.
-
-P. 199. Cook, _Voyages_ (1842), vol. i. p. 425 (Friendly Islands); pp.
-95-7 (Otaheite).
-
- La Perouse, _Voyage autour du monde_ (Paris, 1897), Atlas, No. 61.
-
- Wilkes, _United States Exploring Expedition_ (Philadelphia, 1845),
- vol. i. pp. 331-2 (Wytoohee); vol. ii. p. 157 (Samoa).
-
-P. 200. Williams, _Fiji and the Fijians_ (London, 1858), vol. i. pp.
-71-6.
-
- Wilkes, l. c., vol. v. p. 52.
-
- Wallace, _The Malay Archipelago_ (London, 1869), vol. ii. p. 159
- (the long journey); p. 92 (nail-less boats); pp. 183-6 (the Ke
- islanders). [The author's text has been amended to conform with the
- statements of Wallace.--ED.]
-
-P. 201. Dampier, _A New Voyage round the World_ (London, 1729), vol. i.
-p. 429.
-
- Turpin, _Histoire de Siam_ (Paris, 1771), vol. i. p. 36.
-
-P. 202. Duarte Barbosa (Magellan), _A Description_, &c. (Hakluyt,
-1866), pp. 147-8.
-
- Marco Polo, _Travels_, transl. by Sir H. Yule (London, 1903), vol.
- i. p. 108.
-
-P. 203. Lobo, _A Voyage to Abyssinia_ (London, 1735), p. 24.
-
- Isaiah xviii. 2; see Kitto's _Pictorial Bible_, note on 2 Sam. xix.
- 18.
-
-P. 204. Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (1862), vol. i. p. 169.
-
- Sir Gardner Wilkinson, _The Manners and Customs of Ancient Egypt_,
- 3rd ed., 1878, vol. ii. p. 208, No. 403 (No. 399, 1st ed.).
-
- Lucan, _Pharsalia_, iv. 136 _Conseritur bibula Memphitica cymba
- papyro._
-
- Plutarch, _de Iride et Osiride_, 18.
-
- Pliny, vii. 56 _Nave primus in Graeciam ex Aegypto Danaus advenit:
- ante ratibus navigabatur, inventis in Mari Rubro inter insulas a
- rege Erythra_ (cf. ix. 10, and note on p. 190 above). _Reperiuntur,
- qui Mysos et Troianos priores excogitasse, cum transirent adversus
- Thracas. Etiam nunc in Britannico Oceano vitiles corio circumsutae
- fiunt: in Nilo ex papyro, et scirpo, et arundine._ [The quotation,
- as given in _J.A.I._, iv. 414, is inaccurate.--ED.]
-
- Huxley, _Trans. Int. Congr. Preh. Arch._, Norwich, 1868 (London,
- 1869), p. 92; see also p. 147 above.
-
-P. 205. Owen, _Journ. Anthrop. Inst._, vol. iv. p. 240.
-
- Rosellini, _Monumenti dell' Egitto e della Nubia_ (Pisa, 1834),
- Mon. Civ., Pl. cxix. 1, cxvii. 3 (= Plate XV. 109-11 herewith).
-
-P. 206. Prideaux; Markham, _A History of the Abyssinian Expedition,
-with a chapter ... by Lieut. W. F. Prideaux_ (London, 1869), p. 101.
-
- Denon, _Voyages dans la Basse et la Haute Égypte_ (London, 1807),
- vol. ii. p. 72.
-
- Belzoni, _Narrative of Operations and Recent Discoveries ... in
- Egypt and Nubia_ (London, 1820), p. 62; (holds nine persons).
-
- Bruce, _Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile_ (London, 1790),
- vol. v. p. 6.
-
-P. 207. Pliny, xiii. 2 refers to wooden boats; v. 2 to wickerwork:
-_ibi Aethiopicae conveniunt naves: namque eas plicatiles humeris
-transferunt, quoties ad cataractas ventum est_.
-
- Belzoni, _Narrative of Operations_ (London, 1820), pp. 380-1.
-
- Pliny, v. 2 (above). Lucan, _Phars._ iv. 136 (above).
-
- Herodotus, ii. 96. Wilkinson (Birch), 3rd ed., vol. ii. p. 307.
-
-P. 208. Homer, _Odyssey_, v. 241-261. Smith, _Dict. Gr. and Rom.
-Antiq._, s. v. 'Navis.'
-
- Nydam boat. Engelhardt, _Denmark in the Early Iron Age_ (London,
- 1866), pp. 29-39, Pl. i-iv.
-
- Tacitus, _Germania_, 44.
-
-P. 210. Regnard, _OEuvres_ (Paris, 1854), vol. i, _Voyage de Laponie_,
-pp. 51, 100.
-
- Outhier, _Journal d'un Voyage au Nord, en 1736 et 1737_ (Paris,
- 1744), pp. 60-1.
-
- Bell, _Travels from St. Petersburg in Russia to diverse parts of
- Asia_ (Glasgow, 1763), vol. i. p. 168 ff.
-
- Atkinson, _Oriental and Western Siberia_ (London, 1858), pp. 14-15.
-
-P. 211. Belzoni, _Narrative of Operations, &c. ... in Egypt and Nubia_
-(1820), p. 62.
-
-P. 212. Wilkes, _U. S. Exploring Expedition_ (Philadelphia, 1845), vol.
-i. p. 127. [Pritchard.]
-
- Kalm, _Travels into North America_ (London, 1771), vol. ii. p. 298.
-
- Lahontan, _New Voyages to North America_ (London, 1735), vol. i.
- pp. 26-9.
-
-P. 213. Lane-Fox (Pitt-Rivers), _Report of the British Association_,
-Brighton, 1872 (London, 1873), p. 163.
-
- Steinitz, _The Ship: its Origin and Progress_ (London, 1849), Pl.
- xvi. 6.
-
-P. 214. Layard, _Nineveh and its Remains_ (7th ed., London, 1848), vol.
-ii. pp. 381-2. Cf. Herodotus, i. 194.
-
- Lempriere, _A Tour from Gibraltar to Tangier_ (London, 1793), p.
- 421.
-
-P. 215. Herodotus, i. 194.
-
- Kitto, _Pictorial Bible_, note on 2 Sam. xix. 18. Layard, l. c.
-
- Hamilton (Alexander), _A New Account of the East Indies, 1688-1723_
- (Edinb. 1727), vol. i. p. 88. They are described, even later, by
- Sir R. K. Porter, _Travels in Georgia_, &c., 1817-20 (London,
- 1821-2), vol. ii. p. 260; and figured in Rawlinson, _Herodotus_
- (1862), vol. i. p. 268, after Chesney, _Expedition for the Survey
- of the Euphrates and Tigris_ (London, 1850), vol. ii.
-
- Buchanan, _A Journey from Madras through the countries of Mysore,
- Canara, and Malabar_ (London, 1807), vol. ii. pp. 121, 141, 151,
- 163.
-
-P. 216. Cook, _Voyages_ (London, 1842), vol. ii. pp. 303-4.
-
- Frobisher, _The Three Voyages of Martin Frobisher_, ed. Collinson
- (Hakluyt Society, 1867), p. 384.
-
- Kerguelen, _Relation d'un voyage dans la mer du Nord_ (Paris,
- 1771), pp. 178-9.
-
- Kalm, _Travels into North America_ (London, 1771), vol. ii. p. 241;
- iii. p. 16.
-
- Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. p. 148.
-
-P. 217. Caesar, _de Bello Civili_, i. 54.
-
- Lucan, _Pharsalia_, iii. 131-5.
-
- Bellenden, _The History and Chronicles of Scotland_, &c. 1536
- (Edinburgh, 1821), vol. i. p. lix.
-
- Sir W. Wilde, _Catalogue ... of the Royal Irish Academy_ (Dublin,
- 1863), vol. i. p. 204.
-
- Ulloa, _A Voyage to South America, 1735_ (London, 1807), vol. i.
- pp. 182-5.
-
-P. 218. Bartolomew Ruiz. See Benzoni, _Historia del Mondo Nuovo_
-(Venice, 1572), p. 165 (figure): reproduced in Benzoni (ed. Smyth:
-Hakluyt Soc., 1857), p. 243: cf. Winsor, _Narrative and Critical
-History of America_ (London, 1886), vol. ii. p. 508 (figure).
-
- Condamine, M. de la, _Relation abrégée d'un voyage fait dans
- l'intérieur de l'Amérique méridionale_ (Paris, 1745), p. 30 (on the
- Maranon, not the Chinchipe R.). 'Un exprès que j'avois dépêché de
- Tupenda ... avoit franchi tous ces obstacles sur un petit radeau
- fait avec deux ou trois pièces de bois, ce qui suffit à un Indien
- nud et excellent nageur, comme ils le sont tous.'
-
- Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. p. 177.
-
-P. 219. Bonwick, _Daily Life of the Tasmanians_ (London, 1870), p. 51.
-
- Williams, _Fiji and the Fijians_ (London, 1858), vol. i. p. 76.
-
-P. 220. La Perouse, _Voyage autour du monde_ (Paris, 1797), vol. ii. p.
-94.
-
- Wilkes, _U. S. Exploring Expedition_ (Philadelphia, 1845), vol. i.
- p. 331.
-
- Cook, _Voyages_ (London, 1842), vol. i. p. 425.
-
- Wilkes, l. c, vol. ii. p. 151 (Samoa); iii. pp. 365-6 (Fiji); v.
- pp. 11-12 (Bowditch Island).
-
-P. 221. Dampier, _A New Voyage round the World_ (London, 1729), vol.
-i. p. 215 (at Guam in the Ladrones; elsewhere he notes them 'only at
-Mindanao' in the Philippines, pp. 298-300).
-
-P. 221. Pigafetta, _Voyage round the World_ (= Pinkerton (1811), vol.
-xi. p. 325).
-
- Wilkes, _U.S. Explor. Exped._ (Philadelphia, 1845), vol. v. p. 52
- (Kingsmill Is.).
-
- Dampier, _A New Voyage, &c._ (1729), vol. i. p. 298 (Kingsmill Is.,
- and Ladrones).
-
- Baines, quoted in Wood, _Nat. Hist. of Man_ (London, 1868), vol.
- ii. p. 8.
-
- Cook, _Voyages_ (London, 1842), vol. i. p. 425.
-
- Wilkes, l. c., vol. iii. p. 365 (Fiji); ii. p. 151 (Samoa).
-
-P. 222. Wilkes, l. c., vol. iii. p. 365 (Fiji); v. p. 52 (Kingsmill).
-
-P. 223. De Guignes, _Voyages à Peking, Manille, et l'Ile de France_
-(Paris, 1808), vol. iii. p. 402.
-
- Dampier, _A New Voyage round the World_ (London, 1729), pp. 298-300.
-
- Symes, _An Account of an Embassy to the Kingdom of Ava_ in 1795
- (London, 1800), p. 223 (= Pinkerton (1811), vol. ix. p. 455).
-
-P. 226. Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. p. 175.
-
- Lahontan, _New Voyage to North America_ (London, 1735), vol. i. p.
- 28.
-
- Lloyd, _Journ. Anthrop. Inst._, vol. iv. p. 28.
-
-P. 227. Wilkinson (Birch), _Manners and Customs of the Ancient
-Egyptians_ (3rd ed., London, 1878), vol. ii. p. 219.
-
-
-
-
-Oxford: Printed at the Clarendon Press by HORACE HART, M.A.
-
-
-
-
- * * * * *
-
-
-
-
-Transcriber's Note
-
-
-Illustrations have been moved next to the text which they illustrate.
-
-
-The following apparent mistakes have been corrected:
-
-p. xvi "parodoxical" changed to "paradoxical"
-
-p. 35 "haves hown" changed to "have shown"
-
-p. 46 "which I I am" changed to "which I am"
-
-p. 51 "which they resemble." changed to "which they resemble.[19]"
-
-p. 56 (note) "172-80" changed to "172-80."
-
-p. 62 (note) "DC." changed to "D.C."
-
-p. 76 "glaves" changed to "glaives"
-
-Plate XVI. "AUSTRALIAN SHIELDS" changed to "AUSTRALIAN SHIELDS."
-
-p. 158 "Pescheira" changed to "Peschiera"
-
-p. 172 "the Caucasus:" changed to "the Caucasus;"
-
-p. 186 (note) "The former" changed to "The latter"
-
-p. 198 "mats'." changed to "mats.'"
-
-p. 198 "persons'." changed to "persons.'"
-
-p. 214 "Bagdad" changed to "Baghdad"
-
-
-The following possible mistakes have been left as printed:
-
-p. 31 use it.
-
-p. 72 (1846), vol. ii. 1. p.
-
-
-The following are used inconsistently in the text:
-
-blowpipe and blow-pipe
-
-Butan and Bootan
-
-cocoa-nut and coco-nut
-
-firearms and fire-arms
-
-gipsies and Gipsies
-
-pl. and Pl.
-
-sheepskin and sheep-skin
-
-shipbuilding and ship-building
-
-wickerwork and wicker-work
-
-Inconsistent punctuation in plates XV and XVI has been retained.
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
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-The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Evolution of Culture, by
-Augustus Henry Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
-almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
-re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
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-
-Title: The Evolution of Culture
- and Other Essays
-
-Author: Augustus Henry Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers
-
-Editor: J. L. Myres
-
-Release Date: February 8, 2014 [EBook #44844]
-
-Language: English
-
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-Transcriber's Note
-
-
-Greek text is indicated by ~swung dashes~, and superscript text
-by caret signs.
-
-
-
-
- THE
- EVOLUTION OF CULTURE
- AND OTHER ESSAYS
-
- BY THE LATE
- LT.-GEN. A. LANE-FOX PITT-RIVERS
- D.C.L., F.R.S., F.S.A.
-
- EDITED BY J. L. MYRES, M.A.
- STUDENT OF CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD
-
- WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
- HENRY BALFOUR, M.A.
- FELLOW OF EXETER COLLEGE, OXFORD
- CURATOR OF THE PITT-RIVERS MUSEUM
-
- TWENTY-ONE PLATES
-
- OXFORD
- AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
- 1906
-
-
-
-
- HENRY FROWDE, M.A.
-
- PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
-
- LONDON, EDINBURGH
-
- NEW YORK AND TORONTO
-
-
-
-
-PREFACE
-
-
-These Essays, or rather Lectures, contain the first-fruits of the
-earliest systematic attempt to apply the theory of Evolution to the
-products of human handiwork. In their original form they have long been
-difficult to obtain; and they are reprinted now to supply the needs of
-candidates for the Oxford Diploma in Anthropology, and of the numerous
-visitors to the Pitt-Rivers Museum in Oxford. But they will certainly
-appeal to a far wider public also, as a brief and authentic statement
-of their author's discoveries.
-
-The four Essays are reprinted substantially as they were first
-delivered and published. But verbal errors and actual misquotations
-have been corrected; and allusions to specimens or diagrams exhibited
-during the original discourses, but not published, have been replaced
-so far as possible by references to similar objects figured in the
-Plates.
-
-The Plates are photographic reproductions of the original
-illustrations, with the exception of Plates V, XIII, XVII, XVIII. Of
-these, Plate XIII has simply been re-drawn, from a faded original;
-Plates XVII and XVIII have been translated, without loss of detail,
-from colours to monochrome shading; Plate V has been reconstituted
-from illustrations quoted in the text, with the permission of their
-publisher, Mr. Murray. Plate XXI is reproduced, by permission of Sir
-John Evans, from the paper which it illustrated originally.
-
-The footnotes demand a word of explanation. The author, as the original
-publications show, was not precise in indicating his sources: he
-frequently gave, as a quotation, the general sense rather than the
-exact words of his authority; and occasionally his memory played him
-false. In the reprint, the precise references have been identified,
-and are given in full, and obvious errors in the text have been either
-amended or corrected in a footnote. The editor desires to acknowledge
-much valuable help in the search for references from Miss C. M. Prior,
-of Headington.
-
-
-
-
-CONTENTS
-
-
- PAGE
-
- PREFACE iii
-
- INTRODUCTION v
-
- PRINCIPLES OF CLASSIFICATION (1874) 1
-
- ON THE EVOLUTION OF CULTURE (1875) 20
- WITH PLATES I-V, AND XXI
-
- PRIMITIVE WARFARE. I (1867) 45
- WITH PLATES VI-XI
-
- PRIMITIVE WARFARE. II (1868) 89
- WITH PLATES XII-XVI
-
- PRIMITIVE WARFARE. III (1869) 144
- WITH PLATES XVII-XX
-
- EARLY MODES OF NAVIGATION (1874) 186
-
-
-
-
-INTRODUCTION[1]
-
-
-It was about the middle of last century that an officer in Her
-Majesty's Army began to apply the lessons which he had learnt in
-the course of some of his professional experimental work to studies
-pursued by him as a hobby in a far wider field of science. The story
-of the famous ethnographical collection of Colonel Lane Fox is well
-known, and I need but briefly refer to it. During his investigations,
-conducted with a view to ascertaining the best methods whereby the
-service firearms might be improved, at a time when the old Tower musket
-was being finally discarded, he was forcibly struck by the extremely
-gradual changes whereby improvements were effected. He observed that
-every noteworthy advancement in the efficiency, not only of the whole
-weapon, but also of every individual detail in its structure, was
-arrived at as a cumulative result of a succession of very slight
-modifications, each of which was but a trifling improvement upon the
-one immediately preceding it. Through noticing the unfailing regularity
-of this process of gradual _evolution_ in the case of firearms, he
-was led to believe that the same principles must probably govern the
-development of the other arts, appliances, and ideas of mankind. With
-characteristic energy and scientific zeal Colonel Lane Fox began at
-once, in the year 1851, to illustrate his views and to put them to
-a practical test. He forthwith commenced to make the ethnological
-collection with which his name will always be associated, and which
-rapidly grew to large proportions under his keen search for material
-which should illustrate and perhaps prove his theory of progress by
-evolution in the arts of mankind.
-
-Although as a collector he was omnivorous, since every artefact
-product fell strictly within his range of inquiry, his collection,
-nevertheless, differed from the greater number of private ethnological
-collections, and even public ones of that day, inasmuch as it was built
-up _systematically_ with a definite object in view. It is unnecessary
-for me to describe in detail the system which he adopted in arranging
-his collection. His principles are well known to ethnologists, either
-from the collection itself or from his writings, more especially from
-the series of lectures which he gave at the Royal United Service
-Institution, in the years 1867-9, upon 'Primitive Warfare'; from
-his paper read before the Anthropological Institute in 1874 on 'The
-Principles of Classification, as adopted in the arrangement of his
-Anthropological Collection', which was then exhibited at the Bethnal
-Green Museum; from that portion of the _catalogue raisonne_ of his
-collection which was published in 1877; and from numerous other
-papers dealing with special illustrations of his theory. Suffice it
-to say that, in classifying his ethnological material, he adopted
-a _principal_ system of groups into which objects of like form or
-function from all over the world were associated to form series, each
-of which illustrated as completely as possible the varieties under
-which a given art, industry, or appliance occurred. Within these main
-groups objects belonging to the same region were usually associated
-together in _local_ sub-groups. And wherever amongst the implements or
-other objects exhibited in a given series there seemed to be suggested
-a _sequence of ideas_, shedding light upon the probable stages in
-the evolution of this particular class, these objects were specially
-brought into juxtaposition. This special grouping to illustrate
-sequence was particularly applied to objects from the same region as
-being, from their local relationships, calculated better to illustrate
-an actual continuity. As far as possible the seemingly more primitive
-and generalized forms--those simple types which usually approach most
-nearly to _natural_ forms, or whose use is associated with primitive
-ideas--were placed at the beginning of each series, and the more
-complex and specialized forms were arranged towards the end.
-
-The primary object of this method of classification by series was
-to demonstrate, either actually or hypothetically, the origin,
-development, and continuity of the material arts, and to illustrate the
-variations whereby the more complex and specialized forms belonging
-to the higher conditions of culture have been evolved by successive
-slight improvements from the simple, rudimentary, and generalized forms
-of a primitive culture.
-
-The _earlier_ stages in these sequence series were more especially the
-object of investigation, the later developments being in the greater
-number of cases omitted or merely suggested. It was necessary for
-Colonel Lane Fox to restrict the extent of the series, any one of
-which, if developed to the full extent, would easily have filled a
-good-sized museum. The earlier stages, moreover, were less familiar,
-and presented fewer complications. The general principles of his theory
-were as adequately demonstrated by the ruder appliances of uncivilized
-races as by the more elaborate products of peoples of higher culture;
-and, moreover, there was doubtless a great attraction in attacking
-that end of the development series which offered a prospect at least
-of finality, inasmuch as there was always a chance of discovering
-the absolute origin of a given series. Hence the major part of his
-collection consisted of specimens procured from savage and barbaric
-races, amongst whom the more rudimentary forms of appliances are for
-the most part to be found.
-
-The validity of the general views of Colonel Lane Fox as to evolution
-in the material arts of Man was rapidly accepted by a large number of
-ethnologists and others, who were convinced by the arguments offered
-and the very striking evidence displayed in their support. I have heard
-people object to the use of the term 'evolution' in connexion with
-the development of human arts. To me the word appears to be eminently
-appropriate, and I think it would be exceedingly difficult to find one
-which better expresses the succession of extremely minute variations
-by means of which progress has been effected. That the successive
-individual units of improvement, which when linked together form the
-chain of advancement, _are_ exceedingly small is a fact which any one
-can prove for himself if he will study _in detail_ the growth of a
-modern so-called 'invention'. One reason why we are apt to overlook
-the greater number of stages in the growth of still living arts is
-that we are not as a rule privileged to watch behind the scenes. Of
-the numberless slight modifications, each but a trifling advance upon
-the last, it is but comparatively few which ever meet the eye of the
-public, which only sees the more important stages; those, that is to
-say, which present a sufficiently distinct advance upon that which has
-hitherto been in use to warrant their attracting attention, or, shall
-we say, having for a time a marketable value. The bulk of the links in
-the evolutionary chain disappear almost as soon as they are made, and
-are known to few, perhaps none, besides their inventors. Even where the
-history of some invention is recorded with the utmost care it is only
-the more prominent landmarks which receive notice; the multitude of
-trifling variations which have led up to them are not referred to, for,
-even if they be known, space forbids such elaborately detailed record.
-The smaller variations are, for the most part, utterly forgotten,
-their ephemeral existence and their slight individual influence upon
-the general progress being unrecorded at the time, and lost sight of
-almost at once. The immediately succeeding stage claims for the moment
-the attention, and it again in its turn becomes the stepping-stone upon
-which the next raises itself, and so on.
-
-Before proceeding further, let me give as briefly as I can an example
-of a development series worked out, in the main, upon the general line
-of inquiry inaugurated by Colonel Lane Fox. It is commonly accepted as
-a fact, which is borne out by tradition, both ancient and modern, that
-certain groups of stringed instruments of music must be referred for
-their origin to the bow of the archer. The actual historical record
-does not help us to come to a definite conclusion on this point, nor
-does the direct testimony of archaeology; but from other sources very
-suggestive evidence is forthcoming. A comparative study of the musical
-instruments of modern savage and barbaric peoples makes it very clear
-to one that the greater portion of the probable chain of sequences
-which led from the simple bows to highly specialized instruments of
-the harp family may be reconstructed from types still existing in use
-among living peoples, most of the well-defined early stages being
-represented in Africa at the present day[2]. The native of Damaraland,
-who possesses no stringed instrument proper, is in the habit of
-temporarily converting his ordinary shooting-bow into a musical
-instrument. For this purpose he ties a small thong loopwise round
-the bow and bow-string, so as to divide the latter into two vibrating
-parts of unequal length. When lightly struck with a small stick the
-tense string emits a couple of notes, which satisfy this primitive
-musician's humble cravings for purely rhythmic sound. Amongst many
-other African tribes we find a slight advance, in the form of special,
-rather slightly made bows constructed and used for musical purposes
-only. In order to increase the volume of sound, it is frequently the
-custom amongst some of the tribes to rest the bow against some hollow,
-resonant body, such as an inverted pot or hollow gourd. In many parts
-again, we find that the instrument has been further improved by
-_attaching_ a gourd to the bow, and thus providing it with a permanent
-resonating body. To achieve greater musical results, it would appear
-that somewhere in Africa (in the West, I suspect) two or more small
-bows were attached to a single gourd. I have, so far, been unable to
-trace this particular link in Africa itself, but, curiously enough,
-this very form has been obtained from Guiana. It may be thought that I
-am applying a breaking strain to the chain of evidence when I endeavour
-to work an instrument from South America into an African developmental
-series. But, when we recall the fact that evidence of the existence of
-_indigenous_ stringed instruments of music in the New World has yet to
-be produced, coupled with the certain knowledge that a considerable
-number of varieties of musical instruments, stringed and otherwise,
-accompanied the enforced migration of African natives during the days
-of the slave trade, and were thus established in use and perpetuated
-in many parts of the New World, including the north-east regions of
-South America, we may, I think, admit, with some confidence, that, in
-this particular instance, from Guiana to Guinea is no very far cry,
-and that the more than probable African origin of this instrument
-from South America gives it a perfect claim to take its place in the
-African sequence. I still anticipate that this type of instrument will
-be forthcoming from some hinterland region in West Africa. Were _no_
-evidence at all forthcoming of such a form, either in past or present,
-we should be almost compelled to infer that such a one had existed,
-as this stage in the sequence appears to be necessary to prevent a
-break in the continuity of forms leading to what is apparently the
-next important stage, represented by a type of instrument common in
-West Africa, having five little bows, each carrying its string, all of
-which are fixed by their lower ends into a box-like wooden resonator.
-This method of attaching the bows to the now improved body of the
-instrument necessitates the lower attachment of the strings being
-transferred from the bows to the body, so that the bow-like form begins
-to disappear. The next improvement, of which there is evidence from
-existing types, consists in the substitution of a single, stouter,
-curved rod for the five little 'bows', all the five strings being
-serially attached to the upper end of the rod, their lower ends to
-the body as before. This instrument is somewhat rare now, and it may
-well be a source of wonder to us that it has survived at all (unless
-it be to assist the ethnologist), since it is an almost aggressively
-inefficient form, owing to the row of strings being brought into
-two different places at right angles to one another. The structure
-of this rude instrument gives it a quaintly composite appearance,
-suggesting that it is a banjo at one end and a harp at the other. This
-is due to the strings remaining, as in the preceding form, attached
-to the resonating body in a line disposed _transversely_, while the
-substitution of a single rod for the five 'bows' has necessitated the
-disposal of their upper attachments in a _longitudinal_ series as
-regards the longer axis of the instrument. Inefficient though it be,
-this instrument occupies an important position in the apparent chain
-of evolution, leading on as it does through some intermediate types to
-a form in which the difficulty as regards the strings is overcome by
-attaching their _lower_ ends in a longitudinal series, and so bringing
-them into the same plane throughout their length. In this shape the
-instrument has assumed a harp-like form--a rude and not very effective
-one, it is true, but it is none the less definitely a member of the
-harp family. The modern varieties of this type extend across Africa
-from west to east, and the harps of ancient Egypt, Assyria, Greece,
-and India were assuredly elaborations of this primitive form. The
-Indian form, closely resembling that of ancient Egypt, still survives
-in Burma, while elsewhere we find a few apparently allied forms. In
-all these forms of the harp, from the rudest Central and West African
-types to the highly ornate and many-stringed examples of Egypt and
-the East, one point is especially noteworthy. This is the invariable
-_absence of the fore-pillar_, which in the modern harps of Western
-Europe is so important, nay, essential a structural feature. In spite
-of the skill and care exercised in the construction of some of the
-more elaborate forms, none were fitted with a fore-pillar, the result
-being that the frame across which the strings were stretched was
-always weak and disposed to yield more or less to the strain caused by
-the tension of the strings. This implied that, even when the strings
-were not unduly strained, the tightening up of one of them to raise
-its pitch necessarily caused a greater or less slackening of all the
-other strings, since the free end of the rod or 'neck' would tend
-to be drawn slightly towards the body of the instrument under the
-increased tension. The mere addition of a simple, strut-like support
-between the free end of the 'neck' and the 'body' would have obviated
-this difficulty and rendered the instrument relatively efficient and
-unyielding to varying tension. And yet, even in Western Europe, this
-seemingly obvious and invaluable addition did not appear, as far as I
-can ascertain, until about the seventh or eighth century A.D.; and even
-then it seems to have been added somewhat half-heartedly, and a very
-long time had yet to elapse before the fore-pillar became an integral
-part of the framework and was allotted its due proportion in the
-general design.
-
-I have purposely selected this particular series for my illustration,
-not because it is something new--indeed, it is already more or less
-familiar, and, maybe, has even some merit in its lack of newness,
-since, in accordance with a popular dictum, it may urge a greater
-claim to be regarded as true--nor because it is specially striking,
-but rather for the reason that it illustrates suitably several of
-the points upon which I wish briefly to touch. Even in the severely
-condensed form in which I have been obliged to present this series of
-developments from bow to harp, there is, I think, demonstrated the
-practical application of several of the general principles upon which
-is based the theory whereby Colonel Lane Fox sought to elucidate the
-phenomena of human progress.
-
-A series of this kind serves, in the first place, to demonstrate
-that the absence of historical and archaeological evidence of the
-_actual_ continuity in development from simple to complex does not
-preclude investigations into the early history of any product of human
-ingenuity, nor prevent the formation of a suggestive and plausible
-if largely hypothetical series, illustrating the probable chain of
-sequences along which some highly specialized form may be traced back
-link by link to its rudimentary prototypes, or even to its absolute
-origin, which in this particular instance is the ordinary shooting bow
-_temporarily_ converted into a musical instrument. Where an actual
-chronological series is not forthcoming, a comparative study of
-such types as are available, even though they be _modern_ examples,
-reveals the fact that, if classified according to their apparent
-morphological affinities, these types show a tendency to fall into
-line; the gap between the extreme forms--that is, the most simple and
-the most advanced--being filled by a succession of intermediate forms,
-more or less completely linked together, according to the number of
-varieties at our disposal. We are thus, at any rate, in possession of
-_a_ sequence series. Is it unreasonable for us to conclude that this
-reflects, in great measure, _the_ actual chronological sequence of
-variations through which in past times the evolutionary history of the
-instrument was effected, from the earliest rudimentary form?
-
-It is difficult to account, at all, for the existence of many of the
-forms, such as I have briefly described, except on the supposition
-that they are _survivals_ from more or less _early stages_ in a
-series of progressive evolution; and, for myself, I do not believe
-that so inefficient and yet so elaborate an instrument, as, to take
-an example, the harp of ancient Egypt, Assyria, and India, could have
-come into being by any sudden inventive process, by 'spontaneous
-generation', as it were, to use a biological term; whereas, the innate
-conservatism of the human species, which is most manifest among the
-lower and more primitive races (I use the term conservatism, I need
-hardly say, in a non-political sense), amply accounts for such forms
-having been arrived at, since the rigid adherence to traditional types
-is a prevailing characteristic of human culture, and only admits
-of improvement by very slight and gradual variations upon existing
-forms. The difficulty experienced by man, in a primitive condition of
-culture, of emancipating himself from the ideas which have been handed
-down to him, except by a very gradual and lengthy process, causes him
-to exert somewhat blindly his efforts in the direction of progress, and
-often prevents his seeing very obvious improvements, even when they are
-seemingly forced upon his notice. For instance, the early Egyptian,
-Assyrian, and Greek harps, as I have already stated, were destitute of
-a fore-pillar, and this remained the case for centuries, in spite of
-their actually existing in an environment of other instruments, such
-as the lyre and _trigonon_, which in their rigid, unyielding frames
-possessed, and even paraded, the very feature which was so essential
-to the harp, to enable it to become a really efficient instrument. The
-same juxtaposition of similar types, without mutual influence, may be
-seen in modern Africa among ruder forms of these instruments.
-
-And yet, in spite of instances such as this--where a valuable feature
-suggested by one instrument has not been adopted for the improvement
-of another, even though the two forms are in constant use side by
-side--we must recognize that progress, in the main, is effected by a
-process of bringing the experience gained in one direction to bear upon
-the results arrived at in another. This process of grafting one idea
-upon another, or, as we may call it, the hybridization of ideas and
-experience, is a factor in the advancement of culture whose influence
-cannot be overestimated. It is, in fact, the main secret of progress.
-In the animal world hybridization is liable to produce _sterile_
-offspring; in the world of ideas its results are usually far different.
-A fresh stimulus is imparted, which may last through generations
-of fruitful descendants. The _rate_ at which progress is effected
-increases steadily with the growth of experience, whereby the number of
-ideas which may act and react upon one another is augmented.
-
-It follows, as a corollary, that he who would trace out the
-phylogenetic history of any product of human industry will speedily
-discover that, if he aims at doing so _in detail_, he must be prepared
-for disappointments. The tangle is too involved to be completely
-unravelled. The sequence, strictly speaking, is not in the form of
-a simple chain, but rather in that of a highly complex _system_ of
-chains. The time-honoured simile afforded by a river perhaps supplies
-the truest comparison. The course of the _main stream_ of our evolution
-series may be fairly clear to us, even as far as to its principal
-source; we may even explore and study the general effect produced
-by the more important tributaries; but to investigate in detail the
-contributions afforded in present and past of the innumerable smaller
-streams, brooks, and runlets is clearly beyond any one's power, even
-supposing that the greater number had not changed their course at
-times, and even, in many cases, run dry. While we readily admit that
-important effects have been produced by these numberless tributary
-influences, both on the course and on the volume of the river, it is
-clear that we must in general be content to follow the main stream. A
-careful study of the series of musical instruments, of which I gave but
-a scanty outline, reveals very clearly that numberless ideas borrowed
-from outside sources have been requisitioned, and have affected the
-course of development. In some cases one can see fairly clearly whence
-these ideas were derived, and even trace back in part their own
-phylogenetic history; but a complete analysis must of necessity remain
-beyond our powers and even our hopes.
-
-It will have been observed that, in the example of a sequence series
-which I have given, the early developmental stages are illustrated
-entirely by instruments belonging to _modern savage races_. It was a
-fundamental principle in the general theory of Colonel Lane Fox that in
-the arts and customs of the still living savage and barbaric peoples
-there are reflected to a considerable extent the various strata of
-human culture in the past, and that it is possible to reconstruct in
-some degree the life and industries of Man in prehistoric times by a
-study of existing races in corresponding stages of civilization. His
-insistence upon the importance of bringing together and comparing the
-archaeological and ethnological material, in order that each might
-serve to throw light upon the other, has proved of value to both
-sciences. Himself a brilliant and far-seeing archaeologist as well as
-ethnologist, he was eminently capable of forming a conclusion upon this
-point, and he urged this view very strongly.
-
-The Earth, as we know, is peopled with races of the most heterogeneous
-description, races in all stages of culture. Colonel Lane Fox argued
-that, making due allowance for possible instances of degradation from
-a higher condition, this heterogeneity could readily be explained by
-assuming that, while the progress of some races has received relatively
-little check, the culture development of other races has been retarded
-to a greater or less extent, and that we may see represented conditions
-of at least partially arrested development. In other words, he
-considered that in the various manifestations of culture among the less
-civilized peoples were to be seen more or less direct _survivals_ from
-the earlier stages or strata of human evolution; vestiges of ancient
-conditions which have fallen out at different points and have been left
-behind in the general march of progress.
-
-Taken together, the various living races of Man seem almost to form a
-kind of living genealogical tree, as it were, and it is as an epiphyte
-upon this tree that the comparative ethnologist largely thrives; while
-to the archaeologist it may also prove a tree of knowledge the fruit of
-which may be eaten with benefit rather than risk.
-
-This certainly seems to be a legitimate assumption in a general way;
-but there are numerous factors which should be borne in mind when we
-endeavour to elucidate the past by means of the present. If the various
-gradations of culture exhibited by the condition of living races--the
-savage, the semi-civilized or barbaric, and the civilized races--could
-be regarded as accurately typifying the successive stages through
-which the higher forms of culture have been evolved in the course of
-the ages; if, in fact, the different modern races of mankind might
-be accepted as so many sections of the human race whose intellectual
-development has been arrested or retarded at various definite stages
-in the general progression, then we should have, to all intents and
-purposes, our genealogical tree in a very perfect state, and by its
-means we could reconstruct the past, and study with ease the steady
-growth of culture and handicrafts from the earliest simple germs,
-reflecting the mental condition of primaeval man, up to the highest
-manifestations of the most cultured races.
-
-These ideal conditions are, however, far from being realized.
-Intellectual progress has not advanced along a single line, but, in its
-development, it has branched off in various directions, in accordance
-with varying environment; and the tracing of lines of connexion
-between different forms of culture, as is the case with the physical
-variations, is a matter of intricate complexity. Migrations, with the
-attendant climatic changes, change of food, and, in fact, of general
-environment, to say nothing of the crossing of different stocks,
-transmission of ideas from one people to another, and other factors,
-all tend to increase the tangle.
-
-Although in certain instances savage tribes or races show obvious signs
-of having _degenerated_ to some extent from conditions of a higher
-culturedom, this cannot be regarded as the general rule, and we must
-always bear in mind the seemingly paradoxical truth that degradation
-in the culture of the lower races is often, if not usually, the direct
-result of contact with peoples in a far higher state of civilization.
-
-There can, I think, be little doubt that Colonel Lane Fox was well
-justified in urging the view that most savage races are in large
-measure strictly _primitive_, survivals from early conditions, the
-development of their ideas having from various causes remained
-practically stationary during a very considerable period of time. In
-the lower, though not degenerate, races signs of this are not wanting,
-and while few, possibly none, can be said to be absolutely in a
-condition of arrested development, their normal progress is at a slow,
-in most cases at a _very_ slow, rate.
-
-Perhaps the best example of a truly primitive race existing in recent
-times, of which we have any knowledge, was afforded by the native
-inhabitants of Tasmania. This race was still existing fifty years ago,
-and a few pure-blooded survivors remained as late as about the year
-1870, when the race became extinct, the benign civilizing influence
-of enlightened Europeans having wiped this extremely interesting
-people off the face of the earth. The Australians, whom Colonel Lane
-Fox referred to as being 'the lowest amongst the existing races of
-the world of whom we have any accurate knowledge', are very far in
-advance of the Tasmanians, whose lowly state of culture conformed
-thoroughly with the characteristics of a truly primitive race, a
-survival not only from the Stone Age in general, but from almost the
-earliest beginnings of the Stone Age. The difference between the
-culture of the Tasmanians and that of the Australians was far greater
-than that which exists between man of the 'River Drift' period and
-his Neolithic successors. The objects of everyday use were but slight
-modifications of forms suggested by Nature, involving the exercise of
-merely the simplest mental processes. The stone implements were of
-the rudest manufacture, far inferior in workmanship to those made by
-Palaeolithic man; they were never ground or polished, never even fitted
-with handles, but were merely grasped in the hand. The _varieties_ of
-implements were very _few in number_, each, no doubt, serving a number
-of purposes, the function varying with the requirements of the moment.
-They had no bows or other appliances for accelerating the flight of
-missiles, no pottery, no permanent dwellings; nor is there any evidence
-of a previous knowledge of such products of higher culture. They
-seem to represent a race which was isolated very early from contact
-with higher races; in fact, before they had developed more than the
-merest rudiments of culture--a race continuing to live under the most
-primitive conditions, from which they were never destined to emerge.
-
-Between the Tasmanians, representing in their very low culture the one
-extreme, and the most civilized peoples at the other extreme, lie races
-exhibiting in a general way intermediate conditions of advancement or
-retardation. If we are justified, as I think we are, in regarding the
-various grades of culture, observable among the more lowly of the still
-existing races of man, as representing to a considerable extent those
-vanished cultures which in their succession formed the different stages
-by which civilization emerged gradually from a low state, it surely
-becomes a very important duty for us to study with energy these living
-illustrations of early human history, in order that the archaeological
-record may be supplemented and rendered more complete. The material
-for this study is vanishing so fast with the spread of civilization
-that opportunities lost now will never be regained, and already even
-it is practically impossible to find native tribes which are wholly
-uncontaminated with the products, good or bad, of higher cultures.
-
-The arts of living races help to elucidate what is obscure in those
-of prehistoric times by the process of reasoning from the known
-to the unknown. It is the work of the zoologist which enables the
-palaeontologist to reconstruct the forms of extinct animals from such
-fragmentary remains as have been preserved, and it is largely from the
-results of a comparative study of living forms and their habitats that
-he is able, in his descriptions, to equip the reconstructed types of a
-past fauna with environments suited to their structure, and to render
-more complete the picture of their mode of life.
-
-In like manner, the work of the ethnologist can throw light upon the
-researches of the archaeologist; through it, broken sequences may be
-repaired, at least suggestively, and the interpretation of the true
-nature and use of objects of antiquity may frequently be rendered
-more sure. Colonel Lane Fox strongly advocated the application of the
-reasoning methods of biology to the study of the origin, phylogeny, and
-etionomics of the arts of mankind, and his own collection demonstrated
-that the products of human intelligence can conveniently be classified
-into families, genera, species, and varieties, and must be so grouped
-if their affinities and development are to be investigated.
-
-It must not be supposed--although some people, through misapprehension
-of his methods, jumped at this erroneous conclusion--that he
-was unaware of the danger of possibly mistaking mere accidental
-resemblances for morphological affinities, and that he assumed that
-_because_ two objects, perhaps from widely separated regions, appeared
-more or less identical in form, and possibly in use, they were
-necessarily to be considered as members of one phylogenetic group.
-On the contrary, in the grouping of his specimens according to their
-form and function, he was anxious to assist as far as possible in
-throwing light upon the question of the monogenesis or polygenesis of
-certain arts and appliances, and to discover whether they are exotic
-or indigenous in the regions in which they are now found, and, in
-fact, to distinguish between mere analogies and true homologies. If
-we accept the theory of the monogenesis of the human race, as most of
-us undoubtedly do, we must be prepared to admit that there prevails a
-condition of unity in the tendencies of the human mind to respond in a
-similar manner to similar stimuli. Like conditions beget like results;
-and thus instances of independent invention of similar objects are
-liable to arise. For this very reason, however, the arts and customs
-belonging to even widely separated peoples may, though apparently
-unrelated, help to elucidate some of the points in each other's history
-which remain obscure through lack of the evidence required to establish
-_local_ continuity.
-
-I think, moreover, that it will generally be allowed that cases of
-'independent invention' of similar forms should be considered to have
-established their claim to be regarded as such only after exhaustive
-inquiry has been made into the possibilities of the resemblances being
-due to actual relationship. There is the alternative method of assuming
-that, because two like objects are widely separated geographically, and
-because a line of connexion is not immediately obvious, therefore the
-resemblance existing between them is fortuitous, or merely the natural
-result of similar forms having been produced to meet similar needs.
-Premature conclusions in matters of this kind, though temptingly easy
-to form, are not in the true scientific spirit, and act as a check
-upon careful research, which, by investigating the case in its various
-possible aspects, is able either to prove or disprove what otherwise
-would be merely a hasty assumption. The association of similar forms
-into the same series has therefore a double significance. On the
-one hand, the sequence of related forms is brought out, and their
-geographical distribution illustrated, throwing light, not only upon
-the evolution of types, but also upon the interchange of ideas by
-transference from one people to another, and even upon the migration
-of races. On the other hand, instances in which two or more peoples
-have arrived independently at similar results are brought prominently
-forward, not merely as interesting coincidences, but also as evidence
-pointing to the phylogenetic unity of the human species, as exemplified
-by the tendency of human intelligence to evolve independently identical
-ideas where the conditions are themselves identical. Polygenesis in
-his inventions may probably be regarded as testimony in favour of the
-monogenesis of Man.
-
-I have endeavoured in this review to dwell upon some of the main
-principles laid down by Colonel Lane Fox as a result of his special
-researches in the field of Ethnology, and my object has been twofold.
-First, to bear witness to the very great importance of his contribution
-to the scientific study of the arts of mankind and the development
-of culture in general, and to remind students of Anthropology of the
-debt which we owe to him, not only for the results of his very able
-investigations, but also for the stimulus which he imparted to research
-in some of the branches of this comprehensive science. Secondly, my
-object has been to reply to some criticisms offered in regard to points
-in the system of classification adopted in arranging his ethnographical
-collection. And, since such criticisms as have reached me have appeared
-to me to be founded mainly upon misinterpretation of this system, I
-have thought that I could meet them best by some sort of restatement of
-the principles involved.
-
-It would be unreasonable to expect that his work should hold good
-in all details. The early illustrations of his theories were to
-be regarded as tentative rather than dogmatic, and in later life
-he recognized that many modifications in matters of detail were
-rendered necessary by new facts which had since come to light. The
-crystallization of solid facts out of a matrix which is necessarily
-partially volatile is a process requiring time. These minor errors and
-the fact of our not agreeing with all his details in no way invalidate
-the general principles which he urged, and we need but cast a cursory
-glance over recent ethnological literature to see how widely accepted
-these general principles are, and how they have formed the bases
-of, and furnished the inspiration for, a vast mass of research by
-ethnologists of all nations.
-
- HENRY BALFOUR.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[1] Extracted from Mr. Henry Balfour's address to the Anthropological
-Section of the British Association at Cambridge in 1904.
-
-[2] _The Natural History of the Musical Bow_, by H. Balfour: Clarendon
-Press, Oxford, 1899.
-
-
-
-
-PRINCIPLES OF CLASSIFICATION
-
-(1874)[3]
-
-
-I gladly avail myself of the opportunity that has been afforded me of
-explaining the principles of classification that I have adopted in the
-arrangement of my collection, in the hopes that, by offering them to
-the consideration of anthropologists, their soundness may be put to the
-test, and that they may elicit criticism on the part of those who have
-devoted their attention to the subject of primitive culture.
-
-The collection is divided into four parts. The first has reference
-to physical anthropology, and consists of a small collection of
-typical skulls and hair of races. This part of the collection, as it
-relates to a subject that has received a large amount of attention
-from anthropologists, and has been frequently treated by abler hands
-than mine, I do not propose to enter into. The remainder of the
-collection is devoted to objects illustrating the development of
-prehistoric and savage culture, and consists of--Part II. The weapons
-of existing savages. Part III. Miscellaneous arts of modern savages,
-including pottery and substitutes for pottery; modes of navigation,
-clothing, textile fabrics, and weaving; personal ornament; realistic
-art; conventionalized art; ornamentation; tools; household furniture;
-musical instruments; idols and religious emblems; specimens of the
-written character of races; horse furniture; money and substitutes for
-money; fire-arms; sundry smaller classes of objects, such as mirrors,
-spoons, combs, games, and a collection of implements of modern savages,
-arranged to illustrate the mode of hafting stone implements. Part IV
-refers to the prehistoric series, and consists of specimens of natural
-forms simulating artificial forms, for comparison with artificial
-forms; a collection of modern forgeries for comparison with genuine
-prehistoric implements; palaeolithic implements; neolithic implements;
-implements of bronze, iron, and bone.
-
-The collection does not contain any considerable number of unique
-specimens, and has been collected during upwards of twenty years, not
-for the purpose of surprising any one, either by the beauty or value
-of the objects exhibited, but solely with a view to instruction. For
-this purpose ordinary and typical specimens, rather than rare objects,
-have been selected and arranged in sequence, so as to trace, as far as
-practicable, the succession of ideas by which the minds of men in a
-primitive condition of culture have progressed from the simple to the
-complex, and from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous.
-
-Many ethnological museums exist in this country and elsewhere, and
-therefore, in claiming to have accomplished a useful purpose in forming
-this collection, I am bound to endeavour to show that it performs some
-function that is not performed by the majority of the other museums
-that are to be found. I propose, therefore, to consider, in the first
-place, what the defect of an ethnological museum usually is.
-
-The classification of natural history specimens has long been a
-recognized necessity in the arrangement of every museum which professes
-to impart useful information, but ethnological specimens have not
-generally been thought capable of anything more than a geographical
-arrangement. This arises mainly from sociology not having until
-recently been recognized as a science, if indeed it can be said to be
-so regarded by the public generally at the present time. Travellers, as
-a rule, have not yet embraced the idea, and consequently the specimens
-in our museums, not having been systematically collected, cannot be
-scientifically arranged. They consist of miscellaneous objects brought
-home as reminiscences of travel, or of such as have been most easily
-procured by sailors at the seaports. Unlike natural history specimens,
-which have for years past been selected with a view to variety,
-affinity, and sequence, these ethnological _curiosities_, as they have
-been termed, have been chosen without any regard to their history or
-psychology, and, although they would be none the less valuable for
-having been collected without influence from the bias of preconceived
-theories, yet, not being supposed capable of any scientific
-interpretation, they have not been obtained in sufficient number or
-variety to render classification possible.
-
-This does not apply with the same force to collections of prehistoric
-objects, which during the last ten or fifteen years have received
-better treatment. It is to the arts and implements of modern savages
-that my remarks chiefly relate.
-
-Since the year 1852 I have endeavoured to supply this want by selecting
-from amongst the commoner class of objects which have been brought to
-this country those which appeared to show connexion of form. Whenever
-missing links have been found they have been added to the collection,
-and the result has been to establish, however imperfectly, sequence in
-several series.
-
-The primary arrangement has been by form--that is to say, that the
-spears, bows, clubs, and other objects above mentioned, have each
-been placed by themselves in distinct classes. Within each there is a
-sub-class for special localities, and in each of these sub-classes, or
-wherever a connexion of ideas can be traced, the specimens have been
-arranged according to their affinities, the simpler on the left and the
-successive improvements in line to the right of them. This arrangement
-has been varied to suit the form of the room, or of the screens, or the
-number of specimens, but in all cases the object kept in view has been,
-as far as possible, to trace the succession of ideas.
-
-This is the distinctive difference between my collection and most
-others which I have seen, in which the primary arrangement has been
-geographical, that is to say, all the arts of the same tribe or
-nation have been placed together in one class, and within this there
-may perhaps have been in some cases a sub-class for special arts or
-special forms. Both systems have their advantages and disadvantages.
-By a geographical or racial arrangement the general culture of each
-distinct race is made the prominent feature of the collection, and it
-is therefore more strictly _ethnological_, whereas in the arrangement
-which I have adopted, the development of specific ideas and their
-transmission from one people to another, or from one locality to
-another, is made more apparent, and it is therefore of greater
-_sociological_ value. Different points of interest are brought to
-light by each, and, in my judgement, a great National Anthropological
-Collection, should we ever possess such a desideratum, can never be
-considered complete until it embraces two series, arranged upon these
-two distinct systems.
-
-Following the orthodox scientific principle of reasoning from the known
-to the unknown, I have commenced my descriptive catalogue with the
-specimens of the arts of existing savages, and have employed them, as
-far as possible, to illustrate the relics of primaeval men, none of
-which, except those constructed of the more imperishable materials,
-such as flint and stone, have survived to our time. All the implements
-of primaeval man that were of decomposable materials have disappeared,
-and can be replaced only in imagination by studying those of his
-nearest congener, the modern savage.
-
-This being the system adopted, one of the first points to which I
-desire to invite your attention is the question, to what extent the
-modern savage truly represents primaeval man, or rather to what extent
-may we take the arts of modern savages to represent those of the first
-progenitors of our species?
-
-In order to do this it is necessary to view the question in its
-psychological aspects. This I shall touch upon as lightly as possible,
-avoiding all technicalities, which in a cursory view of the matter,
-might tend to confuse, and confining myself to those parts of the
-subject which appear to have a direct bearing on evolution.
-
-It is a matter of common observation that animals act by instinct, that
-is to say, that in the construction of their habitations and other
-arrangements for providing for their wants, they act intuitively, and
-apparently without the intervention of reason; and that the things
-which they construct, though often of a more or less complex character,
-are usually of a fixed type; that they are repeated by nearly all
-animals of the same kind with but little variety; and that within the
-limited space of time during which we are able to observe them, they do
-not appear to be susceptible of progress, although evidence has been
-adduced to show that animals, even in a wild state, do change their
-habits to a certain extent with the change of external conditions.
-
-On the other hand, we recognize in many animals the operation of a
-reasoning mind. In their efforts to escape, or when conditions of a
-novel character are presented to them, they act in a manner that shows
-clear evidence of intelligence, although they show this to a very
-limited extent as compared with man. We also know that habits acquired
-by animals during domestication, or taught them by the exercise
-of their reasoning faculties, become instinctive in them, and are
-inherited in their offspring, as in the familiar case of the pointer
-dog. We also know that under domestication animals lose the instincts
-acquired in a wild state.
-
-In the human mind we recognize the presence of all these phenomena,
-only in a different degree. We are conscious of an intellectual mind
-capable of reasoning upon unfamiliar occurrences, and of an automaton
-mind capable of acting intuitively in certain matters without effort
-of the will or consciousness. And we know that habits acquired by the
-exercise of conscious reason, by constant habit, become automatic,
-and then they no longer require the exercise of conscious reason to
-direct the actions, as they did at first; as, for example, the habit
-of walking upright, which the child learns with pain and labour, but
-in time performs without conscious effort of the mind. Or the habit
-of reading and writing, the learning of which requires a strong and
-continuous effort of the intellect, but which in time becomes so
-completely automatic that it becomes possible to read a whole page
-aloud whilst the intellectual mind is conscious of being engaged in
-other things.
-
-We perceive clearly that this automatic action of the brain is
-dependent on frequent repetition by the intellectual brain, as in
-the familiar case of learning by heart; and also that the transfer
-of the action from the intellectual to the automaton brain--if
-indeed there are separate portions of the brain allotted to these
-separate functions, as appears probable--is a gradual and not a sudden
-process, and that there are intermediate stages in which an action
-may be performed partly by direction of the intellect and partly
-automatically. This is shown in the case of a person who, wishing to
-make an effective speech at a public meeting, reasons out his address
-carefully, and then learns it partially by heart. When the time comes
-to address the assembly, the speech having been partly referred to the
-automaton brain, the intellect is relieved from action, and, being
-unoccupied, is apt to wander and engage itself in other matters that
-are passing at the time; but the automaton brain, being insufficiently
-prepared to bear the whole responsibility, is unable to continue, and
-the intellectual brain, having already started on a journey elsewhere,
-is unable to return quick enough to take up the thread of the
-discourse. The result is that the would-be orator breaks down pitiably
-in the middle of his speech, owing to his having learnt his lesson too
-well for one function of his mind, and not well enough for the other.
-The same is seen in many business transactions, which, from frequent
-repetition, become what is called a second nature, and in the conduct
-of which the conscious intellect is partly freed from the control of
-the actions.
-
-We see also that both automatic and intellectual activity are inherited
-in different degrees by different persons. Thus it is a matter of
-common observation that there are some persons who are able to acquire
-with great facility the power of conversing upon simple subjects in
-many different languages, whilst upon more complex subjects, requiring
-intellectual effort, they never acquire the power of conversing in any
-language. Thus, also, it is frequently seen that some children show
-a remarkable aptitude for learning in their youth. It is said to be
-a pleasure to educate them; everything speedily becomes automatic in
-them; great hopes are entertained of their future prospects; but they
-frequently become a grievous disappointment to their parents, who have
-built castles in the air upon the strength of their apparent precocity,
-whereas an acute observer might have seen that they had never from the
-first showed signs of great intellectual capacity. On the other hand,
-we hear of dunces who are the despair of their tutors, who can with
-difficulty be taught to read and write and spell, but in after years
-become philosophers and scientists, all which might have been foretold
-from the first if the system of education had been such as to call
-forth the intellectual powers.
-
-It is not merely that some inherit automatic capacity whilst in others
-the capacity is intellectual. There is, without doubt, in both cases
-an hereditary capacity for special things. Thus, whilst some acquire
-a knowledge of music with facility, others can never be made to
-appreciate a note of music, and so with respect to other arts.
-
-How then are we to account for this innate indifference in the
-capacity of individuals, unless by supposing it to be proportioned
-to the length of time during which, or the degree of intensity with
-which, the ancestors of the individuals have had their minds occupied
-in the particular branch of culture for which capacity is shown?
-Unfortunately the difficulty of tracing the channel of hereditary
-transmission stands in the way of obtaining any certainty on this
-point, although the labours of our Vice-President, Mr. Galton, have
-already thrown much light on this interesting subject. But on this
-assumption, it is easy to account for the more perfect action of
-instinct in the lower animals than in men, when it is considered
-that the minds of their progenitors must have been confined to the
-experience of those particular things for which instinct is shown, far
-longer than is the case with man; and this brings us to the point which
-has an important bearing upon the question before us, viz. that every
-action which is now performed by instinct, has at some former period in
-the history of the species been the result of conscious experience.
-
-But, in adopting this theory, it is not necessary to assume that the
-ideas themselves have been communicated by hereditary transmission.
-The doctrine of innate ideas, exploded by Locke, I believe, can never
-again establish itself. What is inherited is no doubt a certain
-organization of the nervous system, which, by repeated use through
-many generations, aided by natural selection, has become exquisitely
-adapted to the recognition of experience of a particular kind, and
-which, by the constant renovation that is going on within the body,
-has grown in harmony with those experiences, so that, when the spring
-is touched, as it were, the machinery is at once set in motion; but,
-until the necessary external conditions are presented to the mind,
-there can be no consciousness of them in the mind. The mind creates
-nothing apart from experience; its function is limited to building with
-the materials presented to it through the medium of the senses. The
-broader the basis of experience, the more lofty the superstructure that
-can be raised upon it. Or, to use the words of Mr. Herbert Spencer[4],
-'the supposition that the inner cohesions are adjusted to the outer
-persistencies by accumulated experience of these outer persistencies,
-is in harmony with all our actual knowledge of mental phenomena. Though
-in so far as reflex actions and instincts are concerned, the experience
-hypothesis seems insufficient; yet, its seeming insufficiency occurs
-only where the evidence is beyond our reach. Nay, even here, such few
-facts as we can get, point to the conclusion that automatic physical
-connexions result from the registration of experiences continued for
-numberless generations.' And further on he says: 'In the progress of
-life at large, as in the progress of the individual, the adjustment of
-inner tendencies to outer persistencies must begin with the simple and
-advance to the complex, seeing that, both within and without, complex
-relations, being made up of simple ones, cannot be established before
-simple ones have been established.'
-
-From the foregoing considerations it follows that, in studying the
-evidence of intellectual progress, the phenomena which we may expect
-to observe are--firstly, a continuous succession of ideas; secondly,
-that the complexity of the ideas will be in an increasing ratio in
-proportion to the time; and thirdly, that the tendency to automatic
-action upon any given set of ideas will be in proportion to the length
-of time during which the ancestors of the individual have exercised
-their minds in those particular ideas. Hence it follows, as a corollary
-to this, that at the present time the tendency to automatic action
-will be greater in the lower animals than in the higher, because the
-minds of their progenitors have been exercised in the simple ideas, for
-which instinct is shown, for a greater length of time than those of the
-higher animals, amongst whom the simpler ideas have, at a comparatively
-recent period in the history of the race, been replaced, or otherwise
-modified, by ideas of a more complex character, which latter have not
-yet had time to become instinctive. And this is in accordance with what
-is practically observed in nature.
-
-Now, in applying these principles to the study of progress in man, we
-must expect to find that the phenomena observed will be in proportion
-to the spaces of time we have to deal with in treating of man as
-compared with animals in general.
-
-Assuming this psychological standard of humanity to have been at the
-level at which we find the highest of the lower animals that exist at
-the present time, we may suppose primaeval man to have been so far
-acquainted with the use of tools as to be able to employ a stone for
-the purpose of cracking the shells of nuts, but incapable of trimming
-the stone into any form that would answer his purpose better than that
-into which it had been shaped by rolling in a river bed or upon the
-seashore.
-
-By the repeated use of stones for this and similar purposes, it would
-be found that, as Sir John Lubbock has pointed out, they sometimes
-split in the hand, and that the sharp edges of the fractured portions
-were more serviceable than the stones before fracture. By constant
-repetition of the same occurrence, there would grow up in the mind of
-the creature an association of ideas between the fracture of the stone
-and the saving of labour effected by the fractured portion, and also a
-sequence of ideas by which it would be perceived that the fracture of
-the stone was a necessary preliminary to the other, and ultimately, by
-still continued repetition, the creature would be led to perform the
-motions which had been found effectual in cracking the stone before
-applying it to the purposes for which it was to be used. So also in
-using the various natural forms of the branches of trees which fell
-into his hands, it would be found that particular forms were of use
-for particular purposes; and by constant repetition there would arise
-an association of ideas between those forms and the purposes for which
-they were useful, and he would begin to select them for such purposes;
-and in proportion to the length of time during which this association
-of ideas continued to exist in the minds of successive generations of
-the creatures which we may now begin to call men, would be the tendency
-on the part of the offspring to continue to select and use these
-particular forms, more or less instinctively--not, indeed, with that
-unvarying instinct which in animals arises from the perfect adaptation
-of the internal organism to external condition, but with that modified
-instinct which assumes the form of a _persistent conservatism_.
-
-'The savage,' says Mr. Tylor, 'is firmly, obstinately conservative.
-No man appeals with more unhesitating confidence to the great
-precedent-makers of the past; the wisdom of his ancestors can control
-against the most obvious evidence of his own opinions and actions.'
-
-In a similar manner mankind would be led to the conception of many
-other ideas, but of the majority of them no record would be preserved;
-it is only where the ideas have been associated with material forms
-that any record of them would be kept in prehistoric times; and this
-brings us to what I conceive to be the object of an anthropological
-collection--to trace out, by means of the only evidence available, the
-sequence of ideas by which mankind has advanced from the condition of
-the lower animals to that in which we find him at the present time, and
-by this means to provide really reliable materials for a philosophy of
-progress. We may not be able to find in these objects any associations
-that may lead us to form an estimate of the highest aspirations of
-the mind at any period of its development, but their importance to
-anthropologists consists in their value as evidence. Affording us
-as they do the only available evidence of man in his most primitive
-condition, they are well worthy of our attention, in order that by
-studying their grammar, we may be able to conjugate their forms.
-
-Yet, although our data are thus limited to the material arts of
-mankind, only a small portion of those of prehistoric races are
-available for our purpose. As already said, only those tools and
-implements which were constructed of durable materials have remained;
-the rest have perished, and we have only the implements of existing
-savages by which to judge of them. The question, therefore, is, to what
-extent they may be taken as the representatives of the implements of
-prehistoric men, seeing that in point of time they are contemporaneous
-with the arts of the most civilized races, and not with those of
-prehistoric races.
-
-Scattered over the world in various localities are savage races
-showing various degrees of culture, some higher and some lower than
-others, many of which have now been greatly influenced by contact with
-civilized races, but of the majority of which we have more or less
-detailed records, dating from the time of their first discovery by
-Europeans, when their arts may be regarded as indigenous, or, at any
-rate, free from any admixture with the arts of civilized races.
-
-If these savage races have been degraded from a higher condition of
-culture, then, seeing that sequence of ideas is necessary to the
-existence of any ideas whatever, we must inevitably find traces in
-their arts of those higher arts from which they descended. But if, on
-the other hand, they have risen from a lower state, and their present
-savage condition arises from their having advanced less rapidly than
-those races which are now above them in the social scale, then what are
-the conditions which we must expect to find prevailing amongst them?
-
-We shall find, firstly, that the forms of their implements, instead of
-showing evidence of having been derived from higher and more complex
-forms, will, in proportion to the low state of their civilization, show
-evidence of being derived from natural forms, such as might have been
-employed by man before he had learnt the art of modifying them to his
-uses; and secondly, we shall find that the persistency of the forms is
-proportioned to the low state of their culture.
-
-Now this is found to be the case with nearly every race of savages of
-whose condition we have any knowledge. Lowest amongst the existing
-races of the world of whom we have any accurate knowledge are the
-Australians. All their weapons assimilate to the forms of nature; all
-their wooden weapons are constructed on the grain of the wood, and
-consequently their curves are the curves of the branches out of which
-they were constructed. In every instance in which I have attempted to
-arrange my collection in sequence, so as to trace the higher forms
-from natural forms, the weapons of the Australians have found their
-place lowest in the scale, because they assimilate most closely to the
-natural forms.
-
-Of this many examples may be given. I will not now again enter into the
-history of the boomerang, to which I have already drawn the attention
-of the Society on former occasions. Those who wish to see the subject
-treated in greater detail will find it discussed in my catalogue of
-the collection, in which are also given the authorities for many facts
-that are mentioned here, and which the limits of time and space do
-not enable me to quote at length. Suffice to say that the whole of
-the Australian weapons can be traced by their connecting links to the
-simple stick, such as might have been used by an ape or an elephant
-before mankind appeared upon this earth, and I have arranged them so as
-to show this connexion on the screens. Here also we are able to trace
-the development of the idea of a shield to cover the body, which in
-its simplest form is a simple parrying-stick held in the centre, and
-which expands gradually into an oval shield. It is also shown upon the
-screens how the simple waddy, or club with a lozenge-shaped head, by a
-gradual development of one side, grew into a kind of wooden hatchet,
-which ultimately became converted into a hatchet-boomerang.
-
-The whole of the Australian weapons, without exception, are of this
-simple character, and in proof of the persistency with which this
-nation has continued to employ the same forms, no further evidence
-is necessary than the fact that they are the same, with but slight
-variations, over the whole continent. The slight differences between
-them, as Mr. Oldfield has pointed out, are so minute as scarcely to
-be perceptible to a European, but sufficient to enable a native to
-determine at a glance from what locality any specimen that may be shown
-him has been obtained.
-
-But although all the connecting forms between the forms of nature
-and the more advanced forms are found amongst the _existing_ weapons
-of these savages, we are not to assume from this that the whole of
-the progress observed has been effected in modern times. The whole
-sequence of ideas connecting these weapons (which are now constructed
-in a manner to show that the art of producing them is partly
-automatic) was reasoned out by such processes of the mind as stood for
-reason, at various former periods in the history of the race, each
-successive improvement constituting a link in the chain of progressive
-development. Each link has left its representatives, which, with
-certain modifications, have survived to the present time; and it is by
-the means of these _survivals_, and not by the links themselves, that
-we are able to trace out the sequence that has been spoken of.
-
-This is the hypothesis put forward, and which I profess to justify by
-the facts accumulated in this collection.
-
-Every form marks its own place in sequence by its relative complexity
-or affinity to other allied forms, in the same manner that every word
-in the science of language has a place assigned to it in the order of
-development or phonetic decay.
-
-If there is such a thing as a science of language, and none can doubt
-it, who shall affirm that there is no such thing as a science of the
-arts? Language, it is true, embraces a wider sphere, and includes the
-arts; but, on the other hand, it is liable to sources of uncertainty
-for the purposes of science, from which the arts are free. Language
-is impalpable, invisible to the eye, except through the medium of a
-written character, which may or may not accurately express the sounds,
-and subject to acoustic changes in the collection of the materials,
-which are a perpetual cause of error and misclassification.
-
-In tracing the development of the material arts, on the other hand,
-we have, in the earliest periods, the support of collateral evidence
-afforded by the fauna with which they are associated and by geological
-sequence, all which is wanting in the science of language.
-
-Why, then, has language hitherto received more scientific treatment
-than the arts? Merely on account of the greater facility with which the
-data are collected. Whilst words take seconds to record, hours and days
-may be spent in the accurate delineation of form. Words cost nothing,
-are packed in folios, transmitted by post, and stored on the shelves
-of every private library. A million classified words may be carried in
-the coat pocket without inconvenience, whilst a hundredth part of that
-number of material objects require a museum to contain them, and are
-accessible only to a few. This is the reason why the arts have never
-been subjected to those classifications which form the groundwork of a
-science.
-
-Then, again, in approaching prehistoric times, or in studying modern
-savages who represent prehistoric man, language loses its persistency,
-or fails us altogether. Although, in an advanced stage of civilization,
-especially when it has been committed to writing, it affords the
-surest test of culture, this is certainly not the case with the
-lowest savages, amongst whom language changes so rapidly that even
-neighbouring tribes cannot understand one another. And if this is the
-case in respect to language, still more strongly does it apply to all
-ideas that are communicated by word of mouth. In endeavouring to trace
-back prehistoric culture to its root forms, we find that in proportion
-as the value of language and of the ideas conveyed by language
-diminishes, that of ideas embodied in material forms increases in
-stability and permanence. Whilst in the earliest phases of humanity the
-names for things change with every generation if not more frequently,
-the things themselves are handed down unchanged from father to son and
-from tribe to tribe, and many of them have continued to our own time,
-faithful records of the condition of the people by whom they were
-fabricated.
-
-Of the antiquity of savages we at present know little or nothing;
-but when archaeologists have exhausted the antiquities of civilized
-countries, a wide and interesting field of research will be open to
-them in the study of the antiquities of savages, which are doubtless to
-be discovered in their surface and drift deposits; and if the stability
-of their form has been such as we have reason to believe, we shall then
-be able to arrive at something like certainty in respect to the degree
-of slowness or rapidity, as well as the order, in which they have been
-developed.
-
-Leaving now the Australians, and turning to other existing races in
-a higher, though still in a low, stage of civilization, such as, for
-example, the Fijians, who at the time of their discovery were still in
-the stone age, we find, on examining the forms of their implements,
-that we are in a higher stratum of culture, the characteristics of
-which correspond exactly to what might have been expected to be found
-on the principle of gradual evolution. The forms of their tools and
-weapons present the same connexions of form between themselves as
-amongst those of the Australians, but they are of a more complex
-type, and are no longer directly traceable to the natural forms of
-the limbs of trees, &c. The links of connexion between weapons of the
-same kind are as close as before, but in their varieties they present
-forms so singular as scarcely to make it possible to infer that they
-were designed for the purposes of use. They appear rather to have
-varied through the instrumentality of some law of succession similar
-to that by which species of animals have been evolved. In many cases,
-indeed, the sequence of ideas has led to the use of forms that are
-absolutely unserviceable as weapons and tools, and human selection,
-corresponding to natural selection, appears to have retained for use
-only such forms as could be employed, whilst the others have been
-consigned to state purposes or applied to symbolic uses. In many cases
-we find that their clubs have been converted into the forms of animals'
-heads, and in all such cases (and there are several in the collection)
-we see, by grouping a sufficient number of like forms together, that
-those which are in the shape of animals' heads have not been designed
-for the purpose of representing animals' heads, but their forms have
-simply been evolved during the numerous variations which the weapon
-has undergone in the process of development, and when the idea of an
-animal's head suggested itself, it has merely been necessary to add an
-eye, or a line for the mouth, in order to give them the resemblance in
-question. Examples of this may be seen in the collection of specimens
-from Africa, New Caledonia, New Zealand, and Solomon Isles.
-
-In ornamentation, the stability of form is very remarkable. Particular
-forms of ornamentation fix themselves on a tribe or nation, and are
-repeated over and over again with but little variation of detail, as,
-for example, in the case of the coil and broken coil ornaments amongst
-the New Zealanders and the inhabitants of New Guinea, which were
-probably derived from Assam, or the representation of the head of an
-albatross amongst the Indians of the north-west coast of North America,
-or that of a human head amongst the inhabitants of New Ireland.
-
-In the transformations of this latter ornament, which I took occasion
-to bring to the notice of the meeting of the Anthropological Department
-of the British Association at Brighton in 1872[5], and which are
-represented in Plate IV, we see a remarkable example of degradation of
-form, produced by gradual changes, caused by these people in copying
-from one another until the original design is lost. The representation
-of a human figure is here seen to lose gradually its limbs and body,
-then the sides of the face, leaving only the nose and ears, and
-ultimately the nose only, which finally expands at the base, and is
-converted into the representation of a half moon. In this sequence we
-have an exact parallel to the transformations observed upon ancient
-British coins by Mr. Evans[6], by which a coin of Philip of Macedon,
-representing a chariot and horses, becomes converted by a succession
-of similar changes into the representation of a single horse, and
-ultimately into fragments of a horse. Other examples of similar
-transformations from other countries are also shown.
-
-Amongst other advantages of the arrangement by form, is the facility it
-affords for tracing the distribution of like forms and arts, by which
-means we can determine the connexion that has existed in former times
-between distant countries, either by the spread of race, or culture, or
-by means of commerce. Thus I have been able to trace the distribution
-of the bow over a large area, with evidence of its having spread from a
-common centre. In the Asiatic islands and the Pacific, the line of its
-southern boundary is very clearly defined, marking off as non-bow-using
-races the whole of the inhabitants of Australia except Cape York,
-Tasmania, and formerly New Zealand and New Caledonia. Above this line
-the use of the bow spread from the Asiatic isles, and its transmission
-to the Papuan and Polynesian isles is due to the Malays, the Malay
-word for it--viz. 'panna'--being used over the whole of the region in
-question with but slight variations.
-
-In the southern hemisphere, where suitable materials for the
-construction of it are abundant, the bow is of the form of the arcus,
-or simple arch; but in the frigid regions to the north, there are large
-tracts in Europe, Asia, and America which are either totally destitute
-of trees, or covered with coniferous forests, yielding few if any
-woods that have sufficient spring for the construction of a bow, and
-there is reason to believe, from the traces of forests discovered at
-low levels beneath the soil in various places, that this inhospitable
-region extended more to the southward in ancient prehistoric times.
-In such a region it is unlikely that the invention of the bow should
-have originated, and when the knowledge of it was communicated from the
-south, it would be necessary to employ some other elastic material to
-combine with the stiff pinewood, and give it the necessary elasticity;
-hence the composite bow, which is the bow of the northern hemisphere,
-and which consists of a combination of wood and sinew, or wood and
-bone. In its varieties I have traced this bow over the whole of the
-northern hemisphere, including Lapland, Siberia, and the northern
-part of North America. It is the bow of the ancient Persians and
-Scythians. The northern people carried it into India and into China,
-and also eastward into America, where its distribution is traced in two
-channels, one extending along the region inhabited by the Esquimaux
-into Greenland, and the other along the west coast as far south as
-California; and throughout the region mentioned, its varieties show it
-to have sprung from a common prototype.
-
-Here also I may select, from amongst other illustrations of the same
-kind that are to be found, a single example of the manner in which the
-implements of modern savages may be made to explain the construction of
-those of races of antiquity, described upon their monuments. Quivers
-for arrows do not admit of much variety by which to trace improvement,
-and for this reason they must have continued unchanged in form much
-longer than contrivances which were susceptible of development; but
-the combination of quiver and bow case in one, may be traced over the
-whole of the region of the composite bow, the sinews of which made
-it necessary that it should be kept dry. Mr. Rawlinson, in his _Five
-Great Monarchies of the Ancient Eastern World_ (London, 1864, vol.
-ii. p. 57), gives an illustration of an Assyrian quiver taken from
-ancient sculptures at Khorsabad. 'It had an ornamental rod attached to
-it, which projected beyond the arrows and terminated in a pomegranate
-blossom or other similar carving. To this rod were attached the rings
-which received the strap by which it was suspended to the shoulders.'
-The learned author adds: 'It is uncertain whether the material of the
-quivers was wood or metal.' The conventional mode of representing
-these objects and the imperfect command which the Assyrians had over
-the hard stone of the sculptures, give to the majority of the objects
-represented, the appearance of having been constructed of some hard
-material, as is clearly seen in the case of the hair and drapery; but,
-on turning to the quivers now used by the Indians of California, we at
-once see that the material of the quiver is explained by the form and
-position of the above-mentioned rod, which is fastened on the outside
-of it for the purpose of keeping the _limp_ skin bag that contains the
-arrows stiff and straight, and thereby enabling the bowman to draw out
-his arrows with the necessary rapidity. And this enables us clearly to
-understand why, as stated by Mr. Rawlinson, not a single example of
-a quiver was found in the Assyrian excavations. In the Californian,
-as in the Assyrian quivers, the rod extends beyond the quiver, and is
-probably intended to guard the arrows from injury.
-
-It is unnecessary in this place to add to the number of examples. The
-object of this paper, as already stated, is to explain the principles
-of classification. For the evidence on which these principles are
-based I must refer you to the catalogue. Whether these principles of
-classification are correct or not is a matter of less consequence than
-the arrangement of the facts, by which every person is enabled to form
-his own idea of the manner in which progress has been evolved in early
-times.
-
-Human ideas, as represented by the various products of human industry,
-are capable of classification into genera, species, and varieties, in
-the same manner as the products of the vegetable and animal kingdoms,
-and in their development from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous they
-obey the same laws. If, therefore, we can obtain a sufficient number
-of objects to represent the succession of ideas, it will be found that
-they are capable of being arranged in museums upon a similar plan.
-
-The resemblance between the arts of modern savages and those of
-primaeval man may be compared to that existing between recent and
-extinct species of animals. As we find amongst existing animals and
-plants, species akin to what geology teaches us were primitive species,
-and as among existing species we find the representatives of successive
-stages of geological species, so amongst the arts of existing savages
-we find forms which, being adapted to a low condition of culture, have
-survived from the earliest times, and also the representatives of
-many successive stages through which development has taken place in
-times past. As amongst existing animals and plants, these survivals
-from different ages give us an outline picture of a succession of
-gradually improving species, but do not represent the true sequence by
-which improvement has been effected, so, amongst the arts of existing
-people in all stages of civilization, we are able to trace a succession
-of ideas from the simple to the complex, but not the true order of
-development by which those more complex arrangements have been brought
-about. As amongst existing species of animals, innumerable links are
-wanting to complete the continuity of structure, so amongst the arts
-of existing peoples there are great gaps which can only be filled
-by prehistoric arts. What the palaeontologist does for zoology, the
-prehistorian does for anthropology. What the study of zoology does
-towards explaining the structures of extinct species, the study of
-existing savages does towards enabling us to realize the condition of
-primaeval man. To continue the simile further, the propagation of new
-ideas may be said to correspond to the propagation of species. New
-ideas are produced by the correlation of previously existing ideas in
-the same manner as new individuals in a breed are produced by the union
-of previously existing individuals. And in the same manner as we find
-that the crossing of animals makes it extremely difficult to trace
-the channel of hereditary transmission of qualities in a breed, so the
-crossing of ideas in this manner makes it extremely difficult to trace
-the sequence of ideas, although we may be certain that sequence does
-exist as much in one case as in the other.
-
-Continuing still further the simile, we find that, as in the breeding
-of animals, when the divergence of races has gone so far as to
-constitute what is called distinct species, they cannot interbreed,
-so when the development of ideas has run in distinct channels far
-enough to create a hiatus, no intercommunication can take place. Two
-men of very different culture may travel in the same coach together,
-and, though speaking the same language, may find themselves unable
-to communicate except upon commonplace topics in which the simple
-ideas are common to both. Or two nations in very different stages of
-civilization may be brought side by side, as is the case in many of our
-colonies, but there can be no amalgamation between them. Nothing but
-the vices and imperfections of the superior culture can coalesce with
-the inferior culture without break of sequence.
-
-Progress is like a game of dominoes--like fits on to like. In neither
-case can we tell beforehand what will be the ultimate figure produced
-by the adhesions; all we know is that the fundamental rule of the game
-is _sequence_.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[3] A Paper read at a Special Meeting of the Anthropological Institute
-of Great Britain and Ireland on July 1, 1874, on the occasion of the
-opening of the Anthropological Collection to the public: and published
-in the _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, iv (1875), pp.
-293-308.
-
-[4] _The Principles of Psychology_ (London, 1881), i.^3 pp. 424-6.
-
-[5] Address to the Department of Anthropology--Report of the British
-Association, 1872 (London, 1873), p. 168.
-
-[6] _The Coins of the Ancient Britons_, by John Evans, F.R.S. (1864),
-pp. 24-32.
-
-
-
-
-ON THE EVOLUTION OF CULTURE
-
-(1875)[7]
-
-
-If we accept the definition of the term science as 'organized common
-sense', we necessarily reject the idea of it as a 'great medicine'
-applicable only to particular subjects and inapplicable to others;
-and we assume that all those things which call forth the exercise
-of our common sense are capable of being scientifically dealt with,
-according as the knowledge which we pretend to have about them is based
-on evidence in the first place, and in the sequel is applied to the
-determination of what, for want of a better word, we call general laws.
-
-But in using this term 'law', we do not employ it in the sense of a
-human law, as a regulating or governing principle of anything, but
-merely as deduction from observed phenomena. We use it in the sense of
-a result, rather than a cause of what we observe, or at most we employ
-it to express the operation of proximate causes; and of the ultimate
-causes for the phenomena of nature we know nothing at all.
-
-Further, in this development of the principle of common sense it has
-been said that the inductive sciences pass through three phases, which
-have been termed the empirical, the classificatory, and the theoretical.
-
-Of these, the first or empirical stage may be defined as representing
-that particular phase of unorganized common sense in which our
-knowledge is simply a record of the results of ordinary experience,
-such as might be acquired by any savage or uneducated person in his
-dealings with external nature.
-
-But as this condition of knowledge might perhaps be denied the claim to
-be considered scientific, it might be better perhaps to extend the term
-so as to embrace all that can be included under a practical knowledge
-of the subjects treated, in which these subjects are studied for their
-own sakes, or on account of their practical uses to man, and not with
-a view to generalizing upon them.
-
-In this way it may be said that agriculture represents the empirical
-or practical stage of botany; mining, that of geology; hunting and the
-domestication of animals, that of zoology; the trade of the butcher,
-that of anatomy; navigation by means of the stars, that of astronomy.
-
-Passing now over the boundary line which separates what are generally
-recognized as the physical sciences from the science of culture, in
-which the subjects treated are emanations from the human mind, we find
-that these also have their corresponding phases of development.
-
-Commencing first with the science of language, which has been the
-earliest and perhaps the most important branch of human culture the
-study of which has been scientifically treated as yet, we find that
-Professor Max Mueller, in the series of lectures delivered in this
-Institution in 1861-3,[8] has shown that the science of language
-has its corresponding empirical or practical stage, in which it is
-studied only for its own sake, or for its utility as a means of
-intercommunication; not as a means of generalizing upon language as
-a whole, but merely for the purpose of understanding the particular
-languages which we wish to make use of in our intercourse with others.
-
-In like manner passing from language to the particular department
-of culture which, for the reasons to be explained hereafter, I
-shall make the subject of this discourse, viz. the material arts, I
-shall endeavour to show that there exists also in relation to them
-a practical or empirical stage, which is the stage that we are now
-in with respect to them, in which we may include the whole of the
-constructive arts of mankind, from the simple flint knife to the most
-complex machine of modern times, when viewed from the standpoint of
-the mechanic or the artificer, not as subjects for generalization, but
-merely from an utilitarian point of view.
-
-There are many persons no doubt who regard utility, not as a primary
-stage, but as the final and highest result of science. But the highest
-achievements of science, even the highest practical achievements, would
-never have been reached by the mere utilitarian. There is a force
-within us by which we are moved in the direction of acquiring knowledge
-for its own sake and for the sake of truth, regardless of any material
-advantage to be derived from such knowledge. Sooner or later such
-knowledge is sure to bear practical fruits, even though we may not live
-to realize them.
-
-It is in this spirit that men of science have advanced to the
-second or classificatory stage, in which, with a view to higher
-generalization, the subjects studied are grouped together according to
-their affinities, and specific points of resemblance are taken as the
-representatives of each class.
-
-These classes are at first grouped round independent centres; but such
-an arrangement of them, having no existence in reality, is purely
-subjective and can only be transitional. The margins of the classes so
-formed represent only the margins of our knowledge or our ignorance, as
-the case may be.
-
-By degrees, as the classes become extended, sub-classes are formed, and
-they are seen to arrange themselves in the form of branches radiating
-from a central stem. By still further observation, the stems of the
-several classes are seen to tend towards each other, and we are led to
-trace them to a point of union.
-
-Thus from the classificatory or comparative we pass gradually into the
-third stage, which I have spoken of as the theoretical, but which may
-perhaps be more clearly defined as the evolutionary. By the use of this
-term 'evolutionary' we make it apparent that our third stage is but a
-development of the second, evolution being merely the necessary and
-inevitable result of the extension of classification, implying greater
-unity and broader generalizations.
-
-These three stages then, the empirical or practical, the classificatory
-or comparative, and the evolutionary, are applicable to the development
-of all the inductive sciences.
-
-But it has been held by some that a broad line of demarcation must
-be drawn between the physical sciences properly so called, such as
-zoology, botany, and geology, which deal with external nature, and
-those sciences which have been termed historic, which deal with the
-works of man.
-
-This question has been ably treated by Professor Max Mueller in the
-series of lectures to which I have referred, a course of lectures
-which must be regarded as a starting-point and basis of instruction for
-all who follow after him in the same path.
-
-But in claiming for the science of language, and for language only,
-a place amongst the physical sciences, he has made admissions to
-opponents which, in my humble judgement, ought not to be made, and
-which are inconsistent with that more extended view of the subject by
-which I contend that, if language, then all that comes under the head
-of culture must be included amongst the physical sciences. Thus, for
-example, we find him admitting this passage as a sound and reasonable
-argument on the part of those who deny the claim of language to be
-included amongst the physical sciences: 'Physical science,' he says,
-'deals with the work of God, historical science with the works of man.'
-
-Now if in dealing with what are here termed the historical sciences,
-we were to take the subjects of such sciences, as for example the arts
-or language, implements or words, and were to regard them as entities
-to be studied apart from their relation to mind, and were to endeavour
-to deduce from them the laws by which they are related to each other,
-it is evident that we should be dealing with a matter which could not
-be correlated with the physical sciences; but such a course would be
-absurd. It would be as absurd to speak of a boomerang as being derived
-by inheritance from a waddy, as to speak of a word in Italian being
-derived by inheritance from a corresponding word in Latin; these words
-and these implements are but the outward signs or symbols of particular
-ideas in the mind; and the sequence, if any, which we observe to
-connect them together, is but the outward sign of the succession of
-ideas in the brain. It is the mind that we study by means of these
-symbols.
-
-But of the particular molecular changes or other processes which
-accompany the evolution of ideas in the mind, we know no more than
-we do of the particular molecular changes and other processes which
-accompany the evolution of life in nature, or the changes in chemistry.
-
-If then we are to understand the expression 'the work of God' as
-implying the direct action of ultimate causes, it is evident that
-we are not in a position either to affirm or to deny or to make any
-statement whatever respecting such ultimate causes, which may operate
-either as directly or as indirectly in the one case as the other. We
-know nothing about them, and therefore to invoke ultimate causes as a
-reason for distinguishing between the sciences is to take up a position
-which cannot be scientifically maintained.
-
-With equal if not greater truth we may combat the assertion that the
-science of culture is historical, whilst nature, on the other hand, as
-dealt with by the physical sciences, is incapable of progress. However
-valid this objection might have appeared during the empirical and
-comparative stages of the physical sciences, it cannot be maintained,
-since the researches of Darwin and others have fairly landed them in
-their evolutionary phase. The principles of variation and natural
-selection have established a bond of union between the physical and
-culture sciences which can never be broken. History is but another
-term for evolution. There are histories and histories, as any one may
-determine who has read Green's _Short History of the English People_,
-and compared it with the kind of matter which passed for history in
-his school days. But our position with regard to culture has always
-been one which has forced on our comprehension the reality of progress,
-whilst with respect to the slow progress of external nature, it has
-been concealed from us, owing to the brief span of human existence and
-our imperfect records of the past. The distinction, therefore, between
-the sciences, as historical and non-historical, is but a subjective
-delusion, and not an objective reality; and herein, I believe, lies the
-secret of most of those errors that we have to contend with.
-
-But the point in which I venture more particularly to differ from the
-conclusions of the learned author of the _Science of Language_ is the
-line which he has drawn between language and the other branches of
-culture by including language amongst the physical sciences whilst he
-excludes the rest. 'If language,' he says, 'be the work of man in the
-same sense in which a statue, a temple, a poem, or a law, are properly
-called works of man, the science of language would have to be classed
-as an historic science'; and again he says, 'It is the object of these
-lectures to prove that language is not a work of human art in the same
-sense as painting, or building, or writing, or printing.'
-
-In dealing with this question it is material, as regards the relative
-claims of language and the arts to be studied as physical sciences,
-to distinguish between the general and the particular. If it is said
-that language as a whole is not a work of human design, the same may
-with equal truth be said of the arts as a whole. A man who constructs
-a building, a tool, or a weapon, can no more be said to have devised
-a scheme of arts, than the introducer of a new word can be said to
-have invented a language; but each particular word bears the impress
-of human design as clearly as a weapon or a coin. A word may be said
-to be a tool for the communication of thought, just as a weapon is an
-implement of war.
-
-But, says Professor Mueller, 'art, science, philosophy, religion, all
-have a history; language or any other production of nature admits
-only of growth.' But unless it can be shown that words are entities
-having the power of generating and producing other words, which arts,
-tools, or weapons, do not possess, the word growth can only be applied
-figuratively to language as it is to the arts, and in that case growth
-and history are synonymous terms. But this is absurd. Words, as I said
-before, are the outward signs of ideas in the mind, and this is also
-the case with tools or weapons. Words are ideas expressed by sounds,
-whilst tools are ideas expressed by hands; and unless it can be shown
-that there are distinct processes in the mind for language and for the
-arts they must be classed together.
-
-But it is said, 'language has the property of progressing gradually
-and irresistibly, and the changes in it are completely beyond the
-control of the free will of man.' This, however, can only be accepted
-relatively. We know that in certain phases of savage life the use of
-particular words may be tabooed in the same manner that the use of
-particular implements or weapons may be tabooed; but it would be quite
-as hopeless for any individual to attempt to change the entire course
-of the constructive arts as to change the form of a language; the
-action of the individual man is limited in both cases to the production
-of particular words or particular implements, which take their place
-like bricks in a building.
-
-Man is not the designer in the sense of an architect, but he is the
-constructor in the sense of a brickmaker or a bricklayer.
-
-But the difficulty of tracing fleeting words to their sources operates
-to a great extent in effacing the action of the individual in language.
-Words become public property before they are incorporated in a
-language. It would be difficult to establish a system of patents for
-new words. Here again we see that the line drawn between language and
-the arts is a subjective delusion, not an objective reality. It is not
-true that words do not originate with individual men, but merely that
-we do not perceive it.
-
-Modifications of words, like modifications in the forms of the
-arts, result from the succession of ideas or other causes affecting
-particular minds. They obtain acceptance through natural selection by
-the survival of the fittest.
-
-The chance which a new word or a new implement has of surviving depends
-on the number of words or implements to be superseded, on their
-relative importance to the art or the language, and the persistency
-with which these superseded words or implements are retained. The truth
-of this is seen in the fact that vocabularies change far more rapidly
-than grammatical forms; because the same grammatical terminations are
-employed with a large number of different words, and they are therefore
-a more constant necessity of speech.
-
-Hence early and barbaric languages may be connected by their
-grammatical forms long after their vocabularies have entirely changed.
-The same truth is seen in the fact admitted by philologists, that in
-small communities new words and modifications of words gain more ready
-acceptance than in large communities; because the struggle of the new
-words for existence is less in small than in large communities, and the
-dialects therefore change more rapidly. And the same causes influence
-the transformations which take place in the arts. Objects in common
-use change more slowly than those which are but little employed; the
-difference is merely one of degree and not of kind.
-
-In dealing with the arts, each separate contrivance occupies a larger
-share of our attention, to the exclusion of any comprehensive survey
-of them as a whole. The arts present themselves to our mental vision
-on a larger scale, and we view them analytically; we are as it were in
-the brickmaker's yard seeing each brick turned out of hand, whereas in
-dealing with language we see only the finished building; the details
-are lost. We view language synthetically. The arts may be said to
-present themselves to us as a sea beach in detached fragments; language
-in the form of a compact sandstone. The empiric or the utilitarian may
-deny that there is any resemblance between them; but the geologist
-knows that the mode of deposition has been the same in both cases, and
-he classes the whole as rocks.
-
-Then again there are facilities for collecting and arranging the data
-for the study of language which do not exist in the case of the arts.
-Whilst words take seconds to record, hours and days may be spent in
-the accurate delineation of form. Words cost nothing, may be packed
-in folios, transmitted by post, and stored on the shelves of every
-private library. Ten thousand classified words may be carried in
-the coat pocket without inconvenience, whilst a tenth part of that
-number of material objects require a museum to contain them, and are
-accessible only to a few: this is the reason why the arts have never
-been subjected to those classifications which form the groundwork of a
-science.
-
-But when we say that words and implements are both tools employed
-for the expression of thought, it is important to bear in view one
-difference between them, which has a practical bearing on the relative
-value of the two studies as a means of tracing the evolution of culture
-in prehistoric times and amongst savages. The word is the tool of the
-ear, the implement the tool of the eye; and for this reason language is
-the science of historic times, whilst the arts constitute the subject
-of science to be studied in relation to prehistoric times.
-
-Every new tool or weapon formed by the hand of man retains the same
-form as long as it continues to exist; it may be handed from man to
-man, from tribe to tribe, from father to son, from one generation
-to another; or, buried in the soil, it may under special conditions
-continue for untold ages without change of form, until in our time it
-may be discovered and employed as evidence of the condition of the arts
-at the time it was fabricated. Very different, however, is the history
-of words. Each word coined by the exercise of the inventive faculty of
-man to express an idea is liable to change as it passes from mouth to
-ear. Its continued identity is dependent solely on memory, and it is
-subject to phonetic and acoustic changes from which the forms of the
-arts are exempt.
-
-When by the invention of writing each word receives its equivalent in
-forms that are appreciable to the sense of sight, it gains stability,
-which places it on a footing of equality with the arts, and enables us
-to trace with certainty the changes it has undergone; and therefore
-in historic times language is the surest test of social contact that
-we can have. But in prehistoric times, before it had acquired this
-permanence through the invention of writing, the forms of language
-were, to use Mr. Sayce's expression, in a constant state of flux.
-
-The truth of this is seen in the immense number of dialects and
-languages employed by savages at the present time. Thus amongst the
-one hundred islands occupied by the Melanesian race, the Bishop of
-Wellington tells us, and his statement is confirmed by the late
-lamented Bishop Patteson, that there are no less than two hundred
-languages, differing so much that the tribes can have but very little
-interchange of thought; and similar accounts are given of rapid changes
-of language in Cambodia, Siberia, Central Africa, North, Central, and
-South America.
-
-The greater stability of the material arts as compared with the
-fluctuations in the language of a people in a state of primaeval
-savagery, is well shown by a consideration of the weapons of the
-Australians, and the names by which they are known in the several parts
-of that continent. These people, from the simplicity of their arts,
-afford us the only living examples of what we may presume to have been
-the characteristics of a primitive people. Their weapons are the same
-throughout the continent; the shield, the throwing-stick, the spear,
-the boomerang, and their other weapons differ only in being thicker,
-broader, flatter, or longer, in different localities; but whether
-seen on the east or the west coast, each of these classes of weapons
-is easily recognized by its form and uses. On the other hand, amongst
-the innumerable languages and dialects spoken by these people, it
-would appear that almost every tribe has a different name for the same
-weapon. The narrow parrying-shield, which consists of a piece of wood
-with a place for the hand in the centre, in South Australia goes by
-the name of 'heileman', in other parts it is known under the name of
-'mulabakka', in Victoria it is 'turnmung', and on the west coast we
-have 'murukanye' and 'tamarang' for the same implement very slightly
-modified in size and form. Referring to the comparative table of
-Australian languages compiled by the Rev. George Taplin, in the first
-number of the _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_ (i, 1872, pp.
-84-8), we find the throwing-stick, which on the Murray River is known
-by the name of 'yova', on the Lower Darling is 'yarrum', in New South
-Wales it is 'wommurrur', in Victoria 'karrick', on Lake Alexandrina
-'taralye', amongst the Adelaide tribes of South Australia it is
-'midla', in other parts of South Australia it is called 'ngeweangko',
-and in King George's Sound 'miro'.
-
-From these considerations we arrive at the conclusion that in the
-earliest stages of culture the arts are far more stable than language:
-whilst the arts are subject only, or chiefly, to those changes which
-result from growth, language, in addition to those which result from
-growth, is also affected by changes arising from phonetic decay.
-
-The importance therefore of studying the grammar, so to speak, of the
-arts becomes apparent, as it is by this means alone that we can trace
-out the origin and evolution of culture in the earliest times.
-
-The task before us is to follow by means of them the succession of
-ideas by which the mind of man has developed, from the simple to the
-complex, and from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous; to work out
-step by step, by the use of such symbols as the arts afford, that
-law of contiguity by which the mind has passed from simple cohesion
-of states of consciousness to the association of ideas, and so on to
-broader generalizations.
-
-This development has to be considered under the two heads of culture
-and constitution, that is to say, that we have to consider not only the
-succession of ideas in the mind resulting from experience, but also the
-development by inheritance of the internal organism of the mind itself,
-or, to use the words of Mr. Herbert Spencer, 'In the progress of life
-at large, as in the progress of the individual, the adjustment of
-inner tendencies to outer persistencies must begin with the simple and
-advance to the complex, seeing that, both within and without, complex
-relations, being made up of simple ones, cannot be established before
-simple ones have been established' (_Princ. of Psych._, i^3, p. 426).
-
-We find no difficulty in assenting to the general proposition that
-culture has been a work of progress. Our difficulty lies in realizing
-the slow stages of its early development, owing to the complexities
-both of our mental constitution and of the contemporaneous culture
-from which experience is drawn, or, again to use Mr. Spencer's more
-expressive words, of our 'inner tendencies', and 'outer persistencies';
-we are apt to regard as intuitive, if not congenital, many simple
-ideas which in early culture can only have been worked out through the
-exercise of experience and reason during a long course of ages.
-
-We see this error of our own minds constantly displayed in the
-education of children. The ideas in a child's mind, like those of
-mankind at large, are necessarily built up in sequence. The instructor
-makes use of some word, the meaning of which is clearly understood
-by him, but which does not fall into the sequence of the child's
-reasoning; the conception associated with it in the child's mind must,
-however, necessarily conform to such sequence. Hence a confusion of
-ideas, which is often attributed to the stupidity of the child, but
-which is in reality due to the inexperience of the instructor; as,
-for instance, in the case exemplified by Pip, in Dickens' _Great
-Expectations_, who, having imbibed the precept that he was to 'walk in
-the same all the days of his life', was led by his sequence of ideas to
-infer therefrom that he was invariably to walk to school by the same
-path, and on no account go round by the pastrycook's.
-
-And so in studying savages and early races whose mental development
-corresponds in some degree to that of children, we have to guard
-against this automorphism, as Mr. Spencer terms it; that is to say, the
-tendency to estimate the capacity of others by our own, which appears
-almost completely to incapacitate some people from dealing with the
-subject.
-
-The question of the free will of man enters largely into this study. I
-shall not be expected to say much upon a subject which has so lately
-occupied the attention of the public, having been discussed by some of
-our ablest scientists; but I cannot avoid quoting, in reference to this
-point, a passage from Dr. Carpenter's _Mental Physiology_, who in this
-controversy is certainly entitled to be regarded as the champion of
-free will; and therefore by quoting him we run no risk of overstating
-the case against free will. 'Our mental activity,' he says (p. 25), is
-'entirely spontaneous or automatic, being determined by our congenital
-nervous organism.... It may be stated as a fundamental principle that
-the will can never originate any form of mental activity....' But
-it has the power, he continues, of selecting any one out of several
-objects that present themselves either simultaneously or successively
-before the mental vision, and of so limiting and intensifying the
-impression which that particular object makes upon the consciousness,
-that all others shall be for the time non-existent to it.
-
-The truth of this, in so far as regards the limitation of the will,
-cannot fail to force itself upon the student of culture. It is,
-I venture to think, by classifying and arranging in evolutionary
-order the actual facts of the manifestations of mind, as seen in the
-development of the arts, institutions, and languages of mankind, no
-less than by comparative anatomy, and far more than by metaphysical
-speculation, that we shall arrive at a solution of the question,
-to what extent the mental Ego has been, to use Professor Huxley's
-expression, a conscious spectator of what has passed.
-
-I propose, therefore, with your permission, to give a few examples,
-by means of diagrams, of material evolution derived from the earliest
-phases of culture. In language and in all ideas communicated by word
-of mouth there is a hiatus between the limits of our knowledge and the
-origin of culture which can never be bridged over, but we may hold in
-our hand the first tool ever created by the hand of man.
-
-It has been said that the use of speech is the distinctive quality of
-man. But how can we know that? We are literally surrounded by brute
-language. We can imitate their calls, and we find that animals will
-respond to our imitations of them. But who has ever seen any of the
-lower animals construct a tool and use it.
-
-The conception of man, not as a tool-_using_ but as a tool-_making_
-animal, is clear, defined, and unassailable; probably if we could
-trace language to its sources, we should be able to draw the same line
-between natural sounds employed as a medium of communication, and the
-created word. Thus the arts which we can study may perhaps be taken to
-illustrate the origin of language, which we cannot study in this phase.
-
-The ape employs both sticks and stones as missiles and as hammers to
-crack the shells of nuts. But we have no evidence that he ever selects
-special forms for special uses. The arts therefore afford us a clearly
-defined starting-point for the commencement of culture.
-
-To go in search of a particular form of stick or stone in order to
-apply it to a particular use would require greater effort of the will
-in fixing attention continuously on the matter in hand than is found to
-exist amongst the lower animals except in cases of instinct, which term
-I understand to mean an inherited congenital nervous organism which
-adapts the mind to the ready reception of experience of a particular
-kind. But this instinct does not exist in the case in question; there
-is no tool-making instinct: our tool has to be evolved through reason
-and experience, without the aid of any special organism for the purpose.
-
-The process we have to assume therefore is that, in using stones as
-hammers, they would occasionally split. In using certain stratified
-rocks this would occur frequently, and so force itself on the attention
-of the creature. The creature going on hammering, it would force itself
-on his notice that the sharp fractured end was doing better work than
-before. It would be perceived that there were hard things and soft
-things, that the hard things split the stone, and the soft things were
-cut by it; and so there would grow up in the mind an association of
-ideas between striking hard things and splitting, and striking soft
-things and cutting, and also a sequence by which it would be perceived
-that the fracture of the stone was a necessary preliminary to the
-other; and in the course of many generations, during which the internal
-organism of the mind grew in harmony with this experience, the creature
-would be led to perform the motions which had been found effectual in
-splitting the stone before applying it to the purposes for which it was
-to be used.
-
-Thus we arrive at a state of the arts in which we may suppose man to
-be able to construct a tool by means of a single blow. By constantly
-striking in the same direction, flakes would be produced; and by still
-further repeating the same motions, it would at last be found that by
-means of many blows a stone could be chipped to an edge or a point so
-as to form a very efficient tool.
-
-But this continued chipping of the stone in order to produce a tool,
-implies a considerable mental advance upon the effort of mind necessary
-to construct a tool with one blow.
-
-It implies continued attention directed by the will to the
-accomplishment of an object already conceived in the mind, and its
-subsequent application to another object which must also have been
-conceived in the mind before the tool was begun.
-
-Now we know from all experience, and from all evolution which we can
-trace with certainty, that progress moves on in an accelerating ratio,
-and that the earlier processes take longer than the later ones.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XII.
-
-_Diagram 1._]
-
-But the implements of the drift, which are the earliest relics of human
-workmanship as yet recognized, are most of them multi-flaked tools,
-such as the implements figured on Plate XII, Nos. 1-10, requiring a
-considerable time to construct, and the use of innumerable blows in
-order to trim to a point at one end.
-
-It appears therefore evident that in the natural course of events
-the drift period must have been preceded by an earlier period of
-considerable extent characterized by the use of single-flaked tools.
-And we may therefore consider it probable that should any evidences of
-man be hereafter discovered in miocene beds, they will be associated
-with such large rude flakes as those now exhibited, which require a
-feebler effort of attention and of reason to construct.
-
-If we examine the forms of the flint implements of the drift, we
-find that out of many intermediate shapes we may recognize three in
-particular, which have been minutely described by Mr. Evans in his
-valuable work on the stone implements of Britain[9]: (1) a side-tool,
-consisting of a flint chipped to an edge on one side and having the
-natural rounded outside of the flint left on the other side, where it
-appears to have been held in the hand; (2) a tongue-shaped implement
-chipped to a point at one end, and having the rounded surface for the
-hand at the big end; and (3) an oval or almond-shaped tool, which is
-often chipped to an edge all round.
-
-We have no evidence to show which of these kind of tools was the
-earliest; but that they were employed for different uses there can be
-little reason to doubt. But have we any evidence to throw light on the
-way in which these several forms originated in the minds of men in the
-very low condition of mental development which we may suppose to have
-existed at the time?
-
-About eight years ago, whilst examining the ancient British camps on
-the South Downs, I chanced to discover in the camp of Cissbury, near
-Worthing, a large flint factory of the neolithic age. There were some
-sixty or more pits from which flints had been obtained from the chalk,
-and these pits were full of the debris of the flint-workers. The
-factory was of the neolithic age, the most characteristic tool of which
-is the flint celt, a form which differs but slightly from the oval
-or almond-shaped palaeolithic form, but the cutting edge of which is
-more decidedly at the broad end. The debris, some six hundred or more
-specimens of which were collected, consisted chiefly of these celts in
-various stages of manufacture.
-
-If any one will attempt to make a flint celt, as I have done sometimes
-(and Mr. Evans, from whom I learnt that art, has done frequently), he
-will find that it is difficult to command the fracture of the flint
-with certainty; every now and then a large piece will come off, or a
-flaw will be discovered which spoils the symmetry of the tool, and it
-has to be thrown away. In arranging and classifying the remains of this
-flint factory, I found that all the palaeolithic forms were represented
-by one or other of these unfinished celts, so much so as to make it
-doubtful whether some of them may not actually have been used like them.
-
-A celt finished at the thin end, and abandoned before the cutting edge
-was completed, represented a tongue-shaped palaeolithic implement; a
-celt finished only on one side represented a palaeolithic side-tool;
-and a celt rudely chipped out, and abandoned before receiving its
-finishing strokes, represented almost exactly an oval palaeolithic
-tool, only differing from it in being somewhat rougher, and showing
-evidence of unfinish.
-
-Taking a lesson then from this flint-worker's shop of the later
-neolithic age, we see how the earlier palaeolithic forms originated.
-They were not designed outright, as the nineteenth-century man would
-have designed them for special uses, but arose from a selection of
-varieties produced accidentally in the process of manufacture. The
-forms were also suggested by those of the nodules out of which they
-were made. We see, by examining the outside surfaces that were left on
-some of them, how a long thin nodule produced a long thin celt, a broad
-thick nodule a broad thick celt, and so forth. Indeed, so completely
-does the fabricator appear to have been controlled by the necessities
-of his art, that in tracing these successive forms one is almost
-tempted to ask whether the principle of causation lay mostly in the
-flint or in the flint-worker, so fully do they bear out the statement
-of Dr. Carpenter and the other physiologists, that nothing originates
-in the free will of man.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE I.]
-
-[Illustration: PLATE II.]
-
-On these two diagrams (Plates I and II) I have shown how, from the same
-form of palaeolithic implement already described, the more complex
-forms of the spear and axe-blade of the subsequent periods were
-developed. The point developed into a spear, and the broad end into an
-axe-blade. You will see by reference to Plate I that the oval tool of
-the drift suggested the smaller leaf-shaped spear-head of the early
-neolithic age. This, by a gradual straightening of the sides, became
-the lozenge-shaped form, which latter developed into the barbed form,
-and this last into the triangular form, which consists of barbs without
-a tang.
-
-On the other hand, this same oval tool of the drift (Plate II), when
-used as an axe-blade with the broad end, became the celt of the
-neolithic period, chipped only at first and subsequently polished. This
-gave rise to the copper celt of the same form having convex surfaces,
-which grew into the bronze celt with flat sides. Then the bronze celt
-was furnished with a stop to prevent its being pressed too far into
-the handle by the blow. Others were furnished with projecting flanges
-to prevent them from swerving by the blow when hafted on a bent stick.
-Others had both stops and flanges. By degrees the flanges were bent
-over the stops and over the handle, and then the central portion above
-the stops, being no longer required, became thinner, and ultimately
-disappeared, the flanges closed on each other, and by this means the
-weapon grew into the socket celt. On this socket celt you will see that
-there is sometimes a semicircular ornamentation on each side. This
-semicircular ornament, as I pointed out in a paper on primitive warfare
-read some time ago, is a vestige of the overlapping flange of the
-earlier forms out of which it grew, which, like the rings on our brass
-cannon, are survivals of parts formerly serving for special uses (pp.
-182-3 below).
-
-In the vertical columns I have given, in the order of their
-occurrence, the successive periods of prehistoric time, viz. the early
-palaeolithic, late palaeolithic, early neolithic, late neolithic,
-early bronze, late bronze and iron periods, beneath which I have placed
-lines for two distinct phases of modern savage culture, viz. the
-Australian and the American Indian. A cross beneath each form denotes
-the periods in which they occur, and a vertical bar denotes that they
-are of rare or doubtful occurrence; so that the sequence of development
-may be seen at a glance, and it is only a glance that I ask you to take
-at these diagrams on the present occasion. I have checked them with Mr.
-Evans' work and also with Sir William Wilde's Catalogue,[10] and I do
-not think that any of the statements made in them will be challenged;
-but as these forms were not developed for the purpose of filling in the
-spaces in rectangular diagrams, such diagrams only imperfectly convey
-an idea of the evolution which has taken place, and must be regarded
-only as provisional and liable to be improved.
-
-In tracing the evolution of prehistoric implements, we are of course
-limited to such as were constructed of imperishable materials. No doubt
-our prehistoric ancestors used also implements of wood, but they have
-long since disappeared; and if we wish to form an idea of what they
-were, we must turn to those of his nearest congener, the modern savage.
-
-In speaking of savages, the question of progression versus degeneration
-is probably familiar to most of those present, through the writings of
-Sir John Lubbock and Mr. E. B. Tylor. To the several weighty arguments
-in favour of progression given by those writers I will add this one
-derived from the sequence of ideas.
-
-If the Australians, for example, were the degenerate descendants of
-people in a higher phase of culture, then, as all existing ideas are
-made up of previous ideas, we must inevitably find amongst their arts
-traces of the forms of earlier and higher arts, as is the case amongst
-some of the savages of South America who early came in contact with
-Peruvian civilization; but the reverse of this is the case: all the
-forms of the Australian weapons are derived from those of nature.
-
-In the same way that we saw that the forms of the palaeolithic flint
-implements were suggested by accidental fractures in the workshop, so
-the several forms of the Australian wooden implements were suggested
-by the various forms of the stems and branches out of which they were
-made. These savages, having only flint tools to work with, cannot
-saw out their weapons to any form they please; they can only trim
-the sticks into a serviceable shape. All their weapons are therefore
-constructed on the grain of the wood, and their forms and uses have
-arisen from a selection of the natural curves of the sticks.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE III.]
-
-I have arranged, on Plate III, drawings of nearly all the weapons used
-by the Australians, placing them together according to their affinities
-in such a manner as to show hypothetically their derivation from a
-single form. As all the forms given on this diagram are drawings of
-weapons in use at the present time, and there are many intermediate
-forms not given here, I have not arranged them in horizontal lines,
-as in the previous diagrams, to show their place in time, but have
-arranged them as radiating from a central point. We know nothing of
-the antiquities of savage countries as yet, and therefore cannot trace
-their evolution in time. The development has therefore been shown by
-means of survivals of early forms existing at the present time.
-
-In the centre I have placed the simple cylindrical stick, as being
-the simplest form. By a gradual development of one end I have traced
-upwards the formation of a sharp ridge and its transition into a
-kind of mushroom form. To the right upwards I have traced the same
-development of the mushroom head, the projecting ridge of which
-is constantly liable to fractures by blows; and as savages always
-systematize accidental fractures so as to produce symmetry, scollops
-have been cut out of the ridge in different places for this purpose,
-which had the effect of concentrating the force of the blow on the
-projections. These were further developed; one of the pilei of the
-mushroom head was made larger than the others, and this suggested the
-form of a bird's head, so that it was only necessary to add a line for
-the mouth and a couple of eyes to complete the resemblance. To the
-right we see that the plain stick held in the centre gave the first
-idea of a defensive weapon, and was used to parry off the darts of the
-assailant; an aperture was then made in the stick for the hand, and
-the face of it became broader, developing into a shield, the narrow
-ends, however, being still retained for parrying. Below I have shown
-that the long stick simply pointed at one end became a lance; a row
-of sharp flints were gummed on to one side to produce a cutting edge,
-and these were then imitated in wood, and by pointing them obliquely
-they were converted into barbs. To the right another kind of barb was
-produced by binding on a piece of sharp-pointed wood. Between this
-and the shields we see that the first idea of the throwing-stick,
-employed to project these lances, was simply constructed like the
-barbed point of the lance itself. The gradual expansion of the stick
-arose from its being employed like a battledore, to fence off the
-enemy's lances. To the left below I have shown the gradual development
-of a peculiar curved weapon, called the 'malga', formed from a stem
-and the branch projecting from it at different angles. The part where
-the continuation of the stem was cut off was trimmed to a kind of
-ridge; this ridge developed, and suggested the crest of a bird's head;
-ultimately the eyes were added, in the same manner as in the club
-on the opposite side of the diagram. To the left we see the plain
-round stick first flattened, then curved. Savages are in the habit
-of throwing all their weapons at their adversaries and at animals.
-In throwing a flat curved stick it rotates of its own accord, and as
-the axis of rotation continues parallel to itself, the thin edge is
-presented to the resistance of the air in front; this increases the
-range, and its peculiar flight must have forced itself on the attention
-of the savage as the result of experience: but he has never had the
-slightest knowledge of the laws of its flight. The different curves
-of the boomerang are the natural curves of the sticks, and like all
-the Australian weapons, they are made on the grain of the wood. Some
-are thicker than others; some will fly in the curves peculiar to that
-weapon, and others will not: scarcely two are alike.
-
-To the left above, we see the mushroom-headed 'waddy', with its
-projecting ridge flattened, then curved; one side becomes more
-developed than the other, and this being thrown develops into the waddy
-boomerang, the ridge of the earlier forms being still represented by a
-mark on the flat head of the weapon; an intermediate link connects it
-with the true boomerang.
-
-Many other examples might be given to illustrate the continuity which
-exists in the development of all savage weapons; but I only ask you
-to glance at the sequence shown in this diagram and the preceding ones
-in order to convince you of the truth of the statement which I made
-at the commencement of this discourse, that although, owing to the
-complexity of modern contrivances and the larger steps by which we
-mount the ladder of progress in the material arts, their continuity
-may be lost sight of, when we come to classify the arts of savages and
-prehistoric men, the term 'growth' is fully as applicable to them as to
-the development of the forms of speech, and that there are no grounds,
-upon the score of continuity, history, or the action of free will, to
-separate these studies generically as distinct classes of science.
-
-But in dealing with evolution we have to speak not only of growth,
-but, as in all other natural sciences, of the principle of decay. By
-decay I do not mean the decay of the materials of the arts, but the
-decomposition of the mental ideas which produced them.
-
-As complex ideas are built up of simple ones, so there is also a
-further process by which they become disintegrated, and the parts go to
-form parts of other ideas.
-
-This decay in the arts corresponds to what is called phonetic decay
-in language; and in both cases it arises either from incapacity, the
-desire to save trouble, or the necessity of abbreviating when ideas
-originally evolved for one purpose come to form parts of other ideas to
-which they are merely accessory and subordinate, as in the well-known
-dialectic changes of speech. Every sound in language had originally a
-distinct meaning of its own; gradually these sounds or roots came to
-form parts of words in which the original meanings of the sounds were
-lost.
-
-I will now endeavour to draw a parallel to this in the arts, by means
-of what may be termed realistic degeneration.
-
-I will not say much as to the place of realism in culture. The
-archaeological world has lately been somewhat startled by the
-discovery of well-executed designs of elephants and other animals in
-the French caves in association with the rude stone implements of the
-palaeolithic age, and by the more recent discovery of Mariette Bey,
-that the earliest Egyptian sculptures of the third dynasty are the most
-truthful representations of the human form that are to be found in
-that country. I see nothing surprising in this, when we consider the
-power that is developed in many children of eight or nine years old of
-making drawings of animals and other objects, which, when allowance is
-made for the feeble hand of childhood, are often as truthful as those
-of the cave-period men, at a time when their minds have acquired but
-little power of reasoning or generalizing, or even of taking care of
-themselves; all which goes to prove that this power of imitation, which
-is a very different thing from ideal art, is one of the most early
-developed faculties of the mind of man.
-
-When the power of imitation had once been developed, it would
-naturally be made use of as a means of intercommunication; thus the
-drawing of a stag would be made to convey information to people at
-a distance that there was a herd of deer in the neighbourhood to be
-hunted; and as the object of the drawing was no longer to depict
-truthfully the peculiarities of the beast, but merely to convey
-information, the amount of labour expended upon it would be the
-least that could be employed for the required purpose. All written
-characters have originated in this way; and no one now requires to be
-told how pictographic representations developed into hieroglyphic and
-subsequently into phonetic characters.
-
-But realistic degeneration would equally take place in all cases in
-which pictorial representations came to be employed for other purposes
-than those for which they were originally designed, as in the case of
-ornamental designs.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XXI.
-
-EVOLUTION OF TYPES ON ANCIENT BRITISH COINS.]
-
-So also a coin receives upon its surface the image of a king or a god
-as a stamp of authority. When from any cause the object of the original
-design is lost, the object of the stamp being no longer to convey a
-likeness, but being merely used as a test of genuineness, or perhaps
-amongst an unlettered people to denote its value, the tendency to
-realistic degeneration would be proportioned to the difficulties of
-execution; no further labour would be expended on it than was necessary
-for the object to be attained. Here I must again remind you of the
-interesting discourse delivered in this Institution on May 14, 1875,
-by Mr. Evans, on the evolution of British coins.[11] His examples are
-figured in his _Coins of the Ancient Britons_, pp. 24-32. With his
-permission I have introduced some of his diagrams (Plate XXI). You will
-remember how the coin of Philip of Macedon having been introduced into
-Britain, the head on the obverse gradually disappeared, leaving only
-the wreath as a band across the coin, which was ultimately converted
-into a cross; and how on the reverse, the chariot and two horses
-dwindled into a single horse, the chariot disappeared, leaving only
-the wheels, the driver became elevated, not elevated after the manner
-unfortunately but too common amongst London drivers, but elevated
-after the manner of the Spiritualists, except that you see he had the
-precaution to take on a pair of wings, differing also both from the
-London driver and the Spiritualists, inasmuch as instead of having lost
-his head he has lost his body, and nothing but the head remains; the
-body of the horse then gradually disappears, leaving only four lines to
-denote the legs.
-
-I will now show you an exact parallel to these transformations in a
-collection of designs, supposed to be tribal marks, which are drawn
-upon the paddle blades of the New Irelanders, a race of Papuan savages
-inhabiting an island on the north-east coast of New Guinea.
-
-Having noticed one or two allied varieties of design in specimens that
-came into my possession, I determined to collect all that I could
-find as they came to this country. In the course of several years I
-succeeded in obtaining the series represented upon Plate IV.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE IV.
-
-ORNAMENTATION OF NEW IRELAND PADDLES, SHOWING THE TRANSITION OF FORM.]
-
-The first figure you will see clearly represents the head of a Papuan:
-the hair or wig is stuffed out, and the ears elongated by means of
-an ear ornament, after the manner of these people; the eyes are
-represented by two black dots, and the red line of the nose spreads
-over the forehead. This is the most realistic figure of the series. In
-the second figure the face is somewhat conventionalized: the line of
-the nose passes in a coil round the eyes; there is a lozenge pattern
-on the forehead, representing probably a tattoo mark; the body is
-represented sitting in full. In the third figure the man is represented
-sitting sideways, simply by lopping off an arm and a leg on one side.
-In the fourth figure the legs have disappeared. In the fifth figure
-the whole body has disappeared. In the sixth figure the nose has
-expanded at the base, and the sides of the face are made to conform
-to the line of the nose; the elongated ears are there, but the ear
-ornament is gone: the nose in this figure is becoming the principal
-feature. In the seventh figure nothing but the nose is left: the sides
-of the face and mouth are gone; the ears are drawn along the side of
-the nose; the head is gone, but the lozenge pattern on the forehead
-still remains; the coil round the eyes has also disappeared, and is
-replaced by a kind of leaf form, suggested by the upper lobe of the
-ear in the previous figures; the eyes are brought down into the nose.
-In the eighth figure the ears are drawn at right angles to the nose.
-In the ninth figure the nose has expanded at the base; all the rest is
-the same as in the last figure. In the tenth figure the lozenge pattern
-and the ears have disappeared, and a vestige of them only remains, in
-the form of five points; the base of the nose is still further expanded
-into a half moon. In the last figure, nothing but a half moon remains.
-No one who compared this figure with the first of the series, without
-the explanation afforded by the intermediate links, would believe that
-it represented the nose of a human face. Unfortunately we do not know
-as yet the exact meaning of these designs, but when further information
-is obtained about them it will throw considerable light on similar
-transformations in prehistoric times.
-
-My next and last illustration is taken from the relics of Troy,
-recently brought to light by Dr. Schliemann.[12] In the valuable
-work lately published by him he gives illustrations of a number of
-earthenware vases and other objects, called by him idols, having on
-them the representation of what he conceives to be the face of an owl,
-and which he believes to represent Athena, the tutelary goddess of
-Troy, called by Homer 'Glaukopis Athene', which signifies, according
-to him, 'with the face of an owl.' Professor Max Mueller has given his
-opinion that the word 'glaukopis' cannot possibly be taken to mean
-owl-faced, but can only mean large- or bright-eyed. On this point
-I will venture no opinion, but accepting Professor Mueller's high
-authority for the usually received interpretation of it being correct,
-I shall in no way weaken the evidence in favour of Dr. Schliemann's
-discovery of the true site of Troy if I succeed in proving that,
-according to the true principle of realistic degeneration, this figure
-does not represent an owl but a human face.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE V.
-
-REALISTIC DEGENERATION.
-
-ILLUSTRATED BY REPRESENTATIONS OF THE HUMAN FACE, FOUND BY DR.
-SCHLIEMANN AT TROY.
-
-[_The numerals in brackets give_--(1) _the number of the figure in
-Schliemann's_ Troy and its Remains, (2) _the depth at which the figure
-was found, in metres_.]]
-
-The figures on Plate V are all taken from Dr. Schliemann's
-representations, and as the depth of each is given it will be seen
-that the different varieties of face occur in all the different strata
-excavated by him except the highest, and therefore no argument as to
-antiquity can be based upon the depth at which they were found. The two
-first figures, it will be seen, are clearly intended to represent a
-human face, all the features being preserved. In the two next figures
-(3, 4) the mouth has disappeared, but the fact of the principal feature
-being still a nose and not a beak, is shown by the breadth of the base
-and also by the representation of the breasts. In the two succeeding
-figures (5, 6) the nose is narrowed at the base, which gives it the
-appearance of a beak, but the fact of its being still a human form
-is still shown by the breasts. Had the idea of an owl been developed
-through realistic degeneration in these last figures, it would have
-retained this form, but in the two succeeding figures (7, 8) it will be
-seen that the nose goes on diminishing.
-
-In the remaining figures, some of which are (12-16) of solid stone,
-not earthenware, and are believed by Dr. Schliemann to be gods, it is
-clearly shown by the rude scratches representing the eyebrows, and
-their want of symmetry, that this degeneration of form is the result of
-haste.
-
-What then are these solid stone objects? I cannot for a moment doubt,
-from their resemblance to the vases, from the marks denoting the
-junction of the cover with the vase, and from the representations of
-handles, that they are votive urns of some kind, similar to those
-Egyptian stone models of urns represented in the two figures above.
-Urns of this kind were used by the Egyptians to contain the viscera of
-the mummies; but with the cheaper form of burial, in which the viscera
-were retained in the body, stone models of urns, of which these figures
-are drawings from originals in the British Museum, were deposited in
-the graves as vestiges of the earlier and more expensive process; these
-objects therefore cannot be idols, but votive urns. The fact of human
-remains having been found in some of the human-headed urns, and the
-hasty scratches on the stone models, show that they are merely models
-appertaining to the conventionalized survival of some earlier or more
-elaborate system of urn burial.
-
-We see from these facts that both growth and decay, the two component
-elements of evolution, are represented in the study of the material
-arts.
-
-My object in this discourse has been not, as I fear it may have
-appeared to you from the brief time at my disposal and my imperfect
-treatment of the subject, to extol the material arts as being
-intrinsically of more interest or importance than other branches
-of culture, but to affirm the principle that it is by studying the
-psychology of the material arts alone that we can trace human culture
-to its germs.
-
-The theory of degradation is supported only by the study of those
-branches of culture of which the early history is lost.
-
-The tree is the type of all evolution: all trees are seedlings,
-but they differ in their mode of growth. Some, like the beech and
-oak, throw their branches upwards, and these are typical of the
-development of the material arts; others, like the straight-stemmed
-pine, throw off their branches downwards, and these are typical of the
-development of some other branches of culture. It is quite true, as
-stated by mythologists, that the history of myths is one of continued
-degeneration in so far as they can be traced, and that the element
-of decay enters far more into their composition than that of growth.
-But the whole accessible history of these myths represents drooping
-branches from the upward-growing stem of free thought out of which they
-sprang. What is the space of time which separates us from the Vedas, as
-compared with the whole upward growth of humanity before and since!
-
-There are huge gaps in our knowledge of the history of the human race,
-and it has been the pleasure of mankind in all ages to people these
-gaps with jugglers and bogies; but surely, if slowly, science will open
-up these desert places, and prove to us that, so far as the finite mind
-of man can reach, there is nothing but unbroken continuity to be seen
-in the present and in the past.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[7] A Lecture delivered at the Royal Institution of Great Britain on
-Friday, May 28, 1875, and published in _Proc. Roy. Inst._, vol. vii.
-pp. 496-520, Pl. i-iv.
-
-[8] _Lectures on the Science of Language_ (London, 1861), i, Lecture 1.
-
-[9] John Evans, _The Ancient Stone Implements, Weapons, and Ornaments
-of Great Britain_ (London, 1872^1), 1897^2, p. 641.
-
-[10] Sir W. Wilde, _Catalogue of the Antiquities of the Museum of the
-Royal Irish Academy_ (Dublin, 1863).
-
-[11] John Evans, 'On the Coinage of the Ancient Britons and Natural
-Selection,' _Journal of the Royal Institution_, vii. p. 476 ff.; with a
-Plate, which is reproduced, by permission, in Plate XXI.
-
-[12] For illustrations, see _Troy and its Remains_, by Dr. Henry
-Schliemann (Murray, 1875). The figures may be taken in the following
-order: No. 185, No. 74, No. 132, No. 13, No. 173, No. 207, No. 12, No.
-11, No. 133, No. 141, No. 165. [Plate V has been compiled from the
-references here given.]
-
-
-
-
-PRIMITIVE WARFARE[13]
-
-
-I
-
-Although it is more in accordance with the purposes for which this
-establishment has been organized, that the Lecture-room should be
-devoted chiefly to subjects of practical utility connected with the
-improvement of our military system and the progress of the mechanical
-appliances, the organization, and general efficiency of our Army and
-Navy, than to the efforts of abstract science, yet the fact of your
-possessing in the three large apartments that are devoted to your
-armoury, one of the best assortments of semi-civilized and savage
-weapons that are to be found in this country, or, perhaps, in any
-part of the world, is sufficient to prove that it is not foreign to
-the objects of the Institution that the science of war should be
-ethnographically and archaeologically, as well as practically, treated.
-
-The requirements of our advancing age demand that every vein of
-knowledge should be opened out, and, in order to make good our title
-to so interesting a collection of objects as that comprised in what
-may very properly be called our ethnographical military department, it
-should be shown that, whether or not the subject may be considered to
-fall within the ordinary functions of the Society, our Museum is made
-available for the purposes of science.
-
-The age in which we live is not more remarkable for its rapid onward
-movement than for its intelligent retrospect of the past. It is
-reconstructive as well as progressive. The light which is kindled by
-the practical discoveries of modern science, throws back its rays,
-and enables us to distinguish objects of interest, which have been
-unnoticed in the gloom of bygone ages, or passed over with contempt.
-
-Men observe only those things which their occupations or their
-education enable them to understand and appreciate. When a savage is
-introduced on board the deck of a European vessel, he notices only
-those objects with the uses of which he is familiar--the sewing of a
-coat, a chain, or a cable, at once rivets his attention, but he passes
-by the steam-engine without observation, and if a work of art is forced
-upon his notice, he is unable to say whether it represents a man, a
-ship, or a kangaroo![14] So in past ages the flint implements of the
-drift, the parents of all our modern implements, whether for war or
-handicraft, must have been carted away in hundreds, unobserved, and in
-ignorance that these inconspicuous objects would one day be the means
-of upsetting the received chronology of our species.
-
-Whilst, therefore, we devote our energies chiefly to progress, and
-fix our attention upon the present and future of war, it cannot fail
-to interest those who are actively engaged in the duties of their
-profession, if we occasionally take a glance backward and see what
-recent discoveries have done towards elucidating its origin and early
-history.
-
-It might, perhaps, assist a right understanding of the principles on
-which the weapons and implements of savages deserve to be studied, if
-I were to notice some of those great questions respecting the origin
-of our species, and man's place in nature, which the investigations
-of science have been the means of raising in our day. I need hardly
-say that the rude implements, which I am about to describe, are of
-little practical interest in themselves, as models for instruction or
-imitation. We have no need of bows and arrows in the existing state
-of war, and if we did require them, the appliances of modern times
-would enable us to construct them in far greater perfection than could
-be acquired by any lessons from savages. These weapons are valuable
-only, in the absence of other evidence, from the light they throw
-on prehistoric times, and on those great questions to which I have
-alluded, and from their enabling us to trace out the origin of many of
-those customs which have been handed down to us by past generations.
-
-As, however, the discussion of these interesting subjects would lead
-me into matters that are hardly suited to the Lecture-room of this
-Institution, I must pass over the consideration of them with a few
-brief remarks.
-
-In so doing, I may appear to postulate some opinions upon points
-that are still the subject of animated controversy in the scientific
-world. But it would require a far broader field of investigation than
-is here afforded me, in order to treat these inquiries successfully,
-and to adduce all the evidence that would be necessary to support the
-hypotheses put forward; and I am anxious to devote no greater space to
-these preliminary remarks than is necessary to point out some of the
-main features of interest that are involved in the particular study
-which forms the subject of my lecture.
-
-We are apt to speak of the creation of the universe as a thing of
-the past, and to suppose that the world, with all the varied life
-upon it, previous to man's appearance, having been created for his
-especial happiness and supremacy, was afterwards left to his control
-and government. But this view of the subject belongs to an age in which
-the laws of nature in their all-sufficiency and completeness were but
-little studied and appreciated. Modern science finds no evidence of
-any such abandonment of the universe to man's jurisdiction. The more
-comprehensively the subject is viewed, the more restricted appear to be
-those limits over which the free will of mankind is permitted to range,
-and the more evident it becomes, that in his social advancement, his
-laws, arts, and wars, he moves on under the influence and development
-of those same laws which have been in force from the very first dawn
-of creation. The lower the archaeologist searches in the crust of the
-earth for the relics of human art, the more faint become the traces of
-that broad gulf, which in our times appears to separate man from the
-brute creation. In all the numerous and varied offsprings of the human
-intellect, in the arts, and even in speech, the more we investigate and
-trace them back, the more clearly they appear to point to a condition
-of the human race in which they had no existence whatever. The great
-law of nature, 'natura non facit saltum,' was not broken by the
-introduction of man upon the earth. He appears to have been produced in
-the fullness of time, as the work of creation required a more perfect
-tool, and to have ameliorated his condition, only as the work to be
-performed became more complicated and varied, just as in the hands of
-man, the rougher tool is employed for felling, and the finer tool for
-finishing and polishing.
-
-By this view we come to look upon even the most barbarous state of
-man's existence, as a condition, not so much of degradation, as of
-arrested or retarded progress, and to see that, notwithstanding many
-halts and relapses, and a very varied rate of movement in the different
-races, the march of the human intellect has been always onward.
-
-As, in the lower creation, we find no individuals that are capable of
-self-improvement, though some appear, by their imitative faculties,
-to contain within them the germs of an improving element, so the
-aboriginal man, closely resembling the brutes, may have passed through
-many generations before he began to show even the first symptoms
-of mental cultivation, or the rudiments of the simplest arts; and
-even then his progress may have been, at first, so slow, that it is
-not without an effort of imagination that the civilized races of
-our day can realize, by means of the implements which he has left
-us, the minute gradations which appear to mark the stages of his
-advancement. This appears to be the view taken by Sir Charles Lyell in
-his _Antiquity of Man_, when, in comparing the flint implements found
-in the higher and lower-level gravels of the valley of the Somme, he
-arrives at the conclusion 'that the state of the arts in those early
-times remained stationary for almost indefinite periods'. 'We see,'
-he says, 'in our own time, that the rate of progress in the arts and
-sciences proceeds in a geometrical ratio as knowledge increases,
-and so, when we carry back our retrospect into the past, we must
-be prepared to find the signs of retardation augmenting in a like
-geometrical ratio; so that the progress of a thousand years at a remote
-period, may correspond to that of a century in modern times, and in
-ages still more remote man would more and more resemble the brutes in
-that attribute which causes one generation exactly to imitate, in all
-its ways, the generation which preceded it' (4th ed. 1873, p. 421).
-
-In order to understand the relationship which the savage tribes of
-our own time bear to the races of antiquity, it is necessary to keep
-in view that, neither in historic nor prehistoric times is there any
-evidence that civilization has been equally or universally distributed;
-on the contrary, it appears always to have been partial, and confined
-to particular races, whose function it has been, by means of war and
-conquest, to spread the arts amongst surrounding nations, or to
-exterminate those whose low state of mental culture rendered them
-incapable of receiving it.
-
-Assuming the whole of the human species to have sprung originally
-from one stock, an hypothesis which, although disputed, appears to me
-by all existing evidence and analogy of known facts, to be the most
-reasonable assumption, the several races appear to have branched off at
-various and remote periods, many of them, perhaps, previously to the
-present geographical arrangement of land and water, and to have located
-themselves in the several regions in which they are now found, in a
-state which probably differs but little from that in which they existed
-at the time of their separation from the parent stem.
-
-Each race, after separation, shows evidence of arrested growth; and,
-finally, the intellect of the nation fossilizes and becomes stationary
-for an indefinite period, or until destroyed by being brought again in
-contact with the leading races in an advanced stage of civilization,
-precisely in the same way that the individuals composing these races,
-after propagating their species, stagnate, and ultimately decay, or, in
-a low state of savagery, are often destroyed by their own offspring.
-
-Taking a comprehensive view of the development of civilization, it may
-be compared to the growth of those plants whose vigour displays itself
-chiefly in the propagation of their leading shoots, which, overtopping
-the older and feebler branches, cause them to be everywhere replaced by
-a fresh growth of verdure. The vegetable kingdom thus furnishes us with
-the grand type of progress; continuity and bifurcation are principles
-of universal application, uniting the lowest with the highest created
-thing.
-
-The analogy of tree growth has been frequently employed in relation
-to natural phenomena, and it may very well be taken to explain the
-distribution of the human race, and the progress and expansion of the
-arts. It forms the key to the Darwinian theory of natural selection,
-which is essentially monogenistic in its application to the origin of
-the human race.
-
-Thus the existing races of mankind may be taken to represent the
-budding twigs and foliage, each in accordance with the relative
-superiority of its civilization, appertaining to branches higher and
-higher placed, upon the great stem of life.
-
-So little is as yet known of the early history of any but our own
-family of nations, that in the existing state of knowledge, the
-attempt to classify and place them on their proper branches, must be
-attended with much difficulty, and great liability to error. However,
-by arranging the existing races according to their civilization, a
-tolerably correct judgement may perhaps be formed as to the value of
-this system of classification, if we distribute them with those of
-antiquity in some two or three broad divisions. The Caucasian races
-of modern Europe, for example, may be said to bear to their ancestors
-of the historical period the same relationship that geologists have
-shown the existing mammalia of our forests to bear to the mammalia
-of the tertiary geological period. The semi-civilized Chinese and
-Hindoos, in like manner, may be classed with the races of ancient
-Assyria, Egypt, and other nations immediately prior to the first dawn
-of history, the civilization of which nations they still so greatly
-resemble, and appear to have retained, in a state of retarded progress
-from those ages to our own. A third division may perhaps be made of the
-Malay, Tartar, and African negro nations, which, though now in an age
-of iron, may, by the state of their arts, and more especially by the
-form of their implements, be taken as the best representatives of the
-prehistoric bronze period of Europe, towards which they appear to hold
-the same relationship that the fish and reptiles of our seas bear to
-those of the secondary geological period. In a fourth division may be
-included the still more barbarous races of our times, the Australian,
-Bushman, and hunting races of America, whose analogy to those of the
-stone age of Europe may be typified by that of the mollusca of recent
-species to the mollusca of the primary geological period.
-
-In all these existing races, we find that the slowness of their
-progression and incapacity for improvement is proportioned to the low
-state of their civilization, thereby leading to the supposition that
-they may have retained their arts with but slight modification from the
-time of their branching from the parent stem, and may thus be taken
-as the living representatives of our common ancestors in the various
-successive stages of their advancement.
-
-Many examples of this immobility on the part of savages and
-semi-civilized races may be given.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE VI.]
-
-Throughout the entire continent of Australia the weapons and implements
-are alike, and of the simplest form, and the people are of the lowest
-grade. The spear, the waddy, and the boomerang, with some stone
-hatchets, are their only weapons; but amongst these it has been noticed
-that, like the implements of the drift, there are minute differences,
-scarcely apparent to Europeans, but which enable a native to determine
-at a glance to what tribe a weapon belongs.[15] This, whilst it
-proves a tendency to vary their forms, shows at the same time either
-an incapacity, or, what answers the same purpose, a retarding power
-or prejudice, which prevents their effecting more than the smallest
-appreciable degree of change. In the island of Tahiti, Captain Cook
-was unable to make the natives (a superior race to the Australians)
-appreciate the uses of metal, until he had caused his armourer to
-construct an iron adze (Plate VI, fig. 1 _a_)[16] of precisely the
-same form as their own adzes of basalt (Fig. 1 _b_). After that, metal
-tools came into general use amongst them, though their old forms are
-in a great measure preserved to this day. When, during the American
-War, the English endeavoured to utilize the Indians by arming them,
-they were compelled to construct for them tomahawks after their own
-pattern, having a pipe in the handle (Fig. 2). When the Purus Indians
-of South America receive a knife from Europeans they break off the
-handle, and fashion the knife according to their own ideas, placing the
-blade between two pieces of wood, and binding it round tight with a
-sinew.[17] The natives of Samoa now use iron adzes, constructed after
-the exact pattern of their ancient stone ones.[18] The Fiji Islanders,
-though they have now the means of obtaining good blades and chisels
-from Sheffield, and axes from America, prefer plane irons to any other
-form of implement, because they are able to fix them by lashing them
-on to their handles in the same fashion as the ancient stone adzes of
-their own manufacture, which they resemble.[19] The Andaman Islanders
-use the European metal that falls into their hands, only to grind it
-down into spear- and arrow-heads of the same form as their stone ones.
-The same applies to the whole of the Aborigines of North and South
-America, which have stood by, for nearly three centuries, passive
-spectators of the arts of Europeans, without attempting to copy them.
-Crawfurd, in his _History of the Indian Archipelago_,[20] comments
-on the obstinate adherence of the Javanese to ancient customs, in
-accounting for the kris having been retained by them long after the
-causes which produced that peculiar weapon had ceased to operate.
-Tylor, in his account of the Anahuac, observes upon the preservation
-of old types amongst the present inhabitants of Mexico, which have
-remained almost unchanged from generation to generation, enabling
-the historian to distinguish clearly those which are of Aztec from
-those which are of Spanish origin.[21] Herodotus describes the spears
-carried by the Ethiopians in the army of Xerxes as being armed with the
-sharpened horn of the antelope.[22] Consul Petherick found still in
-use by the Djibba negroes, more than two thousand years after, these
-identical spears, armed with the straightened and sharpened horn of the
-antelope, and their other weapons also resembled in character those
-described by Herodotus, although they had passed from the stone weapons
-then used, into an age of metal.[23] The Scythian bow (Plate VI, fig.
-3) is the bow still used by the whole of the Tartar races (Fig. 4).
-The celt of the Tartar, and the celt and sword of the Negro (Fig. 5)
-are still the celt and sword of the European bronze period (Fig. 6),
-and this resemblance is not confined to the general outline of the
-weapons, but extends to the style and patterns of ornamentation. The
-same identity of form exists between the 'manillas' (Fig. 7) used as a
-medium of exchange in the Eboe country of West Africa and the so-called
-penannular rings or ring money (Fig. 8) of gold and bronze which are
-found in Ireland, and which, with some modifications, belong also to
-Germany and the Swiss Lakes. The corrugated iron blade of the Kaffir
-assegai, a section of which is shown in Fig. 9, and which is used also
-in Central and West Africa, is identical with those found in the Saxon
-graves (Fig. 10), and is intended to give a spiral motion to these
-missiles. Chevalier Folard observes that the Gauls were remarkable for
-the tenacity with which they clung to their ancient customs, while the
-Romans, their conquerors, are mentioned by all historians as peculiar
-in their time for the facility with which they adopted the customs of
-others, and developed their own.[24] In modern Europe, the Gipsies have
-also been noticed as being distinguished from the Europeans in all
-the various localities in which they are found, for their remarkable
-adherence to especial arts, savouring of an extinct civilization.
-Amongst the Chinese and Hindoos, the conservatism which has caused them
-to remain for ages in nearly the same condition is too well known to
-require comment. It will, however, be remembered (in illustration of
-the fact that customs of minor importance often survive great political
-changes, and serve to keep up the continuity that would otherwise be
-broken), that after the Manchu Tartars had conquered and established
-themselves in the Chinese territory, they were nearly driven again
-from the country, on account of their forcing upon the subject people
-the custom of wearing pigtails, after the fashion of their conquerors;
-showing how difficult it is to ingraft, upon an alien race, customs
-that are not indigenous.
-
-These, and many other notices of a similar character that are to
-be found in the pages of travel, establish it as a maxim, that the
-existing races, in their respective stages of progression, may be
-taken as the bona fide representatives of the races of antiquity;
-and, marvellous as it may appear to us in these days of rapid
-progress, their habits and arts, even to the form of their rudest
-weapons, have continued in many cases, with but slight modifications,
-unchanged throughout countless ages, and from periods long prior to
-the commencement of history. They thus afford us living illustrations
-of the social customs, the forms of government, laws, and warlike
-practices, which belonged to the ancient races from which they remotely
-sprang, whose implements, resembling, with but little difference,
-their own, are now found low down in the soil, in situations, and
-under circumstances in which, alone, they would convey but little
-evidence to the antiquary, but which, when the investigations of the
-antiquary are interpreted by those of the ethnologist, are teeming with
-interesting revelations respecting the past history of our race; and
-which, in the hands of the anthropologist, in whose science that of
-antiquity and ethnology are combined with physiology and geology, are
-no doubt destined to throw a flood of light, if not eventually, in a
-great measure, to clear up the mystery, which now hangs over everything
-connected with the origin of mankind.
-
-That such a combination of the sciences should have been brought about
-so opportunely in our days, appears to me to be one of those many
-indications of an overruling power directing in the aggregate the minds
-of men, which must, at all times, strike even the most superficial
-observer of nature; for there can be little doubt that in a few years
-all the most barbarous races will have disappeared from the earth, or
-will have ceased to preserve their native arts.
-
-The law which consigns to destruction all savage races when brought
-in contact with a civilization much higher than their own, is now
-operating with unrelenting fury in every part of the world. Of the
-aborigines of Tasmania, not a single individual remains; those of New
-Zealand are fast disappearing. The Australian savage dies out before
-the advancing European. North and South America, and the Polynesian
-Islands, all tell the same tale. Wherever the generous influences of
-Christianity have set foot, there they have been accompanied by the
-scourge. Innumerable and often unseen causes combine in effecting the
-same purpose; diseases which are but little felt by Europeans, act as
-plagues when introduced into uncivilized communities, and cause them
-to fall before their ravages, like wheat before the sickle; and the
-vices of civilization, taking a firmer hold of the savages than its
-virtues, aid and abet in the same work. The labours of the missionary,
-if they have produced no other benefit, have been useful in teaching
-us the great truth, that notwithstanding the philanthropic efforts
-of the intruding race, the law of nature must be vindicated. The
-savage is morally and mentally an unfit instrument for the spread of
-civilization, except when, like the higher mammalia, he is reduced to
-a state of slavery; his occupation is gone, and his place is required
-for an improved race. Allowing for the rapidly increasing ratio in
-which progress advances, it is not too much to assume, that in half a
-century from the present time, savage life will have ceased to have a
-single true representative on the face of the globe, and the evidence
-which it has been the means of handing down to our generation will have
-perished with it.
-
-When we find that the condition of the aboriginal man must have
-been one of such complete inanity as to render him incapable of
-spontaneously initiating even the most rudimentary arts, it follows
-as a matter of course that in the earliest stages of his career, he
-must, like children of our own day, have been subject to compulsory
-instruction. And in looking to nature for the sources from which such
-early instruction must have been derived, we need not, I think, be long
-in coming to the conclusion, that the school of our first parent must
-be sought for in his struggles for mastery with the brute creation,
-and that, consequently, his first lessons must have been directed to
-attaining proficiency in the art of war.
-
-Hence it follows that it is to the lower animals that we must look
-for the origin of all those branches of primitive warfare which it is
-the object of this lecture to trace out. Nor indeed shall we fail to
-find abundant evidence that there is hardly a single branch of human
-industry which may not reasonably be attributed to the same source.
-
-The province of war extends downward through the animal kingdom,
-showing unmistakable evidence of its existence in forms, offensive
-and defensive, differing but little from those of the human era,
-through the unnumbered ages of the geological periods, long prior to
-man's advent; proving, beyond the possibility of doubt, that from the
-remotest age in which we find evidence of organized beings, war has
-been ordained to an important function in the creative process.
-
-Judging by results, which I apprehend is the only true method of
-investigating the phenomena of life, three primary instincts appear
-to have been implanted in nearly all the higher animals[25]:
-alimentiveness, for the sustenance of life; amativeness, for the
-propagation of species; and combativeness, for the protection of
-species, and the propagation by natural selection of the most energetic
-breeds; on which latter subject much important information has been
-given to the world by Mr. Darwin, in his celebrated work on the origin
-of species.
-
-Much might, I believe, be said on the connexion which subsists between
-these functions, all of which are, in some form or other, necessary to
-a healthy condition. Suffice, however, to observe, that as regards the
-dawn of an Utopia, in which some men who think themselves practical
-appear to indulge; whether we study the subject by observing the
-uses to which animals apply the various and ingeniously constructed
-weapons with which Providence has armed them, or whether we view it in
-relation to the prodigious armaments of all the most civilized nations
-of Europe, we find no more evidence in nature, of a state of society
-in which wars shall cease, than we do of a state of existence in which
-we shall support life without food, or propagate our species by other
-means than those which nature has appointed.
-
-The universality of the warlike element is shown in the fact, that the
-classifications of the weapons of men and animals are identical, and
-may be treated under the same heads.
-
-Many constructive arts are brought to greater perfection in animals
-by the development of faculties, especially adapting them to the
-peculiar implements with which nature has furnished them, than can be
-attained by man, and especially by the aboriginal man, whose particular
-attribute appears, by all analogy of savage life, to have been an
-increase of that imitative faculty which, in the lower creation, is
-found only in a modified degree in apes.
-
-The lower creation would thus furnish man not only with the first
-element of instruction, but with examples for the improvement of the
-work commenced, or, to use the words of Pope:--
-
- From the creatures thy instructions take,
- Thy arts of building from the bee receive;
- Learn from the mole to plough, the worm to weave;
- Learn from the little nautilus to sail,
- Spread the thin oars, and catch the driving gale;
- Here, too, all forms of social reason find,
- And hence let reason late instruct mankind.[26]
-
-In the art of war, as we shall see, he would not only derive his first
-instruction from the beasts, but he would improve his means of offence
-and defence from time to time by lessons derived from the same source.
-
-It therefore appears desirable that, before entering upon that branch
-of the subject which relates to the _progress_ and _development_ of
-the art of war, I should point out briefly the analogies which exist
-between the weapons, tactics, and stratagems of savages and those of
-the lower creation, and show to what extent man appears to have availed
-himself of the weapons of animals for his own defence.
-
-In so doing the subject may be classified as follows:--
-
-_Classification of the Weapons of Animals and Savages._
-
- Defensive. Offensive. Stratagems.
- Hides. Piercing. Flight.
- Solid plates. Striking. Concealment.
- Jointed plates. Serrated. Tactics.
- Scales. Poisoned. Columns.
- Missiles. Leaders.
- Outposts.
- Artificial defences.
- War cries.
-
-Firstly, with respect to the combative principle itself. The identity
-of this instinct in men and animals may be seen in the widely-spread
-custom of baiting animals against each other, a practice which is not
-derived from any one source, but is indigenous in the countries in
-which it prevails, and arises from the inherent sympathy which exists
-between men and animals in the exercise of this particular function.
-
-In the island of Tahiti, long before the first European vessel was seen
-off their shores, the inhabitants were accustomed to train and fight
-cocks, which were fed with great care, and kept upon finely-carved
-perches.[27] Cock-fighting also prevails amongst the Malays, Celebes,
-and Balinese. The Javanese fight their cocks like the Mahommedans
-of Hindustan, without spurs; the Malays, Bugis, and Macassars with
-artificial spurs shaped like a scythe.[28] It also prevails in Central
-Africa, Central America, and Peru. The Sumatrans fight their cocks for
-vast sums; a man has been known to stake his wife and children, son,
-mother, or sister on the issue of a battle, and when a dispute occurs,
-the owners decide the question by an appeal to the sword. In like
-manner Adrastus, the son of Midas, King of Phrygia, is said to have
-killed his brother in consequence of a quarrel which took place between
-them in regard to a battle of quails.
-
-When Themistocles led the Greeks out against the Persians, happening
-to see two cocks fight, he showed them as an example to his soldiers.
-Cock-fighting was afterwards exhibited annually in presence of the
-whole people, and the crowing of a cock was ever after regarded as a
-presage of victory.[29]
-
-The Javanese also fight hogs and rams together. The buffalo and
-tiger are matched against each other. In Butan the combat is between
-two bulls. Combats of elephants took place for the amusement of the
-early Indian kings. The Chinese and Javanese fight quails, crickets,
-and fish. The Romans fought cocks, quails, and partridges, also the
-rhinoceros. In Stamboul two rams are employed for fighting. The
-Russians fight geese, and the betting runs very high upon them.[30]
-We find horses, elephants, and oxen standing side by side with man in
-hostile array, and dogs were used by the Gauls for the same purpose.
-Amongst the ancients, the horse, the wolf, and the cock were offered on
-the altar of Mars for their warlike qualities.
-
-Who can doubt with these examples before us, that an instinct so widely
-disseminated and so identical in men and animals, must have been
-ordained for special objects?
-
-The causes which give rise to the exercise of the function, vary with
-the advance of civilization. We have now ceased to take delight in the
-mere exhibition of brute combats, but the profession of war is still
-held in as much esteem as at any previous period in the history of
-mankind, and we bestow the highest honours of the State upon successful
-combatants.
-
-This, however, leads to another subject, viz. the causes of war amongst
-primitive races, which is deserving of separate treatment.
-
-
-_Defensive Weapons._
-
-We may pass briefly over the defensive weapons of animals and savages,
-not by any means from the analogy being less perfect in this class of
-weapons, but rather because the similarity is too obvious to make it
-necessary that much stress should be laid on their resemblance.
-
-_Hides._ The thick hides of pachydermatous animals correspond to the
-quilted armour of ancient and semi-civilized races. Some animals, like
-the rhinoceros and hippopotamus, are entirely armed in this way; others
-have their defences on the most vulnerable part, as the mane of the
-lion, and the shoulder pad of the boar.[31] The skin of the tiger is of
-so tough and yielding a nature, as to resist the horn of the buffalo
-when driven with full force against its sides.[32] The condor of Peru
-has such a thick coating of feathers, that eight or ten bullets may
-strike without piercing it.[33]
-
-[Illustration: PLATE VII.]
-
-According to Thucydides, the Locrians and Acarnanians, being professed
-thieves and robbers, were the first to clothe themselves in armour.[34]
-But as a general rule it may be said, that the opinions of ancient
-writers upon the origin of the customs with which they were familiar,
-are of little value in our days. There is, however, evidence to show
-that the use of defensive armour is not usual amongst savages in the
-lowest stages of culture. It is not employed, properly speaking, by
-the Australians, the Bushmen, the Fuegians, or in the Fiji or Sandwich
-Islands. But in other parts of the world, soon after men began to
-clothe themselves in the skins of beasts, they appear to have used the
-thicker hides of animals for purposes of defence. When the Esquimaux
-apprehends hostility, he takes off his ordinary shirt, and puts on
-a deer's skin, tanned in such a manner as to render it thick for
-defence, and over this he again draws his ordinary shirt, which is
-also of deer-skin, but thinner in substance. The Esquimaux also use
-armour of eider drake's skin.[35] The Abipones and Indians of the Grand
-Chako arm themselves with a cuirass, greaves, and helmet, composed
-of the thick hide of the tapir, but they no longer use it against the
-musketry of the Europeans.[36] The Yucanas also use shields of the same
-material. The war-dress of a Patagonian chief from the Museum of the
-Institution is exhibited (Plate VII, figs. 11, 12); it is composed of
-seven thicknesses of hide, probably of the horse, upon the body, and
-three on the sleeves. The chiefs of the Musgu negroes of Central Africa
-use for defence a strong doublet of the same kind, made of buffalo's
-hide with the hair inside.[37] The Kayans of Borneo use hide for
-their war-dress, as shown by a specimen belonging to the Institution
-(Fig. 13). The skin of the bear and panther is most esteemed for this
-purpose.[38] The inhabitants of Pulo Nias, an island off the western
-coast of Sumatra, use for armour a 'baju' made of leather. In some
-parts of Egypt a breastplate was made of the back of the crocodile
-(Fig. 14). In the island of Cayenne, in 1519, the inhabitants used a
-breastplate of buffalo's hide.[39] The Lesghi of Tartary wore armour
-of hog's skin.[40] The Indians of Chili, in the seventeenth century,
-wore corselets, back and breast plates, gauntlets, and helmets of
-leather, so hardened, that it is described by Ovalle as being equal
-to metal.[41] According to Strabo (p. 306), the German Rhoxolani wore
-helmets, and breastplates of bull's hide, though the Germans generally
-placed little reliance in defensive armour. The Ethiopians used the
-skins of cranes and ostriches for their armour.[42]
-
-[Illustration: PLATE VIII.]
-
-We learn from Herodotus that it was from the Libyans the Greeks derived
-the apparel and aegis of Minerva, as represented upon her images, but
-instead of a pectoral of scale armour, that of the Libyans was merely
-of skin.[43] According to Smith's _Dict. of Gr. and Roman Antiquities_
-(s.v. _lorica_), the Greek 'thorax', called ~stadios~, from its standing
-erect by its own stiffness, was originally of leather, before it was
-constructed of metal. In Meyrick's _Ancient Armour_, there is the
-figure of a suit, supposed formerly to have belonged to the Rajah of
-Guzerat (Plate VIII, fig. 15). The body part of this suit is composed
-of four pieces of rhinoceros hide, showing that, in all probability,
-this was the material originally employed for that particular class of
-armour, which is now produced of the same form in metal, a specimen of
-which, from the Museum of the Institution, taken from the Sikhs, is now
-exhibited (Fig. 16).
-
-[Illustration: PLATE IX.]
-
-In more advanced communities, as skins began to be replaced by woven
-materials, quilted armour supplied the place of hides. In those parts
-of the Polynesian Islands in which armour is used, owing probably
-to the absence of suitable skins, woven armour appears to have been
-employed in a comparatively low state of society. Specimens of this
-class of armour from the Museum of the Institution are exhibited; they
-are from the Kingsmill Islands, Pleasant Island, and the Sandwich
-Islands. A helmet from the latter place (Pl. VIII, fig. 17) much
-resembles the Grecian in form, while the under tippet, from Pleasant
-Island (Pl. VII, fig. 18), may be compared to the pectoral of the
-Egyptians (Fig. 19, _a_ and _b_), which, as well as the head-dress (Pl.
-VIII, fig. 20), was of a thickly quilted material. The Egyptians wore
-this pectoral up to the time of Xerxes, who employed their sailors,
-armed in this way, during his expedition into Greece. Herodotus says
-that the Indians of Asia wore a thorax of rush matting.[44] In 1514,
-Magellan[45] found tunics of quilted cotton, called 'laudes', in
-use by the Muslims of Guzerat and the Deccan. An Indian helmet of
-this description from my collection (Fig. 21) is exhibited; in form
-it resembles the Egyptian, and an Ethiopian one (Fig. 22), composed
-of beads of the same form, brought from Central Africa by Consul
-Petherick, is exhibited. Fig. 23 shows that the same form, in India,
-was subsequently produced in metal. A suit of quilted armour formerly
-belonging to Koer Singh, and lately presented to the Institution by Sir
-Vincent Eyre, is also exhibited (Plate VII, fig. 24). The body armour
-and helmet found upon Tippoo Sahib at his death, which are now in the
-Museum of the Institution (Plate IX, fig. 25, _a_, _b_, and _c_), were
-thickly quilted. Upon the breast, this armour consists of two sheets
-of parchment, and nine thicknesses of padding composed of cocoons of
-the _Saturnia mylitta_, stuffed with the wool of the _Eriodendron
-anfractuosum, D.C._, neatly sewn together, as represented in fig. 25
-_b_.[46] The Aztecs and Peruvians also guarded themselves with a wadded
-cotton doublet.[47] Quilted armour or thick linen corselets were used
-by the Persians, Phoenicians, Chalybes, Assyrians, Lusitanians, and
-Scythians, by the Greeks, and occasionally by the Romans.[48] By the
-Persians it was used much later; and in Africa to this day, quilted
-armour, of precisely the same description, is used both for men and
-horses by the Bornouese of Central Africa, and is described by Denham
-and Clapperton[49] (Plate VIII, fig. 26). Plate VII, fig. 27, is a suit
-of armour in the Institution, from the Navigator Islands, composed of
-coco-nut fibre coarsely netted. Fig. 28 is part of a Chinese jacket of
-sky-blue cotton, quilted with enclosed plates of iron; it is precisely
-similar to the 'brigandine jacket' used in Europe in the sixteenth
-century, which was composed of 'small plates of iron quilted within
-some stuff', and 'covered generally with sky-blue cloth'.[50] This
-class of armour may be regarded as a link connecting the quilted with
-the scale armour, to be described hereafter.
-
-As a material for shields, the hides of animals were employed even more
-universally, and up to a later stage of civilization. In North America
-the majority of the wild tribes use shields of the thickest parts of
-the hides of the buffalo.[51] In the New Hebrides the skin of the
-alligator is used for this purpose, as appears by a specimen belonging
-to the Institution. In Africa the Fans of the Gaboon employ the hide of
-the elephant for their large, rectangular shields.[52] The Wadi, the
-Wagogo, and the Abyssinians in East Africa, have shields of buffalo's
-hide, or some kind of leather, like the Ethiopians of the time of
-Herodotus. The ox-hide shields of the Greeks are mentioned in Homer's
-_Iliad_; that of Ajax was composed of seven hides with a coating of
-brass on the outside. The spear of Hector is described as piercing six
-of the hides and the brass coating, remaining fixed in the seventh
-hide.[53] The Kaffirs, Bechuanas, Basutos, and others in South Africa,
-use the hide of the ox.[54] The Kelgeres, Kelowi, and Tawarek, of
-Central Africa, employ the hide of the Leucoryx antelope.[55] Shields
-of the rhinoceros hide, from Nubia, and of the ox, from Fernando Po,
-are exhibited. In Asia the Biluchi carry shields of the rhinoceros
-horn, and the same material is also used in East Africa. A specimen
-from Zanzibar is in the Institution. In the greater part of India the
-shields are made of rhinoceros and buffalo's hide, boiled in oil, until
-they sometimes become transparent, and are proof against the edge of a
-sabre.[56]
-
-In a higher state of civilization, as the facilities for constructing
-shields of improved materials increased, the skins of animals were
-still used to cover the outside. Thus the negroes of the Gold Coast
-made their shields of osier covered with leather.[57] That of the
-Kanembu of Central Africa is of wood covered with leather,[58] and very
-much resembles in form that of the Egyptians, which, as we learn from
-Meyrick and others, was also covered with leather, having the hair on
-the outside like the shields of the Greeks.[59] The Roman 'scutum' was
-of wood covered with linen and sheepskin. According to the author of
-_Horae Ferales_, the Saxon shield was of wood covered with leather; the
-same applies to the Scotch target, and leather was used as a covering
-for shields as late as the time of Henry VIII.
-
-_Head Crests._ The origin of the hairy crests of our helmets is clearly
-traceable to the custom of wearing for head-dresses the heads and hair
-of animals. The Asiatic Ethiopians used as a head-covering, the skin
-of a horse's head, stripped from the carcase together with the ears
-and mane, and so contrived, that the mane served for a crest, while
-the ears appeared erect upon the head (Hdt. vii. 70). In the coins
-representing Hercules, he appears wearing a lion's skin upon the head.
-These skins were worn in such a manner that the teeth appeared grinning
-at the enemy over the head of the wearer (as represented in Plate
-VIII, fig. 29, which is taken from a bronze in the Blacas collection),
-a custom which seems also to have prevailed in Mexico.[60] Similar
-head-dresses are worn by the soldiers on Trajan's Column. The horns
-worn on the heads of some of the North American Indians (Fig. 30), and
-in some parts of Africa[61], are no doubt derived from this practice
-of wearing on the head the skins of animals with their appendages.
-The helmet of Pyrrhus, King of Epirus, was surmounted by two goat's
-horns. Horns were afterwards represented in brass, on the helmets of
-the Thracians (Fig. 31), the Belgic Gauls, and others. Fig. 32 is an
-ancient British helmet of bronze lately found in the Thames, surmounted
-by straight horns of the same material.[62] Horned helmets are figured
-on the ancient vases. Fig. 33 is a Greek helmet having horns of brass,
-and traces of the same custom may still be observed in heraldry.[63]
-
-The practice of wearing head-dresses of feathers, to distinguish the
-chiefs from the rank and file, is universal in all parts of the world,
-and in nearly every stage of civilization. Amongst the North American
-Indians the feathers are cut in a particular manner to denote the rank
-of the wearer, precisely in the same manner that the long feathers
-of our general officers distinguish them from those wearing shorter
-feathers in subordinate ranks. This custom, Mr. Schoolcraft observes,
-when describing the head-dresses of the American Indians, may very
-probably be derived from the feathered creation, in which the males, in
-most of the cock, turkey, and pheasant tribes, are crowned with bright
-crests and ornaments of feathers.[64]
-
-_Solid Plates._ It has often struck me as remarkable that the shells of
-the tortoise and turtle, which are so widely distributed and so easily
-captured, and which would appear to furnish shields ready made to the
-hand of man, should seldom, if ever, in so far as I have been able
-to learn, be used by savages for that purpose. This may, however, be
-accounted for by the fact that _broad_ shields of that particular form,
-though common in more advanced civilizations, are never found in the
-hands of savages, at least in those localities in which the turtle, or
-large tortoise, is available.
-
-It will be seen subsequently, in tracing the history of the shield,
-that in the rudest condition of savage life, this weapon of defence has
-a history of its own; that both in Africa and Australia it is derived
-by successive stages from the stick or club, and that the broad shield
-does not appear to have been developed until after mankind had acquired
-sufficient constructive skill to have been able to form shields of
-lighter and more suitable materials than is afforded by the shell of
-the turtle. It is, however, evident that in later times the analogy
-was not lost sight of, as the word 'testudo' is a name given by the
-Romans to several engines of war having shields attached to them, and
-especially to that particular formation of the legionary troops, in
-which they approached a fortified building with their shields joined
-together, and overlapping, like the scaly shell of the imbricated
-turtle, which is a native of the Mediterranean and Asiatic seas.
-
-_Jointed Plates._ In speaking of the jointed plates, so common to all
-the crustacea, it is sufficient to notice that this class of defence in
-the animal kingdom, may be regarded as the prototype of that peculiar
-form of armour which was used by the Romans, and to which the French,
-at the commencement of the seventeenth century, gave the name of
-'ecrevisse', from its resemblance to the shell of a lobster. The fluted
-armour, common in Persia, and in the middle ages of Europe, is also
-constructed in exact imitation of the corrugated shell defences of a
-large class of the Mollusca.
-
-_Scale Armour._ That scale armour derived its origin from the scales of
-animals, there can be little doubt. It has been stated on the authority
-of Arrian (_Tact._ 13. 14), that the Greeks distinguished scale armour
-by the term ~lepidotos~, expressive of its resemblance to the scales of
-fish; whilst the jointed armour, composed of long flexible bands, like
-the armour of the Roman soldier, and the 'ecrevisse' of the middle
-ages, was called ~pholidotos~ from its resemblance to the scales of
-serpents. The brute origin of scale armour is well illustrated by the
-breastplate of the Bugo Dyaks, a specimen of which, from the Museum
-of the Institution, is represented in Plate IX, fig. 34. The process
-of its construction was described in a notice attached to a specimen
-of this armour in the Exhibition of 1862. The scales of the Pangolin
-are collected by the Bugis as they are thrown off by the animal, and
-are stitched on to bark with small threads of cane, so as to overlap
-each other in the same manner that they are arranged on the skin of
-the animal. When the front piece is completely covered with scales, a
-hole is cut in the bark for the head of the wearer. The specimen now
-exhibited appears, however, to be composed of the entire skin of the
-animal. Captain Grant, in his _Walk across Africa_, mentions that the
-scales of the armadillo are in like manner collected by the negroes of
-East Africa, and worn in a belt 'three inches across', as a charm.[65]
-
-It is reasonable to suppose that the use of scale armour, in most
-countries, originated in this manner by sewing on to the quilted armour
-before described, fragments of any hard material calculated to give
-it additional strength. Plate VIII, fig. 35, is a piece of bark from
-Tahiti, studded with pieces of coco-nut stitched on. The Sarmatians and
-Quadi are described by Ammianus Marcellinus as being protected by a
-'lorica', composed of pieces of horn, planed and polished, and fastened
-like feathers upon a linen shirt.[66] Pausanias also, who is confirmed
-by Tacitus, says that the Sarmatians had large herds of horses, that
-they collected the hoofs, and after preparing them for the purpose,
-sewed them together, with the nerves and sinews of the same animal,
-so as to overlap each other like the surface of a fir cone, and he
-adds, that the 'lorica' thus formed was not inferior to that of the
-Greeks either in strength or elegance. The Emperor Domitian had, after
-this model, a cuirass of boar's hoofs stitched together.[67] Fig. 36
-represents a fragment of scale armour made of horn, found at Pompeii.
-A very similar piece of armour (Fig. 37), from some part of Asia, said
-to be from Japan, but the actual locality of which is not known, is
-figured in Meyrick's _Ancient Armour_, pl. iii. 1. It is made of the
-hoofs of some animal, stitched and fastened so as to hold together
-without the aid of a linen corselet. An ancient stone figure[68]
-(Plate IX, fig. 38), having an inscription in a character cognate to
-the Greek, but in an unknown language, and covered with armour of this
-description, is represented in the third volume of the _Journal of the
-Archaeological Association_. The Kayans, inhabiting the eastern coast
-of Borneo, form a kind of armour composed of little shells placed one
-overlapping the other, like scales, and having a large mother-of-pearl
-shell at the end. This last portion of the armour is shown in the
-figure of the Kayan war-dress already referred to (Plate VII, fig. 13).
-Plate VIII, fig. 39, is a back- and breast-piece of armour from the
-Sandwich Islands, composed of seals' teeth, set like scales, and united
-with string.
-
-Similar scales would afterwards be constructed in bronze and iron.
-It was thus employed by the Egyptians (Plate IX, fig. 40), two scales
-of which are shown in Fig. 41; also by the Persians, Assyrians,
-Philistines, Dacians, and most ancient nations.
-
-The armour of Goliath is believed to have been of scales, from the
-fact of the word 'kaskassim', used in the text of 1 Sam. xvii,
-being the same employed in Leviticus and Ezekiel, to express the
-scales of fish.[69] Amongst the Romans, scale armour was regarded as
-characteristic of barbarians, but they appear to have adopted it in the
-time of the Emperors. A suit of Japanese armour in my collection shows
-four distinct systems of defence, the back and breast being of solid
-plates, the sleeves and leggings composed of small pieces of iron,
-stitched on to cloth, and united with chain, whilst other portions are
-quilted with enclosed pieces of iron (Fig. 42, _a_ and _b_). Fig. 43,
-_a_ and _b_, is a suit of Chinese armour, in the Museum, having large
-iron scales on the inside (Fig. 44). This system was also employed in
-Europe. Fig. 45 is the inner side of a suit of 'jazerine' armour of the
-fifteenth or sixteenth century, in my collection. Fig. 46 represents
-a similar suit in the Museum of the Institution, probably of the same
-date, having large scales of iron on the outside. A last vestige of
-scale armour may be seen in the dress of the Albanians, which, like the
-Scotch and ancient Irish kilt, and that formerly worn by the Maltese
-peasantry, is a relic of costume of the Greek and Roman age. In the
-Albanian jacket the scales are still represented in gold embroidery.[70]
-
-
-_Offensive Weapons of Men and Animals._
-
-[Illustration: PLATE X.]
-
-_Piercing Weapons._ The Gnu of South Africa, when pressed, will attack
-men, bending its head downwards, so as to pierce with the point of
-its horn.[71] The same applies to many of the antelope tribe. The
-rhinoceros destroys the elephant with the thrust of its horn, ripping
-up the belly (Plate X, fig. 47). The horn rests on a strong arch formed
-by the nasal bones; those of the African rhinoceros, two in number,
-are fixed to the nose by a strong apparatus of muscles and tendons,
-so that they are loose when the animal is in a quiescent state, but
-become firm and immovable when he is enraged, showing in an especial
-manner that this apparatus is destined for warlike purposes.[72] It
-is capable of piercing the ribs of a horse, passing through saddle,
-padding, and all.[73] Mr. Atkinson, in his Siberian travels, speaks of
-the tusk of the wild boar, which in those parts is long, and as sharp
-as a knife, and he describes the death of a horse which was killed
-by a single stroke from this animal, delivered in the chest.[74] The
-buffalo charges at full speed with its horn down.[75] The bittern, with
-its beak, aims always at the eye.[76] The walrus (Fig. 48) attacks
-fiercely with its pointed tusks, and will attempt to pierce the side
-of a boat with them.[77] The needle-fish of the Amazons is armed
-with a long pointed lance.[78] The same applies to the sword-fish of
-the Mediterranean and Atlantic (Fig. 49), which, notwithstanding its
-food is mostly vegetable, attacks the whale with its spear-point on
-all occasions of meeting. There is an instance on record, of a man,
-whilst bathing in the Severn near Worcester, having been killed by the
-sword-fish.
-
-The weapon of the sword-fish is used as a spear-head by the wild tribes
-of Cambodia, and some idea may be formed of its efficiency for this
-purpose, and of the confidence with which it is used, by the following
-account of an attack on a rhinoceros with this weapon, by Mons.
-Mouhot.[79] He says:--
-
-'The manner in which the rhinoceros is hunted by the Laotians is
-curious, on account of its simplicity and the skill they display....
-They had bamboos, with iron blades, something between a bayonet and a
-poignard. The weapon of the chief was the horn of a sword-fish, long,
-sharp, strong, supple, and not likely to break. Thus armed, we set
-off into the thickest part of the forest, with all the windings of
-which our leader was familiar, and could tell with tolerable certainty
-where we should find our expected prey. After penetrating nearly two
-miles into the forest, we suddenly heard the crackling of branches, and
-rustling of the dry leaves. The chief went on in advance, signing to us
-to keep a little way behind, but to have our arms in readiness. Soon
-our leader uttered a shrill cry, as a token that the animal was near;
-he then commenced striking against each other two bamboo canes, and the
-men set up wild yells to provoke the animal to quit his retreat.
-
-'A few minutes only elapsed before he rushed towards us, furious at
-having been disturbed. He was a rhinoceros of the largest size, and
-opened a most enormous mouth. Without any sign of fear, but on the
-contrary of great exultation, as though sure of his prey, the intrepid
-hunter advanced, lance in hand, and then stood still, waiting for the
-creature's assault. I must say I trembled for him, and loaded my gun
-with two balls; but when the rhinoceros came within reach, and opened
-his immense jaws to seize his enemy[80], the hunter thrust his lance
-into him to a depth of some feet, and calmly retired to where we were
-posted.' After the animal was dead, the chief withdrew his sword-fish
-blade, and presented it to Mons. Mouhot.
-
-The narwhal has a still more formidable weapon of the same kind (Pl.
-X, fig. 50). It attacks the whale, and occasionally the bottoms of
-ships, a specimen of the effect of which attack, from the Museum of
-the Institution, is represented in Fig. 51. The Esquimaux, who, in
-the accounts which they give of their own customs, profess to derive
-much experience from the habits of the animals amongst which they
-live, use the narwhal's tusk for the points of their spears. Fig.
-52 represents a 'nuguit' from Greenland, of the form mentioned by
-Cranz[81]; it is armed with the point of the narwhal's tusk. Fig. 53,
-from my collection, has the shaft also of narwhal's tusk; it is armed
-with a metal blade, but it is introduced here in order to show the
-association which existed in the mind of the constructor between his
-weapon and the animal from which the shaft is derived, and for the
-capture of which it is chiefly used. The wooden shaft, it will be seen,
-is constructed in the form of the fish, and the ivory fore-shaft is
-inserted in the snout in the exact position of that of the fish itself.
-At Kotzebue Sound, Captain Beechey[82] found the natives armed with
-lances composed of a walrus tooth fixed to the end of a wooden staff
-(Fig. 54). They also employ the walrus tooth for the points of their
-tomahawks (Fig. 55). The horns of the antelope are used as lance-points
-by the Djibba negroes of Central Africa, as already mentioned (p. 52),
-and in Nubia also by the Shillooks and Dinkas.[83] The antelope's
-horn is also used in South Africa for the same purpose.[84] The argus
-pheasant of India[85], the wing-wader of Australia[86], and the plover
-of Central Africa[87], have spurs on their wings, with which they
-fight; the cock and turkey have spurs on their feet, used expressly
-for offence. The white crane of America has been known to drive its
-beak deep into the bowels of a hunter.[88] The Indians of Virginia, in
-1606, are described as having arrows armed with the spurs of the turkey
-and beaks of birds.[89] In the Christy collection there is an arrow,
-supposed to be from South America, which is armed with the natural
-point of the deer's horn (Fig. 56). The war-club of the Iroquois,
-called GA-NE-U'-GA-O-DUS-HA, or 'deer-horn war-club', was armed with
-a point of the deer's horn (Fig. 57), about 4 inches in length; since
-communication with Europeans, a metal point has been substituted
-(Fig. 58). It appears highly probable that the 'martel-de-fer' of the
-fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, which is also used in India and
-Persia, may have been derived, as its form indicates, from a horn
-weapon of this kind. Horn points suitable for arming such weapons have
-been found both in England and Ireland, two specimens of which are
-in my collection.[90] The weapon of the sting-ray, from the method of
-using it by the animal itself, should more properly be classed with
-serrated weapons, but it is a weapon in general use amongst savages for
-spear or arrow points (Fig. 59), for which it has the particular merit
-of breaking off in the wound. It causes a frightful wound, and being
-sharply serrated, as well as pointed, there is no means of cutting
-it out. It is used in this way by the inhabitants of Gambier Island,
-Samoa[91], Otaheite[92], the Fiji Islands[93], Pellew Islands[94], and
-many of the Low Islands. Amongst the savages of tropical South America,
-the blade of the ray, probably the _Trygon histrix_, is used for
-arrow-points.[95]
-
-In the _Balistes capriscus_ (Fig. 60 _a_), a rare British fish, the
-anterior dorsal is preceded by a strong erectile spine, which is
-used for piercing other fishes from beneath. Its base is expanded
-and perforated, and a bolt from the supporting plate passes freely
-through it. When this spine is raised, a hollow at the back receives a
-prominence from the next bony ray, which fixes the spine in an erect
-position, as the hammer of a gun-lock acts at full-cock, and the spine
-cannot be forced down till this prominence is withdrawn, as by pulling
-the trigger. This mechanism may be compared to the fixing and unfixing
-of a bayonet; when the spine is unfixed and bent down, it is received
-into a groove on the supporting plate, and offers no impediment to the
-progress of the fish through the water. These fishes are also found in
-a fossil state, and, to use the words of Professor Owen, from whose
-work this description of the _Balistes_ is borrowed, exemplify in a
-remarkable manner the efficacy, beauty, and variety of the ancient
-armoury of that order.[96] The stickleback is armed in a similar
-manner, and is exceedingly pugnacious. The _Cottus diceraus, Pall._
-(Fig. 60 _b_), has a multi-barbed horn on its back, exactly resembling
-the spears of the Esquimaux, South American, and Australian savages.
-The _Naseus fronticornis, Lac._ (Fig. 60 _c_), has also a spear-formed
-weapon. The Yellow-bellied Acanthurus is armed with a spine of
-considerable length upon its tail.
-
-The Australians of King George's Sound use the pointed fin of the
-roach to arm their spears[97]; the inhabitants of New Guinea also arm
-their arrows with the offensive horn of the saw-fish, and with the
-claw of the cassowary. The sword of the Limulus, or king-crab, is an
-offensive weapon; its habits do not appear to be well understood, but
-its weapon is used in some of the Malay islands for arrow-points (Fig.
-61). The natives of San Salvador, when discovered by Columbus, used
-lances pointed with the teeth of fish.[98] The spine of the Diodon is
-also used for arrow-points (Fig. 62). Amongst other piercing weapons
-suggested by the horns of animals may be noticed the Indian 'kandjar'
-composed of one side of the horn of the buffalo, having the natural
-form and point (Fig. 63). In later times a metal dagger, with ivory
-handle, was constructed in the same country (Fig. 64), after the exact
-model of the one of horn, the handle having one side flat, in imitation
-of the half-split horn, though of course that peculiar form was no
-longer necessitated by the material then used. The same form of weapon
-was afterwards used with a metal handle (Fig. 65). The sharp horns of
-the 'sasin', or common antelope, often steel pointed, are still used
-as offensive weapons in India (Figs. 66, 67, 68). Several examples
-of these are in the Museum of the Institution. Three stages of this
-weapon are exhibited, the first having the natural point, the second a
-metal point, and the third a weapon of nearly the same form composed
-entirely of metal. The Fakirs and Dervishes, not being permitted by
-their profession to carry arms, use the pointed horn of the antelope
-for this purpose. Fig. 69 is a specimen from my collection; from its
-resemblance to the Dervishes' crutch of Western Asia, I presume it
-can be none other than the one referred to in the _Journal of the
-Archaeological Association_, from which I obtained this information
-respecting the Dervishes' weapon.[99] Mankind would also early derive
-instruction from the sharp thorns of trees, with which he must come
-in contact in his rambles through the forests; the African mimosa, the
-Gledischia, the American aloe, and the spines of certain palms, would
-afford him practical experience of their efficacy as piercing weapons,
-and accordingly we find them often used by savages in barbing their
-arrows.[100]
-
-_Striking Weapons._ Many animals defend themselves by blows delivered
-with their wings or legs; the giraffe kicks like a horse as well as
-strikes sideways with its blunt horns; the camel strikes with its
-fore legs and kicks with its hind legs; the elephant strikes with its
-proboscis and tramples with its feet; eagles, swans, and other birds
-strike with their wings; the swan is said to do so with sufficient
-force to break a man's leg; the cassowary strikes forward with its
-feet; the tiger strikes a fatal blow with its paw; the whale strikes
-with its tail, and rams with such force, that the American whaler
-_Essex_ is said to have been sunk by that animal.[101] There is no
-known example of mankind in so low a state as to be unacquainted
-with the use of artificial weapons. The practice of boxing with the
-fist, however, is by no means confined to the British Isles as some
-people seem to suppose, for besides the Romans, Lusitanians[102], and
-others mentioned in classical history, it prevailed certainly in the
-Polynesian islands[103] and in Central Africa.[104]
-
-_Serrated Weapons._ This class of weapons in animals corresponds to the
-cutting weapons of men. Amongst the most barbarous races, however, as
-amongst animals, no example of a cutting weapon is found[105]: although
-the Polynesian islanders make very good knives of the split and
-sharpened edges of bamboo, and the Esquimaux, also, use the split tusk
-of the walrus as a knife, these cannot be regarded, nor, indeed, are
-they used, as edged weapons. These, strictly speaking, are confined to
-the metal age, and their place, in the earliest stages of civilization,
-is supplied by weapons with serrated, or saw-like edges.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XI.]
-
-Perhaps the nearest approach in the animal kingdom to an edged weapon
-is the fore-arm of the mantis, a kind of cricket, used by the Chinese
-and others in the East for their amusement. Their combats have been
-compared to that of two soldiers fighting with sabres. They cut and
-parry with their fore-arms, and, sometimes, a single stroke with these
-is sufficient to decapitate, or cut in two the body of an antagonist.
-But on closer inspection, these fore-arms are found to be set with a
-row of strong and sharp spines, similar to those of all other animals
-that are provided with this class of weapon. The snout of the saw-fish
-is another example of the serrated weapon. Its mode of attacking the
-whale is by jumping up high in the air, and falling on the animal, not
-with the point, but with the sides of its formidable weapon, both edges
-of which are armed with a row of sharp horns, set like teeth, by means
-of which it rasps a severe cut in the flesh of the whale. The design
-in this case is precisely analogous to that of the Australian savage,
-who throws his similarly constructed spear so as to strike, not with
-the bone point, but with its more formidable edges, which are thick set
-with a row of sharp-pointed pieces of obsidian, or rock-crystal. The
-saw-fish is amongst the most widely distributed of fishes, belonging
-to the arctic, antarctic, and tropical seas. It may, therefore, very
-possibly have served as a model in many of the numerous localities in
-which this character of weapon is found in the hands of savages. The
-snout itself is used as a weapon by the inhabitants of New Guinea, the
-base being cut and bound round so as to form a handle. Plate XI, fig.
-70, is a specimen from the Museum of the Institution. The weapon of
-the sting-ray, though used by savages for spear-points, more properly
-belongs to this class, as the mode of its employment by the animal
-itself consists in twisting its long, slender tail round the object of
-attack, and cutting the surface with its serrated edge.[106] The teeth
-of all animals, including those of man himself, also furnish examples
-of serrated weapons.
-
-When we find models of this class of weapon so widely distributed
-in the lower creation, it is not surprising that the first efforts
-of mankind in the construction of trenchant implements, should so
-universally consist of teeth or flint flakes, arranged along the edges
-of staves or clubs, in exact imitation of the examples which he finds
-ready to his hand, in the mouths of the animals which he captures,
-and on which he is dependent for his food. Several specimens of
-implements, edged in this manner with sharks' teeth, from the Museum
-of the Institution, are represented in Plate XI, figs. 71, 72, 73,
-74. They are found chiefly in the Marquesas, in Tahiti, Depeyster's
-Island, Byron's Isles, the Kingsmill Group, Radak Island[107], and
-the Sandwich Islands[108], also in New Zealand (Fig. 75). They are of
-various shapes, and are used for various cutting purposes, as knives,
-swords, and glaives. Two distinct methods of fastening the teeth to
-the wood prevail in the Polynesian Islands; firstly, by inserting them
-in a groove cut in the sides of the stick or weapon; and secondly, by
-arranging the teeth in a row, along the sides of the stick, between
-two small strips of wood on either side of the teeth, lashed on to the
-staff, in all cases, with small strings, composed of plant fibre. The
-points of the teeth are usually arranged in two opposite directions on
-the same staff, so that a severe cut may be given either in thrusting
-or withdrawing the weapon.[109]
-
-A similarly constructed implement, also edged with sharks' teeth,
-was found by Captain Graah on the east coast of Greenland, and is
-mentioned in Dr. King's paper on the industrial arts of the Esquimaux,
-in the _Journal of the Ethnological Society_.[110] The teeth in this
-implement were secured by small nails, or pegs of bone; it was also
-used formerly on the West Coast. A precisely similar implement (Fig.
-76), but showing an advance in art by being set with a row of chips of
-meteoric iron, was found amongst the Esquimaux of Davis Strait, and is
-now in the department of meteorolites in the British Museum. Others,
-of the same nature, from Greenland, are in the Christy collection
-(Fig. 77). The 'pacho' of the South Sea Islands appears to have been a
-sort of club, armed on the inner side with sharks' teeth, set in the
-same manner.[111] The Tapoyers, of Brazil, used a kind of club, which
-was broad at the end, and set with teeth and bones, sharpened at the
-point.[112]
-
-Hernandez gives an account of the construction of the Mexican
-'maquahuilt' or Aztec war-club, which was armed on both sides with a
-row of obsidian flakes, stuck into holes, and fastened with a kind
-of gum (Fig. 78).[113] Herrera, the Spanish historian, also mentions
-these as swords of wood, having a groove in the fore part, in which
-the flints were strongly fixed with bitumen and thread.[114] In 1530,
-according to the Spanish historians, Copan was defended by 30,000 men,
-armed with these weapons, amongst others[115]; and similar weapons
-have been represented in the sculptures of Yucatan.[116] They are
-also represented in Lord Kingsborough's important work on Mexican
-antiquities, from which the accompanying representations are taken
-(Figs. 78, 79, 80). One of these swords, having six pieces of obsidian
-on each side of the blade, is to be seen in a Museum in Mexico.
-
-In the burial mounds of Western North America, Mr. Lewis Morgan, the
-historian of the Iroquois,[117] mentions that rows of flint flakes have
-been found lying, side by side, in order, and suggesting the idea that
-they must have been fastened into sticks in the same manner as those of
-Mexico and Yucatan.
-
-Throughout the entire continent of Australia the natives arm their
-spears with small sharp pieces of obsidian, or crystal, and recently of
-glass, arranged in rows along the sides near the point, and fastened
-with a cement of their own preparation, thereby producing a weapon
-which, though thinner in the shaft, is precisely similar in character
-to those already described (Figs. 81 and 82). Turning again to the
-northern hemisphere, we find in the Museum of Professor Nilsson, at
-Lund, in Sweden, a smooth, sharp-pointed piece of bone, found in that
-country, about six inches long, grooved on each side to the depth of
-about a quarter of an inch, into each of which grooves a row of fine,
-sharp-edged, and slightly-curved flints were inserted, and fixed with
-cement. The instrument thus armed was fastened to the end of a shaft
-of wood, and might either have been thrown by the hand or projected
-from a bow (Fig. 83). Another precisely similar implement (Fig. 84) is
-represented in the illustrated Catalogue of the Museum at Copenhagen,
-showing that in both these countries this system of constructing
-trenchant implements was employed. In Ireland, although there is no
-actual evidence of flints having been set in this manner, yet from the
-numerous examples of this class of weapon that are found elsewhere, and
-the frequent occurrence of flint implements of a form that would well
-adapt them to such a purpose, the author of the Catalogue of the Royal
-Irish Academy expresses his opinion that the same arrangement may very
-possibly have existed in that country, and that the wood in which they
-were inserted may, like that which, as I have already said, is supposed
-to have held the flints found in the graves of the Iroquois, have
-perished by decay.
-
-_Poisoned Weapons._ It is unnecessary to enter here into a detailed
-account of the use of poison by man and animals. Its use by man as a
-weapon of offence is chiefly confined to those tropical regions in
-which poisonous herbs and reptiles are most abundant. It is used by the
-Negroes, Bushmen, and Hottentots of Africa; in the Indian Archipelago,
-New Hebrides, and New Caledonia. It appears formerly to have been used
-in the South Seas. It is employed in Bootan; in Assam; by the Stiens
-of Cambodia; and formerly by the Moors of Mogadore. The Parthians and
-Scythians used it in ancient times; and it appears always to have been
-regarded by ancient writers as the especial attribute of barbarism.
-The Italian bravoes of modern Europe also used it. In America it is
-employed by the Darian Indians, in Guiana, Brazil, Peru, Paraguay, and
-on the Orinoco. The composition of the poison varies in the different
-races, the Bushmen and Hottentots using the venomous secretions of
-serpents and caterpillars,[118] whilst most other nations of the world
-employ the poisonous herbs of the different countries they inhabit,
-showing that in all probability this must have been one of those arts
-which, though of very early origin, arose spontaneously and separately
-in the various quarters of the globe, after the human family had
-separated. This subject, however, is deserving of a separate treatment,
-and will be alluded to elsewhere.
-
-In drawing a parallel between the weapons of men and animals used
-in the application of poison for offensive purposes, two points of
-similitude deserve attention.
-
-Firstly, the poison gland of many serpents is situated on the upper
-jaw, behind and below the eyes. A long excretory duct extends from
-this gland to the outer surface of the upper jaw, and opens above
-and before the poison teeth, by which means the poison flows along
-the sheath into the upper opening of the tooth in such a manner as
-to secure its insertion into the wound. The hollow interior of the
-bones with which the South American and other Indians arm the poisoned
-arrows secures the same object (Fig. 85); it contains the poisonous
-liquid, and provides a channel for its insertion into the wound. In
-the bravo's dagger of Italy, a specimen of which from my collection
-is shown in Fig. 86, a similar provision for the insertion of the
-poison is effected by means of a groove on either side of the blade,
-communicating with two rows of small holes, into which the poison
-flows, and is retained in that part of the blade which enters the
-wound. Nearly similar blades, with holes, have been found in Ireland,
-of which a specimen is in the Academy's Museum, and they have been
-compared with others of the same kind from India, but I am not aware
-that there is any evidence to show that they were used for poison. Some
-of the Indian daggers, however, are constructed in close analogy with
-the poison apparatus of the serpent's tooth, having an enclosed tube
-running down the middle of the blade, communicating with a reservoir
-for poison in the handle, and having lateral openings in the blade
-for the diffusion of the poison in the wound. Similar holes, but
-without any enclosed tube, and having only a groove on the surface
-of the blade to communicate with the holes, are found in some of the
-Scotch dirks, and in several forms of _couteau de chasse_, in which
-they appear to have been used merely with a view of letting air into
-the wound, and accelerating death (Figs. 87 _a_ and _b_). The Scotch
-dirk, here represented, has a groove running from the handle along
-the back of the blade to within three and a half inches of the point.
-In the bottom of this groove ten holes are pierced, which communicate
-with other lateral holes at right angles, opening on to the sides of
-the blade. Daggers are still made at Sheffield for the South American
-market, with a small hole drilled through the blade, near the point, to
-contain the poison; and in my collection there is an iron arrow-point
-(Fig. 88), evidently formed of the point of one of these daggers,
-having the hole near the point.
-
-It often happens that forms which, in the early history of an art,
-have served some specific object, are in later times applied to other
-uses, and are ultimately retained only in the forms of ornamentation.
-This seems to have been the case with the pierced work upon the blades
-of weapons which, intended originally for poison, was afterwards used
-as air-holes, and ultimately for ornament only, as appears by a plug
-bayonet of the commencement of the eighteenth century in the Tower
-Armoury, No. 390 of the official Catalogue, for a drawing of which, as
-well as that of the Scotch dirk, I am indebted to Captain A. Tupper, a
-member of the Council of this Institution.
-
-The second point of analogy to which I would draw attention is that of
-the multi-barbed arrows of most savages to the multi-barbed stings of
-insects, especially that of the bee (Fig. 89), which is so constructed
-that it cannot usually be withdrawn, but breaks off with its poisonous
-appendage into the wound. An exact parallel to this is found in
-the poisoned arrows of savages of various races, which, as already
-mentioned, are frequently armed with the point of the sting-ray, for
-the express purpose of breaking in the wound. In the arrows of the
-Bushmen, the shaft is often partly cut through, so as to break when it
-comes in contact with a bone, and the barb is constructed to remain in
-the wound when the arrow is withdrawn (Fig. 90). The same applies to
-the barbed arrows used with the Malay blowpipe (Fig. 91), and those
-of the wild tribes of Assam (Fig. 92), which are also poisoned. The
-arrow-points of the Shoshones of North America (Fig. 93), said to
-be poisoned, are tied on, purposely, with gut in such a manner as to
-remain when the arrow is withdrawn. The arrows of the Macoushie tribe
-of Guiana (Fig. 94) are made with a small barbed and poisoned head,
-which is inserted in a socket in the shaft, in which it fits loosely,
-so as to detach in the wound. This weapon appears to form the link
-between the poisoned arrow and the fishing arrow or harpoon, which is
-widely distributed, and which I propose to describe on a subsequent
-occasion. Mr. Latham, of Wilkinson's, Pall Mall, has been kind
-enough to describe to me a Venetian dagger of glass, formerly in his
-possession; it had a tube in the centre for the poison, and the blade
-was constructed with three edges. By a sharp wrench from the assassin,
-the blade was broken off, and remained in the wound.
-
-It has also been supposed that from their peculiar construction most of
-the triangular and concave-based arrow-heads of flint that are found in
-this country, and in Ireland, were constructed for a similar purpose
-(Fig. 95).
-
-The serrated edges of weapons, like those of the bee and the sting-ray,
-when used as arrow-points, were likewise instrumental in retaining the
-poison and introducing it into the wound, and this form was copied with
-a similar object in some of the Florentine daggers above mentioned, a
-portion of the blade of one of which, taken from Meyrick's _Ancient
-Arms and Armour_, is shown in Fig. 96.[119]
-
-Although the use of poison would in these days be scouted by all
-civilized nations as an instrument of war, we find it still applied to
-useful purposes in the destruction of the larger animals. The operation
-of whaling, which is attended with so much danger and difficulty, has
-of late been greatly facilitated by the use of a mixture of strychnine
-and 'woorali', the well-known poison of the Indians of South America.
-An ounce of this mixture, attached to a small explosive shell fired
-from a carbine, has been found to destroy a whale in less than eighteen
-minutes, without risk to the whaler.[120]
-
-When we consider how impotent a creature the aboriginal and
-uninstructed man must have been, when contending with the large and
-powerful animals with which he was surrounded, we cannot too much
-admire that provision of nature which appears to have directed his
-attention, during the very earliest stages of his existence, to the
-acquirement of the subtile art of poisoning. In the forests of Guiana
-there are tribes, such as the Otomacs, apparently weaponless, but
-which, by simply poisoning the thumb-nail with 'curare' or 'woorali',
-at once become formidable antagonists.[121] Poison is available for
-hunting as well as for warlike purposes: the South American Indians
-eat the monkeys killed by this means, merely cutting out the part
-struck,[122] and the wild tribes of the Malay peninsula do not even
-trouble themselves to cut out the part before eating.[123] The Bushmen,
-and the Stiens of Cambodia, use their poisoned weapons chiefly against
-wild beasts and elephants.
-
-Thus we see that the most noxious of herbs and the most repulsive of
-reptiles have been the means ordained to instruct mankind in what,
-during the first ages of his existence, must have been the most
-useful of arts. We cannot now determine how far this agent may have
-been influential in exterminating those huge animals, the _Elephas
-primigenius_ and _Rhinoceros tichorhinus_, with the remains of which
-the earliest races of man have been so frequently associated, and
-which, in those primaeval days, before he began to turn his hand to
-the destruction of his own species, must have constituted his most
-formidable enemies.
-
-_Missiles._ Amongst the offensive weapons of animals, the use of
-missiles cannot be altogether excluded, although the examples of
-their use by the lower creation are extremely rare. Some species of
-cuttle-fish have the power of ejecting water with a good aim.[124]
-The Toxotes, or archer-fish, obtains its name from its faculty of
-projecting drops of water at insects some three or four feet from
-the surface of the water; which it seldom fails to bring down. The
-llama has a habit of ejecting its saliva, but I am not aware of the
-object of this singular practice. I only know from experience that its
-manners are offensive, and that it has the power of spitting with a
-good aim and for some distance. The porcupine has the power of throwing
-its quills, and is said to do so with effect, although it is not now
-believed to dart them with any hostile intention. The Polar bear is
-described in Captain Hall's recent publication as an animal capable of
-capturing the walrus by missile force.[125] It is said that the bear
-will take advantage of an overhanging cliff, under which its prey is
-seen asleep upon the ice, to throw down, with its paws, large stones,
-and with such good aim as to hit the walrus on the head, after which,
-running down to the place where the animal lays stunned, it will take
-the stone to beat out its brains. That animals are instinctively
-acquainted with the force of gravitation is evident by their avoiding
-precipices that would endanger them, and it certainly requires a slight
-(but at the same time most important) advance upon this knowledge,
-to avail themselves of large stones for such purposes as are here
-attributed to the bear; but as the story only rests on the authority of
-the Esquimaux, it must, I think--although they certainly are careful
-observers of the habits of animals--be rejected, until confirmed by
-the direct testimony of white men. It has even been doubted whether
-the alleged habit of monkeys, in throwing coco-nuts at their pursuers,
-has not arisen from the mistake of the hunter in supposing that fruit
-accidentally detached from their stalks by the gambols of these animals
-in the trees, may have been intended as missiles; but it appears now
-to be clearly established that monkeys have the intelligence, not only
-to throw stones, but even to use them in breaking the shells of nuts.
-Major Denham, in his account of his travels in Central Africa, near
-Lake Tshad, says: 'The monkeys, or as the Arabs say, men enchanted,
-"Beny Adam meshood," were so numerous, that I saw upwards of 150
-assembled in one place in the evening. They did not at all appear
-inclined to give up their ground, but perched on the top of a bank,
-some 20 feet high, made a terrible noise, and rather gently than
-otherwise, pelted us as we approached within a certain distance.' This,
-I think, is clear evidence of a combined pelting on the part of these
-untutored animals.
-
-The monkey thus furnishes us with the only example of the use of
-any external substance for offensive purposes, by any member of the
-animal kingdom. All others, except, perhaps, the missile fishes above
-described, use, for offence and defence, the weapons with which nature
-has furnished them, and which are integral parts of their persons. It
-is this which so essentially distinguishes man from the lower creation.
-Man is the tool-using animal. We have no knowledge of man, in any state
-of existence, who is not so; nor have we (with the exception of the
-ape, the link indirectly connecting him with the lower creation, in the
-same manner that the savage connects the civilized with the aboriginal
-man, both being branches from the same stem) any knowledge of animals
-that employ tools or weapons. Herein lies the point of separation,
-which, in so far as the material universe is concerned, marks the
-dawn of a new dispensation. Hitherto Providence operates directly
-on the work to be performed, by means of the living, animated tool.
-Henceforth, it operates indirectly on the progress and development of
-creation, first, through the agency of the instinctively tool-using
-savage, and by degrees, of the intelligent and reasoning man.
-
-
-DESCRIPTION OF PLATES VI-XI
-
-[_Revised and abridged from the 'Description' appended to the original
-text. The roman numeral refers to the Plate on which the figure is
-printed._]
-
- 1. _a._ Adze of iron, constructed by Captain Cook's armourer for
- the use of the natives of Tahiti, _b._ Adze of stone, Tahitian,
- used as model in making the above. Meyrick (Skelton), _Engraved
- Illustrations of Ancient Arms and Armour_ (1830), vol. ii. pl.
- cxlix.
-
- PLATE VI.
-
- 2. _a._ Pipe-handled Tomahawk, of European manufacture, constructed
- for the use of North American Indians. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
- Meyrick (Skelton), l. c., vol. ii. pl. cxlix. _b._ Pipe and
- Tomahawk of pipe-stone, used by the Dacotas of N. America.
- Schoolcraft, _Information concerning the History, &c., of the
- Indian Tribes of the United States_, vol. ii. pl. lxix.
-
- VI.
-
- 3. Maeotian, or Scythian Bow, from a vase-painting. Hamilton,
- _Etruscan Antiquities_, vol. iv. pl. cxvi; Meyrick, _Critical
- Enquiry into Ancient Armour_ (1824) vol. i. pl. ii. 14; Rawlinson,
- _Herodotus_ (1862), vol. iii. pp. 3, 35.
-
- VI.
-
- 4. Bow of the Tartar tribes on the borders of Persia. (Mus. R. U.
- S. Inst.) Meyrick (Skelton), l. c., vol. ii. pl. cxliv.
-
- VI.
-
- 5. Iron Sword (_minus_ the wooden handle) and War-Axe of native
- manufacture, constructed by the Fans of the Gaboon country, West
- Africa. (Author's Collection; similar spec. in Mus. R. U. S.
- Inst.) The patterns of ornamentation are taken partly from the Fan
- War-Axe, and partly from iron knives brought from Central Africa by
- Mr. Petherick. (Author's Coll.)
-
- VI.
-
- 6. Leaf-shaped Bronze Sword (_minus_ the handle), from Ireland
- (Author's Coll.); and a Bronze Celt (Mainz Mus.), Lindenschmit,
- _Die Alterthuemer unserer heidnischen Vorzeit_ (1864 ff.). The
- patterns of ornamentation are taken partly from Lindenschmit,
- l. c., pl. iii.; partly from Irish bronze-work in Sir W. Wilde,
- _Catalogue of the Museum of the Royal Irish Academy_ (1863),
- Bronze, pp. 389-90.
-
- VI.
-
- 7. 'Manilla,' or ring-money of copper and iron, used in the Eboe
- country, W. Africa. (Author's Coll.) In 1836, a ship laden with a
- quantity of these 'manillas', made in Birmingham, after the pattern
- in use in Africa (the spec. here figured forming part of the
- cargo), was wrecked on the coast of co. Cork. By this means their
- exact resemblance to the gold and bronze 'penannular rings' found
- in Ireland (Fig. 8) attracted the attention of Mr. Sainthill, of
- Cork, by whom the subject was communicated to the _Ulster Journal
- of Archaeology_, No. 19 (July, 1857).
-
- VI.
-
- 8. 'Penannular Ring,' found in Ireland. Wilde, l. c., Bronze,
- p. 570, Gold, p. 53. Similar forms are found in England and on
- the Continent. Lindenschmit, pl. iv; Keller, _Lake Dwellings of
- Switzerland_ (tr. Lee, 1866), pl. lii _a_, fig. 9.
-
- VI.
-
- 9. Kaffir Assegai-head of iron, of native manufacture, with section
- of blade. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- VI.
-
- 10. Saxon Spear-head of iron, having the same section as fig. 9;
- from a Saxon grave. Neville, _Saxon Obsequies_ (London, 1852), pl.
- xxxv; Akerman, _Saxon Pagandom_ (London, 1855), Introd., p. x.
-
- VI.
-
- 11. War-dress of a Patagonian Chief, composed of seven thicknesses
- of hide on the body part, and three on the sleeves. (Mus. R. U. S.
- Inst.)
-
- VII.
-
- 12. Section of the above, upon the breast, showing how the seven
- thicknesses are united at the top.
-
- VII.
-
- 13. Kayan Cuirass of untanned hide, with the hair outside; and
- Helmet of cane wickerwork. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; pres. by Capt. D.
- Bethune, R.N.)
-
- VII.
-
- 14. Egyptian Breast-plate, made of a crocodile's back. Meyrick
- (Skelton), l. c., vol. ii. pl. cxlviii.
-
- VII.
-
- 15. Suit of Armour, supposed to have formerly belonged to the Rajah
- of Guzerat. The four breast- and back-pieces are of rhinoceros
- hide, having an inscription upon them, beginning with an invocation
- to Ali. The remaining portions are of black velvet, ornamented with
- brass studs, and padded. Meyrick (Skelton), l. c., vol. ii. pl.
- cxli.
-
- VIII.
-
- 16. Four Plates of steel (Sikh), of similar form to those of
- rhinoceros hide in fig. 15, ornamented with patterns of inlaid
- gold. They are fastened with straps over a coat of chain-armour,
- and are called in Persian 'char aineh,' i.e. 'the four mirrors.'
- (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 17. Helmet of basket-work, from the Sandwich Islands, resembling
- the Grecian in form. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; presented by H. Shelley,
- Esq.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 18. Suit of Armour of coco-nut fibre, from Pleasant Island, in
- the Pacific. It is probable that the under tippet, which is now
- attached to the back- and breast-piece at the top, may originally
- have been intended to be worn round the loins, like a kilt. (Mus.
- R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- VII.
-
- 19. _a._ Quilted Pectoral of the Egyptians. Meyrick, l. c., vol.
- i. pl. i. _b._ shows the manner in which it was worn. Rawlinson,
- _Herodotus_ (1862), vol. iv. p. 47, No. iii. 3 (but this figure is
- Kheta, not Egyptian.--ED.).
-
- VII.
-
- 20. Quilted Head-dress of the Egyptian soldiers. Meyrick, l. c.,
- vol. i. pl. i.
-
- VIII.
-
- 21. Quilted Helmet of nearly the same form as fig. 20, from India.
- (Author's Coll.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 22. Head-dress of nearly the same form as figs. 20, 21, from the
- Nouaer tribe of Negroes, inhabiting both banks of the Nile from
- 8 deg. to 10 deg. N. latitude; brought to England by Mr. Petherick. It
- resembles the Egyptian very closely, and is composed of cylindrical
- white beads of European manufacture, fastened together with a kind
- of string. (Author's Coll.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 23. Helmet of the same form as fig. 21, composed of united mail
- and plate, formerly belonging to the Body-guard of the Moguls.
- (Author's Coll.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 24. Suit of Quilted Armour, taken in action from Koer Singh, the
- famous Rajpoot Chief, of Jugdespore in Behar, on August 12, 1857,
- by Major Vincent Eyre, commanding the field force that relieved
- Arrah. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; presented by the captor.)
-
- VII.
-
- 25. _a._ Suit of Quilted Armour, found upon the body of Tippoo
- Sahib at his death, in the breach of Seringapatam. (Mus. R. U. S.
- Inst.)
-
- IX.
-
- _b._ Portion of one of the nine thicknesses of quilting, of the
- above, showing construction (see p. 62): reduced to 1/6.
-
- IX.
-
- _c._ Helmet of the above suit. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- IX.
-
- 26. Quilted Armour of the Bornouese Cavalry. Denham and Clapperton,
- _Travels in Northern and Central Africa_ (1826), p. 328 (Denham).
-
- VIII.
-
- 27. Suit of Armour from the Navigator Islands, composed of coco-nut
- fibre, coarsely netted. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; presented by Sir W.
- Burnett, M.D.) Similar armour is used in the Kingsmill Group.
-
- VII.
-
- 28. Part of a Chinese 'Brigandine Jacket' of cotton, quilted, with
- enclosed plates of metal. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- VII.
-
- 29. Head-dress of Hercules wearing the Lion's Skin, from a Bronze
- in the Blacas Collection. (British Museum.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 30. Head-dress of a North American Chief. Schoolcraft, l. c., vol.
- iii. p. 68. pl. x. 2.
-
- VIII.
-
- 31. Thracian Helmet of brass [?], with horns of the same. Meyrick,
- l. c., vol. i. pl. iii.
-
- VIII.
-
- 32. Ancient British Helmet of bronze, with straight horns of the
- same, found in the Thames. (British Museum.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 33. Greek Helmet, having horns of brass [?]. Meyrick, l. c., vol.
- i. pl. iv.
-
- VIII.
-
- 34. Back-plate and Breast-plate of the Bugo Dyaks, armed with the
- scales of the Pangolin. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- IX.
-
- 35. Piece of Bark from Tahiti, studded with pieces of coco-nut
- shell. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 36. Fragment of Scale-Armour of horn found at Pompeii. [_Pictorial
- Gallery of Arts_, vol. i. figs. 10, 61.]
-
- VIII.
-
- 37. Piece of Scale-Armour, made of the hoofs of some animal, from
- some part of Asia; said to be from Japan. Meyrick, l. c., vol. i.
- pl. iii.
-
- VIII.
-
- 38. An ancient Stone Figure in Scale Armour. Cuming, _Journ.
- Archaeol. Assoc._, vol. iii. p. 31.
-
- IX.
-
- 39. Back-piece and Breast-piece of Armour from the Sandwich
- Islands, composed of seals' teeth. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; pres. by
- H. Shelley, Esq.)
-
- VIII.
-
- 40. Egyptian Suit of Scale-Armour. Rawlinson, _Herodotus_ (1862),
- vol. ii. p. 65, fig. iii; Wilkinson (Birch), _Manners and Customs
- of the Ancient Egyptians_ (1878), fig. 53 _a_.
-
- IX.
-
- 41. Two Scales of Egyptian Armour, enlarged. Rawlinson, l. c., fig.
- iv.
-
- IX.
-
- 42. Japanese Armour, composed of chain, plate, and enclosed quilted
- plates. (_a_) Left arm; (_b_) Greaves. (Author's Coll.)
-
- IX.
-
- 43. _a._ Chinese Suit of Armour, of cotton, having iron scales
- attached to the inside, _b._ Iron Helmet of the same suit (Mus. R.
- U. S. Inst.; presented by Capt. Sir E. Belcher. R.N.)
-
- IX.
-
- 44. A portion of the iron scales attached to the inner side of the
- above suit.
-
- IX.
-
- 45. Breast-piece of 'Jazerine' Armour of iron scales, xv-xvi cent.;
- inner side. (Author's Coll.) Cf. Grose, _Treatise on Ancient
- Armour_ (London, 1786), p. 15, 'Jazerant': cf. pl. xxxiii. 3;
- Meyrick. vol. ii. pl. lvi.
-
- IX.
-
- 46. 'Brigandine' composed of large iron scales on the outside,
- probably of the same date as the above; left by the Venetians in
- the armoury of Candia on the surrender of the island to the Turks
- in 1715. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; presented by Lt.-Col. Patrick
- Campbell, R.A.)
-
- IX.
-
- 47. Horn of the Rhinoceros. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 48. Skull and Tusks of the Walrus. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 49. Weapon of the Sword-Fish; scale 1/2 inch to a foot. (Author's
- Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 50. Spear of the Narwhal; scale 1/2 inch to a foot. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 51. Section, showing part of the timber of the ship _Fame_, where
- it was pierced by the narwhal in the South Seas, through 2-1/2-inch
- oak. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; presented by Lt. A. T. Tulloch, R.A.)
-
- X.
-
- 52. Esquimaux Spear, from Greenland, armed with the spear of the
- narwhal. 1/50. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- X.
-
- 53. Esquimaux Spear in the form of a fish, having fore-shaft
- composed of a narwhal-tusk, inserted so as to represent the tusk of
- the animal; scale 1/2 inch to a foot. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 54. Esquimaux Lance, pointed with a walrus-tooth. 1/20. (Mus. R. U.
- S. Inst.)
-
- X.
-
- 55. Esquimaux Tomahawk or Pickaxe, headed with a walrus-tooth.
- 1/20. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- X.
-
- 56. Arrow-head, probably from South America, headed with the point
- of a deer's horn. (British Museum, Christy Collection.)
-
- X.
-
- 57. War-club of the Iroquois, called _Ga-ne-u-ga-o-dus-ha_ or
- 'Deer-horn War-Club.' Lewis Morgan, _League of the Iroquois_
- (Rochester, N.Y., 1851), p. 363.
-
- X.
-
- 58. Club of the North American Indians, with a point of iron. 1/20.
- (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; presented by T. Hoblyn, Esq.)
-
- X.
-
- 59. Arrow, from S. America, armed with the weapon of the ray,
- probably _Trygon hystrix_. 1/2. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- X.
-
- 60. _a._ Spine of _Balistes capriscus, Cuv._, erect. Yarrell,
- _British Fishes_ (2nd ed., London, 1841), vol. ii, p. 472. _b._
- Horn of _Cottus diceraus, Pall_. Cuvier, _Animal Kingdom_ (1827),
- s. v. _c._ Horn of _Naseus fronticornis, Lac._ Cuvier, l. c.
-
- X.
-
- 61. Spear of the _Limulus_ or 'King Crab.'
-
- X.
-
- 62. Arrow, armed with the spine of the _Diodon_. 1/4. (Author's
- Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 63. 'Khandjar' or Indian Dagger, composed of the horn of the
- buffalo, having the natural form and point. 1/10. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 64. 'Khandjar' of the same form, with metal blade and ivory handle.
- 1/10. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 65. 'Khandjar' of the same form, having both blade and handle of
- iron. The handle is ornamented with the figures of a bird and some
- small quadruped. 1/10. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 66. Dagger formed of the horn of the 'sasin,' or common antelope.
- 1/10. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 67. Dagger like fig. 66, but with the points armed with metal. 1/10
- (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- X.
-
- 68. Dagger like figs. 66, 67, but composed entirely of metal, with
- a shield for the hand. Similar shields are sometimes attached to
- daggers like those in figs. 66, 67. 1/12. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- X.
-
- 69. Weapon composed of the horn of the antelope; steel-pointed;
- supposed to be that used by the Fakirs in India. (Author's Coll.)
-
- X.
-
- 70. Sword formed of the serrated blade of the saw-fish from New
- Guinea. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- XI.
-
- 71-74. Weapons from the Pacific, edged with sharks' teeth. The
- teeth near the point are placed points forward; the remainder with
- the points towards the handle. Two methods of fastening the teeth
- are shown: _a._ in grooves; _b._ lashed between two strips of wood.
- (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- XI.
-
- 75. Implement from New Zealand, armed with sharks' teeth. (British
- Museum.)
-
- XI.
-
- 76. Esquimaux Knife, from Davis Strait, armed with pieces of
- meteoric iron, (British Museum.)
-
- XI.
-
- 77. Knife, from Greenland, armed with pieces of iron along the
- edge. (British Museum, Christy Collection.)
-
- XI.
-
- 78-80. Mexican 'Maquahuitl.' Lord Kingsborough, _Antiquities of
- Mexico_ (1830-48), vol. i (numerous examples on pl. x-xv: fig. 79 =
- No. 1478).
-
- XI.
-
- 81-82. Spear and Knife, from Australia, armed with pieces of
- obsidian, or rock-crystal. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.)
-
- XI.
-
- 83. Arrow-point of bone, armed with a row of sharp flint flakes on
- each side. (Museum of Prof. Nilsson, at Lund, in Sweden.) Reduced
- to 1/2 from the figure in Wilde, l. c., 'Animal Materials,' p. 254.
-
- XI.
-
- 84. Arrow-point like fig. 83. (Copenhagen Museum.) _Illustr. Cat.
- of the Copenhagen Museum._
-
- XI.
-
- 85. Arrow-point of hollow bone, from S. America, the hollow of the
- bone being filled with poison. (Mus. R. U. S. Inst.; Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 86. Dagger of an Italian Bravo, with grooves and holes to contain
- poison; the handle represents a monk in the act of supplication.
- (Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 87 _a._ Scottish Dirk, pierced with holes along the back and sides.
- Along the back of the blade runs a groove eight inches long, in
- which holes are pierced that communicate with lateral holes on the
- side of the blade. (Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 87 _b._ 'Couteau-de-Chasse,' with two grooves on each side near the
- back of the blade, which is pierced through with holes. (Author's
- Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 88. Arrow-head, of iron, with a hole near the point for poison;
- from S. America. (Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 89. Sting of the Bee, serrated or multi-barbed: after F. Huber in
- _Jardine's Naturalist's Library_, Entomology vi. _Bees_ (Edinb.,
- 1840), p. 40.
-
- XI.
-
- 90. Point of Bushman's Arrow, barbed with an iron head, which is
- constructed to come off in the wound. (Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 91. Malay Blowpipe-arrow, iron-headed; similarly constructed. 1/4.
- (Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 92. Arrow of the wild tribes of Assam, copper-headed, and similarly
- constructed. 1/4. (Author's Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 93. Arrow-head of the Shoshones of North America, of flint;
- constructed to come off in the wound. Schoolcraft, l. c., vol. i.
- pp. 212-3, pl. lxxvi. 5.
-
- XI.
-
- 94. Arrow-point of the Macoushie Indians of S. America; similarly
- constructed. 1/4. (Author's Coll.; pres. by Rev. J. G. Wood.)
-
- XI.
-
- 95. Arrow-heads of flint, from the north of Ireland. 1/4. (Author's
- Coll.)
-
- XI.
-
- 96. Part of the Blade of an Italian Dagger, serrated and pierced.
- Full size. Meyrick (Skelton), l. c., vol. ii. pl. cxiii. 14.
-
- XI.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[13] A Lecture delivered at the Royal United Service Institution,
-Friday, June 28, 1867; illustrated by specimens from the Museum of the
-Institution: and published in the _Journal of the R. U. S. Inst._ xi
-(1867).
-
-[14] Beechey, _Voyage to the Pacific_ (London, 1831), vol. i. p. 298;
-Oldfield, 'Aborigines of Australia,' _Trans. Ethno. Soc._, N. S.
-(London, 1865), vol. iii. p. 227.
-
-[15] Oldfield, 'On the Aborigines of Australia,' _Trans. Ethno. Soc._,
-N.S., vol. iii. pp. 261-7.
-
-[16] Meyrick (Skelton), _Engraved Illustrations of Ancient Arms_, &c.
-(1830), vol. ii. pl. cxlix. 11.
-
-[17] Klemm, _Werkzeuge und Waffen_ (Sondershausen, 1858), p. 159.
-
-[18] Turner, _Nineteen Years in Polynesia_ (London, 1861), p. 262.
-
-[19] Williams, _Fiji and the Fijians_ (London, 1858), vol. i. pp. 78-9.
-
-[20] Crawfurd, _History_ (Edinburgh, 1820), vol. i. p. 224.
-
-[21] Tylor, _Anahuac_ (London, 1861), p. 70.
-
-[22] Hdt. vii. 69: Rawlinson, _Herodotus_, vol. iv (2nd ed., 1862, p.
-55).
-
-[23] Petherick, _Egypt, the Soudan, and Central Africa_ (Edinb. and
-London, 1861), p. 360.
-
-[24] Le Sieur de Folard, _Nouvelles Decouvertes sur la Guerre_ (Paris,
-1724), p. 48.
-
-[25] In adopting the nomenclature of phrenology, I am not to be
-understood as advocating strictly the localization of the faculties
-which phrenology prescribes. The mind doubtless consists of a congeries
-of faculties, and phrenology affords the best classification of them
-that has yet been devised.
-
-[26] Pope, _Essay on Man_, Epistle iii. 172-80.
-
-[27] Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_ (London, 1829), vol. i. pp. 302-3.
-
-[28] Crawfurd, _History of the Indian Archipelago_ (1820), vol. i. pp.
-113-4.
-
-[29] Beckman, _History of Inventions_ (London, 1814), pp.
-503-4.--Cock-fighting.
-
-[30] Stanley, _History of Birds_ (London, 1848), p. 389.
-
-[31] Darwin, _Origin of Species_ (London, 1859), p. 88.
-
-[32] Williamson, _Oriental Field Sports_ (London, 1807), p. 94.
-
-[33] Swainson, _Habits and Instincts of Animals_ (London, 1840), p. 142.
-
-[34] Thuc. i. 5 (but what Thucydides says is, that they were the last
-to discard it.--ED.).
-
-[35] Beechey, _Voyage to the Pacific_ (London, 1831), vol. i. p. 248.
-
-[36] Dobrizhoffer, _An Account of the Abipones_ (from the Latin;
-London, 1822), vol. i. p. 262; ii. 361.
-
-[37] Barth, _Travels and Discoveries in North and Central Africa_
-(London, 1857), vol. iii. p. 198.
-
-[38] Low, _Sarawak_ (London, 1848), p. 328.
-
-[39] Pigafetta's _Voyage Round the World_, Pinkerton, vol. ix. p. 349.
-
-[40] William de Rubruquis, _Travels into Tartary and China in 1253_;
-Pinkerton (London, 1811), vol. viii. p. 89.
-
-[41] _An Historical Relation of the Kingdom of Chile_, by Alonso de
-Ovalle, of the Company of Jesus, 1649 (London, 1752), p. 71.
-
-[42] Herodotus, vii. 70; Meyrick's _Ancient Armour_, vol. i. Introd. p.
-iv.
-
-[43] Herodotus, iv. 189; Meyrick's _Ancient Armour_, vol. i. Introd. p.
-iii.
-
-[44] Herodotus, vii. 65 ~heimata ... apo xylon pepoiemena~.
-
-[45] Duarte Barbosa, _The Coasts of East Africa and Malabar_,
-translated from the Spanish, by the Hon. H. E. Stanley (Hakluyt
-Society, 1866), p. 55. Since publication, the translator has
-ascertained that the authorship of this work should be ascribed to
-Magellan.
-
-[46] The _Saturnia mylitta_ is the caterpillar from which the
-Tusseh-silk is obtained; the cocoon is of an oval shape when suspended
-upon the tree, and of exceedingly firm texture; it is figured in Sir
-Wm. Jardine's _Naturalist's Library_ (Edinb. 1841), _Entomology_, vol.
-vii. pl. xiv. 2, pp. 146-53. The _Eriodendron anfractuosum, D.C._,
-is an Indian Bombax. The woolly cotton which envelops the seed is
-remarkable for its softness, and is much and deservedly esteemed for
-making cushions and bedding, owing to its freedom from any tendency to
-become lumpy and uneven by getting impacted into hard knots. Various
-attempts have been made to fabricate it into cloth, but hitherto
-without success, except as a very loose material, fit only for quilting
-muffs, for which it is superior to cotton or woollen stuffs, the
-looseness of its texture rendering it an excellent non-conductor,
-whilst at the same time it is extremely light.--Wight, _Illustrations
-of Indian Botany_ (Madras, 1840), vol. i. p. 68; Roxburgh, _Flora
-Indica_ (Serampore, 1832), vol. iii. p. 165 (= _Bombax pentandrum_).
-Both the caterpillar and the plant are found in the jungle in the
-neighbourhood of Seringapatam. For the identification of the vegetable
-substance, I am indebted to W. Carruthers, Esq., F.L.S., British Museum.
-
-[47] Schoolcraft, _Information concerning the History, &c., of the
-Indian Tribes of the U. S. A._ (Philadelphia, 1851-9), part iii. p. 69.
-
-[48] Meyrick, l. c., vol. i. Introduction.
-
-[49] Denham and Clapperton, _Travels in Northern and Central Africa_
-(London, 1826), p. 328 (Denham).
-
-[50] See _Critical Enquiry into Ancient Armour_, by Sir Samuel R.
-Meyrick, vol. iii. p. 21, and pl. lxviii.
-
-[51] Bollaert, 'Observations on the Indian Tribes of Texas,' _Journ.
-Ethno. Soc._, vol. ii. pp. 262-83.
-
-[52] Du Chaillu, _Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial Africa_
-(London, 1861), p. 80.
-
-[53] Homer, _Iliad_, vii. 244-8.
-
-[54] Casalis, _The Basutos_ (London, 1861), pp. 135-6.
-
-[55] Barth, l. c., vol. i. p. 355.
-
-[56] Meyrick (Skelton), l. c, pl. cxli (text).
-
-[57] Bosman, _Guinea_, Pinkerton (1811), vol. xvi. p. 414.
-
-[58] Barth, l. c., vol. ii. pp. 410, 526; ii. 116 (plate); Denham and
-Clapperton, l. c., p. 166 (Denham).
-
-[59] Meyrick, l. c., vol. i. Introd. pp. i-ii.
-
-[60] Meyrick, l. c., vol. i. Introd. p. xxiv.
-
-[61] At Fernando Po.--Cuming, 'Weapons and Armour of Horn,' _Journal of
-Archaeological Association_ (London, 1848), vol. iii. p. 30.
-
-[62] Fig. 32 is from a rough sketch taken about two years ago, and has
-no pretension to accuracy of detail.
-
-[63] Meyrick, l. c, vol. i. pl. iv. 10.
-
-[64] Schoolcraft, _Information concerning the History, &c., of the
-Indian Tribes of the U. S. A._ (Philadelphia, 1851-9), vol. iii. p. 67.
-
-[65] Grant, _Walk across Africa_ (London, 1864), p. 47.
-
-[66] Smith, _Dict. of Gr. and Rom. Antiq._, s. v.; Meyrick, l. c., vol.
-i. Introd. p. xiv; Amm. Marc. xvii. 12. 2; Pausanias, i. 21. 6; Tac.
-_Hist._ i. 79 (_praeduro corio_).
-
-[67] Kitto, _Pictorial Bible_ (London, 1838-9), note to 1 Sam. xvii.
-
-[68] Cuming, _Journal of the Archaeological Association_, vol. iii. p.
-31.
-
-[69] Kitto, _Pictorial Bible_, note to 1 Sam. xvii.
-
-[70] Skene, 'On the Albanians,' _Journ. Ethno. Soc._, vol. ii. pp.
-159-81.
-
-[71] Casalis, _The Basutos_ (London, 1861), p. 172.
-
-[72] Maunder, _Treasury of Natural History_ (London, 1862), p. 573.
-
-[73] Williamson, _Oriental Field Sports_ (London, 1807), p. 46.
-
-[74] Atkinson, _Oriental and Western Siberia_ (London, 1858), p. 495.
-
-[75] Williamson, _Oriental Field Sports_ (London, 1807), p. 94.
-
-[76] Thompson, _Passions of Animals_ (1851), p. 225. The American
-hunter avails himself of this peculiarity to entrap the crane by
-presenting the barrel of his firelock to the animal; supposing it to be
-an eye, the crane immediately strikes at the hole, and fixes its beak
-firmly in the muzzle.
-
-[77] Beechey, _Voyage to the North Pole_ (London, 1843), pp. 93-4.
-
-[78] Bates, _Naturalist on the Amazons_ (3rd ed. London, 1873), p. 230.
-
-[79] _Travels in the Central Parts of Indo-China, Siam, Cambodia, and
-Laos in 1858-9_, by the late M. Henri Mouhot (London, 1864), vol. ii.
-p. 147.
-
-[80] It is to be observed that this is not the rhinoceros's usual mode
-of attack.
-
-[81] Cranz, _Historie von Groenland_ (2nd ed. Barby and Leipzig, 1770),
-p. 196, pl. v. 8.
-
-[82] Beechey, _Voyage to the North Pole_ (London, 1843), p. 252.
-
-[83] Cuming, _Journal of the Archaeological Association_, vol. iii. p.
-25.
-
-[84] Ibid., p. 26.
-
-[85] Swainson, _Habits and Instincts of Animals_ (London, 1840), p. 141.
-
-[86] Gregory, 'Expedition to the North-west Coast of Australia,' _Royal
-Geographical Society's Journal_, vol. xxxii (1862), p. 417.
-
-[87] Denham and Clapperton, _Travels_ (1826), p. 20 (Denham).
-
-[88] Hind, _Narrative of the Canadian Exploring Expedition_ (London,
-1860), vol. i. p. 316.
-
-[89] Captain John Smith, _Sixth Voyage to Virginia_ (1606); Pinkerton
-(1811), vol. xii. p. 35.
-
-[90] Cuming, _Journal of the Archaeological Association_, vol. iii. p.
-27.
-
-[91] Turner, _Nineteen Years in Polynesia_ (London, 1861), p. 276.
-
-[92] Beechey, _Voyage to the Pacific_ (London, 1831), vol. i. p. 143.
-
-[93] Williams, _Fiji and the Fijians_ (London, 1858), vol. i. p. 57.
-
-[94] Wilson, _Pellew Islands_ (ed. Keate, London, 1788), pl. v, fig. 1,
-p. 310.
-
-[95] Klemm, _Werkzeuge und Waffen_ (1858), p. 50.
-
-[96] Owen, _Comp. Anatomy and Physiology of Vertebrates_ (1846), vol.
-ii. 1. p.
-
-[97] Klemm, l. c., p. 31 ('die Schwanzstachel eines Roches,' i.e. 'the
-caudal spine of a ray.'--ED.).
-
-[98] Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. p. 146.
-
-[99] Cuming, _Journal of the Archaeological Association_, vol. iii. p.
-26.
-
-[100] The probability of the aboriginal man having derived his first
-lessons from this source may be judged of by the accounts given by
-travellers of the effects produced by the large thorns of trees in
-South Africa, of which there is a good account in Routledge's _Natural
-History of Man_, by Rev. J. G. Wood (1868-70), vol. i. p. 235. Large
-animals are said to be frequently destroyed, and even to have impaled
-themselves, upon the large, strong spines of the thorny Acacia.
-Throughout Central Africa a pair of tweezers for extracting thorns is
-an indispensable requisite in the equipment of every native.
-
-[101] Beechey, _Voyage to the Pacific_ (London, 1831), vol. i. pp. 47-8.
-
-[102] Strabo, p. 155.
-
-[103] Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_ (London, 1829), vol. i. chap. viii.
-
-[104] Clapperton, _Travels_, p. 58.
-
-[105] I exclude from this category all nippers, cross-bills, and
-prehensile implements.
-
-[106] Jardine's _Naturalist's Library_ (Edinb. 1843): _Ichthyology_
-(Hamilton), vol. vi, part 2, p. 335.
-
-[107] Choris, _Voyage Pictoresque autour du Monde_ (Paris, 1822),
-'Isles Radak,' pl. ii. 1 and 4.
-
-[108] Cook, _Third Voyage_ (London, 1842), vol. ii. p. 251.
-
-[109] Klemm, l. c., pp. 63-4; Wilkes, _United States Exploring
-Expedition_ (Philadelphia, 1845), vol. v. ch. ii. pp. 49, 79.
-
-[110] King, 'The Industrial Arts of the Esquimaux,' _Journ. Ethno.
-Soc._ (1848), vol. i. p. 290.
-
-[111] Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, vol. ii. p. 497.
-
-[112] Nieuhoff, 'Travels in Brazil'; Pinkerton (1813), vol. xiv. p. 874.
-
-[113] Tylor, _Anahuac_, p. 332, Appendix.
-
-[114] Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (1862), vol. i. pp. 226, 227.
-
-[115] Lloyd Stephens, _Incidents of Travel in Central America_, p. 59.
-
-[116] Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (1862), vol. i. pp. 226, 227.
-
-[117] Lewis Morgan, _The League of the Ho-De-No-Sou-Nee or Iroquois_
-(Rochester, N.Y., 1851), p. 359.
-
-[118] Thunberg, _Travels in Europe, Africa, and Asia_, 1770-9 (3rd ed.,
-London, 1795), vol. i. p. 156; ii. p. 162; Livingstone, _Missionary
-Travels and Researches in South Africa_ (London, 1857), p. 171.
-
-[119] Meyrick (Skelton), _Ancient Arms and Armour_, vol. ii. pl. cxiii,
-fig. 14, cf. fig. 13.
-
-[120] _Times_ newspaper, Dec. 24, 1866.
-
-[121] Humboldt, _Aspects of Nature_ (London, 1849), vol. i. pp. 25,
-203-4.
-
-[122] Klemm, l. c., p. 53.
-
-[123] 'On the Wild Tribes in the Interior of the Malay Peninsula,' by
-Pere Bourien. _Trans. Ethno. Soc._, N.S., vol. iii (1865), p. 78.
-
-[124] Darwin, _Journal of Researches into Nat. Hist. and Geology_
-(London, 1845), p. 8.
-
-[125] Hall, C. F., _Life with the Esquimaux_ (London, 1864), vol. ii.
-pp. 329-30.
-
-
-
-
-PRIMITIVE WARFARE
-
-II
-
-ON THE RESEMBLANCE OF THE WEAPONS OF EARLY MAN, THEIR VARIATION,
-CONTINUITY, AND DEVELOPMENT OF FORM.[126]
-
-
-_General Remarks._
-
-In June, 1867, I had the honour of reading a paper at this Institution,
-which has since been published in the _Journal_, the object of which
-was to point out the resemblance which exists between the weapons of
-savages and early races and the weapons with which nature has furnished
-animals for their defence.
-
-In continuation of the same subject, my present communication will
-relate to the resemblance to each other of the weapons of races
-sometimes widely separated, and of which the connexion, if it ever
-existed, has long since been consigned to obscurity. I shall endeavour
-to show, how in these several localities, which are so remote from
-one another, the progress of form has been developed upon a similar
-plan, and, though to all appearance independently, yet that under like
-conditions like results have been produced; and that the weapons and
-implements of these races will sometimes be found to bear so close a
-resemblance to each other, as often to suggest a community of origin,
-where no such common origin can have existed, unless at the very
-remotest period.
-
-We shall thus be brought to the consideration of the great problem of
-our day, viz. the origin of mankind, or rather the origin of the human
-arts; for the question of man's origin, whether he was himself created
-or developed from some prior form, whether since the period of his
-first appearance he has by variation separated into distinct races,
-or whether the several races of mankind were separately created, are
-questions which, however closely allied, do not of necessity form part
-of our present subject. It has to deal solely with the origin of the
-arts, and more particularly with the art of war, which in the infancy
-of society belonged to a condition of life so constant and universal
-as to embrace within its sphere all other arts, or at least to be so
-intimately connected with them as to require the same treatment; the
-tool and the weapon being, as I shall presently show, often identical
-in the hands of the primaeval savage.
-
-These prefatory remarks are necessary because it will be seen that the
-general observations I am about to offer on the subject are fully as
-applicable to the whole range of the industrial arts of mankind as to
-the art of war. My illustrations, however, will be taken exclusively
-from weapons of war.
-
-Is not the world at the present time, and has it not always been, the
-scene of a continuous progress? Have not the arts grown up from an
-obscure origin, and is not this growth continuing to the present day?
-
-This is the question which lies at the very threshold of our subject,
-and we must endeavour to treat it by the light of evidence alone, apart
-from all considerations of a traditional or poetic character.
-
-I do not propose here to enter into a disquisition upon the functions
-of the human mind. But it must I think be admitted, that if man
-possessed from the first the same nature that belongs to him at the
-present time, he must at the commencement of his career in this world
-have been destitute of all creative power. The mind has never been
-endowed with any creative faculty. The only powers we possess are those
-of digesting, adapting, and applying, by the intellectual faculties,
-the experience acquired through the medium of the senses. We come into
-the world helpless and speechless, possessing only in common with the
-brutes such instincts as are necessary for the bare sustenance of
-life under the most facile conditions; all that follows afterwards is
-dependent purely on experience.
-
-Whether we afterwards become barbarous or civilized, whether we follow
-a hunting, nomadic, or agricultural life, whether we embrace this
-religion or that, or attain proficiency in any of the arts, all this
-is dependent purely on the accident of our birth, which places us in a
-position to build upon the experience of our ancestors, adding to it
-the experience acquired by ourselves. For although it is doubtless true
-that the breeds of mankind, like the breeds of our domestic animals,
-by continual cultivation during many generations, have improved, and
-that by this means races have been produced capable of being educated
-to a higher degree than those which have remained uncivilized, this
-does not alter the fact that it is by experience alone, conscious or
-unconscious, self-imposed or compulsory, and by a process of slow and
-laborious induction, that we arrive at the degree of perfection to
-which, according to our opportunities and our relative endowments, we
-ultimately attain.
-
-The amount, therefore, which any one individual or any one generation
-is capable of adding to the civilization of their age must be
-immeasurably small, in comparison with what they derive from it.
-
-I could not perhaps appeal to an audience more capable of appreciating
-the truth of these remarks than to the members of an Institution, the
-object of which is to examine into the improvements and so-called
-inventions which are from time to time effected in the machinery and
-implements of war.
-
-How often does any proposal or improvement come before this Institution
-which after investigating its antecedents is found to possess
-originality of design? Is it not a fact that even the most ingenious
-and successful inventions turn out on inquiry to be mere adaptations of
-contrivances already existing, or that they are produced by applying
-to one branch of industry the principles or the contrivances which
-have been evolved in another. I think that no one can have constantly
-attended the lectures of this or any similar Institution, without
-becoming impressed, above all things, with the want of originality
-observable amongst men, and with the great calls which, even in this
-age of cultivated intellects and abundant materials to work upon, all
-inventors are obliged to make upon those who have preceded them.
-
-Since, then, we ourselves are so entirely creatures of education, and
-derive so little from our own unaided resources, it follows that the
-first created man, if similarly constituted, having no antecedents from
-which to derive instruction, could not, without external aid, have made
-any material or rapid advance towards the initiation of the arts.
-
-So fully has the truth of this been recognized by those who are not
-themselves advocates for the theory of development, that in order to
-account for the very first stages of human progress they have found
-it necessary to assume the hypothesis of supernatural agency: such
-we know was the belief of the classical pagan nations, who attributed
-the origin of many of the arts to their gods; such we know to be the
-tradition of many savage and semi-civilized nations of modern times
-that have attained to the first stages of culture. But we have already
-disposed of this hypothesis at the commencement of these remarks, by
-deciding that our arguments should be based solely upon evidence. We
-are, therefore, under the necessity of assuming, in the absence of any
-evidence to the contrary, that none but the agencies which help us
-now were at the disposal of our first ancestors, and the alternative
-to which we must have recourse is that of supposing that the progress
-of those days was immeasurably slower than it is at present, and that
-vast ages must have elapsed after the first appearance of man before he
-began to show even the first indications of a settled advance.
-
-Yet the complex civilization of our own time has been built on the
-foundations that were laid by these aborigines of our species, while
-the brute creation may be said to have produced little more than was
-necessary to their own wants or those of their immediate offspring.
-Man has been the agent employed in a work of continuous progression.
-Generation has succeeded generation, and race has succeeded race, each
-contributing its quota to the fabrication of the edifice, and then
-giving place to other workmen. But the progress of the edifice itself
-has never ceased; it has gone on, I maintain (contrary to the opinion
-of some writers of our day), always in fulfilment of one vast design.
-It is a work of all time.
-
-To study it comprehensively, we must devote ourselves to the
-contemplation of the edifice itself, and set aside the study of mankind
-for separate treatment, for it is evident that man has been fashioned,
-not as the designer, but simply as the unconscious instrument of its
-erection. Each individual has been impelled by what--viewed in this
-light--may be regarded as instincts sufficient to stimulate him to
-labour, but falling immeasurably short of a comprehensive knowledge of
-the great scheme, towards which he is an unconscious contributor. Of
-this he knows no more than the earthworm knows it to be its function
-to cover the crust of the earth with mould, or the small coral polypus
-knows that it is engaged in the erection of a barrier reef. No
-comprehensive scheme of progress need be searched for in the pigmy
-intellect of man, and if we are ever destined to acquire any knowledge
-of the laws which influence the growth of civilization, we must look
-for them in an investigation of the phenomenon itself, by studying its
-phases and the sequence of its mutations. In short we must apply to the
-whole range of human culture, to the arts, whether of peace or war, the
-same method which has already been applied with some success to the
-history of language.
-
-It has been shown that the speech of our own day has been the work
-of many generations and of innumerable distinct races; its roots are
-traceable in the utterances of the untutored savage. No nation ever
-consciously invented a grammar, and yet language has been shown to be
-capable of being treated as a science of natural growth, having its
-laws of mutation and development, never dreamt of by any of the many
-myriads of individuals that have unconsciously contributed to the
-formation of it. May not all the products of human intellects in the
-aggregate be made amenable to the same treatment, and, like language,
-be found to be influenced by laws of evolution and progress?
-
-That these remarks are not merely speculative, that the progress of
-civilization has been continuous and connected, while the races which
-have been engaged in the formation of it, like individuals, have had
-their periods of birth, maturity, and decay, is sufficiently proved by
-history.
-
-In Egypt and in Assyria, we see the remains of ancient and formerly
-populous cities, where now the nomadic Arab pitches his tent or wanders
-with his flocks, thus showing that relapses of civilization must have
-occurred in those particular localities where such phenomena are
-observed. But we know also from history that the civilization which
-once flourished in those countries did not expire there, but was
-transferred thence to other places; that the culture of Assyria and
-of Egypt passed into Greece and developed there; that from Greece it
-extended to Rome, and in the hands of a new people passed through fresh
-phases; that after the destruction of the Roman Empire it lay dormant
-for many ages, only to rise again on its original basis, extended
-and fertilized by the introduction of fresh blood; that we ourselves
-are the inheritors of the same arts, customs, and institutions,
-modified and improved; and finally, that civilization, expanding in
-all directions, as it continues to move westward, is now in process of
-being received back by those ancient countries in which it originated,
-in a condition far more varied and diversified than it could ever have
-become, had it been confined to a single people or country.
-
-Passing now from the known to the unknown, we come to the study of
-prehistoric times, prepared to find that every fresh discovery helps us
-to trace backwards the arts of mankind in unbroken continuity towards
-their source.
-
-Commencing with the Saxon and the Celt, and passing from these to
-the lake dwellers, and on to the inhabitants of caves, races whose
-successive periods of existence are determined chiefly by the animals
-with which their remains are associated, we find that, according
-to their antiquity, they appear to have lived in a lower and lower
-condition of culture, until in the drift period, coeval with the
-extinct mammoth and the woolly haired rhinoceros, we find the earliest
-traces of man, scanty and unsatisfactory though they be, yet sufficient
-to show that he must have existed in a state so rude, as to have
-devised no better implements than flints pointed at one end, and held
-in the hand.
-
-These successive prehistoric stages of civilization have been divided
-into the stone, the bronze, and the iron ages of mankind. The evidence
-upon which this classification is based, has been so ably set forth
-in the works of Sir John Lubbock and others, that I need not refer
-to it further than to state that, in my treatment of the origin and
-development of the weapons of war, I shall in a great measure follow
-the same arrangement. But I shall endeavour to trace the development of
-_form_ rather than the _material_ of weapons, and to show by examples
-taken from various distinct periods, and especially by illustrations
-taken from existing savages, the various agencies which appear to have
-operated in causing progression during the earliest ages of mankind.
-
-Of these, the first to be considered is undoubtedly the utilization and
-imitation of natural forms. Nature was the only instructor of primaeval
-man.
-
-In my previous paper, I discussed this subject at some length, giving
-many examples in which the weapons of animals have been employed by
-man. But besides these weapons derived from animals, primaeval man must
-no doubt at first have employed the natural forms of wood and bone,
-and of stones either fractured by the frost, or rolled into convenient
-forms upon the seashore.
-
-This principle of the utilization and imitation of natural forms
-appears to bear precisely the same relationship to the development of
-the arts, that, in the science of language, onomatopoeia has been shown
-to bear to the growth and development of articulate speech. In the
-attempt to trace language to its origin, onomatopoeia, or the imitation
-of the sounds of animals and of nature, appears not only to have been
-the chief agent in _initiating_ the growth of language, but it has also
-served to enrich it from time to time, so that even to this day, poetry
-and eloquence in a great measure depend on the employment of it. But
-apart from this, language has had an independent and systematic growth
-of its own.
-
-So, in like manner, men not only drew upon nature for their ideas
-in the infancy of the arts, but we continue to copy the forms and
-contrivances of nature with advantage to this day. But apart from
-this, we must look for an independent origin and growth, in which form
-succeeded form in regular continuity. Many a lesson has still to be
-learnt from the book of nature, the pages of which are sealed to us
-until, by the natural growth of knowledge, we acquire the power of
-reading and applying them. Imitation therefore, though an important
-element in the initiation of the arts, would not alone be sufficient to
-account for the phenomenon of progress.
-
-The next principle which we shall have to consider, is that of
-variation. Amongst all the products of the most primitive races of man,
-we find endless variations in the forms of their implements, all of
-the most trivial character. A Sheffield manufacturer informed me, that
-he had lately received a wooden model of a dagger-blade from Mogadore,
-made by an Arab, who desired to have one of steel made exactly like
-it. Accordingly my informant, thinking that he had found a convenient
-market for the sale of such weapons, constructed some hundreds of
-blades of exactly the same pattern. On arriving at their destination,
-however, they were found to be unsaleable. Although precisely of the
-type in general use about Mogadore, all of which to the European eye
-would be considered alike, their uniformity rendered them unsuited
-to the requirements of the inhabitants, each of whom piqued himself
-upon possessing his own particular pattern, the peculiarity of which
-consisted in having some almost imperceptible difference in the curve
-or breadth of the blade.
-
-In the earliest stages of art, men would of necessity be led to the
-adoption of such varieties by the constantly differing forms of the
-materials in which they worked. The uncertain fractures of flint, the
-various curves of the trees out of which they constructed their clubs,
-and the different forms of bones, would lead them imperceptibly towards
-the adoption of fresh tools. Occasionally some form would be hit upon,
-which in the hands of its employer would be found more convenient for
-use, and which, by giving the possessor of it some advantage over
-his neighbours, would commend itself to general adoption. Thus by a
-process, resembling what Mr. Darwin, in his late work, has termed
-'unconscious selection', rather than by premeditation or design,
-men would be led on to improvement. By degrees some forms would be
-found best adapted to one pursuit, and some to another; one would
-be used for grubbing up roots, another for breaking shells, another
-for breaking heads; modes of procedure, accidentally hit upon in one
-class of occupation, would suggest improvements in another, and thus
-analogy, coming to the aid of accidental variation, would give an
-impulse to progress. Thus would commence that ramification of the
-arts, occupations, and sciences which, developing simultaneously and
-assisting each other, has borne fruit in the civilization of our own
-times.
-
-I am aware that it will be found extremely difficult to realize a
-condition of human existence so low as that which I am supposing,
-and that many persons will deny the possibility of mankind having
-ever existed in a condition so helpless as to have been incapable of
-designing the simple weapons which we find in the hands of savages
-at the present day. It is as difficult to place one's self in the
-position of a being infinitely one's inferior, as of a being greatly
-one's superior in intellect. 'Few persons,' says Professor Max Mueller,
-'understand children, still fewer antiquity.' Our own experience cannot
-save us in estimating the powers of either, for, long before the
-period of which we have the earliest recollection, we had ourselves
-undergone a course of unconscious education in the arts of a civilized
-community; our very first utterances were in a language which was in
-itself the complex growth of ages, and the improvement of our natural
-faculties, resulting from the continued cultivation of our race,
-enhances the difficulty we find in appreciating the condition of our
-first parents.
-
-Another fertile source of variation arises from errors in successive
-copies. At a time when men had no measures or other appliances to
-assist them in copying correctly, and were guided only by the eye, an
-implement would soon be made to assume a very different appearance. Mr.
-Evans has shown in his work on the 'Coins of the Ancient Britons' (p.
-167) how the head of Medusa, copied originally from a Greek coin, was
-made to pass through a series of apparently meaningless hieroglyphics,
-in which the original head was quite lost, and was ultimately converted
-into a chariot and four. We must not, however, attribute all variation
-to this cause, for I quite agree with a remark made by Mr. Rawlinson in
-his 'Five Great Monarchies', that such varieties are more frequently
-noticed in cases where the contrivance is of home growth, than in those
-which are derived from strangers.
-
-The third point which we shall have to consider in relation to
-continuity, is the retarding element. Under this head, incapacity must
-at all times, and especially in the infancy of society, have played the
-chief part. But as civilization progressed, other agencies would come
-in to influence the same result; prejudice, force of habit, principles
-of conservatism in which we have been told by Mr. Mill that all the
-dull intellects of the world habitually ensconce themselves, a thousand
-interests of a retarding tendency, rise up at the same time as those
-having a progressive influence, and prevent our advancing by other than
-well-measured paces.
-
-The resultant of these contending forces is continuity. If we could but
-put together the missing links; if we could revive contrivances that
-have died at their birth, and expose piracies; if we could penetrate
-the haze that is so often thrown over continuity by great names,
-absorbing to themselves the credit of contrivances that belong to
-others, and thereby causing it to appear that progress has advanced
-with great strides, where creeping was in reality the order of the day;
-we should find that there is not a single work of man's hand which has
-not its history of slow and continuous development, capable of being
-traced back, like branches of a tree, to its junction with others,
-and so on until the roots of all are found to lie in the simplest
-contrivances of primaeval man.
-
-But we must not expect that we shall be able, in the existing state of
-knowledge, to trace this continuity from first to last, for the links
-that are lost far exceed in number those which remain. The task may
-be compared to that of putting together the fragments of a tree that
-has been cut up for firewood, and of which the greater part has been
-burnt. It is only here and there, after diligent search, that we may
-expect to find a few pieces fitting in such a manner as to prove that
-they belonged to the same branch. We do not, on that account, abandon
-our conviction that the tree once grew, that every large branch was
-once a small twig, and that every limb developed by a natural process
-into the form in which we find it. The difficulty we have to contend
-with is precisely that which the geologist experiences in tracing his
-palaeontological sequence. But it is far greater, for natural history
-has been long studied, and the materials upon which Mr. Darwin founds
-his celebrated hypothesis have been in process of collection for many
-generations. But continuity, in relation to the arts, can scarcely
-yet be said to be established as a science. The materials for the
-science have not yet been even classified, and classification is a
-process which must always precede continuity in the study of nature.
-Classification defines the margin of our ignorance; continuity results
-from the extension of knowledge, by bridging over the distinction
-of classes. Travellers, for the most part, have been in the habit
-of bringing home, as curiosities, the most remarkable specimens of
-weapons and implements, without much regard to their history or the
-evidence they convey; and their descriptions of them, as a general
-rule, have been extremely meagre. Until quite recently, the curators
-of our ethnographical museums have aimed more at the collection of
-unique specimens, serving to exhibit well-marked differences of form,
-than such as by their resemblance enable us to trace out community
-of origin. The arrangement of them has been almost universally bad,
-and has been calculated rather to display the several articles to
-advantage, on the principle of shop windows, than to facilitate the
-deductions of science. The antiquities of savage races, moreover, have
-as yet been almost wholly unstudied.
-
-Notwithstanding these difficulties, we are able to catch glimpses of
-evidence, here and there, which, when put together systematically, and
-when the vestiges of antiquity are illustrated by the implements of
-existing savages, will, I trust, be found sufficient to warrant the
-principles for which I contend.
-
-
-_Combination of Tool and Weapon._
-
-In the earliest ages of mankind, when all men were warriors, and before
-the division of labour, consequent on civilization, had separated
-the arts of peace and war into distinct professions, we must expect
-to find the same implement frequently employed in the capacity of
-both tool and weapon. Even long after the very earliest ages of which
-we have any historical or archaeological record, we often find a
-combination of tool and weapon in the same forms, especially amongst
-those semi-civilized and savage races of our own times, whom we regard
-as the representatives of antiquity. The battles of liberty, from the
-age of the Jews and Philistines down to the time of the last Hungarian
-revolution, have always been fought by the subject people with weapons
-made out of the implements of husbandry. We read in the first of
-Samuel, chapter xiii, 'Now there was no smith found in all the land of
-Israel: for the Philistines said, Lest the Hebrews make them swords
-or spears: but all the Israelites went down to the Philistines, to
-sharpen every man his share' (the blade of the ploughshare), 'and his
-coulter' (a kind of knife), 'and his ax, and his mattock' (a kind of
-pickaxe).... 'So it came to pass, in the day of battle, that there was
-neither sword nor spear found in the hand of any of the people that
-were with Saul and Jonathan.' In the revolts of the German peasantry,
-in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the bands of insurgents armed
-themselves with threshing flails and scythe blades. In 1794 and 1831,
-the Polish peasantry were similarly armed[127]; and it was from such
-implements of husbandry that weapons like the military flail, the
-bill, and the yataghan, derived their origin. In the recent outbreak
-in Jamaica (which, had it not been ably and powerfully put down, would
-have led to the destruction of the whole white population) the negroes
-armed themselves with weapons of husbandry. In the proclamation of Paul
-Bogle, he says: 'Every one of you must leave your house, take your
-guns; who don't have guns, take cutlasses.' The cutlasses here referred
-to were the implements used for cutting the sugar-cane, sharp on the
-concave edge, and are the same which, having been used as weapons by
-the negroes in their own country, have continued to be employed by them
-ever since. In like manner, we learn from Symes's 'Embassy to Ava in
-1795',[128] that the Burmese use the sabre both for warlike purposes,
-as well as for cutting bamboos, felling timber, &c.; it is the constant
-companion of the inhabitants for all purposes, and they never travel
-without it. In Borneo, the peculiar sword-like weapon, called the
-'parangilang', is used both as a weapon, and also for felling trees,
-and the axe of this country is constructed so that, by turning it on
-the helve, it can be used either as a weapon or as a carpenter's axe.
-In like manner, the Kaffir axe-blade, by simply altering its position
-in the handle, is used either as a weapon, or for tilling the ground.
-The North American Indian tomahawk, like the Kaffir axe, is used for
-many different purposes; the spear-head of the Kaffir assegai is the
-knife that is used for all purposes of manufacture, and Captain Grant
-says that the Watusi of East Central Africa make all their baskets with
-their spear-heads.[129] The weapons edged with sharks' teeth, to which
-I referred in my former paper, are used in the Marquesas and other of
-the South Sea Islands, as much for cutting up fish and carcasses as for
-warlike purposes.[130] Dr. Klemm, in his valuable work on savage and
-early weapons, describes the wooden pick used by the inhabitants of
-New Caledonia both as a weapon, and also for tilling the ground,[131]
-and he gives reasons for supposing[132] that in Egypt and many other
-parts of the world, the form of the plough was originally derived
-from that of the hatchet or hoe, used for tilling purposes. The hoe
-used in East Central Africa, which also, like the Kaffir axe, serves
-as a medium of exchange in lieu of money, evidently derived its form
-from that of a spear or arrow head. The spade, formerly used in this
-country, and represented in old pictures, which is still used as a
-shovel in Ireland, is a pointed spear-like instrument, and the 'loy'
-or spade still used in all parts of Ireland is hafted exactly in the
-same manner as the bronze celt of prehistoric times. Dr. Klemm (l. c.,
-p. 119) gives an illustration of an axe used by the Norwegian peasants
-both as a tool and weapon. Speke describes the Usoga tribe[133] as
-being armed with huge short-handed spears, adapted rather for digging
-than for war; and Barth describes the Bornouese troops in Central
-Africa digging holes with their spears, and employing them in searching
-for water.[134] The Australian 'dowak', a kind of club with a flint
-attached, combines the purposes of a tool and weapon. We know from the
-short sticks upon which the small arrow-heads of quartz found in the
-Peruvian tombs are mounted, that they must have been used as knives as
-well as for missile purposes. Professor Nilsson says that flint-barbed
-arrow-heads, of precisely the same form, are used by the inhabitants
-of Tierra del Fuego as knives,[135] and Mr. Stephens, in his travels
-in Central America, shows reason for supposing that the large stone
-idols in Copan were carved with similar arrow-points,[136] no other
-instrument capable of being used for such a purpose having been found
-in the neighbourhood.
-
-Examples of this class of evidence might be multiplied _ad infinitum_;
-but enough has already been said to afford good grounds for believing
-that many of the implements of stone and bronze which are found in the
-soil, may have been used for a great variety of purposes, and that,
-especially in the earliest stages of culture, we must be careful how we
-attribute especial purposes to tools and weapons because they appear
-to differ from each other slightly in form. This is more especially so
-when, as is almost invariably the case, the several distinct types are
-found--when a sufficient number of them are collected and arranged--to
-pass almost imperceptibly into each other by connecting links; showing
-that the differences observable between any two implements of the same
-class, when brought together and contrasted, are rather due to the
-operation of a law of variation and development in the fabrication of
-the tool itself, than to an intention on the part of the constructor
-to adapt it to particular purposes, and that its application to
-such especial purposes must have followed, rather than itself have
-influenced, the development of the tool.
-
-
-_Transition from the Drift to the Celt Type._
-
-My first illustration must of necessity be taken from the flint
-implements of the drift, the earliest records of human workmanship that
-the researches of science have as yet revealed to us. These, to use the
-words of Sir Charles Lyell, 'were probably used as weapons both of war
-and the chase, to grub roots, cut down trees, or scoop out canoes.'[137]
-
-I will not attempt during the brief time allotted to me on the present
-occasion, any detailed account of the evidence of the antiquity of
-these weapons, assuming that the works of Sir Charles Lyell, and Sir
-John Lubbock, will have rendered this subject more or less familiar to
-most persons at the present day, but I will confine myself to pointing
-out the indications of variation and of improvement observable in the
-implements themselves.
-
-I have arranged upon diagram No. 1 (Plate XII) a series of specimens of
-the same type from nearly every part of the globe.
-
-All the figures given in these diagrams are traced from the implements
-themselves, and reduced by photography; they may therefore be regarded
-as facsimiles, a point of great importance when our subject has to
-deal with the minute gradations of difference observable between them.
-Figures 1 to 11 are of the drift type. Casts of the originals of some
-of them, and specimens of the implements themselves, are also upon the
-table for comparison.
-
-I may here acknowledge the great obligation I am under to Mr. Franks
-for the facilities he has afforded me in drawing many of these
-specimens in the Christy Collection; to Dr. Watson for a similar
-permission in regard to the valuable collection of arms in the India
-Museum; and also to Dr. Birch of the British Museum. A large proportion
-of my illustrations are taken from the excellent Museum of this
-Institution, and others are from my own collection.
-
-Of the drift specimens which I have selected to illustrate the
-diagrams, five are from the gravel beds of St. Acheul, in order that
-we might have an opportunity of observing the variation in implements
-derived from the same locality, and probably belonging to the same or
-nearly the same period--chips in fact from the same workshop.
-
-It has been usual to classify these drift implements in two divisions;
-the spear-head form, and the oval form. Of the first or spear-head
-form, figures 2 to 4 are typical examples; of the oval form, figure
-8 is the best illustration. I venture, however, to think that a
-distinction more clearly embodying a principle of progress may be made
-by dividing them differently, and by placing in the first class those
-which are either left rough or rounded at one end and pointed at the
-other, of which figures 1 to 7 are examples; and in the second class,
-such as are chipped to an edge all round, of which figures 8 to 11 are
-types. My reason for preferring this classification to one dependent
-on outline is this. The first class having the natural outside coating
-of the flint or a roughly rounded surface on one side, appears to be
-in every way adapted to be held in the hand; whereas the second class,
-of which a beautiful specimen in the Christy Collection from St.
-Acheul is represented in a front and side view in figure 10, could not
-conveniently be used in the hand as a tool or weapon, without injury to
-the hand from the sharp edge with which its periphery is surrounded on
-all sides. If, therefore, we see reason for supposing that one class of
-implements was employed in handles, whilst the other may have been used
-in the hand, I think this constitutes a more important distinction,
-and one more obviously implying progress, than a classification which
-merely involves a modification of outline, which may have resulted from
-no more significant cause than a difference in the form of the flint
-nodule out of which the implement was made.[138]
-
-Another important distinction between these drift implements as thus
-arranged, arises from the different purposes to which they may have
-been put by the fabricators. The first class, figures 1 to 7--it
-will be seen by the side view of them--could have been used only as
-spears, picks, or daggers, the pointed or small end being employed for
-that purpose, whereas the latter class, figures 8 to 11, are equally
-available for use as axes with the sharp and broad end. It is quite
-possible therefore, that we may see here, in these vestiges of the
-first tools of mankind (specimens of all varieties of which are found
-in the same beds at St. Acheul), the point of divergence between the
-two distinct classes, which must certainly be regarded as the two most
-constant and universal weapons of mankind in all ages and countries of
-the world, viz. the spear and the axe; the small end developed into the
-spear and into all that class of tools for which a point is required;
-and from the broad end we obtained the axe and all those tools which
-either as chisels, choppers, gouges, or battle-axes, have continued in
-use with an endless continuity of development and modification, and
-a world-wide history up to the present time. I am aware that in the
-St. Acheul implements, as well as in those of similar form from the
-laterite beds of Madras, we find occasionally specimens in which the
-small end is made broader, as if indicating the gradual development
-of an edge on that side, but upon the whole I think the balance of
-evidence is in favour of the broad end having originated the axe form.
-
-Nothing, it will be seen, can be more primitive than these tools, or
-more gradual than their development. They are perfectly consistent
-with the idea that the fabricators of them were in a condition closely
-verging upon that of the brutes. Apes are known to use stones in
-cracking the shells of nuts. The advantage to be derived from a pointed
-form, when it accidentally fell into the hand, would suggest itself
-almost instinctively to any being capable of profiting by experience
-and retaining it in the memory. Accidental fractures, producing a sharp
-edge, would lead to fractures of design, and thus we may easily suppose
-that such implements as are represented in the first few figures of
-our diagram must necessarily have resulted from the very earliest
-constructive efforts of primaeval man.
-
-From the very first, a peculiar mode of fabrication appears to have
-been adopted, which consisted of chipping off flakes from alternate
-sides of the flint, and the facets thus left upon the flint produce
-the wavelike edge which you will see in the side views of all the
-implements here represented. This method continued to be employed
-throughout the entire stone age, in all parts of the universe, and is
-characteristic not merely of the drift, but of the cave, pfahlbauten,
-and surface periods.
-
-The numerous intermediate gradations of form, whether between the
-oval and the spear-head form, or between the thick and the sharpened
-form, have been noticed by Sir Charles Lyell (l. c., p. 164). By
-selecting specimens, and arranging them in order from left to right,
-I have endeavoured to trace the transition from the drift type to the
-almond-shaped celt type, which latter is common to the stone age of
-mankind, whether ancient or modern, in all parts of the world.
-
-Had the discovery of drift implements been confined to one locality
-or to one district, it is probable it would have attracted but little
-notice. As early as the first year of the present century the attention
-of the Society of Antiquaries had been drawn by Mr. Frere to the
-existence of these implements, in conjunction with the remains of the
-elephant and other extinct animals at Hoxne in Suffolk. An illustration
-of the specimens from this locality is given in figure 4. Mr. Frere
-described them as 'evidently weapons of war, fabricated and used by a
-people who had not the use of metals'. But little or no attention was
-paid to the subject until the discovery by M. Boucher de Perthes of
-precisely similar implements associated with the same class of remains,
-in the drift gravel of St. Acheul, near Amiens, in 1858.[139] Since
-then many other discoveries have been made, and still continue to be
-made, by Mr. Prestwich, Mr. Evans, Mr. Flower, Mr. Bruce Foote, and
-others, not only in this country but also in Asia and Africa, showing,
-in so far as the discoveries have hitherto gone, that this drift type,
-like the almond celt type, is common to the earliest ages in all
-parts of the world, and that everywhere the drift type preceded the
-almond-shaped celt type, and is found in beds of earlier formation.
-
-Figure 5 is a drift-shaped implement from the laterite beds of Madras,
-of exactly the same form as those found in England. Figure 6 is an
-implement of the same class from the Cape of Good Hope, found fourteen
-feet from the surface. In America, implements of the drift type have
-not yet been discovered, but stone spear-heads have been found in
-Missouri in connexion with the elephant and other extinct animals.
-Figure 11 is from a mound of sun-dried bricks at Abou Sharein, in
-Southern Babylonia, obtained by Mr. J. E. Taylor, British Consul at
-Basrah; it is a chipped flint; in form it is of the drift type, and
-its outline is precisely that of some of the Carib celts found in the
-West India Islands; it also closely resembles in form others from the
-Pacific[140]; its edge was evidently at the broad end. Another of
-the same type was found at Mugeyer in Babylonia, and a third closely
-resembling the two former was found in a cave in Bethlehem.
-
-The celt type has not as yet been found in the French caves of the
-reindeer period, but it is common in the 'pile dwellings' of the Swiss
-lakes. Some of the French cave specimens, however, closely approach
-the drift form, and in place of the celt, we have a peculiar kind of
-tool trimmed to a cutting edge on one side and having the other round
-for holding in the hand. As, however, these do not fall into the
-direct line of development, but may be regarded as a branch variety, I
-have not figured them in my diagram, but pass at once, though almost
-imperceptibly as regards form, from the drift to the surface type.
-
-Figure 12 formed part of a large find of flint implements, discovered
-by myself in the ancient British camp of Cissbury, near Worthing--an
-account of this discovery was communicated by me to the Society of
-Antiquaries at the commencement of the present year.[141] The period of
-these Cissbury implements must be fixed at a very much more modern date
-than those of the drift, with which they are associated in my diagram,
-having been found in conjunction with the earliest traces of domestic
-animals, such as the Bos longifrons, Capra hircus, and Sus; they may,
-however, be classed with the stone age, no trace of metal having been
-discovered with them, although from 500 to 600 flint implements were
-found in the camp. The peculiarity of the Cissbury find, however,
-consists in the discovery (in the same pits in which celts of the
-type represented in figure 12 were found) of a few flints closely
-approaching the drift type, being thick at the broad end, and also of
-a large number resembling those found in the French caves, trimmed
-to an edge on one side, and adapted to be held in the hand. So that
-the Cissbury find, although belonging to what is usually called the
-surface period, contains specimens affording every link of connexion
-between the drift and the almond-shaped celt type. This discovery must,
-I think, be regarded as a step in knowledge of prehistoric antiquity,
-and a decided accession to the science of continuity, for Sir John
-Lubbock has told us in his preface to the work of Professor Nilsson,
-lately published[142], that the Palaeolithic, i. e. the drift types,
-'have never yet been met with in association with the characteristics
-of a later epoch.' I shall therefore be interested to know whether,
-after an examination of the Cissbury specimens, which I have presented
-to the Christy Collection, Sir John Lubbock may be induced to alter
-his opinion on that point; for I think it is entirely consistent with
-all that is known of early races of mankind, that early types should
-be retained in use long after the introduction of others that have
-been developed from them. However this may be, I think that in casting
-the eye from left to right along the upper row of diagram No. 1 (Plate
-XII), it will puzzle the acutest observer to determine where the drift
-type ends, and that of the celt begins. If it is contended, as I am
-aware it will be contended by some, that the typical characteristic
-of the celt consists in its being sharp at the broad end, while those
-of the drift are blunt at the broad end, I reply that many of the
-drift specimens are also sharpened at the broad end, more especially
-those represented in figures 9 and 10 from the drift of St. Acheul.
-Many specimens from Thetford which I have seen, as, for example, Fig.
-17 _b_, from a cast in the collection of the Society of Antiquaries,
-presented by Mr. Flower, approach equally closely to the celt type,
-as do some of those from the laterite beds of Madras, and though they
-are of rare occurrence in all these localities, and are certainly a
-variation from the normal type of drift implements, still they are
-found in sufficient numbers to serve as links in connecting the forms
-of the earliest, with those of the later period.
-
-I have dealt somewhat at length upon this part of my subject, owing
-to the circumstance of its presenting some features of novelty in
-the study of flint implements, and being therefore open to criticism
-on the part of those who are more favourable to the principles of
-classification than of continuity, with all the important concomitants,
-of division _versus_ unity, which those principles involve.
-
-I may now pass briefly over the remaining figures in the diagram.
-Figure 13 is a specimen found by Mr. Evans at Spienne, near Mons; its
-very close resemblance to figure 12 from Cissbury will be noticed; in
-fact the whole of the Spienne specimens resemble very closely those
-discovered in Cissbury, except that the Spienne implements of this
-class are associated with others of polished flint, which gives them
-a more advanced character than those derived from Cissbury, in which
-place only one fragment of a polished implement was discovered, and
-that in a part of the intrenchment which renders it very doubtful
-whether it ought to be associated with the Cissbury find. Figures
-15, 16, and 17 are from Denmark, Ireland, and Yorkshire;--this type,
-however, is rare in Denmark, most of the flint implements from that
-country being of a more advanced character, and having usually a
-rectangular cross-section.
-
-The lower row of the diagram consists of specimens derived, either from
-what has been termed the neolithic or polished stone age of Europe, or
-from savages who are still in a corresponding stage of progression in
-various parts of the world at the present time.
-
-To the former or neolithic stone age of Europe belong figure 21 from
-France, figure 25 from the bed of the Clyde in Scotland, figure 27 from
-the Swiss lake-dwellings, figure 29 from the caves in Gibraltar, figure
-30 from Sweden, figure 36 from Portugal, figure 37 from the bed of the
-Thames, figure 38 from Ireland, figure 39 from Jelabonga, in Russia.
-Precisely identical forms are also found in Germany, Italy, and the
-Channel Isles. Amongst the specimens derived from the ancient stone age
-of other parts of the world, and belonging to an age of civilization
-that is now extinct, may be enumerated figure 22 from Peru, figure 40
-from Mexico, figure 24 from Central India, figure 41 from Japan, figure
-42 from Mugeyer, in Babylonia. Nearly similar ones, but flattened at
-the side, like those common in Denmark, have been obtained from China
-and Pegu. Figure 43 is from Algeria, from the collection of Mr. Flower.
-
-The following are examples of the same class of implements, used by
-savages of our own, or of comparatively modern times:--Figures 18 and
-19 from Australia; these are generally used in a handle, formed by a
-withe twisted round them in the manner still used by blacksmiths in
-this country. Sometimes, however, I am informed by an eye-witness, the
-Australians use these celts in the hand without any handle at all.
-Although polished on the surface, these Australian celts have been
-compared by Sir Charles Lyell (l. c., p. 79) to the oval forms of the
-drift represented in figure 7. The art of polishing appears to have
-preceded the development of form in this country. Figure 20, from New
-Zealand, is a specimen in Mr. Evans's collection, of which he has been
-so kind as to allow me to take an outline; this form, however, is
-extremely rare in New Zealand, the usual shape of the stone celts from
-that country being flat-sided, like the specimens from Denmark, already
-noticed. Figure 23 is from the Pacific; figure 26, from Pennsylvania;
-these were used by the American Indians, previously, and for some time
-after the immigration of Europeans. Figures 31 and 32 are Carib celts
-from my collection, beautifully polished. Figure 33, from St. Domingo,
-is in the Cork Museum. Figure 34, from the Antilles, is in the Christy
-Collection; both of these have a human face engraved upon them. Figure
-35 is of jade, from New Caledonia, in my own collection.
-
-
-_Hafting._
-
-The method of hafting these implements, employed by savages, shows that
-they were used for a variety of purposes; in some, the edge is fastened
-at right angles to the handle, to be used as an adze, whilst in others
-the same tool is fastened with the blade in a line with the handle,
-to be used as a chopper or battle-axe. In some it is fastened with a
-withe, passed round the stone, as in the specimen from Australia (fig.
-44, from this Institution) and some parts of North America; figure 45
-is a stone axe from the Ojibbeway Indians, from my collection. At
-other times it is inserted in the side of a stick or club. A specimen
-in my collection from Ireland (fig. 46), one of the few that have ever
-been found with handles, shows that this was the method employed in
-that country.[143] Others are inserted in the end of a bent stick (fig.
-47), a mode of hafting common in the Polynesian Islands, in Africa,
-Ancient Egypt, Mexico, North America, and New Caledonia; it is employed
-by the Kalmucks and others, and was used during the bronze age. Some
-of the Australian axes were fastened to their handles by a peculiar
-preparation of gum manufactured for that purpose.
-
-Dr. Klemm, in his 'Werkzeuge und Waffen', supposes the first lessons
-in hafting to have been derived from nature, by observing the manner
-in which stones are often firmly grasped by the roots of trees growing
-round them, and he gives several woodcuts of specimens of Nature's
-hafting, which he has collected from various sources; one of these,
-extracted from his work (l. c., p. 14), is represented in figure 48.
-I have placed upon the table, in illustration of this idea, an iron
-mediaeval axe-head (fig. 49), which has furnished itself with a handle
-in this manner, whilst buried beneath the surface; it is said to have
-been found in Glemham Park, Suffolk, eleven feet from the surface. Even
-to this day, when a peasant in Brittany discovers one of these stone
-celts upon the ground, he is in the habit of splitting the branch of a
-young tree and inserting the celt into the cleft; in the course of a
-year or two it becomes firmly fixed, and he then cuts off the branch,
-and uses the implement thus hafted by nature as a hammer for driving
-nails. In the 'Antiquites Celtiques et Antediluviennes,' vol. i (Paris,
-1847), p. 327, M. Boucher de Perthes mentions the discovery of two
-ancient stone hammer-heads, which appeared to have been furnished with
-handles by passing the hole over the bough of a tree and allowing it to
-fill up the aperture by its natural growth, until it became fixed as a
-handle.[144]
-
-It might be interesting, if space permitted, to follow up the
-development of the stone axe-head through its various phases until,
-in the latest stages, when bronze had already come into general use
-for weapons, we find it furnished with a hole through the middle
-for the insertion of the handle. It may, I think, be safely said
-that--although nature furnishes numerous examples, in many classes of
-rocks, and especially in flints, of stones perforated with holes, and
-although they appear to have attracted the notice of the aborigines of
-many countries by the peculiar superstitious reverence which is often
-found to be attached to such stones when found in the soil--this mode
-of fastening stone implements in their handles did not come into use
-until late in the stone age, and that even in the bronze age it was but
-little employed.
-
-
-_Transition from Oval to Rectangular Forms._
-
-Whether the stone celts having a square or rectangular section (such
-as are found principally in Denmark, New Zealand, Mexico, and Pegu),
-were coeval, or of subsequent development, to those of the almond-shape
-type, may be a matter for conjecture; the small flint hatchets found
-in the Kitchenmiddens of Denmark appear to approach closely to the
-rectangular type. It is certain, that in the Swiss Lakes both forms
-are found fully developed, and it may be mentioned, as an instance of
-the constant tendency to variation that is everywhere observable in
-the weapons of the early races of mankind, that of the whole of the
-celts found at Nussdorf, in the Lake of Constance, though all might be
-traced to the same normal type as regards their general outline, no two
-were alike; and Dr. Keller gives sections, showing every conceivable
-gradation from the square and rectangular to the oval and circular
-section[145]. It may, however, be affirmed, that convex forms, as a
-general rule, preceded those having a rectangular or concave surface;
-it is so in the forms of nature; the habitations of animals are
-almost invariably convex. Dr. Livingstone mentions[146] that he found
-it impossible even to teach the natives of South Africa to build a
-square hut; when left to themselves for a few minutes, they invariably
-reverted to the circle. All the earliest habitations of prehistoric
-times are found to be circular or oval; even the sophisticated infant
-of modern civilization, when he plays with his bricks, will invariably
-build them in a circular form, until otherwise instructed.
-
-
-_Development of Spear and Arrow-head Forms._
-
-We must now turn to the development of the second great class of
-weapons--the spear and arrow. These may be classed together, the
-arrow being merely the diminutive of the spear; and it may be taken
-as a general rule, applicable to all the arts of prehistoric times,
-that when a given form has once been introduced, it will speedily be
-repeated in every possible size that can be applied to any of the
-various purposes for which such a form is capable of being used. Size,
-in the arts of the earliest ages, is no indication of progress. In the
-same way it may be said of the development of the animal or vegetable
-kingdom, size is no indication of improved organism.
-
-In the same beds in which the drift-type implements are found, flakes,
-either struck off in the formation of such tools, or especially
-flaked off from a core in a particular manner, indicating that they
-were themselves intended for use as tools, are found in considerable
-numbers. No more useful tool could have been used during the stone age
-than the plain, untouched flint flake, which, from the sharpness of
-the edge, is capable of being used for a variety of purposes. Those,
-for example, formed of obsidian are so sharp that it is recorded,
-by the Spanish historians, that the Mexicans were in the habit of
-shaving themselves with such flakes. As my present subject has to
-deal exclusively with war weapons, I will not enter into a detailed
-description of these flakes, further than to observe that they are
-found, together with the cores from which they were struck off, in
-every quarter of the globe in which flint, obsidian, or any other
-suitable material has been found, and that everywhere the process of
-flaking appears to have been the same.
-
-Now, the fracture of flint is very uncertain; by constant habit,
-the ancient flint-workers appear to have been able to command the
-fracture of the flint in a manner that cannot be imitated, even by
-the most skilful forgers of those implements in modern times; but,
-notwithstanding this, the varieties of the forms of the flakes thus
-struck off must have been very considerable, and these varieties must,
-from the very first, have suggested some of the different forms of
-tools that were made out of them.
-
-I cannot, perhaps, explain this point better than by exhibiting a
-number of flakes, found by myself in the bed of the Bann at Toom, in
-Ireland, at the spot where that river flows out of Lough Neagh. This
-was a place originally discovered by Mr. Evans, where probably, in
-a habitation built upon the river, they formerly manufactured flint
-implements; and the bed of the river for the space of a hundred yards
-or more is covered with the flakes. It will be seen on examining
-these flakes, that some of them came off in a broad leaf-shaped form,
-and these, with a very little additional chipping, have been formed
-into spear-heads. Others longer and thicker have been chipped into
-something like picks, and others thinner and narrower than the two
-former, have been used probably as knives; others for scraping skins.
-We see from this that certain forms would naturally suggest themselves
-through the natural fracture of the flint, and this may to a certain
-extent account, though it does not, I think, entirely account, for the
-remarkable resemblance of form and unity of development observable in
-the spear and arrow heads, derived from localities so remote from each
-other as almost to preclude the possibility of their having ever been
-derived from a common source.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XIII.
-
-_Diagram 2._
-
-DEVELOPMENT OF SPEAR & ARROW-HEAD FORMS.]
-
-I have arranged in tabular form, on diagram No. 2 (= Plate XIII),
-representations of spear and arrow heads from all the different
-localities from which I have been able to obtain them in sufficient
-number to show fairly the numerous varieties which each country
-produces. On the top of the diagram, from left to right, the several
-forms are arranged in the order that appears most truly to indicate
-progression; but it must not be supposed that this arrangement is
-absolutely correct, for the several forms, such for example as the
-tang and the triangular form, were most probably derived from a common
-centre. The specimens from each locality ought therefore, in order
-to display their progression properly, to be arranged in the form of
-a tree, branching from a common stem. On the left of the diagram are
-written the different periods and localities, from which the specimens
-are derived. Commencing with the drift--the oldest of which we have
-any knowledge--which is coeval with the elephant and rhinoceros in
-Europe, we have the peculiar thick form already described. The examples
-of the drift period here shown, from their small size, must evidently
-have been used with a shaft, as they are scarcely large enough to have
-served as hand tools. None of the lozenge, tang, or triangular forms,
-have ever been found in the drift.
-
-The next line represents specimens from the French caves of the
-reindeer period, which are taken from the _Reliquiae Aquitanicae_,
-chiefly from Dordogne.[147] It will be seen that in these caves the
-first rude indications of the lozenge and tang form are represented,
-but no perfect specimens of either class. No example of the triangular
-form has been discovered. The leaf-shape form, however, is well
-represented.
-
-In the ancient habitations of the Swiss Lakes, which belong to a later
-period, all varieties, except those of the drift type, are represented,
-but none of them in their most fully developed form; the tangs, it will
-be seen, are long, and the barbs comparatively short; the triangular
-form, which I consider to be the latest in the order of development, is
-mentioned by Dr. Keller, from whose work these specimens are taken, as
-being extremely rare. The comparative rarity of flint implements in the
-Lakes may, however, in some measure be accounted for, by the absence of
-flint in the district, necessitating the importation of this material
-from a distance.
-
-The specimens from Yorkshire, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark, Italy, and
-Germany, may be considered to carry the development of these forms up
-to the latest period, viz. the late stone, and early bronze age; for
-there can be no doubt from the number of arrow-heads found in these
-countries, in connexion with implements of bronze, that they were
-used for missile purposes long after the _armes blanches_ had been
-constructed of metal.
-
-In all these localities it will be seen that the various gradations of
-form are identical; but as I have been able to collect a much larger
-number of arrow-heads from Ireland than elsewhere, the development of
-form is more apparent in the specimens selected from that country.
-
-From the leaf-shape, it will be observed, there is every link of
-transition into the perfect lozenge type, and the latter is as a
-general rule, both in Ireland and in Yorkshire, much rarer, and more
-carefully constructed, than the leaf-shaped type, showing that there is
-every probability of the lozenge having been an improved form.
-
-The tang form is represented, at first, by a few rude chips on each
-side of the base of the original flake, narrowing that part in such a
-manner as to admit of its being inserted, into a handle or shaft, and
-bound round with a sinew. This is superseded by the gradual formation
-of barbs on each side, and these barbs are lengthened by degrees, until
-they reach to the line of the base of the tang; the tang subsequently
-shortens, leaving the barbs with a semicircular aperture between them,
-and thus approaching some of the forms represented in the triangular
-column. These latter barbed specimens are usually more finished, and
-chipped with greater care than the long-tanged ones, which are rougher,
-more time-worn, and probably of earlier date.
-
-The triangular form is seen at first, with a straight base; gradually
-a semicircular aperture appears, and this deepens by degrees until, in
-some of the more carefully formed specimens, it approaches the form
-of a Norman arch. This last variety is especially well represented in
-Denmark.
-
-Sir William Wilde's arrangement, in his _Catalogue of the Royal Irish
-Academy_,[148] differs in some respects from this; he considers the
-triangular an early form, and he assigns the final perfection of the
-art of fabricating flint spear-heads, to the large lozenge-shape form;
-grounding his opinion on the circumstance of many of this form, of the
-larger size, having been found polished, whilst those of the leaf,
-triangular, and tang shape are not usually carried further than the
-preliminary process of chipping. But it is evident that these larger
-forms may have been used for spears, the lozenge shape being especially
-adapted for this purpose, as enabling the owner of it to withdraw it
-from the wound, after slaying his adversary; while those of the barbed
-and triangular form being lighter, and calculated to stick in the
-wound, would be better adapted for arrow-heads: and it is unlikely
-that the same amount of labour would be expended on a weapon intended
-to be cast from a bow, as upon one designed to be held in the hand. I
-consider the polishing of these particular weapons therefore to be no
-criterion of age, but merely to indicate that they were used as _armes
-d'hast_, and not as missiles.
-
-It appears highly probable, however, that all the several varieties,
-if not developed simultaneously, were used at the same time; for we
-find amongst the Persians, the Esquimaux, and many other nations, that
-a great variety of arrow-heads are carried in the same quiver, and are
-used either indiscriminately or for different purposes[149].
-
-In the eighth row from the top, I have arranged a series of similar
-forms from America, obtained chiefly from Pennsylvania, but they
-are also found in other parts of the continent, and some few of the
-illustrations here given (Plate XIII, figs. 131, 132, and 133) are
-from Tierra del Fuego. Their forms enable them to be arranged under
-precisely the same divisions as those from the continent of Europe,
-and in each division the same development is observable. The tang or
-barbed form, however, differs sufficiently from the European forms of
-the same class to show that they arose independently, and were not
-derived from a common source. The tang of the American arrow-heads, it
-will be seen, is broader, at least in the later forms, and it appears
-to have originated in a notch on the sides of the blade, intended to
-hold the sinew with which it is attached to the shaft or handle. This
-notch appears to have been constructed lower and lower on the sides
-of the blade, until at last it comes down quite into the base of the
-flint, and it then closely resembles the European in form; compare, for
-example, figures 94 and 136; except that the tang is broader, and has a
-lateral projection on each side, so as to render it firmer in the shaft
-when bound by the sinew.
-
-Notches at the side of the blade are extremely rare in Ireland, but
-from Sweden Professor Nilsson gives a drawing of an arrow-head, which
-I have copied into my diagram (figure 96). It is precisely identical,
-in its peculiar form, to one here figured from America (figure 139),
-and they both have a concave base, in addition to the side notch; thus
-apparently representing a transition form between the tang and the
-triangular, which I have never noticed, except in the two specimens
-here referred to, and which must be regarded in Europe as extremely
-rare.
-
-To illustrate the mode of fixing these instruments in their shafts, I
-have here figured several examples from my collection; two of these
-(figures 163 and 164) were derived from the Esquimaux, between Icy Cape
-and Point Barrow, the person from whom I purchased them having brought
-them himself from that locality. Figures 165, 166, and 167, are from
-California.
-
-Burton says that the Indians between the Mississippi and the Pacific
-use the barbed form only for war[150]; and Schoolcraft, in the
-_Archives of the Aborigines of America_,[151] gives illustrations of
-two methods of fastening, one for war and the other for the chase, the
-former being loosely tied on, so as to come off when inserted in the
-wound.
-
-But, in addition to their use as arrow-points, we have reason to
-suppose that they were used also as knives. I have represented in
-the diagram (figures 168 and 169) two short-handled instruments
-from Peru, which are now in the British Museum, into which similar
-arrow-points are inserted. These, from the shortness and peculiar
-shape of their shafts, could hardly have been used as darts. The only
-weapon peculiar to those regions from which such an instrument could
-have been projected, is the blow-pipe, and they are entirely different
-from the darts used with the blow-pipe either in South America, the
-Malay Peninsula, or Ceylon, in which countries the blow-pipe is used.
-There is reason to believe, from the manner in which they are placed in
-the graves, unaccompanied by any bow or other weapon from which they
-could have been projected[152], that they were employed as knives, and
-this is confirmed by the fact, already mentioned, of the inhabitants
-of Tierra del Fuego using their arrow-points for knives. The great
-numbers in which they are found in Ireland, in Yorkshire, and other
-localities appertaining to the late stone age, in which places they
-form the greater part of the relics collected, and are always the most
-highly finished implements discovered--the other stone implements
-associated with them being either celts, flint-discs, picks, or rough
-or partially worked flakes, that are capable of being wrought into
-arrows--the fact that the peculiar modification of form observable at
-the base of these implements appears to have been designed rather to
-facilitate the attachment of them to their wooden shafts or handles,
-than for the special purposes of war; and the frequent marks of use, as
-if by rubbing, that are found on the points of many of them, especially
-in the specimens from Ireland; all these circumstances favour the
-supposition that in Europe, as well as in America, these arrow-head
-forms were used for many other purposes besides war and the chase; and
-that, like the assegai of the Kaffir, and the many other examples of
-tool-weapons already enumerated, we may regard them as having served to
-our primaeval ancestors the general purposes of a small tool available
-for carving, cutting, and for all those works for which a fine edge and
-point was required. On the other hand the celt undoubtedly provided
-them with a large tool capable of being applied to all the rougher
-purposes, whether peaceful or warlike, for which it was adapted in the
-simple arts of an uncivilized people.
-
-In the ninth row I have arranged, under their respective classes, the
-whole of the specimens of flint arrow-heads that are given in Siebold's
-atlas of Japanese weapons.[153] It will be seen that they present the
-same variety of form as those already described. A similar collection
-of flint arrow-heads has lately been added to the British Museum by Mr.
-Franks, and described by him. They formed part of a Japanese collection
-of curiosities, and are labelled in the Japanese character, showing
-that this remote country not only passed through the same stone period
-as ourselves, but that, as their culture improved and expanded, they,
-like ourselves, have at last begun to make collections of objects to
-illustrate the arts of remote antiquity.
-
-
-_Implements composed of Perishable Materials._
-
-It is now time that I should say a few words respecting weapons
-constructed of more perishable materials; for it is not to be assumed
-that, because we find nothing in the drift-gravels but weapons of
-flint and stone, the aborigines of that age did not also employ wood
-and other materials capable of being more easily worked. If man was
-at that time, as he is now, a beast of prey, he must also have become
-familiar, in the very first stages of his existence, with the uses of
-bone as a material for fabricating into weapons. In the French caves, a
-large number of bone implements have been found, and their resemblance,
-amounting almost to identity, with those found in Sweden, amongst the
-Esquimaux, and the inhabitants of Tierra del Fuego, has been noticed by
-Sir John Lubbock, Professor Nilsson, and others.
-
-But, in dealing with the subject of continuity and development, it is
-necessary to confine our remarks to those countries from which we have
-had an opportunity of collecting large varieties of the same class of
-implement; we must therefore have recourse to the Australian, the New
-Zealander, and those nations with which we are more frequently brought
-in contact.
-
-
-_Transition from Celt to Paddle, Spear, and Sword Forms._
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XIV.
-
-_Diagram 3._
-
-TRANSITION FROM CELT TO PADDLE SPEAR & SWORD FORMS.]
-
-The almond-shape celt form, as I have already demonstrated, is one so
-universally distributed and of such very early origin, that we may
-naturally expect to find many of the more complicated forms of savage
-implements derived from it. [See diagram No. 3, reproduced in Plate
-XIV.] In a paper in the _Ulster Journal of Archaeology_ (Belfast, 1857,
-vol. v, pp. 125-27) a writer draws attention to the occurrence in
-the bed of the Bann, and elsewhere in the north of Ireland, of stone
-clubs, formed much upon the general outline of the celt, but narrowed
-at the small end, so as to facilitate their being held in the hand
-like a bludgeon. Fig. 50 is copied from the illustration given in the
-paper referred to, and fig. 51 is another in my collection, also from
-Ireland, of precisely the same form; the original is upon the table,
-and it will be seen that it is simply a celt cut at the small end,
-so as to adapt it to being held in the hand. Fig. 52 is an implement
-in common use among the New Zealanders, called the 'pattoo-pattoo',
-of precisely the same shape; it is of jade, and its form, as may be
-seen by the thin sharp edge at the top, is evidently derived from that
-of the stone celt. Fig. 53 is a remarkably fine specimen, from the
-Museum of this Institution; the handle part in this specimen is more
-elaborately finished. These weapons are used as clubs to break heads,
-and also as missiles, and the fact of their having been derived from
-the celt is shown by the manner in which they are used by the New
-Zealanders. I am informed by Mr. Dilke, who derived his information
-from the natives whilst travelling in New Zealand, that the manner of
-striking with these weapons is not usually with the side, but with the
-sharp end of the pattoo-pattoo, precisely in the same manner that a
-celt would be used if held in the hand. The spot selected for the blow
-is usually above the ear, where the skull is weakest. If any further
-evidence were wanting to prove the derivation of this weapon from the
-stone celt, it is afforded by fig. 54, which is a jade implement lately
-added to the British Museum from the Woodhouse Collection. It was, for
-some time, believed to have been found in a Greek tomb, but this is now
-believed by Mr. Franks to be a mistake; it is, without doubt, a New
-Zealand instrument. The straight edge shows unmistakably that the end
-was the part employed in using it, while the rounded small end, with a
-hole at the extremity, shows that, like the pattoo-pattoo, it was held
-in the hand. It is, in fact, precisely identical with the hand celts
-from Ireland, above described, and forms a valuable connecting link
-between the celt and pattoo-pattoo form. Now it may be regarded as a
-law of development, applicable alike to all implements of savage and
-early races, that when any form has been produced symmetrically, like
-this pattoo-pattoo, the same form will be found either curved to one
-side, or divided in half; the variation, no doubt, depending on the
-purposes for which it is used. The pattoo-pattoo, having been used at
-first, like its prototype the celt, for striking with the end, would
-naturally come to be employed for striking upon the side edge.[154]
-The other side would therefore be liable to variation, according to
-the fancy of the workman. Figs. 55, 56, and 57, are examples of these
-implements, in which the edge is retained only on one side and at the
-end, the other side being variously cut and ornamented. This weapon
-extended to the west coast of America, and there, as in New Zealand,
-they are found both of the symmetrical and of the one-sided form. Fig.
-58 is one believed to be from Nootka Sound, in my collection. Fig. 59
-is also from Nootka, in the Museum of this Institution. Fig. 60 is an
-outline of one from Peru, which is figured in Dr. Klemm's work (l. c.,
-fig. 46, p. 26), and I am informed that a nearly similar club has been
-derived from Brazil.
-
-The same form as the pattoo-pattoo, in Australia, has been developed
-in wood. Fig. 61 is from Nicol Bay, North-West Australia, and is in
-the Christy Collection described as a sword. Fig. 62 is of the same
-form, also of wood, but of cognate form, from New Guinea. In fig. 63,
-which is also from New Guinea, we see the same form developed into a
-paddle. In the larger implements of this class we see the same form,
-modified in such a manner as to diminish the weight; thus, the convex
-sides become either straight or concave. I have arranged upon the walls
-a variety of clubs and paddles, from the Polynesian Islands, figs.
-64 to 67, all of which must have been derived from a common source.
-The New Zealand steering-paddle, fig. 64, it will be seen, is simply
-an elongated celt form. Those from the Marquesas (fig. 65), Society
-Isles, Fiji, and Solomon Isles, &c., are all allied. In the infancy of
-the art of navigation, we may suppose that the implements of war, when
-constructed of wood, may have frequently been used as paddles, or those
-employed for paddles have been used in the fight, and this may perhaps
-account for the circumstance that, throughout these regions, the club,
-sword, and paddle pass into each other by imperceptible gradations.
-In the Friendly Isles we may notice a still further development of
-this form into the long wooden spear, specimens of which, from this
-Institution, are exhibited (figs. 68, 69, and 70).
-
-We must not expect to find all the connecting links in one country or
-island. We know that the same race has at different times spread over
-a very wide area; that the Polynesians, New Zealanders, and Malays are
-all of the same stock, speaking the same or cognate languages. The same
-race spread to the shores of America on the one side, and to Madagascar
-on the other, carrying with them their arts and implements, and we may,
-therefore, naturally expect that the links which are missing in one
-locality may be supplied in another.
-
-
-_Development of the Australian Boomerang._
-
-We now turn to the Australians, a race which, being in the lowest stage
-of cultivation of any with whom we are acquainted, must be regarded as
-the best representatives of aboriginal man.
-
-I have transferred the Australian sword, Plate XIV (diagram 3), fig.
-61, to Plate XV (diagram 4), fig. 72, in order that from it we may
-be able to trace the development of a weapon supposed by some to be
-peculiar to this country, but one which in reality has had a very wide
-range in the earliest stages of culture; I allude to the boomerang.[155]
-
-The Australians, in the manufacture of all their weapons, follow the
-natural grain of the wood, and this leads them into the adoption of
-every conceivable curve. The straight sword would by this means at
-once assume the form of the boomerang, which, it will be seen by the
-diagram, is constructed of every shade of curve from the straight line
-to the right angle, the curve invariably following the natural grain of
-the wood, that is to say, the bend of the piece of a stem or branch out
-of which the implement was fabricated.
-
-All savage nations are in the habit of throwing their weapons at the
-enemy. The desire to strike an enemy at a distance, without exposing
-one's self within the range of his weapons, is one deeply seated in
-human nature, and requires neither explanation nor comment. Even apes,
-as I have already noticed, are in the habit of throwing stones. The
-North American Indian throws his tomahawk; the Indians of the Grand
-Chako, in South America, throw the 'macana', a kind of club. We
-learn from the travels of Mr. Blount,[156] in the Levant in 1634,
-that at that time the Turks used the mace to throw, as well as for
-striking. The Kaffirs throw the knob-kerry, as did also the Fidasians
-of Western Africa.[157] The Fiji Islanders are in the habit of throwing
-a precisely similar club. The Franks are supposed to have thrown the
-'francisca'.[158] The New Zealander throws his 'pattoo-pattoo', and the
-Australian throws the 'dowak' and the waddy, as well as his boomerang.
-All these weapons spin of their own accord when thrown from the hand.
-In practising with the boomerang, it will be found that it does not
-require that any special movement of rotation should be imparted to it,
-but if thrown with the point first it must inevitably rotate in its
-flight. The effect of this rotation, it will hardly be necessary to
-remind those acquainted with the laws of projectiles, is to preserve
-the axis and plane of rotation parallel to itself, upon the principle
-of the gyroscope. By this means the thin edge of the weapon would be
-constantly opposed to the atmosphere in front, whilst the flat sides,
-if thrown horizontally, would meet the air opposed to it by the action
-of gravitation; the effect, of course, would be to increase the range
-of the projectile, by facilitating its forward movement, and impeding
-its fall to the earth. This much, all curved weapons of the boomerang
-form possess as a common property.
-
-If any large collection of boomerangs from Australia be examined, it
-will be seen that they vary not only in their curvature, but also in
-their section; some are much thicker than others, some are of the same
-breadth throughout, whilst others bulge in the centre; some are heavier
-than others, some have an additional curve so as to approach the form
-of an S, some have a slight twist laterally, some have an equal section
-on both sides, while others are nearly flat on one side and convex on
-the other.
-
-As all these varieties continued to be employed, it would soon be
-perceived that peculiar advantages were derived from the use of the
-flatter class of weapon, especially such as are flat on the under
-side, for by throwing these in such a manner as to catch the air on
-the flat side, instead of falling to the ground they would rise in
-the air, precisely in the same manner that a kite, (fig. 71), when
-the boy runs forward with the string, rises and continues to rise as
-long as it is kept up by the action of the air beneath. In like manner
-the boomerang, as long as the forward movement imparted to it by the
-thrower continues, will continue to rise, and the plane of rotation,
-instead of continuing perfectly parallel to its original position,
-will be slightly raised by the action of the atmosphere on the forward
-side. When the movement of transition ceases, the boomerang will
-begin to fall, and its course in falling will be by the line of least
-resistance, which is in the direction of the edge that lies obliquely
-towards the thrower; it will therefore fall back in the same manner
-that a kite, when the string is suddenly broken, is seen to fall
-back for a short distance; but as the kite has received no movement
-of rotation to cause it to continue in the same plane of descent,
-it soon loses its parallelism, and falls in a series of fantastic
-curves towards the ground. The boomerang will do the same thing if it
-loses its movement of rotation; but as long as this continues, which
-it usually does after the forward movement has ceased, it continues
-to fall back upon the same inclined plane by which it ascended, and
-finally reaches the ground at the feet of the thrower. There are
-various ways of throwing the boomerang, but the principles here
-enunciated will explain the course of its flight in whatever manner it
-may be thrown.
-
-Now it is evident that this peculiar mode of flight would be of great
-advantage to the savage, for as we learn from a paper in _Trans.
-Ethnological Society_ (N.S. iii. pp. 264-5), by Mr. Oldfield, who
-speaks from experience, the natives usually employ this weapon against
-large flocks of ducks or wild-fowl in rivers or marshes; the weapon
-after striking or missing the prey would return to the thrower,
-instead of being lost in the morass; its use, therefore, would give
-to the individual or tribe possessing it a great advantage over their
-neighbours in the struggle for life.
-
-But it is evident that the principles of the flight of the boomerang,
-such as I have described it, according to the recognized law of
-projectiles, must have been entirely unknown to the savage; he can no
-more be said to have _invented_ the boomerang than he can be said to
-have _invented_ the art of sustaining life by nourishment. Instinct
-prompts him to eat; little better than instinct would enable him to
-select from amongst his weapons such as are found most suitable for
-obtaining food; and we have already seen how he may have been led to
-the adoption of such an instrument as the boomerang, purely through
-the laws of accidental variation, guided by the natural grain of the
-material in which he worked.
-
-The boomerang, though used chiefly for game, is used also as a weapon,
-and Mr. Oldfield says that it is capable of inflicting a wound several
-inches in depth.
-
-A further movement is effected in the flight of the boomerang by giving
-the arms a slight lateral twist, by means of which it is caused to rise
-by virtue of its rotation, screwing itself up in the air precisely in
-the same manner that a boy's flying top rises to the ceiling. By means
-of this addition, the weapon is sometimes made to strike an object in
-its fall to the ground, behind the thrower, but the twist is not by
-any means invariable, as any one may see by examining a collection of
-these weapons. Nor is it essential to ensure a return fall, which I
-have frequently ascertained by practising with a boomerang that was
-perfectly flat.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XV.
-
-_Diagram 4_
-
-AUSTRALIA.
-
-TRANSITION FROM THE MALGA TO THE BOOMERANG.
-
-_Diagram 6_
-
-INDIAN BOOMERANGS
-
-_Diagram 5_
-
-AUSTRALIA.
-
-TRANSITION FROM HATCHET TO THE BOOMERANG
-
-_Diagram 7_
-
-AFRICAN BOOMERANGS.]
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XVI.
-
-_Diagram 8_
-
-AUSTRALIAN THROWING STICKS.
-
-AUSTRALIAN CLUBS
-
-AFRICAN CLUBS
-
-_Diagram 9_
-
-AUSTRALIAN SHIELDS.
-
-_Diagram 10_
-
-AFRICAN SHIELDS.]
-
-In examining Plate XV (diagram 4), it will be seen that the boomerang
-passes by imperceptible gradations from the straight sword, fig. 72,
-on the one hand, into the 'malga', a kind of pick, fig. 89, used for
-war purposes, on the other[159], and this Australian malga closely
-resembles a weapon of the same kind from New Caledonia, figs. 90 and
-91, which, as already mentioned, is used both as a weapon and for
-tilling the ground. In Plate XV (diagram 5), figs. 92 to 100, I have
-also arranged the links of connexion between the boomerang and a kind
-of hatchet or chopper called the waddy. A slight swell or projection
-is seen to grow out of one end of the concave side of the boomerang,
-and this develops into the form of a chopper. In those specimens of
-this class in which the projection is only slightly developed, as in
-figs. 94 and 95, the sides of the implement are flat, and the weapon
-is obviously designed for throwing, but in some of those in which
-the projection is more fully developed, as in fig. 96, the shaft is
-quite round, and the head becomes thick and heavy, so as to render it
-totally unsuited to the purposes of a missile. We see, therefore, in
-this diagram, the transition, by minute gradations, from a missile to
-a hand weapon, or vice versa. The boomerang, the sword, the malga,
-and the waddy, are thus seen to be allied in such a manner as to make
-it difficult to determine which of the four was the original weapon,
-and, if properly arranged to display their development, they should be
-distributed in branch lines, starting from a common centre, exactly in
-the same manner that I have suggested the various forms of spear and
-arrow-heads ought to be arranged in the natural order of progression.
-[See, for example, Plate III, and pp. 37-8, above.]
-
-
-_Indian Boomerangs._
-
-In Plate XV (diagram 6), figs. 101-5, I have arranged a series of
-boomerangs from India. Figures 101 and 102 are specimens of the
-'katureea' or boomerang of Goojerat, from the Indian Museum; they
-are used by the coolies, according to the ticket in the Museum, 'for
-whirling at hares, boars, and other wild animals, and disabling
-them'. It is of 'raen' wood, thicker and heavier than the Australian
-specimens, and therefore not adapted to rise in the air and return. The
-section is equal on both sides, but in other respects it is precisely
-identical with the Australian weapon, and appears to have been roughly
-chipped into form. Figures 103 and 104 are of an improved form, from
-Madras, called the 'collery', also of wood, but having a knob at the
-handle end; they are from the Museum of this Institution. Figure 105
-is precisely the same form in steel, from the India Museum. It is
-probable that this weapon led to the use of the steel 'chakra' or war
-quoit (fig. 106) of which I have given an illustration from the Museum
-of this Institution. The principle of its flight is precisely that of
-the boomerang, in so far as regards the increase of range and velocity
-produced by the rotation preserving the thin edge in the line of its
-forward motion. The earliest mention of this instrument is in the
-description of the Malabar Coast, by Magellan, about 1512, translated
-by Mr. Stanley, for the Hakluyt Society. The author describes amongst
-the arms used in the kingdom of Dely, certain wheels called chacarani,
-'two fingers broad, sharp outside like knives, and without edge inside,
-and the surface of these is of the size of a small plate, and they
-carry seven or eight of these each, put on the left arm, and they take
-one and put it on the finger of the right hand, and make it spin round
-many times, so that they hurl it at their enemies, and if they hit
-any one on the arm or neck, it cuts through all, and with these they
-carry on much fighting, and are very dexterous.'[160] These weapons
-are usually worn on the head, but the circumstance here mentioned of
-their being worn on the arm, reminds us very much of the peculiar
-weapon worn by the Djibba negroes of Central Africa as a bracelet; this
-is represented in figure 107; it is of iron, sharp on the outside and
-blunt on the inside, which touches the arm; the edge is usually covered
-with a strip of hide to prevent injury to the person. I am not aware
-that this weapon of the negroes is ever used as a missile, but the
-occurrence of two such singular weapons, similarly carried, is worthy
-of notice, more particularly as we have clear evidence of a connexion
-between the metal-workers of the whole continent of Africa and the hill
-tribes of Central India.
-
-It is possible that many links of connexion may be supplied when the
-subject of continuity comes to be more carefully studied in these
-countries. It would appear extremely probable that the small Koorkeree
-and Goorkah knife, though now used only for hand fight, may have had
-their origin in these missile weapons, which they resemble in form,
-especially the large Goorkah knife. It would be interesting to know
-if they are ever thrown. I have heard stories of this having been the
-case, but no authentic account of such a practice. The Spaniards throw
-their long clasp-knives with effect for a considerable distance.
-
-
-_African Boomerangs._
-
-Turning to Africa (Plate XV, diagram 7), we find the boomerang well
-represented in many parts of that continent. Figure 108 is an ancient
-Egyptian boomerang of wood, in the British Museum. It was obtained from
-the collection of James Burton, Jr., Esq., which was formed by him in
-Egypt, and is described as 'an instrument for fowling, for throwing at,
-or knocking down birds, as is continually represented on the walls of
-the tombs'. It is of hard but light wood, the section is symmetrical
-on both sides, and not flat on one side, like some of the Australian
-boomerangs; it is somewhat broader at the ends than in the middle
-of the blade. Figures 100, 110, and 111, are taken from Rosellini's
-_Egyptian Monuments_,[161] and show how this instrument was used by the
-ancient Egyptians. Sir Samuel Baker has described the weapon called the
-'trombash', used in those parts of Abyssinia which he traversed.[162]
-It is of hard wood, resembling the Australian boomerang, about two feet
-in length, and the end turns sharply at an angle of 30 deg.; they throw
-this with great dexterity, and inflict severe wounds with the hard
-and sharp edge, but, unlike the boomerang, it does not return to the
-thrower. Figure 113 is a wooden instrument, in the Christy Collection,
-said to be used by the Djibba negroes for throwing at birds. Figure 114
-is the Nubian sword, which in form exactly resembles the boomerang.
-They have a great variety of curves, some of them, especially those of
-the same form used in Abyssinia, bending nearly in a right angle. I am
-not aware that this instrument is ever thrown by the Nubians; they,
-however, are in the habit of throwing their curved clubs with great
-dexterity. Figure 115 is an iron implement of native workmanship, used
-as a missile by the inhabitants of Central Africa; it was brought from
-that region by Consul Petherick, at whose sale I purchased it. Like
-the majority of the succeeding figures represented in this diagram, it
-resembles the Australian boomerang, in being flat on the under side,
-that is to say, upon the side which would be undermost, if thrown from
-the right hand with the point first; the weight, however, would prevent
-such a weapon from rising in the air, or returning to the thrower.
-Figure 116 is used by the Mundo tribe of Africa; like the last, it is
-flat on the under side; in form it resembles the falchion, represented
-in the Egyptian sculptures as being held in the hand by Rameses and
-other figures, when slaying their enemies. The small knob on one side
-of the blade is used to attach it to the person in carrying it. Figure
-117, from Central Africa, is clearly a development of the preceding
-figure. Figure 118 is a weapon of the same class, from Kordofan,
-obtained near the cataracts of Assouan, Upper Nile, and now in the
-Museum of this Institution; though of the same character as the other
-missiles, its section is equal on both sides, and therefore it is not
-calculated to range far in its flight. Figure 119 is also from the
-Museum of this Institution; it is flat on the under side. Figures 120
-and 121 are from illustrations in Denham and Clapperton's _Travels
-in Northern and Central Africa_ (Pl. xli. 3, 4), of the missile
-instruments, called 'hunga-mungas', used by the negro tribes, south of
-Lake Tchad. One of these is of very peculiar form; in the course of the
-innumerable variations which this weapon appears to have undergone, the
-constructor appears to have hit upon the idea of representing the head
-and neck of a stork. Figure 122 is from a sketch, in Barth's _Travels_,
-of one of these weapons, belonging to the Marghi, a negro tribe in the
-same region; it is called 'danisco', and he says that the specimen here
-represented is of particularly regular shape, thereby inferring that
-numerous varieties of form are in use among these people. In another
-place, he describes the 'goliyo' of the Musgu and the 'njiga' of the
-Bagirmi, as weapons of the same class, the name of the latter differing
-from the word for spear only in a single letter; he says this weapon is
-common to all the pagan, i.e. negro tribes, that he came across.[163]
-Figure 123 is from East Central Africa, presented to the Christy
-Collection by the Viceroy of Egypt; it is described as a cutting
-instrument, from the country of the Dinkas and Shillooks, capable of
-being thrown to a great distance. Mr. Petherick met with these tribes
-in his travels on the White Nile.[164] Figure 124, from my collection,
-is described as a battle-axe of the Dor tribe, between the equator and
-the 6th or 7th degree of north latitude. It was brought to England
-by Mr. Petherick, who obtained it in his travels in 1858; it is used
-also for throwing. Figure 125 is from an illustration in Du Chaillu's
-work,[165] of the missile tomahawk, used by the Fans in the Gaboon, in
-West Central Africa; he says that the thrower aims at the head, and,
-after killing his victim, uses the round edge of the axe to cut off
-the head. We see from this, that notwithstanding the innumerable and
-apparently meaningless variations which this weapon has undergone, the
-different parts of it are sometimes applied to especial uses. Figure
-126 is another missile, used by the Neam-Nam tribes, East Central
-Africa. Mr. Petherick says, that the Baer tribe carry a different kind
-of iron missile from the Neam-Nams. Figures 126 to 129 are different
-varieties of Neam-Nam weapons, in which, as they are all derived from
-the same people, the gradual transition of form is more perceptible
-than in those isolated specimens derived from different tribes. If,
-however, we had specimens of all the varieties used by each tribe, we
-should without doubt be able to trace the progression of the whole
-of them from a common form. As it is, the connexion is sufficiently
-obvious when the details are examined, throughout the whole region in
-which they are found, extending from Egypt and the Nile in the East, to
-the Gaboon on the West Coast. In all, the principle of construction is
-the same, the divergent lateral blades serving the purpose of wings,
-like the arms of the Australian boomerang, to sustain the weapon in
-the air when spun horizontally. The variations are such as might
-have resulted from successive copies, little or no improvement being
-perceivable in the principle of construction throughout this region,
-notwithstanding the innumerable forms through which it must have passed
-during its transmission from its original source; the locality of
-which we shall probably be unable to determine, until the antiquities
-of the country have been more carefully described and studied. As,
-however, it is everywhere found in the hands of the negro aborigines of
-the country, it must probably have had the same origin as the art of
-smelting and fabricating iron, which is everywhere identical throughout
-this region, and is, without doubt, of the remotest antiquity, dating
-long prior to any historical record of the continent of Africa.
-
-
-_Cateia._
-
-The possible employment of the boomerang in Europe has been made the
-subject of occasional speculation amongst antiquarian writers. Having
-been used in Egypt, and perhaps in Assyria, there is no good reason for
-doubting that it may have spread from thence to the north-west. In a
-learned paper on the subject in the _Transactions of the Royal Irish
-Academy_, vol. xix (1843), Sec. 'Literature,' p. 22, Pl. i, ii, Mr. Samuel
-Ferguson endeavours to prove that the 'cateia' mentioned by classical
-authors was the boomerang. He quotes several passages, and amongst
-them one from Virgil (_Aeneid_ vii. 741), in which mention is made of
-a people accustomed to whirl the 'cateia' after the Teutonic manner.
-In the _Punica_ of Silius (iii. 327), one of the Libyan tribes which
-accompanied Hannibal to Italy is described as being armed with a bent
-or crooked 'cateia'. Isidore, Bishop of Seville, a writer of the end of
-the sixth and beginning of the seventh century, described the 'cateia'
-as 'a species of bat, which, when thrown, flies not far, by reason
-of its weight, but where it strikes, it breaks through with extreme
-impetus, and if it be thrown with a skilful hand, it returns back again
-to him who dismissed it' (_Origines_, xviii. 7. 7).
-
-Strabo also (pp. 196-7) describes the Belgae of his time, as using
-'a wooden weapon of the shape of a grosphus, which they throw out of
-hand ... which flies farther than an arrow, and is chiefly used in the
-pursuit of game'.
-
-
-_General Conclusions relative to the Boomerang._
-
-Those who desire further information relative to its supposed use
-in Europe, cannot do better than refer to the paper from which I
-have quoted. Meanwhile, enough has been said to show:--(1) that
-the boomerang was used in many different countries at a very early
-period, and in a very primitive condition of culture, and that it was
-everywhere employed chiefly in the pursuit of game; (2) that it was
-everywhere constructed of wood, before it was copied in metal; (3) that
-in Australia it originated as a variety of the almond- or leaf-shaped
-sword, and was suggested by the natural curvature of the material out
-of which it was formed; (4) that the subsequent improvements by which
-its return flight was ensured, arose from a practical selection of
-suitable varieties, and was not the result of design, and (5) that the
-form of the boomerang passes by minute gradations into at least three
-other classes of weapons in common use by the same people, and may
-therefore be regarded as a branch variety of an original normal type
-of implement, used by the most primitive races as a general tool or
-weapon.
-
-
-_Development of the Club._
-
-Amongst other implements used for war, the form of which appears to be
-derived from the same common source as those already described, may
-be included the Australian club, and the wamera or throwing stick. I
-have arranged in Plate XVI, diagram 8, figs. 130 to 137, a series of
-Australian clubs, showing a transition from the plain stick, of equal
-size throughout, to one having a nearly round knob at one end. Nearly
-similar forms to some of these, from Africa, figs. 138 to 140, are also
-represented on the same diagram.
-
-
-_Contrivances for Throwing the Spear._
-
-Amongst the Australian 'wameras', there are so many varieties, that it
-is next to impossible to speculate upon the priority of any particular
-form, unless the plain stick, with a projecting peg at one end, may be
-regarded as certainly the simplest, and therefore the earlier form.
-The 'wamera' is held in the right hand, and the projecting peg at the
-end is fitted into a cavity at the end of the spear, which latter is
-held in the left hand, in the required direction, until just before the
-moment of throwing. The spear is then impelled to its destination by
-the wamera, which gives great additional impetus to the arm. Fig. 147
-is a wamera from Nicol Bay, of exactly the same general outline as the
-sword already figured from that locality, figs. 61 and 62, except that
-one of the faces at the end of which the peg is fastened, is concave,
-and the other convex; this specimen is in the Christy Collection. The
-wamera assumes a great variety of forms; some, as for example fig.
-142, resemble on a small scale the New Zealand paddle, the broad end
-being held in the hand, and the peg inserted in the small end; others,
-broad and flat, figs. 148 to 150, bulge out in the middle by successive
-gradations, until they approach the form of a shield. No reasonable
-cause that I am aware of, can be assigned for these different forms;
-beyond caprice, and the action of the law of incessant variation, which
-is constant in its operation amongst all the works of the aborigines.
-
-The wamera is found on the north-west[166] and south-west[167] coasts
-of Australia, and Major Mitchell describes it in the east and central
-parts of the continent.[168]
-
-That the wamera preceded the bow, appears probable from the fact that
-no bow is ever used in Australia, unless occasionally upon the north
-coast, where it is derived from the Papuans. The bow is not indigenous
-in New Zealand, or in any of those islands of the Pacific which are
-peopled by the Polynesian race; it belongs truly to the Papuans, and
-where it is used elsewhere in the Pacific Islands as a toy, it may
-very probably have been derived from their Papuan neighbours. The
-throwing stick is used in New Zealand, in which country Mr. Darwin
-describes the practice with them. 'A cap,' he says, 'being fixed at
-30 yards distance, they transfixed it with the spear delivered by
-the throwing stick, with the rapidity of an arrow from the bow of a
-practised archer.'[169] In New Guinea, Captain Cook saw the lance
-thrown 60 yards, as he believed, by the throwing stick.[170] I saw
-the Australians, now exhibiting on Kennington Common (1868), throw
-their spears with the wamera nearly 100 yards extreme range, but as
-they practised only for range, I had no opportunity of observing the
-accuracy of flight. Mr. Oldfield says that their practice has been much
-exaggerated by the European settlers, in order to justify acts on their
-part, which would otherwise appear cowardly. He says, that a melon
-having been put up at a distance of 30 yards, many natives practised
-at it for an hour without hitting it, after which an European, who had
-accustomed himself to the use of this weapon, struck it five times
-out of six with his spear. Klemm, on the other hand, has collected
-several accounts of their dexterity in the use of it; he says, that the
-range is 90 yards, and mentions that Captain Phillip received a wound
-several inches deep at 30 paces. At 40 paces, he says, the aborigines
-are always safe of their mark (l. c., p. 32). A sharp flint is usually
-fixed with gum into the handle of the wamera, which they use for
-sharpening the points of their spears.
-
-The throwing stick (fig. 151) is used by the Esquimaux throughout
-the regions they inhabit. Frobisher[171] mentions it on the east,
-Captain Beechey on the north-west, and Cranz describes its use in
-Greenland.[172] Klemm says (l. c., p. 39), that the throwing stick used
-in the Aleutian Isles, differs from that of the Greenlander in having a
-cavity, to receive the end of the spear, instead of a projecting tang.
-The Esquimaux stick generally differs from the Australian in form,
-and has usually holes cut to receive the fingers, which by this means
-secure a firm grasp of the instrument. The custom of forming holes or
-depressions in an implement to receive the fingers was very widely
-spread in prehistoric times. I have specimens of stones so indented,
-used probably as hammers, from Ireland, Yorkshire, Denmark, and Central
-India. In the Christy Collection there is one precisely similar from
-the Andaman Isles.
-
-The only other race that is known to make use of the throwing stick is
-the Purus-Purus Indians of South America, inhabiting a tributary of the
-Amazon. These people have no bow, and in many other respects resemble
-the Australians in their habits. Their throwing stick is called
-'palheta'; it has a projection at the end, to fit into the end of the
-spear, and is handled exactly in the same manner as the Australian
-'wamera'.[173]
-
-Another kind of spear-thrower, consisting of a loop for the finger and
-a thong by which it is fastened to the spear, is used in New Caledonia,
-and Tanna, New Hebrides (fig. 152). On ordinary occasions this is
-carried by being suspended to an armlet on the left arm, but, when
-preparing for war, they fasten it on to the middle of their spears. I
-exhibit here, fig. 153, a precisely similar contrivance from Central
-Africa, from my collection. Judging by the spiral ferrule, at the end
-of the lance to which it is attached, it appears to be derived from
-Central or East Central Africa. This mode of increasing the range of
-the dart or javelin was well known to the ancients, and was called by
-the Greeks ~ankyle~, and by the Romans 'amentum'; it is represented on
-the Etruscan vases, and is figured in Smith's _Dictionary of Greek
-and Roman Antiquities_, from which the drawing given in fig. 154 is
-taken.[174] One of the effects produced by this contrivance was,
-doubtless, to give the weapon a rotary motion, and thereby to increase
-the accuracy of its flight, upon the same principle as the rifling of a
-bullet; but the range and velocity were also increased, by enabling the
-thrower, the tip of whose forefinger was passed through the loop of the
-'amentum', to press longer upon the spear, and thus impart a greater
-velocity to it, in the same manner that the effect of the Australian
-wamera may be said to increase the length of the thrower's arm. The
-Emperor Napoleon, who, as we all know, has paid great attention to
-these weapons of the ancients, caused experiments to be conducted,
-under his own personal supervision, at Saint Germain, the result of
-which showed that the range of a spear was increased from 20 to 80
-meters by the use of this accessory.[175]
-
-
-_Transition from Club to Shield (Australia)._
-
-My next example of variation of form is taken from the Australian
-'heileman', or shield. It may, on the first cursory consideration of
-the subject, appear fanciful to suppose that so simple a contrivance
-as the shield could require to have a history, or that the plain round
-target, for example, so common amongst many savage nations, could be
-the result of a long course of development. Surely, it may be said,
-the shells of tortoises or the thick hides of beasts would, from the
-first, have supplied so simple a contrivance. But the researches in
-palaeoethnology teach us that such was not the case; man came into the
-world naked and defenceless, and it was long before he acquired the
-art of defending himself in this manner. His first weapon, as I have
-already said, was a stone or a stick, and it is from one or other of
-these, that we must trace all subsequent improvements. The stick became
-a club, and it is to this alone that many of the earliest races trust
-for the defence of their persons. The Dinkas of East Central Africa
-have no shields, using the club, and a stick, hooked at both ends (Pl.
-XVI, fig. 170), to ward off lances.[176] The Shoua and the Bagirmi
-of Central Africa rarely carry shields, and they use a foreign name
-for it.[177] The Khonds, hill tribes of Central India, have never
-adopted the shield.[178] The inhabitants of Tahiti use no shield.[179]
-The Sandwich Islanders use no shield or weapon of defence, employing
-the javelin to ward off lances: like the Australians, and, like the
-Bushmen, they are very expert in dodging the weapons of their enemies.
-In Samoa the club is used for warding off lances, and the warriors
-frequently exercise themselves in this practice. The 'kerri' sticks of
-the Hottentots are used for warding off stones and assegais.[180]
-
-The club head formed by the divergent roots of a tree (Pl. XVI,
-fig. 155), offers great advantages in enabling the warrior to catch
-the arrows in their flight, and this led to the use of the jagged
-mace-head form of club, which is here represented from many different
-localities. Fig. 155 is from Fiji, fig. 157 from Central Africa, fig.
-156 from Australia, fig. 158 from New Guinea, and fig. 159 from the
-Friendly Isles. The curved clubs, of which a great variety are found
-in the hands of savages in every part of the world, are exceedingly
-well adapted to catch and throw off the enemy's arrow. The Australian
-'malga', or 'leowel', as it is called by the Australians now in this
-country, and already described (pp. 125-6), is used in this manner.
-
-By degrees, instead of using the club as a general weapon, offensive
-and defensive, especial forms would be used for defence, whilst
-others would be retained for offensive purposes; but the shield for
-some time would continue to be used merely as a parrying instrument.
-Such it is in Australia. In its most primitive form, it is merely a
-kind of stick with an aperture cut through it in the centre for the
-hand. The fore part varies with the shape of the stem out of which it
-was made; in some it is round, in others flat. This form appears to
-have branched off into two varieties; one developed laterally, and
-at last assumed the form of a pointed oval, as represented in Plate
-XVI, figs. 165 to 169; these are frequently scored on the front with
-grooves to catch the lance points. The other variety appears to have
-assumed a pointed form in front, so as to make the spear glance off
-to one side, as represented in figs. 160 to 164. The Australians are
-exceedingly skilful in parrying with these shields. One of the feats
-of the Australians now in this country, consists in parrying cricket
-balls thrown with full force by three persons at the same time. The
-'heileman' is cut out of the solid tree and, like all their other
-weapons, invariably follows the grain of the wood.
-
-In 1861, Mr. Oldfield, when engaged in collecting specimens of timber
-for the International Exhibition, came upon one of these shields,
-nearly finished, and abandoned, but only requiring a few strokes to
-detach it from the growing tree; and he noticed the immense time and
-labour it must have cost the native to construct it, not less than 30
-cubic feet of wood having been removed in digging it out of the tree
-with no better tool than a flint fixed to the end of a stick. Trees
-of sufficient size for these shields are not found in all parts of
-Australia, and in those places where they are wanting, the natives
-only obtain them by traffic with other tribes. The same cause may
-also account, in some measure, for the varieties of their form, yet,
-notwithstanding these numerous varieties, they never leave the normal
-type throughout the continent, and you might as well expect to see the
-Australian using a firelock of native manufacture, as to find in his
-hands the circular flat shield which is common in Africa, America, and
-ancient Europe.
-
-
-_Transition from Club to Shield (Africa)._
-
-In Africa, the development of the shield appears to have followed
-precisely the same course, commencing with the plain stick or club,
-Pl. XVI, fig. 170, and passing through the varieties represented in
-figs. 171, 172, and 173, which are scarcely distinguishable from the
-Australian 'heileman', to the oval shield of the Kaffirs, fig. 174,
-and of the Upper Nile, figs. 175 and 176, which are of ox hide, but
-show their origin by a stick passing down the centre and grasped in
-the hand; with this stick they parry and turn off the lances of the
-assailant precisely in the same manner that the Australian employs the
-projecting point at the end of his oval shield. Judging by the side
-views represented in the Egyptian and Assyrian sculptures, similar
-shields were used by the ancients, and we may especially notice the
-Assyrian shield, of small dimensions, fig. 178, mentioned by Mr.
-Rawlinson as being represented in the Assyrian sculptures, and having
-projecting spikes on the fore part, to catch and throw off the enemy's
-weapons (_Five Great Monarchies_ (1864), vol. ii. p. 51).
-
-
-_Development of the Shield._
-
-All these antique shields have one other feature in common with the
-shields of existing aborigines, viz. that they are held by a handle
-in the centre. It was only in a more advanced age, when armies began
-to fall into serried ranks, that the broad shield was introduced
-and held upon the left arm, a mode of carrying it ill adapted to
-the requirements of the light-armed combatants. Besides the oval,
-the shield took other forms, but appears always to have been narrow
-in its earliest developments: fig. 176 from the Upper Nile closely
-resembles in outline fig. 177 from the New Hebrides. Livy describes
-the shields of the Gauls in the attack of Mount Olympus, B.C. 189, as
-being too narrow to defend them against the missiles of the Romans,
-and he also describes them as brandishing their shields in a peculiar
-manner practised in their original country.[181] This must without
-doubt have been connected with the operation of parrying. Sir Walter
-Scott describes the Scotch parrying with their shields. Shields in the
-form of a figure 8 are met with in various countries; Captain Grant
-describes the Unyamwezi as carrying a shield of this form.[182] Fig.
-179 from this Institution is from Central Africa, of a very primitive
-form. Fig. 180 is of the same shape from New Guinea, and the beautiful
-bronze shield, fig. 181[183], of the late Celtic period, in the British
-Museum, found in the Thames, appears to be of an allied form. Fig.
-182 is an ox-hide shield of the Basutos; it is allied to that of the
-Kaffirs, Fig. 174, by having a stick at the back, and the peculiar
-wings with which it is furnished connect it with that of the Fans of
-the Gaboon, on the West Coast, fig. 183, which latter is of elephant
-hide and has no stick at the back. No connexion that I am aware of is
-known to have existed between these remote tribes, which are of totally
-different races, but the forms of their shields here represented must,
-I think, have been derived from a common source.
-
-
-_Concluding Remarks._
-
-It would be quite impossible within the space of a single lecture to
-produce more than a very small portion indeed of the evidence which is
-available in support of my arguments. If the principles which I have
-enunciated are sound, they must be applicable to the whole of the arts
-of mankind and to all time. If it can be proved that a single art,
-contrivance, custom, or institution, sprang into existence in violation
-of the law of continuity, and was not the offspring of some prior
-growth, it will disprove my theory. If in the whole face of nature
-there is undoubted evidence of any especial fiat of creation having
-operated capriciously, or in any other manner than by gradual evolution
-and development, my principles are false.
-
-It would be a violation of the law of continuity, for example, if the
-principles which I am now advocating, in common with many others at the
-present time, opposed as they are to many preconceived notions, were
-suddenly to receive a general and widespread acceptance. This also,
-like other offsprings of the human mind, must be a work of development,
-and it will require time and the labours of many individuals to
-establish it as the truth, if truth it be.
-
-Meanwhile it may be well that I should briefly sum up the several
-points which I have endeavoured to prove on the present occasion.
-
-I have endeavoured to prove in the first place, though I must here
-repeat that I have produced only a very small portion of the evidence
-on the subject, that all the implements of the stone age are traceable
-by variation to a common form, and that form the earliest; that their
-improvement spread over a period so long as to witness the extinction
-of many wild breeds of animals; that it was so gradual as to require
-no effort of genius or of invention; and that it was identical in all
-parts of the world.
-
-I have shown in the second place, that all the weapons of the
-Australians which I have described, are traceable by variation to
-the same common form, or to forms equally as primitive as those of
-the stone age of Europe; that it is perfectly consistent with the
-phenomena observed, that these variations may have resulted, or at
-least may have in a great measure been promoted by accidental causes,
-such as the grain of the wood influencing the shape of the weapon;
-that they were not invented or designed for especial purposes, but
-that their application to such purposes may have resulted from a
-selection of the implements already in hand; and that by this process,
-the natives of Australia, during countless ages, may have crept on,
-almost unconsciously, from the condition of brutes, to the condition of
-incipient culture in which they are now found.
-
-I have compared these weapons of the Australians with others of the
-same form in various parts of the world, showing grounds for believing
-that whenever we shall be able to collect a sufficient variety of
-specimens to represent the continuous progression of each locality, the
-_modus operandi_ will be found to have been everywhere the same.
-
-Lastly, I have alluded cursorily to the analogy which exists between
-the development of the arts and the development of species. It may be
-better to postpone any comprehensive generalization on this subject
-until a much larger mass of evidence has been collected and arranged.
-Sir Charles Lyell has devoted a chapter in his work on the _Antiquity
-of Man_ to a comparison of the development of languages and the
-development of species. 'We may compare,' he says, 'the persistency of
-languages, or the tendency of each generation to adopt without change
-the vocabulary of its predecessor, to the force of inheritance in the
-organic world, which causes the offspring to resemble its parents. The
-inventive power which coins new words or modifies old ones, and adapts
-them to new wants and conditions as often as they arise, answers to
-the variety-making power in the animal creation.' He also compares
-the selection of words and their incorporation into the language of a
-people, with the selection of species, resulting in both cases in the
-survival of the fittest (4th ed., 1873, p. 503).
-
-Whilst, however, we dwell upon the analogy which exists between the
-phenomena of the organic world and the phenomena of human culture,
-we must not omit to notice the points of difference. The force of
-inheritance may resemble in its effects the principle of conservatism
-in the arts and culture of mankind, but they are totally dissimilar
-causes.
-
-The variety-making power may resemble the inventive power of man;
-nothing, however, can be more dissimilar, except as regards results.
-
-When, therefore, we find that like results are produced through the
-instrumentality of totally dissimilar causes, we must attribute the
-analogy to some prior and more potent cause, influencing the whole
-alike.
-
-It might be premature to speculate upon the course of reasoning which
-this class of study is likely to introduce; this much, however, we may,
-I think, safely predict as the result of our investigation, that we
-shall meet with no encouragement to deify secondary causes.
-
-Another subject to which we must necessarily be led by these
-investigations, although, as I before said, it does not fall actually
-within the scope of my paper, is the question of the unity or plurality
-of the human race.
-
-The ethnologist and the anthropologist who has not studied the
-prehistoric archaeology of his own country compares the present
-condition of savages with that of the Europeans with whom they are
-brought in contact. He notices the vast disparity of intellect between
-them. He finds the savage incapable of education and of civilization,
-and evidently destined to fall away before the white man whenever the
-races meet, and he jumps at the conclusion that races so different in
-mental and physical characteristics, must have had a distinct origin,
-and be the offspring of separate creations. But the archaeologist
-traces back the arts and institutions of his own people and country
-until he finds that they once existed in a condition as low or lower
-than that of existing savages, having the same arts, and using
-precisely the same implements and weapons; and he arrives at the
-conclusion that the difference observable between existing races is
-one of divergence, and not of origin; that owing to causes worthy of
-being carefully studied and investigated, one race has improved, while
-another has progressed slowly or remained stationary.
-
-In this conclusion he is borne out by all analogy of nature, in which
-he finds frequent evidences of difference produced by variation, but no
-one solitary example of independent creation. Are not all the branches
-of a young tree parts of the same organism; and yet one will be seen to
-throw up its shoots with a vigorous and rapid growth, whilst another
-turns towards the ground and ultimately decays? Not to mention the
-variations produced by the breeding of animals, with which we are
-all more or less familiar, we see under our own eyes families of men
-diverging in this manner. One branch, owing to causes familiar to us in
-everyday life, will become highly cultivated, whilst another continues
-to live on in a low condition of life, so that in the course of a few
-years the disparity, mental and physical, between these two branches,
-bearing the same name, will be greater, in proportion to the time of
-separation, than that which, in the course of countless ages, has
-separated the black from the white man.
-
-At the present time there is a tendency to rectify these inequalities,
-whether in regard to our own or to other races, and there can be little
-doubt that in the course of time, all that remains of the various races
-of mankind will be brought under the influence of one civilization. But
-as this progressive movement is often led by men who have not made the
-races of mankind their study, they are perpetually falling into the
-error of supposing, that the work of countless ages of divergence, is
-to be put to rights by Act of Parliament, and by suddenly applying to
-the inferior races of mankind laws and institutions for which they are
-about as much fitted as the animals in the Zoological Gardens.
-
-In conclusion, I have only a few words to say upon the defects of our
-ethnographical collections generally. It will be seen that in order to
-exhibit the continuity and progression of form, I have been obliged to
-collect and put together examples from many different museums; and,
-as it is, it will have been noticed that many links of connexion are
-evidently wanting. This is owing, in a great measure, to the very short
-period during which the arts and customs of primaeval races have been
-made the subject of scientific investigation; but it also arises from
-the absence of system on the part of travellers and collectors, who in
-former times appear to have had but little knowledge of the evidence
-which these specimens of the industry of the aborigines are destined
-to convey, and who have, therefore, neglected to bring home from the
-various regions they visited all the varieties of the several classes
-of implements which each country is capable of affording, thinking that
-one good example of a tool or weapon might be taken as a sample of all
-the rest.
-
-I am not so presumptuous as to suppose that the particular arrangement,
-which I have adopted, may not require frequent modification as our
-evidence accumulates; but I trust that I shall at least have made it
-apparent to those who have followed the course of my argument, that
-without the connecting links which unite one form with another, an
-ethnographical collection can be regarded in no other light than a mere
-toy-shop of curiosities, and is totally unworthy of science.
-
-Owing to the wide distribution of our Army and Navy, the members of
-which professions are dispersed over every quarter of the globe and
-have ample leisure for the pursuit of these interesting studies, this
-Institution possesses facilities for forming a really systematic
-collection of savage weapons, not perhaps within the power of any
-other Institution in the world. The time is fast approaching when
-this class of prehistoric evidence will no longer be forthcoming. The
-collection is already what, for this country, must be regarded as a
-good one, and if I may venture to hope that the remarks I have now the
-honour of making will be of service in collecting the materials for the
-improvement of it, I trust it may be thought that my labours and your
-patience will not have been thrown away.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[126] A Lecture delivered at the Royal United Service Institution on
-June 5, 1868, and printed in the _Journal of the R. U. S. Inst._, vol.
-xii (1868), pp. 399-439, pl. xvii-xxi (= Plates XII-XVI herewith).
-
-[127] Klemm, l. c., p. 147.
-
-[128] Pinkerton (1811), vol. ix. p. 501.
-
-[129] _Walk across Africa_, p. 78.
-
-[130] Klemm, l. c., p. 62.
-
-[131] l. c., p. 78.
-
-[132] l. c., pp. 123-6.
-
-[133] Speke, _Journal of the Discovery of the Source of the Nile_
-(London, 1863), p. 460.
-
-[134] _Barth_, Travels, vol. iii. p. 162.
-
-[135] Nilsson, _The Primitive Inhabitants of Scandinavia_, edited by
-Sir John Lubbock (3rd ed., London, 1868), p. 44.
-
-[136] Lloyd Stephens, _Incidents of Travel in Central America_ (London,
-1854), p. 94.
-
-[137] Lyell, _Antiquity of Man_ (London, 1873), p. 161.
-
-[138] I am informed by an eye-witness, that the Australian savages, in
-climbing trees, use implements nearly similar to these, to cut notches
-for their feet. The implement is held in the hand, without any handle.
-Others are used in handles, either fastened with gum, or consisting of
-a withe passed round the stone and tied underneath.
-
-[139] Mr. Frere's first discovery was in 1797 (_Archaeologia_,
-xiii. p. 204). (M. Boucher de Perthes began work in 1837 (_De la
-Creation_, Paris, 1838), and published his _Antiquites Celtiques et
-Antediluviennes_ (vol. i) in 1847. His discoveries were, however, not
-verified and accepted by the British observers till 1858-9.--ED.)
-
-[140] See figures 23 and 32, as well as figure 17 _a_ from Central
-India.
-
-[141] March 5, 1868. _Proc. Soc. Ant. Lond._ 2nd Ser. iv. p. 85:
-_Archaeologia_, xlii.
-
-[142] Nilsson, _The Primitive Inhabitants of Scandinavia_, edited by
-Sir John Lubbock (London, 1868), Editor's Introduction, p. xxiv.
-
-[143] The handle, since its discovery, has been fractured in four
-places, and has shrunk a good deal from its original size.
-
-[144] Cf. Kemble, _Horae Ferales_ (London, 1863), p. 134.
-
-[145] Keller, _The Lake Dwellings of Switzerland_, transl. by J. E. Lee
-(2nd ed. London, 1878), vol. i. pp. 111-3.
-
-[146] Livingstone, _Missionary Travels and Researches in S. Africa_
-(1857), p. 40.
-
-[147] Lartet and Christy, _Reliquiae Aquitanicae_ (London, 1865-75,
-passim).
-
-[148] Wilde, _Catalogue of the Antiquities of the Museum of the Royal
-Irish Academy_ (Dublin, 1863), vol. i. pp. 19-23.
-
-[149] After having witnessed the process of fabricating flint
-arrow-heads, as re-discovered by Mr. Evans, I am able to understand why
-it is that the leaf-shaped form is of more frequent occurrence, and why
-this and the long-tanged forms are so often rougher and less finished
-than the other forms, the deep barbs and hollow base requiring much
-greater skill than the former.
-
-[150] Burton, _The City of the Saints_ (London, 1861), p. 146.
-
-[151] Schoolcraft, _Information concerning ... the Indian Tribes of the
-U.S.A._ (Philadelphia, 1851-9), vol. i. p. 212.
-
-[152] In the museum belonging to the Cork College, there is a Peruvian
-mummy, with which, amongst other articles, two of these arrow-pointed
-knives were found.
-
-[153] Siebold, _Nippon_ (Leiden, 1832-52), vol. i. pt. ii (Alte
-Waffen), Tab. xi.
-
-[154] Evidence of this transition may be seen by examining any number
-of pattoo-pattoos. Some are sharp at the end; others are blunt at the
-end, but sharp at the side near the broadest part.
-
-[155] Since this paper was read to the Royal United Service
-Institution, Sir John Lubbock has delivered a remarkably interesting
-series of lectures on savages, in the course of which he took exception
-to my classification of the Indian, African, and Australian boomerangs,
-under the same head; giving as his reason that the Australian boomerang
-has a return flight, whilst those of other nations have not that
-peculiarity. If it could be shown that the Australian weapon had been
-_contrived_ for the purpose of obtaining a return flight, I should
-then agree with him in regarding the difference as generic. But the
-course of my investigations tends to show that this was probably an
-application of the weapon accidentally hit upon by the Australians, and
-that it arose from a modification of weight and form, so trivial as
-to prevent our regarding it as generically distinct from the others.
-I therefore consider the Australian weapon to be a mere variety of
-the implement which is common to the three continents. The difference
-between us on this point, though one of terms, is nevertheless
-important as a question of continuity. I am much gratified, however,
-to find my opinions on many other points supported by Sir John's high
-authority.
-
-[156] Henry Blount, _Voyage into the Levant_, 1634 (London, 1671), p.
-91.
-
-[157] Bosman, _Guinea_, Pinkerton (1811), vol. xvi. pp. 505-6.
-
-[158] Kemble, _Horae Ferales_ (1863), p. 65.
-
-[159] This weapon is called 'leowel' by the Australians now in this
-country (1868).
-
-[160] Duarte Barbosa, _A Description of the Coasts of East Africa and
-Malabar_ (by Magellan), translated by the Hon. H. E. Stanley: Hakluyt
-Society, xxxv (1866), pp. 100-1.
-
-[161] Rosellini, _Monumenti dell' Egitto e della Nubia_ (Pisa, 1834),
-Monuments Civiles, pl. cxvii. 3; cxix. 1.
-
-[162] Baker, _Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia_ (London, 1867), p. 511.
-
-[163] Barth, l. c., vol. iii. pp. 231, 451, &c., &c.
-
-[164] Petherick, _Egypt, the Soudan, and Central Africa_ (1861), p. 456.
-
-[165] Du Chaillu, _Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial Africa_
-(London, 1861), p. 79.
-
-[166] Gregory's account of his expedition in 1861, _Journal of the
-Royal Geographical Society_, vol. xxxii (1862), p. 378.
-
-[167] Oldfield, 'On the Aborigines of Australia,' _Trans. Ethnol.
-Soc._, vol. iii. pp. 261-2.
-
-[168] _Expedition to the Interior of Eastern Australia_, by Major T.
-L. Mitchell, Surveyor-General, _Journal of the Royal Geographical
-Society_, vol. ii. pp. 325-6.
-
-[169] [Darwin, _Journal_.] (But the quotation (from Darwin, _Journal of
-Researches_ (London, 1845) pp. 433-4) refers to _Australia_, not New
-Zealand.--ED.)
-
-[170] Cook, _Third Voyage_ (London, 1842), vol. i. p. 273.
-
-[171] Frobisher, _The Three Voyages of Martin Frobisher_, ed. Collinson
-(Hakluyt Society, 1867), p. 283.
-
-[172] Cranz, _Historie von Groenland_^2 (1770), pp. 195-6, pl. v. 2 _f._
-
-[173] Markham, _Tribes of the Valley of the Amazon_.--_Trans. Ethnol.
-Soc._, N.S., vol. iii. p. 183.
-
-[174] Smith, _Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities_ (s. v. Hasta).
-
-[175] Desor, _Les Palafittes ou Constructions Lacustres du Lac de
-Neuchatel_ (Paris, 1865), p. 87.
-
-[176] Petherick, _Egypt, the Soudan, and Central Africa_ (1861), p. 391.
-
-[177] Barth, l. c., vol. iii. p. 450.
-
-[178] Campbell, _Thirteen Years amongst the Wild Tribes of Khondistan_
-(London, 1864), p. 40.
-
-[179] Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_ (1829), vol. ii. p. 489.
-
-[180] Kolb, _Reise an das Capo du Bonne Esperance_ (Nuernberg, 1719),
-pp. 477-8.
-
-[181] Livy, Book xxxviii. ch. 17 and 21.
-
-[182] Grant, _Walk across Africa_, p. 69.
-
-[183] Kemble, _Horae Ferales_ (1863), p. 190, pl. xiv.
-
-
-
-
-PRIMITIVE WARFARE
-
-III
-
- ON THE RESEMBLANCES OF THE WEAPONS OF EARLY RACES; THEIR
- VARIATIONS, CONTINUITY AND DEVELOPMENT OF FORM: METAL PERIOD.[184]
-
-
-Having in two previous lectures upon 'Primitive Warfare', delivered at
-this Institution, spoken of the general principles to be observed in
-studying the development of the weapons of savages and early races,
-I need not preface the remarks I am about to offer by any detailed
-allusion to the generalizations which I have already ventured to make,
-but I will proceed at once to lay before you some additional facts
-which I have collected in continuation of the same subject.
-
-This I do the more readily, because I hold strongly to the opinion that
-the value of a communication of this kind may, in a great degree, be
-measured by the attention which is paid to the accumulation of facts,
-and to the comparative brevity and simplicity of that portion of it
-which relates to theory. Without general principles, however, we should
-have no incentive to collect and systematize our facts, and they are
-therefore valuable even where they involve--and in a new field of
-study, such as I am now treating, with very scanty materials as yet at
-our disposal to assist conjecture, I can hardly hope they should not
-involve--a certain amount of error.
-
-Before entering upon the subject of the origin of metal implements, I
-must, however, revert to one part of my former communication, in order
-to show that a statement I then made in reference to the geographical
-distribution of the boomerang has since had some light thrown upon it
-by the researches of one of our most eminent men of science. It will,
-perhaps, be remembered by those who did me the honour of reading my
-last lecture, which was printed in vol. xii of the _Journal_, that,
-in describing the weapons of the Australians, I showed, by means of
-numerous illustrations of the varieties of each class of weapon from
-that country, that they all passed one into the other by connecting
-links, so that where a sufficient number of them are arranged in such
-a manner as to exhibit their continuity, it is often impossible to
-determine any definite line of separation between them. I also showed
-that the form of each weapon was determined by the form of the stem or
-branch of the tree out of which it was made, the outline of all these
-implements conforming to the grain of the wood; and the inference which
-I drew from this was, that it showed a very low state of intellect on
-the part of the constructors, the several classes of implements not
-having been designed originally for their respective purposes, but
-produced accidentally, and then applied during subsequent ages to the
-several uses to which in practice they appeared most suited.
-
-As we have no reason to suppose that the Australian continent was
-peopled at a later date than other parts of the world, and as there
-is no evidence upon that continent of the people inhabiting it having
-ever been in a higher state of civilization than they are at present,
-we have grounds for supposing that they must have remained stationary,
-or have progressed very slowly, while the inhabitants of other parts
-of the globe advanced more rapidly, and that their existing arts
-and implements, simple and primitive though they be, nevertheless
-represent the highest development of constructive power to which these
-people have ever attained. Hence it follows, that if the inhabitants
-of any other portions of the globe can be traced to a common origin
-with the Australians, viewing the persistency of type observable as a
-characteristic of the arts of these people, and of all other people
-in a primitive state of culture, we must expect to find some traces
-of similar implements in use amongst all such people to whom a common
-origin can be assigned.
-
-In my last lecture I mentioned that there were three countries in
-which the boomerang is either still used, or is known to have been
-used in ancient times, viz. Australia, the Deccan of India, and Egypt,
-and I also showed some grounds for believing that the same weapon,
-or something allied to it, may have spread from those countries over
-Europe, as it is known to have done over a great part of Northern and
-Central Africa.
-
-Although the comparison of weapons from various parts of the globe
-can have no other object than to trace out an original connexion,
-I did not venture to build upon the coincidence of this weapon in
-these regions, any argument for the common origin of the people by
-whom it was used. Nor do I think that I should have been justified
-in assuming such origin upon the grounds of the identity of a single
-weapon. Such identity may have arisen in three ways:--(1) it may have
-arisen independently by the spontaneous development of like weapons
-under similar conditions of life; (2) the weapon itself may have been
-communicated from some primal source; (3) the races using it may have
-been themselves derived from a common origin. Of these, the first
-view, viz. the independent origin of the weapon, would perhaps strike
-any one at first sight, before having studied the conservatism and
-persistency of type which is so especially characteristic of savages,
-as the most probable; it appears so exceedingly simple in its form and
-uses to our trained and educated minds, that it seems hardly necessary
-to account for it in any other way; besides which, there are slight
-differences between the Indian and Australian boomerangs, which have
-been considered by some to distinguish the two weapons.
-
-I will not here revert to the arguments which I have used to combat
-this opinion. Suffice to say, that I have since been favoured with
-much valuable information on the subject by Sir Walter Elliot, who
-has frequently accompanied the natives of India in their hunting
-expeditions with this weapon. He says that it is formed on the grain
-of the wood, like the Australian boomerang, the curve varying with the
-bend of the stem; it is whirled horizontally, with the end foremost,
-like the Australian practice, and is used by two tribes in the Deccan,
-viz. the Kolis of Guzerat and the Marawars of Madura, but more
-especially in its simplest form by the former, who are of the Dravidian
-or black race of the Deccan. In a letter to me he says, speaking of
-these tribes:--'I have seen both, and, indeed, served ten years in the
-latter district (Southern Mahratta), where the crooked stick is used
-by all the lower orders every Sunday during the hot season, when all
-agricultural labour is at a stand. The villagers turn out in large
-numbers, and scour the jungle armed with these sticks. Everything that
-rises is knocked over; deer, hares, birds, even the wild hog and the
-tiger are occasionally (though rarely, of course) included in the bag.
-I have seen a line of upwards of 100 men and boys, and the boomerang
-whirling about in such numbers, and with such precision, that even
-birds on the wing are brought down. I never met with any regularly
-formed specimens, except in the South; those in the North were mere
-angular sticks, of very various form, as natural branches occurred; the
-favourite form was a rather obtuse angle--nearly a right angle.' Thus,
-whether we regard the purposes for which it is used, the material of
-which it is constructed, the manner of throwing, or the varieties of
-its form, the Indian and Australian boomerang is virtually the same
-weapon; and I think those who dispute their identity appear rather to
-have had in view the 'collery stick' of Madras and of the Marawars than
-the boomerang of the Kolis.
-
-We may therefore, I think, fairly consider the causes which may have
-led to the adoption of this weapon as sprung from a common source.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XVII.]
-
-Since my last communication to this Institution, Professor Huxley has
-given to the world, in a paper read at the meeting of the International
-Congress of Prehistoric Archaeology--of which I had the honour to be
-general secretary--in August, 1868, his views 'on the distribution of
-the races of mankind, as bearing on their antiquity'.[185] The paper
-created a considerable sensation in the scientific world, owing to the
-boldness of the generalizations contained in it, and, it may be added,
-a certain amount of opposition. The accompanying map (Plate XVII) is
-taken from one drawn by Professor Huxley himself for the Ethnological
-Society, to illustrate this subject (_Journ. Ethno. Soc._ (1870) N. S.
-ii. 404-12).
-
-Basing his distribution of the human race on the principle that the
-characters of the hair and complexion are more permanent, and of
-greater value as a means of classification, than the bony structure
-of man, Professor Huxley traces back the numerous varieties of tribes
-and races into what, for the present, may be regarded as four primary
-groups.
-
-Commencing, for the convenience of my present subject, with the
-highest, or those which have shown themselves most capable of
-development--which, in all probability, is the wrong end of the scale
-to begin with, if we regarded them in their natural succession--the
-first of these groups is what he terms Xanthochroid type (the
-distribution of which is marked [shading] in the map), a people
-characterized by yellow hair and fair complexions, with blue eyes, who
-form a strong element in the composition of the population of this
-country and a great part of Europe, extending from thence through
-Scandinavia and Central Europe eastward into Northern India. Next to
-these he classes the great Mongoloid race (marked by various shades
-of [shading] on the map), with yellow-brown complexions and black
-hair and eyes, of which the Kalmucs and Tartars represent the purest
-types, occupying the whole of Northern Europe and Asia, from Lapland
-to Behring Strait, and down to the southernmost parts of China;
-including also the Esquimaux, the Polynesians, and the whole of the
-inhabitants of the two continents of America. Thirdly, the Negro race
-(marked [shading] and [shading] in the map), long headed, with woolly
-hair, which has its head quarters in all that part of Africa south of
-the Sahara, but has outlying branches widely detached, and occupying
-a broken line of islands extending in a belt, from the Andaman Isles
-in the Bay of Bengal, to the peninsula of Malacca, New Guinea, New
-Caledonia, and the adjoining isles, and having its southmost limits in
-the distant island of Tasmania. Lastly, we come to the Australioid race
-(marked [shading]), distinguished by dark chocolate complexions and
-black eyes, with long heads and soft wavy hair; these the Professor,
-upon physiological grounds, and after intimate acquaintance with these
-people in the distant regions in which they are found, traces in
-three distinct portions of the globe, viz. Australia, the Deccan of
-India, and Egypt; the three identical countries, it will be observed,
-in which, unconscious of Professor Huxley's distribution of races, I
-had traced the occurrence of the boomerang. I think, therefore, it is
-not an unreasonable conjecture, assuming the correctness of Professor
-Huxley's premises, that this peculiar weapon may be a relic of the
-original Australioid stock, which having been originally an effective
-weapon for all purposes amongst the aborigines of this race, and
-continuing still to be used as such in Australia, survived in India
-and in ancient Egypt merely as an implement for the chase and for
-amusement, much in the same way that, in Europe, bows and arrows have
-survived amongst children to the present day.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XIX.]
-
-In the remarks which I made (p. 127) upon the varieties of the African
-boomerang, I drew attention to the peculiarly curved form of the Nubian
-and Abyssinian sword, and I ventured an opinion that its form may have
-been originally derived from that of the boomerang, of which weapon a
-variety, constructed of wood, is still in use by the inhabitants of
-the country; and I see no reason to doubt that the Abyssinian sword
-may have been the prototype of those numerous allied forms of iron
-weapons, the 'hunga-munga', &c., which throughout Africa are still used
-as missiles, and thrown with a rotatory motion like the boomerang. My
-conjecture on this subject appears to receive some confirmation from
-the very peculiar construction of one of these swords, which has lately
-been added to the museum of this Institution, and which is represented
-in Plate XIX, figure 1. The angular form of the blade, swelling in the
-middle, presents such a close affinity to the Australian boomerang, as
-to strike even those who have not been led, by the considerations I
-have mentioned, to look for a coincidence in these weapons. I noticed
-at the same time the very great resemblance between the rudimentary
-shields of the Australians and those of some of the inhabitants of the
-valley of the Upper Nile, which may also perhaps be accounted for in
-the same way. With a view of further connecting this primitive form
-of shield with similar defensive weapons in India, it is worthy of
-notice that the hand-shield, having antelopes' horns projecting from
-it, a representation of which was given in my first lecture, Plate X,
-figs. 66, 67_a_, and 69 (many of which are furnished with a small iron
-shield, or guard for the hand, though some are without this accessory),
-is used--Sir Walter Elliot now informs me--precisely in the same way
-as the Australian and African parrying-shields, viz. by catching the
-arrows and darts of the assailant, and parrying them off with the
-horns, thus favouring the conjecture that I ventured to put forward,
-that the square, oblong, and circular targets are defensive weapons of
-comparatively recent origin, being represented in a primitive stage of
-culture by a simple parrying-stick, derived originally from the club.
-The club is, as a general rule, the only defensive guard employed by
-races in the lowest stages of culture. These seem to have been replaced
-by parrying-sticks, held in the centre, and subsequently hollowed to
-receive the hand, or furnished with hand-guards, forming rudimentary
-shields; of which stage in the development of the weapon we are now
-able to establish connected traces in the three countries under
-consideration.
-
-If the comparisons which I have made, and the conclusions I have
-ventured to draw from them, are found to stand the test of further
-investigation, as it appears to me reasonable to hope they will, the
-importance of studying the forms and uses of these primitive weapons in
-connexion with other sociological and biological phenomena, as a means
-of tracing back the early history of mankind, will be well established.
-Of this, however, we may feel certain, that if a connexion formerly
-existed between the inhabitants of India, Australia, and Egypt, the
-evidence of such connexion will not be limited either to the colour
-of the hair and skin, or to the resemblance of their weapons, but
-will be found in other customs and institutions which they brought
-with them from their fatherland. The important generalizations of
-Professor Huxley, whether or not they ultimately hold good, have had
-the good effect of drawing attention to a comparison of the inhabitants
-of these countries; and though it would be foreign to my present
-purpose to anticipate the result of these investigations in other
-branches not immediately connected with my present subject, I may
-mention that officers acquainted with India and Australia have since
-pointed out resemblances in the hymeneal and other customs of those
-countries, which have not before been noticed, but which, when put
-together and compared, making all due allowance for the variations
-which are inevitable in the continuous development of all human arts
-and institutions, will, I doubt not, tend to give confirmation to the
-theory of races which the author of it has so ably advanced.
-
-Having strayed thus far into the geological and biological aspect of
-the question, it is necessary to go a step further in order to apply
-the subject more generally to the origin of weapons, and at the same
-time to point out some difficulties which stand in the way of accepting
-this theory of races--difficulties of which Professor Huxley himself
-appears by his paper to be fully sensible.
-
-The detached portions of the Australioid race are separated from each
-other by seas of considerable depth, and the same thing applies to the
-Negroid race. The Australians, he points out, though possessing ample
-materials for the construction of canoes, have never learnt to make
-any that are capable of traversing the great seas which separate them
-from their apparent kindred in other lands, and it is unlikely they
-should have forgotten the art of navigation if they had once known it.
-It is inconceivable, therefore, that they should have migrated from
-Australia to the Deccan, and to Egypt, during the existing geographical
-arrangement of sea and land, more especially as no trace of such
-migration is found upon intervening isles. He points out, however, that
-great geographical changes have probably taken place, and that those
-changes, in so far as our knowledge of them goes, are of a nature to
-account for the phenomena observed.
-
-The region of the negro race in Africa is separated from Northern
-Africa and from Europe by the desert of Sahara, of which there is
-geological evidence to show that it was sea at a recent geological
-period. The same applies to the Deccan of India, which is separated
-from the Himalaya by the great alluvial plains of the Indus and the
-Ganges, which, having probably formed a strait before the miocene
-epoch, may have divided the black men inhabiting the Deccan from the
-Xanthochroid and Mongoloid races to the north. At the same time large
-tracts now occupied by the sea may then have been land, uniting or
-connecting by a chain of easily accessible islands the regions in which
-men of the same colour and physical peculiarities are now found. But it
-will be seen by the map that the lines of distribution of two of the
-races, the Negroid and the Australioid, cross each other, and this,
-according to the theory of migration by land, appears to involve a
-succession of submersions and upheavals during the human period, which
-it is difficult to account for.
-
-The distribution of races, according to supposed original distinctions
-of colour and complexion, will be seized upon by polygenists as an
-argument in their favour; for it will be said that, according to this
-theory, the distinctions of race in the earliest times must have been
-as great, or greater, than they are at present.
-
-There are three ways in which it has been attempted to account for
-these early distinctions of colour and persistency of type--(1) by
-supposing the several races of man to have been separately created
-upon distinct continents of land; (2) by assuming that on each
-primaeval continent, man was evolved from the anthropoid apes of that
-continent;[186] or (3), by supposing that these divisions of race,
-remotely and immeasurably distant though they be, nevertheless carry us
-only a short way back into the history of man, and that still earlier
-ages, if we could penetrate them, would show the races of man united.
-
-Now, with respect to the first assumption, that of creation, though
-we are not, of course, in a position to deny the possibility of it,
-I confess it appears to me unwarranted by any of the phenomena of
-nature. We have no knowledge of the special creation of any organized
-being; and how can we scientifically assume as probable, that, for the
-probability of which there is no sort of evidence of a nature that
-inductive science would be warranted in building upon? Continuity and
-development are seen to be the order of the universe. Man is seen to
-be, both mentally and physically, amenable to that law; and on what
-grounds can we assume that he was ever an exception to it? I cannot
-conceive how those who believe geological changes to have been brought
-about by causes which are still in operation in our own day, and who
-make great calls upon time in order to reconcile those causes to the
-phenomena observed, can, in treating biological phenomena, advocate
-belief in so great a break in the observed order of the universe as is
-implied by the special creation of man. Still less willing am I, in
-the absence of more cogent argument than has ever yet been advanced
-in support of it, to assent to hypotheses of the separate development
-of races, which appears to me equally at variance with nature. There
-can be no doubt that all the existing races of man, whatever their
-colour and physical peculiarities, have greater affinity to each other
-than any of them have to the apes, or to any other class of animals.
-The tendency of progress is from simplicity to complexity, from unity
-to diversity, and it would be a complete inversion of the order of
-nature that animals so various as the apes should independently
-produce animals so much resembling each other as the races of man.
-The recognized law that, with certain variations, like begets like,
-appears to me to negative this assumption as fully as it would do
-the notion, if it were put forward, that because the horse and some
-other classes of the mammalia, say the rhinoceros, for instance, have
-some affinities in their bony structure, therefore the black horse is
-descended from the African rhinoceros, and the white horse from that
-of India. Moreover, all the races of mankind interbreed, and I am at a
-loss to understand how a circumstance like this, which throughout the
-animal kingdom is regarded as a proof of unity of species, should be
-discarded in its application to humanity. If, then, it is true that
-diversity of colour is as old as the very earliest traces of man, and
-there is evidence that the several coloured races were inhabitants of
-distinct continents, which have disappeared through geological changes
-dispersing and mixing the races, blending the colours and obliterating
-the traces of their formerly isolated homes; then to the same causes,
-which produced the mixing and the blending, we must also attribute the
-original separation. According to the view I hold, we must ask for more
-time, and still further geological changes, to bring them together
-again in the primaeval cradle of the human race.
-
-Now, to apply this reasoning to the origin of weapons. The only
-vestiges of the primaeval tools of mankind now left to us are those
-constructed of stone; others of the more perishable materials have
-decayed, and their representatives only have remained in some few
-cases as survivals. In my last lecture I showed how uniform in shape
-and in development these stone implements are found to be in all parts
-of the world, whether derived from the northern or southern continent
-of America, from Siberia, Australia, India, Africa, or the surface
-soils and river gravels of Europe. This uniformity of shape has been
-used as an argument that mankind must have independently designed the
-same forms of tools in various parts of the world, and that under
-like conditions, like forms will be produced by men, however remotely
-separated. I am not prepared to deny the possibility of some of these
-forms having had an independent origin; but if the proof of it is to be
-based upon the separation of continents, we see how entirely groundless
-such an argument is when applied to the earliest ages of humanity. For
-if, as has been conjectured, the races of man may have been dispersed
-by geographical changes of land and sea, it is obvious they may have
-carried with them, from some primal source, the art of manufacturing
-stone weapons; the resemblance of which is far more satisfactorily
-accounted for by this means[187] than by supposing such singular and
-invariable coincidence in design to be the result of independent
-discovery. As we contemplate man in his lower and lowest conditions,
-we find the imitative faculty stands out more and more prominently by
-the absence of those higher qualities which characterize civilized
-races; and whatever power of originality for the invention of new arts
-may have been possessed by the earliest inhabitants of the globe, its
-results appear to have been spread over so vast a lapse of time that it
-can scarcely be accounted at all as an element in the mental attributes
-of primaeval man.
-
-I now pass to what has been announced as the subject proper of my
-present communication, viz. the origin and development of metal tools.
-I use the word _metal_ intentionally, in preference to specifying
-bronze, because, although we have good reason for supposing that in
-Europe, Egypt, Assyria, and the central parts of America, bronze
-preceded iron as a material for weapons, it is not so certain that this
-was the case in all parts of Asia; and in Africa we know that iron was
-the first metal employed by the negroes.
-
-Perhaps no subject has given rise to so much difference of opinion
-amongst archaeologists as this question of the origin of metal
-implements, or has been accompanied with such uncertain results,
-owing to the great mass of conflicting evidence to be dealt with,
-and the great doubt which rests upon much of it, whether in regard
-to the casual mention of the subject in ancient authors, or to the
-often ill-directed researches of modern times. It would be hopeless,
-in the brief time allotted me on the present occasion, to attempt
-to throw fresh light on this intricate subject, even if I possessed
-the materials for so doing. All I shall endeavour to do is, to put
-together, in as intelligible a form as possible, some of the more
-salient points upon which archaeologists are divided, and trace the
-continuity observable in passing from the stone to the metal age.
-
-We have already seen, in speaking of the implements of the stone age,
-a gradual improvement in form and fabrication, developing itself in
-proportion as the wild animals which were contemporaneous with the
-first traces of man in Europe became extinct, partly, no doubt, through
-the efforts of man himself in exterminating them, and partly, as
-there seems reason to suppose, owing to an alteration of temperature,
-rendering the climate unsuited to the constitution and habits of
-those animals, which therefore migrated by degrees, and the majority
-of which are now found chiefly, though not exclusively, in arctic
-regions. Thither they have been accompanied by races of men whose
-arts and implements show them to be very nearly in a corresponding
-stage of civilization to the early races, the relics of which are
-found associated with the same animals in Europe. The simultaneous
-migration of races of men in the hunting stage of civilization, with
-the animals, the pursuit of which forms the almost sole occupation of
-their lives, is well shown in the case of the North American Indians,
-whose geographical distribution is now almost identical with that of
-the buffalo. This forms a strong point in the arguments of those who
-are disposed to attribute all the changes in the world's civilization
-to the influx and extermination of antagonistic races. But it must
-be remembered that progress advances in an increasing ratio, and the
-phenomenon now seen in America and Australia of a highly civilized
-race constantly fed by steam-communication from the Old World, driving
-before it and rapidly exterminating other races so vastly its inferior
-as the Australians and American Indians, is one which could have had no
-parallel at the early period of which I am now speaking. We must here
-look for a slower process, though doubtless the operating causes may,
-to a great extent, have been the same.
-
-The fabrication of stone implements would of itself lead by degrees
-to a knowledge of the metals which are contained in stones. Thus, for
-example, I have here a specimen of a stone mace-head from Central
-America, figure 2, Plate XIX, composed of a nodule of haematite
-partially coated with micaceous iron ore, the particles of which are
-distinctly visible on its glittering surface. The weight of this
-implement, being nearly double that of a mace-head composed of ordinary
-stone, would at once attract the notice of the savage fabricator, and
-lead him to investigate the uses of metal.
-
-But, as a general rule, races engaged exclusively in hunting, who
-rarely turn their attention to the ground except to examine a trail
-or to search for water, would have little opportunity of profiting by
-the mineral wealth of the soil over which they roamed. Witness the
-Australians, who have continued for ages in ignorance of the gold and
-other mines which are now so attractive to Europeans; or the North and
-South American Indians, and the Esquimaux, amongst whom the art of
-smelting metal has never been found associated with those races who are
-in a purely hunting stage of existence; the wrought metals used by such
-races to point their weapons being invariably derived from civilized
-sources.
-
-From hunting wild animals, the savage, in the natural sequence of
-progress, would turn his attention to their capture and domestication,
-and thus he creeps gradually into the pastoral life; and as the bones
-of animals under domestication, through want of exercise and good
-living, become smoother and of finer texture, the experienced anatomist
-is thereby afforded the means of distinguishing, amongst the vestiges
-of antiquity, the remains of domesticated animals from those derived
-from the chase, and of observing to what extent the domestication
-of animals was contemporaneous with other changes in the social
-condition of the people.[188] Still, however, in the pastoral state,
-the barbarian is not necessarily brought in contact with metals; and
-hence we should expect in many cases to find the traces of domesticated
-animals associated with people who are still in the stone age. This was
-notably the case amongst the ancient inhabitants of the Swiss lakes,
-where the sheep and horse have been found at Moosseedorf, and other
-lake habitations which are proved to belong to the stone age, though
-not in such abundance as in the settlements belonging to the bronze
-age.[189]
-
-From the pastoral life, the barbarian, hampered by his flocks and
-herds, and no longer obliged to wander in search of food, settles down
-to a more stationary life, and by degrees takes to agriculture. Then,
-for the first time, he digs into the soil, and becomes acquainted
-with its mineral treasures. It has been proved by the discovery of
-quantities of carbonized grains of wheat, lumped together, in the Swiss
-lake-habitations of the stone age, together with the materials for
-preparing it for food, that a knowledge of agriculture preceded the
-general employment of bronze in that region,[190] whilst in Britain,
-and in Denmark also, bronze is almost invariably associated with
-evidence of domestication and agriculture.
-
-The metals first employed would be those that are most attractive.
-Copper, in Europe, from the bright colour of its ores, would be noticed
-more readily than iron, which is often scarcely distinguishable from
-the soil, and requires greater temperature and more skilled labour to
-render it available than could be expected of a people emerging out
-of the savage state. It is not, therefore, surprising that in Europe,
-copper first, and subsequently its alloy, bronze, should have been
-employed before iron as a material for weapons. But in those countries
-where iron is found upon the surface in an attractive form, and in a
-condition to be easily wrought, we must for the same reason suppose
-that it would be used instead of copper in the earliest ages of
-metallurgy.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XVIII.
-
-DEVELOPMENT OF FORM IN CELTS OF COPPER, BRONZE AND IRON.]
-
-It is natural to suppose that, in the ordinary course of development,
-an age of pure copper must have intervened between the ages of stone
-and bronze. But implements of pure copper are comparatively rare,
-bronze being the metal almost invariably found following immediately
-upon the age of stone.[191] Notwithstanding the comparative rarity of
-copper tools, however, there is reason to believe that this metal was
-used in a pure state before the discovery of the alloy. According
-to Professor Max Mueller, copper was the metal spoken of by Hesiod
-and Homer as the material generally employed for weapons in their
-time.[192] Mr. Rawlinson, in his _Five Ancient Monarchies_, says that
-the metallurgy of the early Chaldeans was of a very rude character,
-indicating a nation but just emerging from an almost barbaric
-simplicity, and that copper often occurs pure.[193] Copper implements,
-of a very early form, beaten into shape, occur not unfrequently in
-Ireland, as may be seen by specimens represented in Class A, Plate
-XVIII. They have also been found in Mecklenburg and in Denmark, and
-Klemm[194] says that they occur in Greece, Italy, Spain, Egypt, and
-Hindustan. At Maurach, in Switzerland, a copper celt was found in a
-lake dwelling, which Dr. Keller, notwithstanding this circumstance,
-attributes to the stone age.[195] In the lake dwelling of Peschiera,
-on the lake of Garda, several copper implements were discovered,[196]
-and in certain localities in Hungary copper implements are said to
-be as plentiful as those of bronze.[197] An axe of pure copper was
-discovered in Ratho Bog, near Edinburgh, under 20 feet of stratified
-sand and clay, and Dr. Wilson mentions that others have been found in
-Scotland.[198] Copper implements occur in Peru, to prove that, in the
-central parts of America also, the manufacture of bronze was preceded
-by the use of copper in a pure state; and in the ancient mines of Lake
-Superior we have distinct evidence of a stage of early metallurgy in
-which copper was used simply as a malleable stone, and beaten out into
-the form of implements without the aid of any alloy or a knowledge of
-the process of casting.[199] (See Plate XIX, figures 3, 4, 5, and 6.)
-When it is considered that without the admixture of a small portion
-of alloy of zinc or tin, copper is very difficult to melt, and can
-only be used by a laborious process of beating into form, and also
-what a great superiority bronze has over copper as a cutting material,
-whilst at the same time the process of fabrication is actually in some
-degree facilitated by the addition of tin, it is not surprising that
-on the first discovery of the advantages of this mixture, all the old
-implements of copper, wherever procurable, should have been taken to
-the melting-pot for conversion into bronze, and we should thus be left
-with such scanty evidence of the existence of an age of copper.
-
-Up to this point we meet with no difficulty in supposing that
-the use of metal may have been at first adopted by many nations
-independently, without intercourse one with another. But when we find
-in both hemispheres of the globe a very wide diffusion of weapons of
-bronze, consisting of a mixture of the same metals, which, though
-varying slightly in its proportions, as we shall afterwards see,
-is nevertheless, for the most part, constant in its adherence to a
-standard of about nine parts copper to one of tin in all parts of the
-world, the question arises whether the knowledge of this mixed metal
-could have been arrived at independently in different countries, or
-whether it must have been diffused all over the universe from a common
-source. It is true that copper and tin materials are sometimes found
-in the same locality, as, for instance, in Cornwall, the locality
-which, from the remotest time up to the present, has afforded the
-most plentiful supply of both metals perhaps in the world. We have
-evidence, also, that in ancient copper mines fire was employed by the
-miners for softening the metal and detaching it from the matrix,[200]
-and it is, therefore, highly probable that the admixture of the two
-metals occurring so close together, and a knowledge of the advantages
-accruing therefrom, may have been brought about accidentally in the
-process of mining.[201] But this connexion of the metals in a state
-of nature is not common, and in those countries, such as Denmark and
-Scandinavia, where bronze implements occur, and in which neither metal
-is found native, it is most improbable that the inhabitants should have
-discovered the merits of these particular ingredients, unless they had
-derived the knowledge of them from without.
-
-Hence we find archaeologists as much divided in their opinions upon
-what I may call the monogenesis or polygenesis of bronze, as biologists
-and anatomists are upon the monogenesis or polygenesis of the human
-race. The same question repeats itself again and again in dealing
-with the vestiges of the early history of man, and we may therefore
-divide the consideration of this question of the origin of bronze under
-pretty nearly the same heads to which I have adverted when speaking
-of the distribution of races, and of the age of stone (pp. 147-54).
-The questions to be considered may be numbered as follows:--(1) that
-bronze was spread from a common centre by an intruding and conquering
-race, or by the migration of tribes; (2) that the inhabitants of each
-separate region in which bronze is known to have been used discovered
-the art independently, and made their implements of it; (3) that the
-art was discovered, and the implements fabricated, on one spot, and
-the implements disseminated from that place by means of commerce; (4)
-that the art of making bronze was diffused from a common centre, but
-that the implements were constructed in the countries in which they are
-found.
-
-Amongst the advocates for the first hypothesis, viz. introduction by
-the intrusion of fresh races, are to be found chiefly the Scandinavian
-archaeologists, amongst whom may be especially mentioned Professors
-Worsaae, of Copenhagen[202], and Nilsson, of Stockholm. Both metals
-are foreign to the soil of Denmark, and must, therefore, have been
-imported. In the graves, bronze weapons are in Denmark invariably
-found with burials by cremation, while those of the stone age are
-by inhumation, the former being recognized, in an early stage of
-civilization, as a later process than burial by inhumation. Bronze is
-here markedly associated with traces of agriculture, the evidence
-of which is wanting in the stone age. The age of bronze, it is
-asserted by these antiquaries, was ushered in in Denmark by the
-employment of implements showing the highest perfection of art, and
-at a later period, when they are associated with weapons of iron,
-they are inferior in the quality of their workmanship. The weapons of
-bronze have remarkably small handles, denoting a smaller race, and
-hypothetically an eastern origin, small handles being to this day the
-characteristic of weapons from India. Some of the bronze spear-heads in
-Denmark have been found with nails driven into them, a practice which
-still exists in India, each nail denoting a victim; and in the Asiatic
-islands the custom of boring a hole in the weapon for each victim is
-found to the present time.[203] The peculiar ornamentation so often
-found on the bronze swords of Denmark, known as the spiral ornament,
-is said, though I think erroneously, to be of Phoenician origin. To
-these and other arguments for the introduction by intruding races,
-Professor Nilsson adds, that in the countries of the north, where
-bronze implements are found in greatest abundance, the graves in which
-they occur are usually situated in groups, proving that bronze was
-introduced, not by isolated individuals, merchants, or travellers, but
-by tribes or colonies more or less numerous, occupying especial tracts
-of country.
-
-The theory of race-origin is also not without its adherents in this
-country. Dr. Thurnam, who has excavated a large number of barrows in
-the south of England, divides them--as, indeed, they have been divided
-by former antiquaries--into several classes, amongst which we may
-chiefly distinguish two principal types, viz. the long and the round
-barrows. The former he attributes to the stone age, containing usually
-implements of that material, whilst implements of bronze are almost
-invariably found in the round barrows. He also gives it as the result
-of his researches, extending over some years of exploration--and Canon
-Greenwell, in so far as his experience of long barrows in the north
-of England goes, confirms the statement--that the long barrows are
-generally associated with dolichocephalic, or long skulls, whilst in
-the round barrows brachycephalic, or round skulls, are found, thus
-leading to the supposition that the long-headed people of the stone
-age who erected the long barrows may have been succeeded by another
-race with round heads importing bronze, and burying their dead in
-round barrows. But after having heard Dr. Thurnam's last papers
-on this subject, read before the Society of Antiquaries and other
-societies[204], I confess, although he has no doubt established a
-sequence, that he does not appear to me to have determined a clear
-line of separation between the two classes of interments; the long
-barrows pass by intermediate links into the round ones, and the long
-skull, although no doubt it may be considered characteristic of an
-earlier period, and therefore connected with an earlier form of
-barrow, also passes by gradations into the round skull, the variations
-of form being considerable. Then, with respect to the implements,
-although the absence of bronze in the long barrows of the earlier
-period appears to be determined, yet it is notorious to all those who
-have paid attention to the subject--and is not by any means denied
-by the learned antiquaries whose names I have mentioned--that the
-transition from stone to bronze in this country was gradual, and
-extended over a long period, flint weapons being found in nearly all
-the barrows of the bronze age in such positions as to show they were
-used contemporaneously by the same people; and from discoveries which
-have been made both by myself and others[205], there seems good reason
-to suppose that flint weapons continued to be used by some of the
-inhabitants of this country even during the Roman era. This distinction
-of long heads in long barrows, and round heads in round barrows, is
-one so easily remembered, that it is liable on this account, perhaps,
-to receive greater attention than it really deserves as a criterion
-of race. The difficulty of distinguishing in all cases the primary
-from the secondary interments in the barrows--it being an established
-fact that these barrows were used as places of burial by successive
-generations, and even perhaps by successive races, including also
-the Anglo-Saxons--the possible distortion of some of the crania by
-time and pressure, and the other facts of the case, as I believe I
-have correctly stated them, are, I think, sufficient to justify us in
-withholding for the present our entire acceptance of the theory of the
-introduction of bronze into this country by intruding races, as drawn
-from any evidence derived from the graves.
-
-From amongst those who have advocated the totally independent origin
-of bronze, the opinion of Professor Daniel Wilson may be selected,
-as affording a most ingenious argument derived from an analysis of
-the metals.[206] He quotes some experiments conducted by Dr. George
-Pearson, and communicated by him to the Royal Society of London
-in 1796, to ascertain the results of various proportions of the
-ingredients of tin and copper in bronze. 'Having fused these metals
-in various united proportions, commencing with 1 part of tin to 20
-parts of copper, which produced a dark-coloured bronze, he reduced
-the proportion gradually to 15 parts of copper to 1 of tin, when the
-colour was materially affected, and the red copper hue was no longer
-seen, but an alloy of greater strength was produced. The experiments
-were continued with 12, 10, 9, 8, and 7 parts of copper to 1 of
-tin, and when the last fusion of the metals was tested, increased
-hardness and brittleness of the metals became very apparent. The same
-characteristics were still more marked on successively reducing the
-proportions of copper to 6, 5, 4, and 3; and when alloy was made of 2
-parts of copper to 1 of tin, it was, according to Dr. Pearson's report,
-as brittle as glass.'
-
-From the result of these experiments we see that the best average
-proportions, of about 9 parts of copper to 1 of tin, would invariably
-show itself by a practical experience in the use of these ingredients,
-and it is therefore unnecessary to assume that these particular
-proportions, when found in the bronzes of different countries, must
-necessarily have been communicated.
-
-Dr. Wilson then proceeds to give the results of analyses of ancient
-bronzes discovered in Europe, America, and elsewhere, contained in the
-accompanying tables. And he concludes his observations on the subject
-as follows:--
-
-'From the varied results which so many independent analyses disclose,
-varying, as they do, from 79 to 94 per cent, of copper, or more than
-the total amount of the supposed constant ratio of tin, besides the
-variations in the nature, as well as the quantity of their ingredients'
-(a proportion of lead will be seen in some of the analyses of European
-bronzes, the small proportion of iron being probably accidental), 'it
-is abundantly obvious that no greater uniformity is traceable than
-such as might be expected to result from the experience of isolated
-and independent metallurgists, very partially acquainted with the
-chemical properties of the standard alloy, and guided for the most
-part by practical experience derived from successive results of their
-manufacture.' The comparison of the two tables here given, from
-Professor Wilson's work, also shows a smaller average amount of tin in
-the American bronze (Table I) than in that of ancient Europe (Table II).
-
-
-TABLE I.--ANALYSES OF ANCIENT AMERICAN BRONZES
-
- --------------------------+---------+-----------------+-------+-----+-----+
- Object. |Locality.| Observer. |Copper.| Tin.|Iron.|
- --------------------------+---------+-----------------+-------+-----+-----+
- 1 Chisel from Silver Mines|Cuzco |Humboldt |94.0 |6.0 | |
- 2 Chisel " " |Cuzco |Dr. J. H. Gibbon |92.385 |7.615| |
- 3 Knife " " |Atacama |J. H. Blake, Esq.|97.870 |2.130| |
- 4 Knife | | Ditto |96.0 |4.0 | |
- 5 Crowbar |Chili |Dr. T. C. Jackson|92.385 |7.615| |
- 6 Knife |Amaro |Dr. H. Croft |95.664 |3.965|0.371|
- 7 Perforated Axe | | Ditto |96.0 |4.0 | |
- 8 Personal Ornament |Truigilla|T. Ewbank, Esq. |95.440 |4.560| |
- 9 Bodkin from Female Grave| | Ditto |96.70 |3.30 | |
- --------------------------+---------+-----------------+-------+-----+-----+
-
-
-TABLE II.--ANALYSES OF ANCIENT EUROPEAN BRONZES
-
- ----------------+--------------+----------------+-------+-----+-----+-----
- Object. | Locality. | Observer. |Copper.|Tin. |Lead.|Iron.
- ----------------+--------------+----------------+-------+-----+-----+-----
- 1 Lituus |Lincolnshire |Dr. G. Pearson, | 88.0 |12.0 | |
- | | F.R.S., Phil. | | | |
- | | Trans. | | | |
- 2 Anglo-Roman | | Ditto ditto | 86.0 |14.0 | |
- Patellae | | | | | |
- 3 Spear-Head | | Ditto ditto | 86.0 |14.0 | |
- 4 Scabbard |Danish? | Ditto ditto | 90.0 |10.0 | |
- 5 Axe-Head |Ireland | Ditto ditto | 91.0 | 9.0 | |
- 6 Axe-Palstave |Cumberland | Ditto ditto | 91.0 | 9.0 | |
- 7 Axe-Head | | Ditto ditto | 88.0 |12.0 | |
- 8 Bronze Vessel|Cambridgeshire|Professor Clark,| 88.0 |12.0 | |
- | | M.D. | | | |
- 9 Sword |France |Mongez, Memoires| 87.47 |12.53| |
- | | de l'Institut | | | |
- 10 Caldron |Berwickshire |G. Wilson, M.D.,| 92.89 | 5.15| 1.78|
- | | Prehist. | | | |
- | | Ann. Scot. | | | |
- 11 Sword |Duddingstone | Ditto ditto | 88.51 | 9.30| 2.30|
- 12 Kettle |Berwickshire | Ditto ditto | 88.22 | 5.63| 5.88|
- 13 Axe-Head |Mid-Lothian | Ditto ditto | 88.5 |11.12| 0.78|
- 14 Caldron |Duddingstone | Ditto ditto | 84.8 | 7.19| 8.53|
- 15 Palstave |Fifeshire | Ditto ditto | 81.19 |18.31| 0.75|
- 16 Sword |Ireland |Professor Davy, | 88.63 | 8.54| 2.83|
- | | Prehist. | | | |
- | | Ann. Scot. | | | |
- 17 Sword | | Ditto ditto | 83.50 | 5.15| 8.35| 3.0
- 18 Sword |Thames |J. A. Phillips, | 89.69 | 9.58| | 0.33
- | | F.G.S., &c. | | | |
- 19 Sword |Ireland | Ditto | 85.62 |10.02| | 0.44
- 20 Celt | | Ditto | 90.68 | 7.43| 1.28|
- 21 Axe-Head | | | 90.18 | 9.81| |
- 22 Axe-Head | | Ditto | 89.33 | 9.19| | 0.33
- 23 Celt | | Ditto | 83.61 |10.79| 3.20| 0.58
- 24 Celt |King's County,|Dr. Donovan, | 85.23 |13.11| 1.14|
- | Ireland | Chem. Gazette | | | |
- 25 Drinking-Horn| | | 79.34 |10.87| 9.11|
- 26 Bronze Vessel|Ireland |Mr Gibbon, | 88.0 |12.0 | |
- | | U.S. Mint | | | |
- 27 Wedge | | Ditto | 94.0 | 5.9 | | 0.1
- ----------------+--------------+----------------+-------+-----+-----+-----
-
-This argument, however, is defective when taken to determine the
-question of the origin of bronze in favour of independent discovery,
-for we have already seen, in speaking of the stone age,--and I have
-endeavoured to show that it is a peculiarity observable in the works of
-all savage and barbarous races,--that being devoid of rule or measure,
-and having very imperfect means of securing adherence to a uniform
-standard, their productions are characterized by incessant variations,
-even in cases where the first idea is known to have been derived from
-a common source. The variations here shown to exist in the composition
-of bronze are no greater than are capable of being accounted for by
-the universal prevalence of a law of variation, resulting from many
-causes, and amongst others from want of precision, and carelessness,
-which is a defect common alike to all tyros in their art, whether
-ancient or modern. It is a fault we have many of us to complain of
-almost daily in our cooks. A batter pudding is composed of milk, flour,
-and eggs, in proper proportions, but a careless cook will constantly
-vary her proportions, and will fail in adjusting her quantities to
-the total amount; but we must not, on that account, assume that each
-cook has invented the art of making batter puddings independently.
-So, in like manner, it is quite consistent with the facts observed
-even in America, to suppose that the first knowledge of bronze, and of
-those many features in the civilization of the Mexicans and Peruvians
-which present such striking analogies to the civilization of Egypt,
-may have been originally communicated by some casual wanderer or some
-shipwrecked castaway from the then centres of Eastern culture (for the
-theory of geographical changes is, of course, out of the question when
-speaking of the origin of bronze), and that they have varied in their
-development on American soil no more than might naturally be expected
-from their introduction to an entirely new and partially civilized
-race. Such an assumption, though difficult to account for, and wanting
-in evidence, is more in accordance with the well-known traditions of
-the Mexicans and Peruvians, who attribute their civilization to the
-advent of a god; or with that of the natives of Nootka Sound, on the
-north-west, who state that an old man entered the bay, in a copper
-canoe, with paddles of copper, and that the Nootkans by that means
-acquired a knowledge of that metal.
-
-As illustrations of the modern metal-work of the natives of Nootka
-Sound and its neighbourhood, several examples are given in Plate
-XIX, figs. 7 to 11. Figures 7 and 8 represent two sides of an iron
-dagger in the Museum of the Royal United Service Institution. The
-ornamentation on the handle is that of the natives of the country, but
-the workmanship of the blade, which is ribbed on one side, appears
-to indicate foreign manufacture. Figures 9 and 10 are two sides of a
-copper dagger of the same form; this specimen is now in the Belfast
-Museum, in which it was deposited in the year 1843 by Mr. A. Thompson,
-who brought it from the north-west coast of America, and described it
-as having been fabricated by the Flathead Indians; it is undoubtedly
-of native workmanship; in both these weapons one side of the blade and
-handle is concave, the other convex, a form which appears to denote
-that it was originally taken from some similar weapon of bone or cane.
-The nearest approach to the form of this weapon in bone, that I am
-aware of, is that of the Indian 'kandjar', a figure of which was given
-in my first lecture on Primitive Warfare, Plate X, fig. 63. This weapon
-has also one concave and one convex side, derived from the natural
-curvature of the bone out of which it is made.
-
-But putting aside American civilization, which, it must be admitted,
-does in the existing state of our knowledge present great difficulties
-in the way of those who advocate the theory of a common origin for
-bronze, and turning our attention to the eastern hemisphere, we find
-the evidence on this point more satisfactory. We may observe, in
-the first place, that the area over which bronze has been used for
-implements appears, in so far as we have at present been able to trace
-it, to be continuous, extending over the greater part of Europe, Egypt,
-Assyria, and some parts of Siberia, India, and China, from which latter
-country some few bronze weapons have lately been added to the British
-Museum. Mr. Theobald, of the Geological Survey of India, also mentions
-in a paper read to the Bengal Asiatic Society,[207] that bronze axes
-are found in the valley of the Irrawaddy, where they are held in such
-veneration as rarely to be procurable; and Sir Walter Elliot has
-shown me some bronze implements which he found deep beneath the soil
-in cutting a canal in the valley of the Ganges. Bronze is wanting in
-Africa; in America, with the exception of Peru and Mexico; in the
-north of Sweden and Norway, and, I believe, in the greater part of
-the northern districts of Russia and Siberia, though with regard to
-Russian and Siberian bronzes, our information is still very deficient.
-And here I may observe that I speak only of bronze as applied to tools
-and weapons; its use for other purposes may have been introduced at
-any subsequent period of the world's history; but the presence of a
-bronze weapon implies either total ignorance, or at least an imperfect
-knowledge of the means of hardening the more useful metal for this
-purpose, iron.
-
-Those who wish for more detailed information as to the evidence upon
-which the succession of the stone, bronze, and iron ages has been
-determined, would do well to refer to Sir John Lubbock's remarks upon
-this subject in _Prehistoric Times_. It may, however, be useful to
-enumerate briefly some of the chief points which have been adduced
-in support of the opinion that the employment of these materials
-corresponds to successive stages in the development of civilization in
-Europe. (1) Not only do the Roman writers mention iron as being the
-metal used by them in their time, but they also speak of its employment
-by the barbarian nations of the north, with whom they came in contact,
-and the word 'ferrum', _iron_, was with the Romans synonymous with
-sword. (2) Although numerous finds of iron implements of the Roman
-period have been discovered in various parts of the world, there has
-been no authentic and undoubted instance of a weapon of bronze having
-been found associated with them, or with Roman pottery or coins. (3)
-Bronze implements are most abundant in Denmark and Ireland, countries
-which were never invaded by Roman armies, whilst they are exceedingly
-rare in Italy. (4) The ornamentation of the bronze implements is not
-Roman, but pre-Roman in character. (5) On the other hand, the numerous
-finds of bronze weapons which have been discovered have never been
-associated with iron, except in cases where the nature of the iron
-implements shows them to have belonged to a period of transition. (6)
-The pottery associated with bronze-finds is superior to that found
-with stone implements, but inferior to that of the iron age, and the
-potter's wheel was unknown during the stone and bronze ages. (7) Silver
-is found associated with iron, but rarely if ever with stone or bronze.
-(8) No coins or inscriptions of any kind have been found with bronze
-implements. (9) In the Swiss lakes, settlements associated with stone
-and bronze have been found near each other, as for instance Moosseedorf
-and Nidau, 15 miles apart; in the former, bronze is entirely absent;
-in the latter, it was used not only for articles of luxury, such as
-might denote a more wealthy class, but also for implements of common
-use, such as fish-hooks, pins, &c.; it is improbable that so marked
-a contrast in the civilization of two settlements so close to each
-other should have existed during the same period. (10) The implements
-and ornaments of the bronze-finds are more varied in form, showing
-an advance in art upon those appertaining to the stone age. (11) The
-bronze-finds are marked by an increase in the number of domesticated
-animals, and an entire absence of some of the wild animals of the
-earlier period, and they are also more clearly associated with traces
-of agriculture. (12) In the Danish peat bogs, successive strata are
-found overlying each other, denoting changes in the vegetation of the
-country; in the lowest and earliest are found the remains of pine
-trees, which now are foreign to the soil; above which are strata in
-which oak was the prevailing tree, and at the present time the oaks
-have been superseded by beeches. These successive strata correspond
-in a general way to successive stages in the civilization of the
-inhabitants; in the pine-bearing strata, implements of stone are found;
-with the oak trees, implements of bronze, and higher up, implements of
-iron. It has also been attempted to trace a somewhat similar succession
-of periods in the gravels and alluvium of the torrent of Tiniere,
-in Switzerland; but the evidence in this case is not considered so
-satisfactory as in that of the Danish peat bogs.
-
-In Chaldea, the transition from stone to bronze has been traced by
-the relics found in the soil; iron being then used only in small
-quantities, and chiefly for ornaments, as amongst the ancient Britons
-in the time of Caesar.[208] In Egypt, where both bronze and iron
-weapons have been found in the tombs, the transition from bronze to
-iron is marked by the colour of the weapons in the paintings, and
-dates, according to Sir Gardner Wilkinson, about B.C. 1400. Hesiod
-speaks of an age of copper, when the 'black iron did not exist'. Homer
-also alludes frequently to copper or bronze implements, and when iron
-is mentioned always speaks of it as requiring much time and labour to
-fabricate it. Then we have the well-known passage from Lucretius, so
-often quoted in reference to this subject, in which the three ages of
-stone, bronze, and iron are mentioned;[209] and Strabo mentions the
-Lusitanians as being armed partly with copper or bronze weapons.[210]
-
-Many other quotations might be given from ancient authors to prove that
-the existence of a bronze age preceding the use of iron was known to
-the ancients, but I will not occupy your time further with this part
-of the subject, seeing that others far more competent to deal with
-it than myself have failed to derive much information of value from
-this source. There is often considerable difficulty in determining
-the exact meaning of the writers, when speaking of the material of
-which weapons are composed, the same word being sometimes used to
-express copper, bronze, and iron. In fact it may, I think, safely be
-said that, notwithstanding the large amount of useful information that
-may be obtained from the study of the early writers, there is no more
-fruitful source of error than the attempt to apply ancient history and
-tradition to the elucidation of prehistoric events. Modern science, and
-our fuller appreciation of the value of evidence, have thrown far more
-light on prehistoric times than ever fell to the lot of the ancients;
-and it is for us, therefore, to correct their errors, and not to be
-misled by them.
-
-Professor Max Mueller, in the second series of his _Science of
-Language_, has, however, drawn some important conclusions on this
-subject, from the etymology of words representing metal, of which
-it may be useful here to give a brief abstract. Quoting Mr. E. B.
-Tylor's work on the Anahuac (p. 140), he says: 'The Mexicans called
-their own copper or bronze _tepuztli_, which is said to have meant
-originally _hatchet_; the same word is now used for iron, with which
-the Mexicans first became acquainted through their intercourse with
-the Spaniards. _Tepuztli_ then became a general name for metal, and
-when copper had to be distinguished from iron, the former was called
-red _tepuztli_, and the latter black _tepuztli_. The conclusion,'
-he says, 'which we may draw from this, viz. that Mexican was spoken
-before the introduction of iron into Mexico, is one of no great value,
-because we know it from other sources'; but applying the same line of
-reasoning to Greek, he says, 'here, too, _chalkos_, which at first
-meant copper, came afterwards to mean metal in general, and _chalkeus_,
-originally a copper-smith, occurs in the Odyssey (ix. 391) in the sense
-of a blacksmith, or worker of iron.' What does this prove? It proves
-that Greek was spoken before the introduction of iron. The name for
-copper is shared in common by Latin and the Teutonic languages, _aes_,
-Latin; _aiz_, Gothic; _er_, old high German; _erz_, modern German;
-_ar_, Anglo-Saxon; and the same word is represented in our English
-word _ore_. But the words specifically used for iron differ in each
-of the principal branches of the Aryan family. At the same time the
-words originally representing copper come to be used for metal in
-general, and in some cases for iron. In Sanskrit, _ayas_, which is
-the same word as _aes_, came to be used for iron, a distinction being
-made between dark _ayas_ or iron, and bright _ayas_ or copper. _AEs_ in
-Latin, and _aiz_ in Gothic, came to be used for metal in general, but
-was never used for iron. _Aiz_, however, according to Grimm, gave rise
-to the Gothic word _eisarn_, meaning iron. In old high German _eisarn_
-is changed into _isarn_, later to _isan_, and lastly to the modern
-_eisen_, while the Anglo-Saxon _isern_ is converted into _iren_, and
-ultimately to _iron_. The learned Professor sums up his researches on
-this subject as follows:--'We may conclude,' he says, 'that Sanskrit,
-Greek, Latin, and German were spoken before the discovery of iron, that
-each nation became acquainted with that most useful of all metals after
-the Aryan family was broken up, and that each of the Aryan languages
-coined its name for iron from its own resources, and marked it by its
-own national stamp, while it brought the names for gold, silver, and
-copper from the common treasury of their ancestral home'.[211]
-
-These remarks point to a very remote period, and to an Aryan origin for
-the first knowledge of copper and bronze, but on the other hand much
-has been written in favour of a Semitic origin, especially by Professor
-Nilsson, who believes that he has discovered traces of that people even
-on the coast of Norway.[212]
-
-The employment of war chariots, which are known to have been used by
-the Britons, and vestiges of which have been found in their graves,
-implies, it is said, Semitic influence. Much stress is also laid upon
-the resemblance of some of the ornaments found on the Danish and other
-bronzes to those in use by the Phoenicians; more especially the spiral
-ornaments, which Professor Nilsson traces to that source through the
-engravings on weapons in the bronze age tumuli. Against this, however,
-it may be urged that the spiral ornament has a very wide distribution,
-extending over modern Africa, ancient Egypt, Greece, China, New Guinea,
-Mexico, and South America, and even to New Zealand and the Asiatic
-Isles. In illustration of this I have arranged upon Plate XIX a series
-of illustrations of spiral ornament from various countries, showing
-how universally it is distributed over the globe. Fig. 12 is from a
-New Zealand canoe in my collection; Fig. 13, from a club brought from
-New Guinea by the commander of the 'Rattlesnake', in 1849, and now
-in my collection; Fig. 14, from China; Fig. 15, from ancient Egypt;
-Fig. 16, from Greece; Fig. 17, from a Danish bronze sword; Fig. 18,
-from an Irish bronze brooch in my collection; Fig. 19, from the Swiss
-lakes, figured in Dr. Keller's work; Fig. 20, an iron ornament in my
-collection from Central Africa; Fig. 21, an iron ornament on a club,
-from the Bight of Benin, West Africa, in the Christy Collection; Fig.
-22, an ornament on a wooden arrow-head, in the Christy Collection,
-probably from one of the Melanesian isles; Fig. 23, from Hallstatt;
-Fig. 24, a cane arrow-head from the Amazons, South America; Fig.
-25, a spindle-whirl from Mexico; Fig. 26, on a bronze shield from
-the Caucasus; Fig. 27, an ornament on a bracelet from Hindustan, in
-the British Museum; Fig. 28, an ornament carved upon the stones of
-New Grange, in Ireland; Fig. 29, from a New Zealand canoe. Compare
-the two last figures with Fig. 30, a stone weight in my collection,
-lately fished up on the coast of Kent, whilst dredging for whelks; the
-ornamentation so closely resembles the New Zealand pattern, and at
-the same time that of the stone carvings of the European tumuli, that
-considering the circumstance of its discovery, it is purely a matter
-for conjecture whether it is to be referred to the antiquities of
-this country, or has been dropped overboard by some vessel returning
-from our South Pacific colonies. We see from these examples that the
-spiral ornament cannot be regarded as belonging exclusively to any one
-race; it is a contrivance derived simply from the coil of string, the
-source from which, and also from straw plaiting, nearly all barbaric
-ornamentation had its origin; it is a proof merely of barbaric origin,
-an evidence of continuity from the earliest periods of art.
-
-Mr. Franks in his remarks at the Paris Meeting of the International
-Congress of Prehistoric Archaeology, has summarily disposed of the
-question of Phoenician ornamentation, by observing that the Phoenicians
-were copyists, taking their style from Egypt, Greece, or Rome,
-according to the fashion of the period, and that in point of fact a
-Phoenician style of art has never existed (_Compte Rendu, II^{me}
-Session_, Paris, 1868, p. 251).
-
-Amongst those who have upheld the theory of the origin of bronze from
-Phoenician sources, may be mentioned Mr. Howorth, in a paper lately
-published in the _Transactions of the Ethnological Society_ (1868,
-N.S., vol. vi. pp. 73-100); and Sir John Lubbock, though not committing
-himself to the same view as regards the origin of bronze, has
-nevertheless been at the pains of ably defending the ancient authors
-who speak of Phoenician intercourse with Britain from the attacks made
-upon them by Sir George Cornewall Lewis (_Prehistoric Times_, 1869, pp.
-59-69).
-
-This being the existing state of our knowledge in regard to the
-introduction of bronze, and the variety of opinion on the subject
-being, as we have seen, considerable, the task before us will be to
-ascertain as far as may be possible, from the implements themselves,
-the history of their origin, by examining carefully their construction
-in the various regions in which they occur, and by tracing the
-geographical distribution of those details of form which show evidence
-of connexion; thereby to determine, if possible, the sources from which
-they were derived. Whatever degree of veracity we may be disposed to
-attribute to early history, we must at least admit that the implements
-have this advantage over written testimony of any kind, that they
-cannot intentionally mislead us. If we draw wrong inferences from them,
-the fault is our own. We shall find the evidence very fragmentary as
-yet, but sufficient to prove that it affords a valuable source of
-information whenever sufficient materials are collected to enable us
-to work out the problem to its legitimate ends.
-
-On the present occasion I propose to confine my remarks to showing, by
-means of the accompanying table (Plate XVIII), the distribution of some
-of the commoner varieties of the copper and bronze celt, an instrument
-which, like its prototype in stone, appears to have been employed both
-as tool and as weapon for all the various purposes to which it was
-capable of being turned, and to have been used not merely as a hatchet
-and battle-axe, but also to have been sometimes hafted on the end of a
-straight handle, to be used as a spud or crowbar, and even perhaps, as
-some of the forms appear to indicate, as a spade in tilling the ground.
-
-The table is arranged upon the same plan as Plate XIII of my last
-lecture, and is intended to serve as a continuation of Plate XII of
-the same lecture, showing a further development of the same weapon.
-The successive developments are arranged, in order, by classes from
-left to right; the several localities are separated by horizontal
-dotted lines, by means of which are seen the various types prevalent in
-each locality, in so far as I have been able to obtain drawings from
-published sources; there can be no doubt, however, that the table is
-still very imperfect, and that considerable additions may be made to
-it hereafter. On the left, in Class A, will be found celts with convex
-surfaces, identical in form to those constructed of stone, the relative
-antiquity of which is shown by their being almost invariably of pure or
-nearly pure copper. It has been suggested that this form may have been
-adopted on account of its being more easily produced by beating the
-copper, and that its resemblance to the stone celts is not necessarily
-a proof of age; but there is no reason why Class B should not be as
-easily formed as Class A by this means, and many are so formed, as may
-be seen in the table. Moreover, Fig. 3 _a_ is a _bronze_ celt of the
-earlier form, taken from _Prehistoric Times_, and as this must have
-been cast in a mould, its peculiar shape can only be accounted for
-by supposing it to have been constructed in imitation of the stone
-celts. In passing from Class B, a gradual development of form may be
-traced, commencing with a slight stop or ridge across, and rudimentary
-flanges along the side of the shaft of the blade, developing in
-size and improving in form, no doubt, as the art of casting bronze
-became gradually perfected.[213] These stops and flanges are at first
-raised on the surface of the blade, but by degrees the same purpose
-is effected by sinking a groove in the blade to receive the handle,
-thereby economizing the metal, and producing a more symmetrical form;
-the flanges were at the same time bent over, and ultimately cast with
-a cavity on each side to receive the handle, and obviate the necessity
-for binding on the celt with thongs. This led by degrees to the
-ultimate perfection of the weapon, by the introduction of the socket
-type, which is associated with weapons of iron, and is sometimes itself
-constructed of that metal.
-
-The order of development here adopted is in the main that followed by
-Sir William Wilde, in his _Catalogue of the Museum of the Royal Irish
-Academy_, but I have omitted all mention of branch varieties, as they
-do not serve my purpose of illustrating the continuity of development,
-though they are valuable in showing the connexion between localities.
-
-Although the course of development appears to have followed the
-order here indicated, it is not unlikely the earlier forms may have
-continued in use, and may even have continued to be constructed at the
-same time as the later forms. The earlier and less complicated types,
-being easier of construction, and being equally serviceable for some
-purposes, would continue to be made, in the same way that smooth-bores
-and rifle-barrels, row-boats, sailing-vessels, and steam-packets,
-continue to be used simultaneously in our own time.
-
-The progress of development of this weapon will be better understood by
-a detailed reference to the figures.
-
-
-_Reference to the Figures in Plate XVIII._[214]
-
-COPPER, BRONZE, AND IRON CELTS.
-
-CLASS A.--Copper celts from various localities, having convex surfaces,
-in form resembling those of stone.--Figs. 1, 2, and 3, from Ireland,
-_in my collection_.--Fig. 3 _a_, a bronze celt of the same form, from
-Le Puy, France, _Prehistoric Times_, p. 27.--Fig. 4, copper celt
-found at Blengow, Mecklenberg-Schwerin Museum; _Horae Ferales_.--Fig.
-5, copper celt from the lake dwellings of Sipplingen, Switzerland,
-found embedded in a coating of clay (a mould?). See Keller, _The Lake
-Dwellings of Switzerland_, (transl. J. E. Lee, 1866), p. 121, Plate
-xxix.--Fig. 6, copper celt found in an Etruscan tomb, and now in the
-Berlin Museum. See _Catalogue of the Royal Irish Academy_, 'Bronze,'
-pp. 367, 395.
-
-CLASS B.--Copper and bronze celts from various localities, having flat
-concave sides, and a rectangular cross section, showing a gradual
-enlargement of the cutting edge.--Figs. 7 to 12, copper celts from
-Ireland, _in my collection_, showing a gradual enlargement of the
-cutting edge.--Figs. 13, 14, 15, ditto, _ditto_, of bronze, the
-sides more concave, and the cutting edge more expanded.--Fig. 16,
-bronze celt, of similar form, from Denmark (Madsen, _Afbildninger
-af Danske Oldsager og Mindesmaerker_, Copenhagen, 1872, Heft iii,
-Fig. 1).--Fig. 17, copper celt from Steinfurt, in the collection of
-Professor Dieffenbach, at Friedberg, Lindenschmit, _Die Alterthuemer
-unserer heidnischen Vorzeit_ (Mainz, 1864 ff.), Plate 3.--Fig. 18,
-ditto of copper, found near Mainz, Museum of Mainz, _Lindenschmit_,
-Plate 3.--Fig. 19, the same form of bronze, from near Mainz,
-_Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 20, the same form of bronze from Italy, _British
-Museum_.[215]--Figs. 21, 22, 23, the same form of copper from Hungary,
-_Keller_, p. 219, Plate lxviii.--Figs. 24, 25, 26, similar forms of
-bronze, with rectangular holes, from the Island of Thermia, Greek
-Archipelago, _British Museum_.
-
-CLASS C.--Bronze celts of the same outline as Class B, but having a
-cross ridge or stop on both faces, to prevent the blade from burying
-itself in the handle.--Figs. 27, 28, bronze celts from Ireland, _in my
-collection_; this form is common to the British Isles.
-
-CLASS D.[216]--Bronze celts, having four longitudinal ridges or
-flanges, one on each edge, but no cross stop. The flanges are for the
-purpose of fixing the blade in a bent handle; they exhibit a gradual
-development of the flange, and an expansion of the cutting edge, which
-latter takes a semicircular, and in some cases nearly a circular
-form.--Figs. 29, 30, from Ireland, _in my collection_, showing front
-view and section.--Fig. 31, from Versailles, _in my collection_, with
-section.--Fig. 32, from France; with side view; see _Materiaux pour
-l'Histoire de l'Homme_.--Fig. 33, from Loyette, Department of Isere,
-from _Horae Ferales_, front view.--Fig. 34, from the South of France,
-_British Museum_, the blade very circular.--Fig. 35, from Alps [Aps?],
-in Ardeche, _British Museum_, the circular form of the blade still
-more developed. This form appears peculiar to the neighbourhood of
-the Rhone, _Horae Ferales_.--Fig. 36, from France; with side view;
-_Materiaux_.--Fig. 37, from Denmark, _British Museum_, of copper; this
-form is rarely found in copper; with section.--Fig. 38, from Denmark,
-of bronze, from _Madsen_, Heft iii.--Fig. 39, from Denmark, with
-semicircular blade, _Madsen_, Heft iii.--Fig. 40, from Hessen, now in
-the collection at Hanover, _Lindenschmit_, Heft i, Taf. iii.--Fig. 41,
-from near Baltringen, _Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 42, from Neinheiligen, in
-Thuringia, _British Museum_; with section.--Fig. 43, from the Terramara
-Beds, Castione, Switzerland; with section; _Keller_, Plate lix.--Fig.
-44, from Unter Uhldingen; with section; _Keller_, Plate xxix.--Fig.
-45, from the Terramara Beds, Castione; with section; _Keller_, Plate
-lix.--Fig. 46, from the Terramara Beds, Castione; with section;
-_Keller_, Plate lix.--Fig. 47, from Hallstatt, in Austria, von Sacken,
-_Das Grabfeld von Hallstatt in Oberoesterreich und dessen Alterthuemer_
-(Vienna, 1868), Taf. vii; with side view.--Fig. 48, ditto, _ditto_,
-found with the body of a child.--Fig. 49, ditto, the shaft of bronze,
-and the blade of iron, from Hallstatt.--Fig. 50, the same form in iron,
-also from Hallstatt, _in Mr. John Evans' collection_.--Figs. 51 and
-52, similar forms, in bronze, from Italy, _British Museum_.--Fig. 53,
-the same form, from Telsch, Vilna, Russia, _British Museum_; with two
-sections.
-
-CLASS E.--Bronze celts having both the cross stop and the longitudinal
-flanges. In the earliest form, the cross stop and flanges are raised
-upon the faces of the blade, as in Class D. In the more improved form,
-the upper part of the shaft of the blade is hollowed so as to answer
-the same purpose and economize the metal. Figs. 54-8, from Ireland;
-Fig. 54, with rudimentary stop and flanges, _in my collection_. Figs.
-55 and 56, ditto, with rudimentary stop, the flanges more developed;
-_in my collection_. Fig. 57, showing a development of both stop and
-flange, ditto, _ditto_. Fig. 58, showing the stop and flange further
-developed, and the metal of the upper part of the blade slightly sunk,
-ditto, _ditto_. Fig. 59, a further development of the same, the metal
-of the upper part of the shaft of the blade reduced to a minimum.--Fig.
-60, the same form as Fig. 54, from Denmark, _Madsen_, Heft iii.--Fig.
-61, from near Mainz, _Lindenschmit_, Taf. iii.--Fig. 62, from the
-Museum at Wiesbaden, _Lindenschmit_, Taf. iii.--Fig. 63, from Altona,
-in Courland; this form has some affinity to Class G, but is introduced
-here on account of the expansion of the blade.--Figs. 64, 65, and 66,
-from Italy, _in the British Museum_, the metal of the shaft slightly
-sunk to produce a stop.--Fig. 67, from Fiesole, Italy, the metal part
-of the shaft further reduced.--Fig. 68, from Baron von Stackelberg's
-collection, _in the British Museum_, also described in Klemm,
-_Werkzeuge und Waffen_, p. 103, Fig. 180; said to be from Greece, but
-its close resemblance to those from Italy is remarkable.
-
-CLASS F.--The same form as Class E, but having the flanges bent by
-hammering over the stop; the flanges appear to have been cast upright,
-as in Class E, and to have been bent over the cleft handle after
-hafting; by this means the necessity for binding the blade on with
-thongs was obviated. This class forms a transition to the socket
-type.--Figs. 69, 70, 71, from Ireland, _in my collection_.--Fig.
-72, from the Royal Irish Academy collection, having a loop on the
-side. See _Catalogue R. I. A._, 'Bronze,' page 379. The introduction
-of the loop appears to be synchronous with the abandonment of the
-binding, the overlapping flanges answering that purpose by enclosing
-the bent portion of the handle, and requiring only that it should
-be fastened by the loop to prevent its falling off the end of the
-handle.--Fig. 73, from Denmark, _in my collection_.--Figs. 74, 75, from
-Denmark, _Madsen_, Heft iii.--Fig. 76, from the Museum at Hanover,
-_Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 77, from the Museum at Munich, _Lindenschmit_,
-Taf. iv.--Fig. 78, from Moeringen, Switzerland, _Keller_, Plate
-xli.--Fig. 79, from Nidau-Steinberg, Switzerland, _Keller_, Plate
-xxxv.--Fig. 80, from Hallstatt; _Von Sacken_.--Fig. 81, from Italy,
-_British Museum_.
-
-CLASS G.--The pocket type. The bent portion of the handle in this ease
-was retained in its place by pockets cast on each side of the shaft
-of the blade; it seems doubtful whether this, or Class F, is to be
-regarded as the nearest approach to the socket type. In Class F the
-overlapping was produced by hammering the metal; but Class G is a
-further advance in the casting process.--Figs. 82 and 83, from Ireland,
-_in my collection_; the latter with loop; the pockets or pouches to
-receive the points of the bent handle are shown in the sections.--Fig.
-84, from France; see _Materiaux pour l'Histoire de l'Homme_.--Fig. 85,
-found twelve leagues south of Oviedo, Spain, _in the collection of the
-Society of Antiquaries_.--Fig. 86, from Andalusia, Spain, _British
-Museum_.--Fig. 87, from Denmark, _Madsen_, Heft iii.--Fig. 88, from the
-collection at Munich, _Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 89, from the collection at
-Hanover, _Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 89 _a_, an iron celt of the same form,
-still in use by the Kalmucs, Siberia, _Prehistoric Times_, p. 26.
-
-CLASS H.--The socket type. In some of the specimens of Class G, as for
-example Figs. 82 and 83, the metal portion of the shaft of the blade
-dividing the two pouches is reduced to a minimum. The next step was
-to do away with it altogether and enlarge the sides of the pouches so
-as to form a single socket. By this means the bent handle no longer
-required to be cleft to receive the blade, but was inserted whole into
-the socket, producing greater firmness, each blow of the axe serving to
-fix it more securely to its handle. The loops, seen only occasionally
-on Classes F and G, are almost invariably present in Class H.--Figs.
-90, 91, 92, 93, 94. Socket celts of bronze, from Ireland and England,
-_in my collection_; the form with square sides is very uncommon in
-Ireland; in Fig. 92 a representation of the overlapping flange of
-Class F is cast on the surface of the socket.--Fig. 94_a_, a socket
-celt of wrought iron with loop, from Merionethshire, _British Museum_;
-_Archaeologia Cambrensis_, vol. i, third series, p. 250.--Figs. 95 and
-96, the same forms from France. See _Materiaux, &c._ The square-sided
-celt is common in the north of France.--Fig. 97, from Alemquez,
-Portugal; _Coll. Societe des Archit. Portugais_.--Fig. 98, from
-Denmark, _in my collection_.--Figs. 99, 100, Denmark, _Madsen_, Heft
-i.--Fig. 100 _a_, an iron socket celt, from the moss of Nydam, in
-Slesvik, of the iron period; Engelhardt, _Denmark in the Early Iron
-Age_ (1866), Pl. xv; believed, from the Roman coins found with it,
-to be of the third century A.D.[217]--Fig. 101, from the collection
-at Hanover, _Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 102, from the Museum at Mainz,
-_Lindenschmit_.--Fig. 103, socket celt of iron, from Golssen, _Klemm_,
-Fig. 195.--Fig. 104, socket celt of iron, from Thuringia, _Klemm_,
-Fig. 194.--Fig. 105, of bronze, from Unter Uhldingen, Switzerland;
-_Keller_, Pl. xxix.--Fig. 106, of iron, found near Marin, Switzerland,
-the socket formed by beating over the blade on one side only; the
-socket is not quite completed; see _Keller_, Pl. lxxi.--Fig. 107,
-the same form of iron, found near Marin; the socket is closed and
-completed all round, _Keller_, Pl. lxxi. These specimens in iron may
-be regarded as connecting links between Classes F and H. Viewing the
-occurrence of iron celts of this form, it appears not impossible
-that the introduction of the socket type and the sudden abolition of
-the central division may have been suggested by the use of the more
-malleable metal, by means of which the fabricator acquired the art of
-forming a socket by bending over the metal on one side; the inutility
-of the central division would thus become apparent.--Fig. 108, bronze
-socket celt with loop, from Hallstatt, _Von Sacken_.--Fig. 109, exactly
-the same form in iron, from Hallstatt; a portion of the wooden handle
-is still shown in this specimen.--Figs. 110 and 111, bronze socket
-celts, from Italy, of a variety peculiar to that country, _British
-Museum_.--Fig. 112, socket celt of copper, from Hungary, believed by
-the author to be the only known specimen of pure copper; _Keller_,
-Pl. lxxviii.--Fig. 113, bronze socket celt, from Hungary, _British
-Museum_.--Fig. 114, bronze socket celt, with two loops, from Kertch,
-_British Museum_.--Fig. 115, bronze socket celt, from the province of
-Viatka, Russia. See _Materiaux, &c._--Fig. 116, bronze socket celt with
-two loops, from the Ural, Russia.--Fig. 117, mode of hafting, Classes
-A, B, and C.--Fig. 118, mode of hafting, Classes D, E, F, and G.--Fig.
-119, mode of hafting, Class H.
-
-In a paper lately read to the Society of Antiquaries by Dr.
-Thurnam,[218] he has drawn attention to the fact that none but celts of
-the most primitive type, viz. those belonging to Classes B, C, D, and
-the most rudimentary form of Class E, have been found in the British
-tumuli. Scarcely a single instance of the more developed palstave or of
-the socketed celt has as yet been discovered; the only exceptions being
-a bronze socket celt found in a tumulus on Plumpton Plain, near Lewes,
-and a diminutive bronze socket celt found in a tumulus at Arras in the
-Yorkshire wolds. These Arras barrows are known, however, to belong to
-the iron age; having produced, amongst other articles composed of that
-metal, the iron tire of the wheel, and trappings of a war chariot. We
-learn from this that the discoveries in the tumuli confirm in point
-of time the order of development inferred from a consideration of the
-implements themselves.
-
- * * * * *
-
-From the foregoing detailed description of Plate XVIII we are enabled
-to draw the following conclusions, viz.:--(1) That in each of the
-divisions of Europe therein represented, traces of the development
-of the celt, from its simplest to its most complex form, have been
-discovered; the earliest forms being in imitation of those of stone,
-and being not unfrequently constructed of pure copper. Where some
-of the connecting links are wanting in the table there is reason to
-suppose the absence of those links may be the result of imperfect
-information, and does not necessarily imply a flaw in the continuity
-of development. (2) That, notwithstanding the simultaneous development
-which appears to have taken place in different countries, we may
-nevertheless observe slight differences in the details of construction,
-which are sufficient to give a distinctive character to the celts of
-each separate region. Thus, for instance, the celts from Ireland are,
-as a general rule, shorter and less elegant in form than those found on
-the Continent. Class C, consisting of stop celts without wings, though
-common in Great Britain and Ireland, is, so far as I have been able
-to ascertain, unknown on the Continent. On the other hand, Class D,
-having wings without stops, is rare in Ireland, but common in France,
-Denmark, Germany, and Switzerland. The development of this class of
-celt into a nearly circular edge, as represented in Figs. 34 and 35, is
-peculiar to the south of France, though traces of it are observable in
-the celts from Germany, Fig. 40. Class E, having both stop and flange,
-is found in a more rudimentary stage in Ireland than elsewhere. The
-palstaves of this form, having shoulders on the side of the blade, are
-peculiar to Italy and Switzerland, Figs. 66, 67, and 68. Class F, with
-overlapping wings, is but slightly developed in Ireland, but is fully
-so in Italy, Germany, and at Hallstatt. Class G, the double pocket
-variety, has its head quarters in the north-west of France, but is also
-known in Ireland, Denmark, Spain, and Germany; it is, in so far as I
-have been able to ascertain, unknown in Italy. Class H, the socket
-type, varies greatly in different countries; the square form, Figs. 93,
-94, 95, 96, 100, and 102, is exceedingly rare in Ireland, but common
-in France. The socket celts from Italy, Figs. 110 and 111, are of
-peculiar type, and evidently derive their form from the winged palstave
-of the same country, Fig. 67. Socket celts of iron have been found at
-Hallstatt, and in Switzerland, Denmark, Germany, and North Wales. The
-representation of the overlapping wings, cast on the surface of the
-socket celt, Figs. 92 and 101, is common in England and Germany, but
-exceedingly rare in Ireland. The double-looped socket celt, Figs. 97,
-114, and 116, appears to be especially characteristic of the Eastern
-provinces of Russia and Siberia, though found occasionally elsewhere.
-
-In attempting to account for the varieties, which I have described,
-in the details of construction, coupled with a general uniformity of
-design throughout the entire region of distribution of these weapons,
-we may, I think, draw an exact parallel between the development of
-bronze celts and the development of the forms of cannon between the
-fourteenth and the nineteenth centuries. From Europe to China we know
-that the form of cannon has developed upon the same plan. In the same
-way that the overlapping wings of the palstave were represented on the
-faces of the socket celt, so the rings of metal which bound together
-the bars of which the ancient bombard was composed, were represented
-on the surface of the cast bronze cannon which superseded it. In
-every country the general type of development of cannon has been the
-same, but the details of construction have varied in each. Even in
-our own time, the introduction of breech-loaders has been synchronous
-throughout Europe; but the French and English cannon are not perfectly
-identical. Now, the cause of this is sufficiently well known. There
-has been constant intercommunication between the several countries
-throughout the whole period of the development of this weapon. Each new
-improvement as it occurred has been communicated from one country to
-another, either by contact in war, or by peaceful intercourse; but each
-country has fabricated its own weapons, and has by that means contrived
-to give them a national character.
-
-[Illustration: PLATE XX.
-
-CELT MOULDS.]
-
-So in like manner we must assume that the development of the bronze
-celt extended over a long period of time; that each new improvement
-was communicated from tribe to tribe and from nation to nation; but
-that each country manufactured its own implements, and varied in
-the construction of them. The proof that this was the case is found
-in the circumstance that moulds for casting them have been found in
-different countries. Plate XX, Fig. 31, represents a stone mould found
-at Ballynahinch, Co. Down, Ireland, and figured in the _Catalogue
-of the Royal Irish Academy_; it is adapted for casting celts of the
-Class B. Fig. 32 is a stone mould for Class G, found at Montaigu,
-near Valoignes, Normandy, and is taken from a cast in the Museum of
-the Society of Antiquaries. Fig. 33, a stone mould for Class H, from
-Kilkenny, Ireland. Fig. 34, two halves of a bronze mould for Class
-E, from Morges, Switzerland, figured in Keller, Plate xxxix. Fig.
-35, two halves of a bronze mould for Class H, found in the Forest of
-Bricquebec, Normandy, in the Museum of the Society of Antiquaries.
-Fig. 36, one-half of a bronze mould for Class H, from England, figured
-in the _Catalogue of the Royal Irish Academy_, 'Bronze,' page 393.
-In the three last specimens it will be seen that the mode of fitting
-the two halves together, so as to prevent the escape of the metal,
-is by means of a ridge on one half, fitting into a groove in the
-other. It is improbable that a contrivance so identical as this should
-have arisen independently in the three countries. Further proof of
-connexion is shown by the identity of the ribs in the interior of the
-sockets of celts belonging to Class H. Figs. 37 and 38 represent
-sections of socket celts from Ireland, the former showing three, the
-latter one, longitudinal rib of raised metal running from the bottom
-of the socket for some distance up the side of the interior of the
-socket. Fig. 39 is the section of a socket celt from Denmark, in my
-collection, having one rib of the same kind. It has been suggested
-that these ribs represent the interstices between slices of the core,
-by means of which the socket was formed in casting; if so, the cores
-must have been constructed of some hard material, cut in slices, in
-order to facilitate their removal from the socket when formed. Several
-objections may, however, be urged against this; in the first place, no
-such cores have ever been discovered, which tends to the supposition
-that the cores must, in all probability, have been constructed of clay;
-in the second place, it will be seen by reference to Fig. 20 that this
-celt has only one central rib; if, therefore, the rib was formed by the
-metal pressing into the interstices between the slices of the core, it
-is evident that the core in this case had only two slices; but it will
-be seen that the aperture of the socket expands towards the bottom, and
-it would have been impossible, therefore, to extract the core if it
-were divided into only two parts.
-
-The theory of core slices must, therefore, be abandoned, and we are
-driven to the conclusion that the ribs must have been intentional,
-either to give strength to the celt, which is unlikely from the great
-thickness of the metal, or to form channels for the passage of the
-metal in casting, or, what is more probable, to serve the purpose
-of gripping the portion of the wooden handle which fitted into the
-socket, and preventing its shifting with the blows of the weapon. Fig.
-39 represents cross ribs at the bottom of the socket of a celt from
-Denmark, in my collection. Whatever may have been the purpose for which
-the ribs were formed, their identity in the implements of the two
-countries serves us as an additional proof of intercourse between them.
-
-Although moulds for casting celts have not been found in Denmark, there
-is evidence to show, from vestiges of scoriae that have been found,
-that they were there cast in clay, as indeed they must probably have
-been to a great extent in other parts of Europe.
-
-It would be premature to speculate upon the primary sources of
-the bronze civilization of Europe, until we have examined carefully the
-distribution of the other weapons belonging to that period. This much
-may, however, I think, be said with respect to the geographical region
-of bronze celts, that they belong more especially to the north and west
-of Europe; they have never been found in any of those countries which
-were occupied by the Phoenicians, nor have we any sufficient reason
-for believing that they were common in Greece. We have, therefore, no
-evidence whatever for supposing that the north of Europe derived the
-first idea of these weapons from either of those nations. We certainly
-have only negative evidence as yet for affirming that they did not,
-but the burden of proof must rest with those who have attributed
-them to the Phoenicians. To what extent they were employed in Russia
-and Northern Siberia, is a point which we have not as yet sufficient
-evidence to determine. I think, however, I am justified in saying that
-those hitherto discovered in Siberia are of a late type, belonging
-chiefly to the socket variety, and that they are there often associated
-with weapons of iron. I trust, however, to have an opportunity of
-entering more fully into this subject on a future occasion, when
-treating of the weapons of the later bronze and early iron periods of
-Europe.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[184] A Lecture delivered at the Royal United Service Institution on
-June 18, 1869, and published in the _Journal of the R. U. S. Inst._,
-vol. xiii (1869), pp. 509-539, pl. xxxi-xxxiii (= Plates XVII-XX
-herewith).
-
-[185] _Trans. Int. Congr. Preh. Arch. at Norwich_, 1868 (London, 1869),
-p. 92 ff.
-
-[186] _Lectures on Man, his Place in Creation, and in the History of
-the Earth_, by Dr. Carl Vogt. Edited by James Hunt, Ph.D. (London,
-1864), p. 466 ff.
-
-[187] The fact mentioned both by the Baron de Bonstetten and Dr.
-Keller, of celts of jade and nephrite having been found in Switzerland,
-materials which, according to the latest investigations [1869], are not
-found in the Alps, but must have been imported from the East, proves
-that intercommunication and barter must have been carried on between
-distant countries at the time when such weapons were used.--Baron
-de Bonstetten, _Recueil d'Antiquites Suisses_ (Berne, 1855), p. 12;
-Keller, _The Lake Dwellings of Switzerland_ (1866), pp. 56, 68 (cf.
-1878, pp. 72, 195, 205, 215).
-
-[188] _Prehistoric Times_, by Sir John Lubbock, Bart., F.R.S., London
-(1865), p. 147.
-
-[189] _Prehistoric Times_, by Sir John Lubbock, Bart., F.R.S. (1865),
-pp. 142-3; _Results of the Investigation of Animal Remains from
-the Lake Dwellings_, by Prof. Ruetimeyer; in _The Lake Dwellings of
-Switzerland_, by Dr. Ferdinand Keller, translated by J. E. Lee, F.S.A.,
-F.G.S., 1866, pp. 355-62 (1878, pp. 537-44).
-
-[190] _Moosseedorf_, Keller, l. c., p. 35; _Robenhausen_, Keller, l.
-c., p. 40.
-
-[191] (The first two sentences of this paragraph have been transposed,
-for clearness.--ED.)
-
-[192] Max Mueller, _Science of Language_, second series (London, 1864),
-p. 230.
-
-[193] Rawlinson, _The Five Great Monarchies of the Ancient Eastern
-World_ (1864), vol. i. p. 123.
-
-[194] Klemm, _Werkzeuge und Waffen_ (Sondershausen, 1858), p. 96.
-
-[195] Keller, l. c., p. 116: (1878, p. 121).
-
-[196] Keller, l. c., p. 221, pl. lxvii: (1878, p. 362, pl. cxix).
-
-[197] Keller, l. c., pp. 218, 219, pl. lxviii: (1878, pp. 362-3, pl.
-cxx. 1-28).
-
-[198] Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. p. 282.
-
-[199] Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_, vol. i. pp. 231-79; Squier and Davis
-in _Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge_, vol. i. pp. 196-203, figs.
-81, 82, 84, 87.4, 87.1, from which work the illustrations are taken.
-
-[200] Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_, vol. i. p. 253.
-
-[201] Since the above was written, Sir John Lubbock has published in an
-Appendix to his second edition of _Prehistoric Times_ (1869), p. 595,
-letters from Dr. Percy, and from Messrs. Jenkin and Lefeaux, highly
-experienced assayers, expressing their opinions upon the theory of
-M. Wibel, that the ancient bronze was obtained, not by the fusion of
-copper and tin, but directly from ore containing the two metals. They
-are unanimously of opinion that this could not have been the case, none
-of the ores containing naturally a mixture of the metals in proper
-proportions. Although the opinions of these gentlemen appear decisively
-to negative the possibility of ancient bronze having been habitually
-produced for commercial purposes in this manner, they do not appear to
-me to discredit the supposition that the first imperfect knowledge of
-the mixture may have been brought about accidentally in the manner I
-have described.
-
-[202] Worsaae, _The Primeval Antiquities of Denmark_ (London, 1849),
-pp. 24, 40-45.
-
-[203] The custom of making a mark upon the weapon for each victim
-slain, is one of very usual occurrence among savage people.
-
-[204] Thurnam, _Ancient British Barrows_ (1869), pp. 168, 198;
-_Archaeologia_, vol. xlii; 'On the Two Principal Forms of Ancient
-British and Gaulish Skulls,' _Mem. Anthrop. Soc. Lond._, i. 120
-ff., 459 ff. (1865); iii. 41 ff. (1870); Davis and Thurnam, _Crania
-Britannica_ (London, 1865).
-
-[205] 'On some Flint Implements found associated with Roman Remains in
-Oxfordshire and the Isle of Thanet,' by Col. A. Lane Fox, _Journal of
-the Ethnological Society_ (1869), N.S., vol. i. p. 1 ff.
-
-[206] _Prehistoric Man_, by Daniel Wilson, LL.D. (London, 1869), vol.
-i. p. 308.
-
-[207] _Proceedings of the Asiatic Society of Bengal_, 1865, p. 126.
-
-[208] Rawlinson, _Five Great Monarchies_ (1864), vol. i. p. 120.
-
-[209]
-
- Arma antiqua manus, ungues, dentesque fuerunt
- Et lapides, et item sylvarum fragmina rami,
- Et flamma atque ignis postquam sunt cognita primum
- Posterius ferri vis est aerisque reperta,
- Et prior aeris erat quam ferri cognitus usus,
- Quo facilis magis est natura, et copia maior.--V. 1282.
-
-
-[210] Strabo, b. iii. c. iii. 6, p. 154.
-
-[211] Max Mueller, _Science of Language_, 2nd Series (1864), pp. 229-37.
-
-[212] Nilsson, _The Primitive Inhabitants of Scandinavia_ (Lubbock, 3rd
-ed., 1868), p. 257.
-
-[213] Sir Richard Colt Hoare found four of these celts in the Wiltshire
-barrows, with rudimentary flanges along the side edges of the blade
-that had been formed by beating, and similarly formed flanges have
-also been noticed upon celts from Ireland, thereby leading to the
-supposition that Class B may have been converted into Class D in this
-way, before the casting process was applied to the formation of the
-flanges.--_The Ancient History of South Wiltshire_ (London, 1812), p.
-203, pl. xxi, xxvi, xxviii. 2, xxix.
-
-[214] (The greatly reduced scale of these figures makes exact
-verification of the references impracticable in all cases.--ED.)
-
-[215] I have been enabled to take drawings of these celts in the
-British Museum, through the kind permission of Mr. A. W. Franks.
-
-[216] The forms included in Classes D, E, F, and G, are commonly known
-under the name of _paalstab_ or _palstave_, a word of Scandinavian
-origin, said to have designated the weapons employed by some northern
-tribes for battering the shields of their enemies. Iron implements like
-the Irish _loy_, and called _paalstabs_, are still used in Iceland,
-either for digging in the ground or breaking the ice.--_Catalogue of
-the Museum of the R. I. Academy_, 'Bronze,' p. 361.
-
-[217] Lubbock, _Prehistoric Times_ (1869), p. 9.
-
-[218] Read in 1869, published in _Archaeologia_, xliii. p. 443: for
-Plumpton Plain, see _Sussex Arch. Coll._ ii. p. 268: for Arras, _Arch.
-Journ._ xviii. p. 156.
-
-
-
-
-EARLY MODES OF NAVIGATION[219]
-
-(1874)
-
-
-In the paper which I had the honour of reading to this Institute at
-Bethnal Green (pp. 1-19), I spoke of the general principles by which I
-was guided in the course of inquiries, of which the present paper forms
-a section. I need not, therefore, now refer to them further than to
-say that the materials for this paper were collected whilst writing a
-note to my _catalogue raisonne_ relating to the case of models of early
-forms of ships.[220]
-
-In inquiries of this nature it is always necessary to guard against the
-tendency to form theories in the first instance, and go in search of
-evidence to support them afterwards. On the other hand, in dealing with
-so vast a subject as Anthropology, including all art, all culture, and
-all races of mankind, it is next to impossible to adhere strictly to
-the opposite of this, and collect the data first, to the exclusion of
-all idea of the purpose they are to be put to in the sequel, because
-all is fish that comes into the anthropological basket, and no such
-basket could possibly be big enough to contain a millionth part of the
-materials necessary for conducting an inquiry on this principle. Some
-guide is absolutely necessary to the student in selecting his facts.
-The course which I have pursued, in regard to the material arts, is
-to endeavour to establish the sequence of ideas. When the links of
-connexion are found close together, then the sequence may be considered
-to be established. When they occur only at a distance, then they are
-brought together with such qualifications as the nature of the case
-demands. Other members of this Institute have followed the same course
-in relation to other branches of culture, the object being to lay the
-foundation of a true anthropological classification, without seeking
-either to support a dogma or establish a paradox. This is, I believe,
-the requirement of our time, and the necessary preliminary to the
-introduction of a science of Anthropology.
-
-Whilst, however, deprecating the influence of forgone conclusions,
-there are certain principles already established by science which we
-cannot afford to disregard, even at the outset of inquiries of this
-nature. It would be sheer moonshine, in the present state of knowledge,
-to study Anthropology on any other basis than the basis of development;
-nor must we, in studying development, fail to distinguish between
-racial development and the development of culture. The affinity of
-certain races for particular phases of culture, owing to the hereditary
-transmission of faculties, constitutes an important element of inquiry
-to be weighed in the balance with other things, just as the farmer
-weighs in the balance of probabilities the nature of the soil in which
-his turnips are growing; but when particular branches of culture do run
-in the same channel with the distribution of particular races, this
-is always a coincidence to be investigated and explained, each by the
-light of its own history. It would be just as reasonable to assume with
-the ancients, that the knowledge of every art was originally inculcated
-by the gods, as to assume that particular arts and particular ideas
-arise spontaneously and as a necessary consequence of the possession of
-particular pigments beneath the skin.
-
-Nobody doubts that there must be affinities and interdependencies
-between the race and the crop of ideas that is grown upon it; but the
-law, _ex nihilo nihil fit_, is as true of ideas as it is of races, and
-in the relations between them it is as true and has the same value,
-neither more nor less, as the statement that potatoes do spring out
-of the ground where no potatoes have been sown. To study culture is,
-therefore, to trace the history of its development, as well as the
-qualities of the people amongst whom it flourishes. In doing this
-it is not sufficient to deal with generalities, as, for example, to
-ascertain that one people employ bark canoes, whilst another use
-rafts. It is necessary to consider the details of construction,
-because it is by means of these details that we are sometimes able
-to determine whether the idea has been of home growth or derived from
-without. The difficulty is to obtain the necessary details for the
-purpose. Travellers do not give them, as a rule, especially modern
-travellers. The older books are more valuable, both because they deal
-with nations in a more primitive condition, and also because they are
-more detailed; books were fewer, and men took more pains with them; now
-the traveller writes for a circulating library, and for the unthinking
-portion of mankind, who will not be bothered with details. I have been
-careful to give the dates to the authors quoted. But we must endeavour
-to remedy this evil before it is too late. The _Notes and Queries
-on Anthropology_[221], published by the Committee of the British
-Association, are drawn up with this object. It is to be hoped that they
-will receive attention, but I fear not much, for the reasons already
-mentioned; the supply will be equal to the demand. As long as we have a
-large Geographical Society and a small Anthropological Society, so long
-travellers will bring home accurate geographical details, abundance of
-information about the flow of water all over the world, but the flow of
-human races and human ideas will receive little attention. With these
-preliminary remarks I pass on to the subject of my paper.
-
-
-_Modes of Navigation._
-
-Following out the principle adopted in Parts 1 and 2 of my Catalogue,
-of employing the constructive arts of existing savages as survivals
-to represent successive stages in the development of the same arts in
-prehistoric times, it may be advisable, in order to study the history
-of each part of a canoe or primitive sailing vessel, to divide the
-subject under seven heads, as follows: viz.--(1) Solid trunks or
-dug-out canoes, developing into (2) Vessels on which the planks are
-laced or sewn together, and these developing into such as are pinned
-with plugs of wood, and ultimately nailed with iron or copper; (3) Bark
-canoes; (4) Vessels of skins and wicker-work; (5) Rafts, developing
-into (6) Outrigger canoes, and ultimately into vessels of broader beam,
-to which may be added (7) rudders, sails, and contrivances which gave
-rise to parts of a more advanced description of vessel, such as the
-_oculus_, _aplustre_, _forecastle_, and _poop_.
-
-
-1. _Solid Trunks and Dug-out Canoes._
-
-It requires but little imagination to conceive an idea of the process
-by which a wooden support in the water forced itself upon the notice
-of mankind. The great floods to which the valleys of many large rivers
-are subject, more especially those which have their sources in tropical
-regions, sometimes devastate the whole country within miles of their
-banks, and by their suddenness frequently overtake and carry down
-numbers of both men and animals, together with large quantities of
-timber which had grown upon the sides of the valleys. The remembrances
-of such deluges are preserved in the traditions of many savage races,
-and there can be little doubt that it was by this means that the human
-race first learnt to make use of floating timber as a support for the
-body. The wide distribution of the word signifying ship--Latin _navis_;
-Greek ~naus~; Sanskrit _nau_; Celtic _nao_; Assam _nao_; Port Jackson,
-Australia, _nao_--attests the antiquity of the term. In Bible history
-the same term has been employed to personify the tradition of the first
-shipbuilder, _Noah_.
-
-It is even said, though with what truth I am not aware, that the
-American grey squirrel (_Sciurus migratorius_), which migrates in large
-numbers, crossing large rivers, has been known to embark on a piece of
-floating timber, and paddle itself across (Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_,
-1862, vol. i. p. 147).
-
-The North American Indians frequently cross rivers by clasping the left
-arm and leg round the trunk of a tree, and swimming with the right
-(Steinitz, _History of the Ship_, Pl. 2).
-
-The next stage in the development of the canoe would consist in
-pointing the ends, so as to afford less resistance to the water. In
-this stage we find it represented on the NW. coast of Australia.
-Gregory, in the year 1861, says that his ship was visited on this
-coast by two natives, who had paddled off on logs of wood shaped like
-canoes, not hollowed, but very buoyant, about 7 feet long, and 1 foot
-thick, which they propelled with their hands only, their legs resting
-on a little rail made of small sticks driven in on each side. Mr.
-T. Baines, also, in a letter quoted by the Rev. J. G. Wood, in his
-_Natural History of Man_ (vol. ii. p. 7), speaks of some canoes which
-he saw in North Australia as being 'mere logs of wood, capable of
-carrying a couple of men'. Others used on the north coast are dug out,
-but as these are provided with an outrigger, they have probably been
-derived from New Guinea. The canoes used by the Australians on the
-rivers consist either of a bundle of rushes bound together and pointed
-at the ends, or else they are formed of bark in a very simple manner;
-but on the south-east coast, near Cape Howe, Captain Cook, in his first
-voyage, found numbers of canoes in use by the natives on the seashore.
-These he described as being very like the smaller sort used in New
-Zealand, which were hollowed out by means of fire. One of these was of
-a size to be carried on the shoulders of four men.
-
-It has been thought that the use of hollowed canoes may have arisen
-from observing the effect of a split reed or bamboo upon the water. The
-nautilus is also said to have given the first idea of a ship to man;
-and Pliny, Diodorus, and Strabo have stated that large tortoise-shells
-were used by primitive races of mankind (Kitto, _Pictorial Bible_). It
-has also been supposed that the natural decay of trees may have first
-suggested the employment of hollow trees for canoes, but such trees are
-not easily removed entire. It is difficult to conceive how so great an
-advance in the art of shipbuilding was first introduced, but there can
-be no doubt that the agent first employed for this purpose was fire.
-
-I have noticed when travelling in Bulgaria that the gipsies and others
-who roam over that country usually select the foot of a dry tree to
-light their cooking fire; the dry wood of the tree, combined with the
-sticks collected at the foot of it, makes a good blaze, and the tree
-throws forward the heat like a fireplace. Successive parties camping on
-the same ground, attracted thither by the vicinity of water, use the
-same fireplaces, and the result is that the trees by degrees become
-hollowed out for some distance from the foot, the hollow part formed
-by the fire serving the purpose of a semi-cylindrical chimney. Such a
-tree, torn up by the roots, or cut off below the part excavated by the
-fire, would form a very serviceable canoe, the parts not excavated by
-the fire being sound and hard. The Andaman islanders use a tree in this
-manner as an oven, the fire being kept constantly burning in the hollow
-formed by the flames.
-
-One of the best accounts of the process of digging out a canoe by
-means of fire is that described by Kalm, on the Delaware river, in
-1747. He says that, when the Indians intend to fell a tree, for want
-of proper instruments they employ fire; they set fire to a quantity
-of wood at the roots of the tree, and in order that the fire might
-not reach further up than they would have it, they fasten some rags
-to a pole, dip them in water, and keep continually washing the tree a
-little above the fire until the lower part is burnt nearly through; it
-is then pulled down. When they intend to hollow a tree for a canoe,
-they lay dry branches along the stem of the tree as far as it must be
-hollowed out, set them on fire, and replace them by others. While these
-parts are burning, they keep pouring water on those parts that are not
-to be burnt at the sides and ends. When the interior is sufficiently
-burnt out, they take their stone hatchets and shells and scoop out
-the burnt wood. These canoes are usually 30 or 40 feet long. In the
-account of one of the expeditions sent out by Raleigh in 1584 a similar
-description is given of the process adopted by the Indians of Virginia,
-except that, instead of sticks, resin is laid on to the parts to be
-excavated and set fire to: canoes capable of holding twenty persons
-were formed in this manner.
-
-The Waraus of Guiana employ fire for excavating their canoes; and when
-Columbus discovered the Island of Guanahani or San Salvador, in the
-West Indies, he found [fire] employed for this purpose by the natives,
-who called their boats '_canoe_', a term which has ever since been
-employed by Europeans to express this most primitive class of vessel.
-
-Dr. Mouat says that, in Blair's time, the Andaman islanders excavated
-their canoes by the agency of fire; but it is not employed for that
-purpose now, the whole operation being performed by hand. Symes, in
-1800, speaks of the Burmese war-boats, which were excavated partly by
-fire and partly by cutting. Nos. 1276 and 1277 of my collection are
-models of these boats. In New Caledonia, Turner, in 1845, says that the
-natives felled their trees by means of a slow fire at the foot, taking
-three or four days to do it. In excavating a canoe, he says, they
-kindle a fire over the part to be burnt out, and keep dropping water
-over the sides and ends, so as to confine the fire to the required
-spot, the burnt wood being afterwards scraped out with stone tools.
-The New Zealanders, and probably the Australians also, employ fire for
-this purpose [Cook]. The canoes of the Krumen in West Africa are also
-excavated by means of fire.
-
-A further improvement in the development of the dug-out canoe consists
-in bending the sides into the required form after it has been dug out.
-This process of fire-bending has already been described on p. 87 of my
-_Catalogue_ (Parts i and ii), when speaking of the methods employed by
-the Esquimaux and Australians in straightening their wooden spears and
-arrow-shafts. The application of this process to canoe-building by the
-Ahts of the north-west coast of North America is thus described by Mr.
-Wood in his _Natural History of Man_, vol. ii. p. 732. The canoe is
-carved out of a solid trunk of cedar (_Thuja gigantea_). It is hollowed
-out, not by fire, but by hand, and by means of an adze formed of a
-large mussel-shell; the trunk is split lengthwise by wedges. All is
-done by the eye. When it is roughly hollowed it is filled with water,
-and red-hot stones put in until it boils. This is continued until the
-wood is quite soft, and then a number of cross-pieces are driven into
-the interior, so as to force the canoe into its proper shape, which
-it ever afterwards retains. While the canoe is still soft and pliant,
-several slight cross-pieces are inserted, so as to counteract any
-tendency towards warping. The outside of the vessel is then hardened
-by fire, so as to enable it to resist the attacks of insects, and also
-to prevent it cracking when exposed to the sun. The inside is then
-painted some bright colour, and the outside is usually black and highly
-polished. This is produced by rubbing it with oil after the fire has
-done its work. Lastly, a pattern is painted on its bow. There is no
-keel to the boat. The red pattern of the painting is obtained by a
-preparation of _anato_. For boring holes the Ahts use a drill formed by
-a bone of a bird fixed in a wooden handle.
-
-A precisely similar process to this is employed in the formation of
-the Burmese dug-out canoes, and has thus been described to me by Capt.
-O'Callaghan, who witnessed the process during the Burmese War in 1852.
-A trunk of a tree of suitable length, though much less in diameter
-than the intended width of the boat, is cut into the usual form, and
-hollowed out. It is then filled with water, and fires are lit, a short
-distance from it, along its sides. The water gradually swells the
-inside, while the fire contracts the outside, till the width is greatly
-increased. The effect thus produced is rendered permanent by thwarts
-being placed so as to prevent the canoe from contracting in width as
-it dries; the depth of the boat is increased by a plank at each side,
-reaching as far as the ends of the hollowed part. Canoes generally
-show traces of the fire and water treatment just described, the inner
-surface being soft and full of superficial cracks, while the outer is
-hard and close.
-
-It is probable that this mode of bending canoes has been discovered
-during the process of cooking, in which red-hot stones are used in many
-countries to boil the water in vessels of skin or wood, in which the
-meat is cooked. No. 1256 of my collection is a model of an Aht canoe,
-painted as here described. No. 1257 is a full-sized canoe from this
-region, made out of a single trunk; it is not painted, so that the
-grain of the wood can be seen.
-
-The distribution of the dug-out canoe appears to be almost universal.
-It is especially used in southern and equatorial regions. Leaving
-Australia, we find it employed with the outrigger, which will be
-described hereafter (pp. 218-9), in many parts of the Polynesian and
-Asiatic islands, including New Guinea, New Zealand, New Caledonia,
-and the Sandwich Islands. It was not used by the natives of Tasmania,
-who employed a float consisting of a bundle of bark and rushes, which
-will be described in another place (p. 203). Wilkes speaks of it in
-Samoa, at Manilla, and the Sooloo Archipelago. De Guignes in 1796 and
-De Morga in 1609 saw them in the Philippines, where they are called
-_pangues_, some carrying from two to three and others from twelve to
-fifteen persons. They are (or were) also used in the Pelew, Nicobar,
-and Andaman Isles. In the India Museum there is a model of one from
-Assam, used as a mail boat, and called _dak nao_. In Burmah, Symes, in
-1795, describes the war-boats of the Irrawaddy as 80 to 100 feet long,
-but seldom exceeding 8 feet in width, and this only by additions to the
-sides; carrying fifty to sixty rowers, who use short oars that work
-on a spindle, and who row instead of paddling. Captain O'Callaghan,
-however, informs me that they sometimes use paddles (Nos. 1276 and
-1277). They are made of one piece of the teak tree. The king had
-five hundred of these vessels of war. They are easily upset, but the
-rowers are taught to avoid being struck on the broadside; they draw
-only 3 feet of water. On the Menan, in Siam, Turpin, in 1771, says
-that the king's _ballons_ are made of a single tree, and will contain
-150 rowers; the two ends are very much elevated, and the rowers sit
-cross-legged, by which they lose a great deal of power. The river
-vessels in Cochin China are also described as being of the same long,
-narrow kind. At Ferhabad, in Persia, Pietro della Valle, in 1614,
-describes the canoes as being flat-bottomed, hollow trees, carrying ten
-to twelve persons.
-
-In Africa, Duarte Barbosa, in 1514, saw the Moors at Zuama make use of
-boats, _almadias_, hollowed out of a single trunk, to bring clothes and
-other merchandise from Angos. Livingstone says the canoes of the Bayeye
-of South Africa are hollow trees, made for use and not for speed.
-If formed of a crooked stem they become crooked vessels, conforming
-to the line of the timber. On the Benuwe, at its junction with the
-[Yola], Barth, for the first time in his travels southward, saw what
-he describes as rude little shells hollowed out of a single tree; they
-measured 25 to 30 feet in length, 1 to 1-1/2 foot in height, and 16
-inches in width; one of them, he says, was quite crooked. On the White
-Nile, in Unyoro, Grant says that the largest canoe carried a ton and
-a half, and was hollowed out of a trunk. On the Kitangule, west of
-Lake Victoria Nyanza, near Karague, he describes the canoes as being
-hollowed out of a log of timber 15 feet long and the breadth of an
-easy-chair. These kind of canoes are also used by the Makoba east of
-Lake Ngami, by the Apingi and Camma, and the Krumen of the West African
-coast; of which last, No. 1272 of my collection is a model.
-
-In South America the Patagonians use no canoes, but in the northern
-parts of the continent dug-out canoes are common. One described by
-Condamine, in 1743, was from 42 to 44 feet long, and only 3 feet wide.
-They are also used in Guiana, and Professor Wilson says that the
-dug-out canoe is used throughout the West Indian Archipelago. According
-to Bartram, who is quoted by Schoolcraft, the large canoes formed out
-of the trunks of cypress trees, which descended the rivers of Florida,
-crossed the Gulf, and extended their navigation to the Bahama Isles,
-and even as far as Cuba, carrying twenty to thirty warriors. Kalm, in
-1747, gives some details respecting their construction on the Delaware
-river already referred to (p. 191), and says that the materials chiefly
-employed in North America are the red juniper, red cedar, white cedar,
-chestnut, white oak, and tulip tree. Canoes of red and white cedar are
-the best, because lighter, and they will last as much as twenty years,
-whereas the white oak barely lasts above six years. In Canada these
-dug-outs were made of the white fir. The process of construction on the
-west coast of North America has been already described (p. 192).
-
-In Europe Pliny mentions the use of canoes hollowed out of a single
-tree by the Germans. Amongst the ancient Swiss lake-dwellers at
-Robenhausen, associated with objects of the stone age, a dug-out canoe,
-or _Einbaum_, made of a single trunk 12 feet long and 2-1/2 wide, was
-discovered (Keller, _Lake Dwellings_, Lee^2, p. 45). In Ireland, Sir
-William Wilde says that amongst the ancient Irish dug-out canoes were
-of three kinds. One was small, trough-shaped, and square at the ends,
-having a projection at either end to carry it by; the paddlers sat
-flat at the bottom and paddled, there being no rowlocks to the boat. A
-second kind was 20 feet in length and 2 in breadth, flat-bottomed, with
-round prow and square stern, strengthened by thwarts carved out of the
-solid and running across the boat, two near the stem and one near the
-stern. The prow was turned up; one of these was discovered in a bog on
-the coast of Wexford, 12 feet beneath the surface. The third sort was
-sharp at both ends, 21 feet long, 12 inches broad, and 8 inches deep,
-and flat-bottomed. These canoes are often found in the neighbourhood
-of the crannoges, or ancient lake-habitations of the country, and
-were used to communicate with the land; also in the beds of the Boyne
-and Bann. Ware says, that dug-out canoes were used in some of the
-Irish rivers in his time, and to this day I have seen paddles used on
-the Blackwater, in the south of Ireland. Professor Wilson says that
-several dug-out canoes have been found in the ancient river-deposits
-of the Clyde, and also in the neighbourhood of Falkirk. In one of
-those discovered in the Clyde deposits, at a depth of 25 feet from the
-surface, a stone almond-shaped celt was found. Others have been found
-in the ancient river-deposits of Sussex and elsewhere, in positions
-which show that the rivers must probably have formed arms of the sea,
-at the time they were sunk.
-
-
-_2. Vessels in which the Planks are Stitched to each Other._
-
-All vessels of the dug-out class are necessarily long and narrow,
-and very liable to upset; the width being limited by the size of the
-tree, extension can only be given to them by increasing their length.
-In order to give greater height and width to these boats, planks are
-sometimes added at the sides and stitched on to the body of the canoe
-by means of strings or cords, composed frequently of the bark or leaves
-of the tree of which the body is made. In proportion as these laced-on
-gunwales were found to answer the purpose of increasing the stability
-of the vessel, their number was increased; two such planks were added
-instead of one, and as the joint between the planks was by this
-means brought beneath the water line, means were taken to caulk the
-seams with leaves, pitch, resin, and other substances. Gradually the
-number of side planks increased and the solid hull diminished, until,
-ultimately, it dwindled into a bottom-board, or keel, at the bottom of
-the boat, serving as a centre-piece on which the sides of the vessel
-were built. Still the vessel was without ribs or framework; ledges on
-the sides were carved out of the solid substance of each plank, by
-means of which they were fastened to the ledges of the adjoining plank,
-and the two contiguous ledges served as ribs to strengthen the boat;
-finally, a framework of vertical ribs was added to the interior and
-fastened to the planks by cords. Ultimately the stitching was replaced
-by wooden pins, and the side planks pinned to each other and to the
-ribs; and these wooden pins in their turn were supplanted by iron nails.
-
-In different countries we find representations of the canoe in all
-these several stages of development. Of the first stage, in which side
-planks were added to the body of the dug-out canoe, to heighten it,
-the New Zealand canoe, No. 1259 of my collection, is an example. Capt.
-Cook describes this as solid, the largest containing from thirty men
-upwards. One measured 70 feet in length, 6 in width, and 4 deep. Each
-of the side pieces was formed of an entire plank, about 12 inches wide,
-and about 1-1/2 inch thick, laced on to the hollow trunk of the tree by
-flaxen cords, and united to the plank on the opposite side by thwarts
-across the boat. These canoes have names given to them like European
-vessels.
-
-On the Benuwe, in Central Africa, Barth describes a vessel in this same
-early stage of departure from the original dug-out trunk. It consisted
-of 'two very large trunks joined together with cordage, just like the
-stitching of a shirt, and without pitching, the holes being merely
-stuffed with grass. It was not water-tight, but had the advantage,' he
-says, 'over the dug-out canoes used on the same river, in not breaking
-if it came upon a rock, being, to a certain degree, pliable. It was 35
-feet long, and 26 inches wide in the middle.' No. 1258 of my collection
-is a model of one of these. The single plank added to the side of the
-Burmese dug-out canoe has been already noticed (p. 193). Although my
-informant does not tell me that these side planks are sewn on, I have
-no doubt, judging by analogy, that this either is or was formerly the
-case.
-
-The Waraus of Guiana are the chief canoe-builders of this part of South
-America, and to them other tribes resort from considerable distances.
-Their canoe is hollowed out of a trunk of a tree, and forced into
-its proper shape partly by means of fire and partly by wedges, upon
-a similar system to that described in speaking of the Ahts of North
-America (p. 192) and the Burmese; the largest have the sides made
-higher by a narrow plank of soft wood, which is laced upon the gunwale,
-and the seam caulked. This canoe is alike at both ends, the stem and
-stern being pointed, curved, and rising out of the water; there is no
-keel, and it draws but a few inches of water. This appears to be the
-most advanced stage to which the built-up canoe has arrived on either
-continent of America, with the exception of Tierra del Fuego, where
-Commodore Byron, in 1765, saw canoes in the Straits of Magellan made
-of planks sewn together with thongs of raw hide; these vessels are
-considerably raised at the bow and stern, and the larger ones are 15
-feet in length by 1 yard wide. They have also been described by more
-recent travellers. Under what conditions have these miserable Fuegians
-been led to the employment of a more complex class of vessel than their
-more advanced congeners of the north?
-
-In order to trace the further development of the canoe in this
-direction, we must return to Africa and the South Seas. On the island
-of Zanzibar, Barbosa, in 1514, says that the inhabitants of this
-island, and also Penda and Manfia, who are Arabs, trade with the
-mainland by means of 'small vessels very loosely and badly made,
-without decks, and with a single mast; all their planks are sewn
-together with cords of reed or matting, and the sails are of palm
-mats.' On the river Yeou, near Lake Tchad, in Central Africa, Denham
-and Clapperton saw canoes 'formed of planks, rudely shaped with a
-small hatchet, and strongly fastened together by cords passed through
-holes bored in them, and a wisp of straw between, which the people
-say effectually keeps out the water; they have high poops like the
-Grecian boats, and would hold twenty or thirty persons.' On the Logon,
-south-east of Lake Tchad, Barth says the boats are built 'in the same
-manner as those of the Budduma, except that the planks consist of
-stronger wood, mostly _Birgem_, and generally of larger size, whilst
-those of the Budduma consist of the frailest material, viz. _Fogo_.
-In both, the joints of the planks are provided with holes, through
-which ropes are passed, overlaid with bands of reed tightly fastened
-upon them by smaller ropes, which are again passed through small holes
-stuffed with grass.' On the Victoria Nyanza, in East Central Africa,
-Grant speaks of 'a canoe of five planks sewn together, and having four
-cross-bars or seats. The bow and stern are pointed, standing for a yard
-over the water, with a broad central plank from stem to stern, rounded
-outside (the vestige of the dug-out trunk), and answering for a keel.'
-
-Thus far we have found the planks of the vessels spoken of, merely
-fastened by cords passed through holes in the planks, and stuffed with
-grass or some other material, and the accounts speak of their being
-rarely water-tight. Such a mode of constructing canoes might serve well
-enough for river navigation, but would be unserviceable for sea craft.
-Necessity is the mother of invention, and accordingly we must seek for
-a further development of the system of water-tight stitching, amongst
-those races in a somewhat similar condition of culture, which inhabit
-the islands of the Pacific and the borders of the ocean between it and
-the continent of Africa.
-
-The majority of those vessels now to be described are furnished with
-the outrigger; but as the distribution of this contrivance will be
-traced subsequently (p. 218 ff.), it will not be necessary to describe
-it in speaking of the stitched plank-work.
-
-In the Friendly Isles Captain Cook, in 1773, says 'the canoes are
-built of several pieces sewed together with bandage in so neat a
-manner that on the outside it is difficult to see the joints. All the
-fastenings are on the inside, and pass through _kants_ or ridges,
-which are wrought on the edges and ends of the several boards which
-compose the vessel.' At Otaheite he speaks of the same process,
-and says that the chief parts are formed separately without either
-saw, plane, or other tool. La Perouse gives an illustration of an
-outrigger canoe from Easter Island, the sides of which are formed
-of drift-wood sewn together in this manner. At Wytoohee, one of the
-Paumotu, or Low Archipelago, Wilkes, in 1838, says that the canoes
-are formed of strips of cocoa-nut tree sewed together. Speaking of
-those of Samoa, he describes the process more fully. 'The planks are
-fastened together with _sennit_; the pieces are of no regular size
-or shape. On the inside edge of each plank is a ledge or projection,
-which serves to attach the sennit, and connect and bind it closely
-to the adjoining one. It is surprising,' he says, 'to see the labour
-bestowed on uniting so many small pieces together, when large and
-good planks might be obtained. Before the pieces are joined, the gum
-from the husk of the bread-fruit tree is used to cement them close,
-and prevent leakage. These canoes retain their form much more truly
-than one would have imagined; I saw few whose original model had
-been impaired by service. On the outside the pieces are so closely
-fitted as frequently to require close examination before the seams
-can be detected. The perfection of workmanship is astonishing to
-those who see the tools with which it is effected. They consist now
-of nothing more than a piece of iron tied to a stick, and used as an
-adze; this, with a gimlet, is all they have, and before they obtained
-their iron tools, they used adzes made of hard stone and fish-bone.'
-The construction of the Fiji canoe, called _drua_, is described by
-Williams in great detail. A keel or bottom board is laid in two or
-three pieces, carefully scarfed together. From this the sides are built
-up, without ribs, in a number of pieces varying from three to twenty
-feet. The edges of these pieces are fastened by ledges, tied together
-in the manner already described. A white pitch from the bread-fruit
-tree, prepared with an extract from the coco-nut kernel, is spread
-uniformly on both edges, and a fine strip of _masi_ laid between.
-The binding of sennit with which the boards, or _vanos_, as they are
-called, are stitched together is made tighter by small wooden wedges
-inserted between the binding and the wood, in opposite directions.
-The ribs seen in the interior of these canoes are not used to bring
-the planks into shape, but are the last things inserted, and are for
-uniting the deck more firmly with the body of the canoe. The carpenters
-in Fiji constitute a distinct class, and have chiefs of their own.
-The Tongan canoes were inferior to those of Fiji in Captain Cook's
-time, but they have since adopted Fiji patterns. The Tongans are
-better sailors than the Fijians. Wilkes describes a similar method of
-building vessels in the Kingsmill Islands, but with varieties in the
-details of construction. 'Each canoe has six or eight timbers in its
-construction; they are well modelled, built in frames, and have much
-sheer. The boards are cut from the coco-nut tree, from a few inches to
-six or eight feet long, and vary from five to seven inches in width.
-These are arranged as the planking of a vessel, and very neatly put
-together, being sewed with sennit. For the purpose of making them
-water-tight they use a slip of pandanus leaf, inserted as our coopers
-do in plugging a cask. They have evinced much ingenuity,' he says, 'in
-attaching the uprights to the flat timbers.' It is difficult, without
-the aid of drawings, to understand exactly the peculiarities of this
-variety of construction, but he says they are secured so as to have all
-the motion of a double joint, which gives them ease, and comparative
-security in a seaway.
-
-Turning now to the Malay Archipelago, Wallace speaks of a Malay
-_prahau_ in which he sailed from Macassar to New Guinea, a distance
-of 1,000 miles, and says that similar but smaller vessels had not a
-single nail in them. The largest of these, he says, are from Macassar,
-and the Bugi countries of the Celebes and Boutong. Smaller ones sail
-from Ternate, Pidore, East Ceram, and Garam. The majority of these,
-he says, have stitched planks. No. 1268 of my collection is a model
-of a vessel employed in those seas. Wallace says that the inhabitants
-of Ke Island, west of New Guinea, are the best boat-builders in the
-archipelago, and several villages are constantly employed at the work.
-The planks here, as in the Polynesian Islands, are all cut out of
-the solid wood, with a series of projecting ledges on their edges in
-the inside. But here we find an advance upon the Polynesian system,
-for the ledges of the planks are pegged to each other with wooden
-pegs. The planks, however, are still fastened to the ribs by means of
-_rattans_. The principles of construction are the same as in those
-of the Polynesian Islands, and the main support of the vessel still
-consists in the planks and their ledges, the ribs being a subsequent
-addition; for he says that after the first year the rattan-tied ribs
-are generally taken out and replaced by new ones, fitted to the planks
-and nailed, and the vessel then becomes equal to those of the best
-European workmanship. This constitutes a remarkable example of the
-persistency with which ancient customs are retained, when we find each
-vessel systematically constructed, in the first instance, upon the old
-system, and the improvement introduced in after years. I wonder whether
-any parallel to this could be found in a British arsenal. The psychical
-aspect of the proceeding seems not altogether un-English.
-
-Extending our researches northward, we find that Dampier, in 1686,
-mentions, in the Bashee Islands, the use of vessels in which the planks
-are fastened with wooden pins. On the Menan, in Siam, Turpin, in 1771,
-speaks of long, narrow boats, in the construction of which neither
-nails nor iron are employed, the parts being fastened together with
-roots and twigs which withstand the destructive action of the water.
-They have the precaution, he says, to insert between the planks a
-light, porous wood, which swells by being wet, and prevents the water
-from penetrating into the vessel. When they have not this wood, they
-rub the chinks, by which the water enters, with clay. In the India
-Museum there is a model of a very early form of vessel from Burmah,
-described as a trading vessel. The bottom is dug out, and the sides
-formed of planks laced together. A large stone is employed for an
-anchor. Here we see that an inferior description of craft has survived,
-upon the rivers, in the midst of a higher civilization which has
-produced a superior class of vessel upon the seas.
-
-Turning westward, we have the surf-boat of Madras, called _massoola_,
-which, on account of its elasticity, is still used on the seashore.
-Its parts are stitched together in the manner represented in the
-model, No. 1267 of my collection. On the Malabar coast the ships of
-the Pardesy, who consisted of Arabs, Persians, and others who have
-settled in the kingdom of Malabar, are described by Barbosa in 1514.
-They build ships, he says, of 200 tons, which have keels like the
-Portuguese, but have no nails. They sew their planks with neat cords,
-very well pitched, and the timber very good. Ten or twelve of these
-ships, laden with goods, sail every year in February for the Red Sea,
-some for Aden and some for Jeddah, the port of Mecca, where they sell
-their merchandise to others, who transmit it to Cairo, and thence to
-Alexandria. The ships return to Calicut between August and October of
-the same year. The earliest description we have of these vessels in
-this part of the world, in historic times, is in the account of the
-travels of two Mahomedans in the ninth century. In these travels it is
-related that there were people in the Gulf of Oman who cross over to
-the islands that produce coco-nuts, taking with them their tools, and
-make ships out of it. With the bark they make the cordage to sew the
-planks together, and of the leaves they make sails; and having thus
-completed the vessel, they load it with coco-nuts and set sail. Marco
-Polo, at the commencement of the fourteenth century, confirms this,
-and says, speaking of the ships at Ormuz, in the Persian Gulf, that
-they do not use nails, but wooden pins, and fasten them with threads
-made of the Indian nut. These threads endure the force of the water,
-and are not easily corrupted thereby. These ships have one mast, one
-sail, _and one beam_, and are covered with but one deck. They are not
-caulked with pitch, but with the oil and fat of fishes. When they cross
-to India they lose many ships, because the sea is very tempestuous, and
-they are not strengthened with iron. In the Red Sea, Father Lobo, in
-1622, describes the vessels called _gelves_, which, he says, are made
-almost entirely of the coco-nut tree. The trunk is sawn into planks,
-the planks are sewn together with thread which is spun from the bark,
-and the sails are made of the leaves stitched together. They are more
-convenient, he says, than other vessels, because they will not split if
-thrown upon banks or against rocks.
-
-We have now arrived in the region which is usually regarded as the
-cradle of Western civilization, certainly the land in which Western
-culture first began to put forth its strong shoots; and we must expect
-to find that the art of shipbuilding advanced in the same ratio as
-other trades. But, unlike the Phoenicians, the Egyptians confined their
-navigation chiefly to the Nile, and had an abhorrence of Typhon, as
-they termed the sea, because it swallowed up the great river, which,
-being the chief source of their prosperity, they regarded as a god.
-
-Here it may be desirable to digress for one moment from the chain of
-continuity which we have been following, in order to say a few words
-about the most primitive form of vessel used on the Nile, viz. that
-mentioned by Isaiah (xviii. 2) as being of Ethiopian origin, the
-vessel of bulrushes to which the mother of Moses entrusted her infant
-progeny. What the coco-nut tree was to the navigators on the eastern
-seas, the papyrus was to the Egyptians, and from it every part of the
-vessel--rope, planks, masts, and sails--was constructed. Adverting to
-the earliest and simplest of these papyrus vessels, the common use for
-a bundle of faggots, for such it was, is not, perhaps, one of those
-coincidences which, viewed by the light of modern culture, we should
-select as evidence of connexion between distant lands. And yet there
-are peculiarities of form which make the bulrush float of the Egyptians
-worthy of comparison with those used in the rivers of Australia.
-
-The Australian float, as represented by a model in the British Museum,
-consisted of a bundle of bark and rushes, pointed and elevated at
-the ends, and bound round with girdles of the same material. The
-only vessel, according to Mr. Calder, used in Tasmania, on the west
-coast, is thus described by him in the _Journal of the Anthropological
-Institute_, iii. 22. 'It was of considerable size, and something
-like a whale-boat, that is, sharp-sterned, but a solid structure,
-and the natives, in their aquatic adventures, sat on the top of it.
-It was generally made by the buoyant and soft, velvety bark of the
-swamp tea-tree (_Melaluca_ sp.), and consisted of a multitude of small
-strips bound together.' Professor Wilson says that the Californian
-canoe consists of a mere rude float, made of rushes, 'in the form of
-a lashed-up hammock.' A woodcut in Sir Gardner Wilkinson's _Ancient
-Egypt_, No. 399 of his work, represents three persons making one of
-these papyrus floats. It is the _baris_, or Memphite bark, bound
-together with papyrus, spoken of by Lucan, and it is of precisely
-similar form to those above described, elevated and pointed at the
-ends, and the men are in the act of binding it round with girdles. This
-is the kind of boat in which Plutarch describes Isis going in search of
-the body of Osiris through the fenny country; a bark made of papyrus.
-Pliny attributes the origin of shipbuilding to these vessels (vii. 56);
-and speaks (vi. 22) of their crossing the sea and visiting the Island
-of Taprobane (Ceylon, according to Sir G. Wilkinson); but it seems
-probable that he must refer to a more advanced form of vessel than the
-mere bulrush float.
-
-The racial connexion between the Australians and the Egyptians, first
-put forward by Professor Huxley, has hardly met with general acceptance
-as yet; but, startling as it at first sight appeared, the more we look
-into the evidence bearing upon it, the less improbable, to say the
-least, it becomes, when viewed by the light of comparative culture.
-I have already shown, in another place,[222] how closely some of the
-Australian weapons correspond to some of those still used on the Upper
-Nile, and the remarkable resemblance here pointed out in a class of
-vessels which might well have been used in passing short distances
-from island to island of the now submerged fragments of land that are
-supposed to have formerly existed in parts of the southern hemisphere,
-is, at least, worthy of attention amongst other evidence of the same
-kind that may be collected, although I fully admit that it is not of a
-character to stand alone. I will not exceed my province by attempting
-to defend the theory of the Australioid origin of the Egyptians on
-physical grounds, preferring to leave the defence of that theory in the
-hands of its author, who is so well able to support his own views;
-but I may take this opportunity of commenting on some remarks made by
-Professor Owen in his valuable paper, published in the last number of
-our _Journal_, on the psychical evidence of connexion between them and
-the black races of the southern hemisphere. Adverting to the fresco
-painting, in the British Museum, of the ancient Egyptian fowler, who
-holds in his hand a stick, which he is in the act of throwing at a
-flock of birds, I am inclined to agree with Professor Owen in thinking
-there is nothing in its shape to denote that it is a boomerang. Other
-figures, however, in Rosellini's _Egyptian Monuments_, show the
-resemblance more clearly, and if these are not enough, the specimen
-of the weapon itself in the glass case in the Egyptian room of the
-British Museum proves the identity of the weapon beyond possibility of
-doubt. I have elsewhere stated at length,[223] that having made several
-facsimiles of this weapon from careful measurements, so as to obtain
-the exact size, form, and weight of the original, for the purpose
-of experiment, I found that it possessed all the properties of the
-Australian boomerang, rising in the air, and returning in some cases to
-within a few paces of the position from which it was thrown. In fact,
-it was easier to obtain the return flight from this weapon than from
-many varieties of the Australian boomerang, with which I experimented
-at the same time.
-
-But supposing the ancient Egyptian to be 'convicted of the boomerang',
-says the learned professor, 'common sense repudiates the notion of the
-necessity of inheritance in relation to such operations.' Against this
-I would urge, that the application of the general quality of common
-sense to the determination of questions of psychical connexion, between
-races so far removed from us, as the Australians or the predecessors
-of the earliest Egyptian kings, is inconsistent with all that we
-know of the phenomena of mental evolution in man, seeing that there
-must necessarily be many stages of disparity between them and any
-intelligent member of the Anthropological Institute to whose common
-sense this appeal was made.
-
-If the common sense of the nineteenth century does not repudiate the
-fact that the steam engine, the electric telegraph, vaccination, free
-trade, and a thousand other contrivances for the benefit of our race,
-have sprung from special centres, and have been inherited, or otherwise
-received, by the highly cultivated races to which they have spread
-in modern times, neither would the common sense of the Australian
-or prehistoric Egyptian, after its kind, bar the likelihood of such
-contrivances as the boomerang, the parrying-shield, or the 'baris'
-having been handed from one savage people to another in a similar
-manner. Wherever two or three concurrent chains of connexion, whether
-of race, language, or the arts, can be traced along the same channel,
-such evidence is admissible, and is indeed frequently the only evidence
-available in dealing with prehistoric times.
-
-The peculiar elevated ends of the papyrus floats are almost identical
-in form, but not in structure, with those now used in parts of India,
-especially on the Ganges; and the word _junk_ is said to be related
-to _juncus_, a bulrush. Somewhat similar rafts, but flat, turned up
-in front but not behind, and called _tankwa_, are described by Lieut.
-Prideaux as being still used on Lake Tsana, in Soudan, and they are
-also used by the Shillooks, who make them of a wood as light as cork,
-called _ambads_ (_Anemone mirabilis_). A paper by Mr. John Hogg, in
-the _Magazine of Natural History_ (1829, ii. p. 324 ff.), to which
-my attention has been kindly drawn by Mr. John Jeremiah, contains
-some useful information on the subject of Egyptian papyrus vessels.
-Denon describes and figures a very primitive float of this sort,
-consisting of a bundle of straw or stalks, pointed and turned up in
-front, and says that the inhabitants of the Upper Nile go up and down
-the river upon it astride, the legs serving for oars; they use also
-a short double-bladed paddle. It is worthy of notice that the only
-other localities, that I am aware of, in which this double paddle is
-used, are the Sooloo Archipelago and among the Esquimaux. Belzoni
-also describes the same kind of vessel. Mr. Hogg, in his paper, gives
-several illustrations of improved forms of these solid papyrus floats,
-derived from a mosaic pavement discovered in the Temple of Fortune at
-Praeneste. From these it seems that they were bound round with thongs,
-pointed, and turned up and over at both ends. But Bruce, in 1790,
-describes more particularly the class of vessel used in Abyssinia in
-his time, called _tankwa_, or, as he writes it, _tancoa_, and says
-that it corresponds exactly to the description of Pliny (_Nat. Hist._,
-xiii. 2, compare v. 9). His description appears possibly to indicate
-that there was a separate line of development of hollow vessels derived
-from the flat raft. A piece of acacia tree was put in the bottom
-to serve as a keel, to which plants were joined, being first sewed
-together, then gathered up at the ends and stern, and the ends of
-the plant tied fast there. On Lake Tsana they are only turned up in
-front: see above. Belzoni describes a similar kind of vessel on Lake
-Moeris, which seems clearly to be hollow. The outer shell or hulk was
-composed of rough pieces of wood, scarcely joined, and fastened by four
-other pieces wrapped together by four more across, which formed the
-deck; no tar, no pitch, either inside or out, and the only preventive
-against the water coming in was a kind of weed which had settled in the
-joints of the wood. The only other locality, that I know of, in which
-similar vessels to these are used, is Formosa, a description of which
-is given by Mr. J. Thomson (_The Straits of Malacca, Indo-China, and
-China_, London, 1875, p. 304), for the sight of which I am indebted
-to Mr. W. L. Distant. He says: 'We went ashore in a catamaran, a sort
-of raft made of poles of the largest species of bamboo. These poles
-are bent by fire, so as to impart a hollow shape to the raft, and are
-lashed together with rattan. There is not a nail used in the whole
-contrivance.'
-
-But the boats 'woven of' the papyrus, mentioned by Pliny, certainly
-refer to something more complex than the papyrus bundle above
-described. Lucan describes them as being sewn with bands of papyrus,
-and Herodotus describes them more fully. This passage has been
-variously translated by different authors, but the version given by Sir
-Gardner Wilkinson is as follows:--'they cut planks measuring about two
-cubits, and having arranged them like bricks, they build the boat in
-the following manner: they fasten the planks round firm long pegs, and,
-after this, stretch over the surface a series of girths, _but without
-any ribs_, and the whole is bound _within_ by bands of papyrus.' The
-exact meaning of this is obscure; but I would suggest, that as the
-'fastening within' clearly shows it was not a solid structure, the
-more reasonable interpretation of it is by supposing that the planks,
-arranged in brick fashion, were fastened on the inside by cords, in
-the manner practised in the South Sea Islands and elsewhere. What the
-long pins were is uncertain; but as Sir Gardner Wilkinson says that the
-models found in the tombs show that ribs were used at a time probably
-subsequent to this, these pins may have been rudimentary ribs of some
-kind, and they also may have been 'bound within' to the planks in the
-same manner. It seems not unlikely that these boats may have also been
-bound round on the outside to give them additional strength, after the
-manner of the papyrus floats above described.[224] With this vessel,
-which was called _baris_, they used a sort of anchor, consisting of a
-stone with a hole in it, similar to one on a Burmese vessel, of which a
-model is in the India Museum.
-
-The larger class of Egyptian vessels were of superior build, the planks
-being fastened with wooden pins and nails, and their construction
-somewhat similar to those still used on the Nile.
-
-Returning now to the link of the chain to which we have appended this
-digression, and carrying our inquiries further northward into the area
-of Western civilization, it is to be expected that we should lose all
-trace of this primitive mode of ship-building. The earliest vessels
-recorded in classical history were fastened with nails. In Homer's
-description of the vessel built by Odysseus, both nails and ribs were
-employed, and it had a round or a flat bottom (Smith's _Dict._). No
-trace of any earlier form of ship has been discovered in Europe, until
-we come to the neighbourhood of the North Sea. Here, in the Nydam Moss,
-in Slesvic, in 1863, was discovered a large boat, seventy-seven feet
-long, ten feet ten inches broad in the middle, flat at the bottom, but
-higher and sharper at both ends, having a prow at both ends, like those
-described by Tacitus as having been built by the Suiones, who inhabited
-this country and Sweden in ancient times. This vessel, from its
-associated remains, has been attributed to the third century A. D. The
-bottom consisted of a broad plank, about two feet broad in the middle,
-but diminishing in width towards each end. A small keel, eight inches
-broad and one deep, was carved on the under side of the plank, which
-corresponds to the bottom plank, which, in Africa and the Polynesian
-Islands, we have shown to be the vestige of the dug-out trunk. On to
-this bottom plank, five side planks, running the whole length of the
-vessel, were built, but they differed from those previously described
-in overlapping, being clinker-built, and attached to each other, not by
-strings or wooden pins, but by large iron bolts. The planks, however,
-resembled those of the southern hemisphere, in having clamps or ledges
-carved out of the solid on the inside; these ledges were perforated,
-and their position corresponded to rows of vertical ribs, to which,
-like the vessels at Ke Island, and elsewhere in the Pacific, they
-were _tied_ by means of cords passing through corresponding holes in
-the ribs. Each rib was carved out of one piece, and, like those of Ke
-Island in the Asiatic Archipelago, could easily have been taken out and
-replaced by others after the vessel was completed. In short, the vessel
-represented the particular stage of development which may be described
-as plank-nailed and rib-tied, or which might be characterized as having
-removable ribs; differing in this respect from the more advanced system
-of modern times, in which the ribs, together with the keel, form a
-framework to which the planks are afterwards bent and fastened.
-
-This mode of fastening the ribs to ledges carved out of the planking,
-Mr. Engelhardt, to whom we are indebted for the accurate drawings and
-description of this vessel,[225] remarks, is a most surprising fact,
-considering that the people who constructed the boat are proved by the
-associated remains to have been not only familiar with the use of iron,
-but to have been able to produce damascened sword-blades. But this
-fact, which, taken by itself, has been justly described as surprising,
-analogy leads us to account for, by supposing these particular parts
-of the vessel to have been survivals from a universally prevalent
-primitive mode of fastening, the nearest southern representative of
-which, at the present time, is to be found in the Red Sea and adjoining
-oceans. Nor can there be any reason to doubt, I think, that this
-mode of constructing vessels may have been used in the intervening
-countries, which have been the scene of the rise of Western
-civilization since the earliest times, but which have now lost all
-trace of the most primitive phases of the art of ship-building.
-
-Mr. Engelhardt, however, traces a connexion between this ancient
-vessel, found in the Nydam Moss, and the Northland boats now used on
-the coast of Norway and the Shetland Isles, the peculiar rowlocks of
-which, and also the clincher-nails by which the sides are fastened,
-correspond very closely to those of the Nydam boat. Here also, and
-in Finland and Lapland, we find survivals of a still earlier mode of
-ship-building, corresponding to the more primitive plank-stitched
-vessels, before described, in so many places in the southern
-hemisphere. Regnard, in 1681, describes the Finland boats as being
-twelve feet long and three broad. They are made of fir, and fastened
-together with the sinew of the reindeer; this makes them, he says, so
-light that one man can carry one on his shoulders; others are fastened
-together with thread made of hemp, rubbed with glue, and their cords
-are of birch bark or the root of the fir. Outhier, in 1736, confirms
-this account of the manner in which they are sewn together, and says
-that it renders them very flexible, and suitable for passing cataracts,
-on account of their lightness, and because they do not break when they
-are cast against a rock. The Lapland sledge called _pulea_ is also
-described by Regnard as being of the same construction--boat-shaped,
-and the parts sewn together with the sinew of the reindeer, without
-a single nail. I have not as yet been able to trace this mode of
-fastening vessels continuously in Russia; but Bell, in 1719, says that
-the long, flat-bottomed barks used on the Volga for carrying salt have
-not a single iron nail in their whole fabric; and Atkinson describes
-vessels on the Tchoussowaia which are built without nails, but these
-are fastened with wooden pins.
-
-
-3. _Bark canoes._
-
-The use of bark for canoes might have been suggested by the hollowed
-trunk; but, on the other hand, we find this material employed in
-Australia, where the hollowed trunk is not in general use. Bark is
-employed for a variety of purposes, such as clothing, materials for
-huts, and so forth. Some of the Australian shields are constructed of
-the bark of trees. The simplest form of canoe in Australia consists,
-as already mentioned (p. 203), of a mere bundle of reeds and bark
-pointed at the ends. It is possible that the use of large pieces of
-bark in this manner may have suggested the employment of the bark
-alone. Belzoni mentions crossing to the island of Elephantine, on
-the Nile, in a ferry-boat which was made of branches of palm trees,
-fastened together with cords, and covered on the outside with a mat
-pitched all over. The solid papyrus boats represented on the pavement
-at Praeneste, before mentioned, have evidently some other substance on
-the outside of them; and Bruce imagines that the junks of the Red Sea
-were of papyrus, covered with leather.[226] The outer covering would
-prevent the water from soaking into the bundle of sticks, and thus
-rendering it less buoyant. Bark, if used in the same manner, would
-serve a like purpose, and thus suggest its use for canoe-building.
-Otherwise I am unable to conceive any way in which bark canoes can have
-originated, except by imitation of the dug-out canoe.
-
-For crossing rivers, the Australian savage simply goes to the nearest
-stringy-bark tree, chops a circle round the tree at the foot, and
-another seven or eight feet higher, makes a longitudinal cut on each
-side, and strips off bark enough by this means to make two canoes. If
-he is only going to cross the river by himself, he simply ties the bark
-together at the ends, paddles across, and abandons the piece of bark
-on the other side, knowing that he can easily provide another. If it
-is to carry another besides himself, he stops up the tied ends with
-clay; but if it is to be permanently employed, he sews up the ends more
-carefully, and keeps it in shape by cross-pieces, thereby producing a
-vessel which closely resembles the bark canoe of North America (Wood,
-_Nat. Hist. of Man_, ii. 103). I have not been able to trace the use of
-the bark canoe further north than Australia on this side of the world,
-probably owing to its being ill adapted for sea navigation; nor do I
-find representatives of it in any part of Europe or Africa, although
-bark is extensively used, in the Polynesian Islands and elsewhere, for
-other purposes.
-
-It is the two continents of America which must be regarded as the home
-of the bark canoe.
-
-The Fuegian canoe has been described by Wilkes, Pritchard, and others.
-It is sewn with shreds of whalebone, sealskin, and twigs, and supported
-by a number of stretchers lashed to the gunwale; the joints are stopped
-with rushes, and, without, smeared with resin. In Guiana the canoe
-is made of the bark of the purple-heart tree, stripped off and tied
-together at the ends. The ends are stopped with clay, as with the
-Australians. This mode of caulking is not very effectual, however, and
-the water is sure to come in sooner or later.
-
-The nature of the material does not admit of much variety in the
-construction; suffice it to say that it is in general use in North
-America, up to the Esquimaux frontier. Its value in these regions
-consists in the facility with which it is taken out of the water and
-carried over the numerous rapids that prevail in the North American
-rivers. The Algonquins were famous for the construction of them. Some
-carry only two people, but the _canot de maitre_ was thirty-six feet in
-length, and required fourteen paddlers. Kalm, in 1747, gives a detailed
-account of the construction of them on the Hudson river, and Lahontan,
-in 1684, gives an equally detailed description of those used in Canada.
-The bark is peeled off the tree by means of hot water. They are very
-fragile, and every day some hole in the bottom has to be stopped with
-gum.
-
-Mr. T. G. B. Lloyd, in an excellent paper descriptive of the Beothucs
-of Newfoundland, published in _Journ. Anthrop. Inst._ (vol. iv. pp.
-26-8), has described the remarkable bark canoe of these people. Its
-form is different from any other canoe of this or any other region
-that I have heard of, the line of the gunwale rising in the middle, as
-well as at the ends, and the vessel being V-shaped in section, with a
-straight wooden keel at the bottom. Its form is so singular, that the
-only idea of continuity which I can set up for it is, that it must
-have been copied from some European child's paper boat, capable, by
-a single additional fold, of being converted into a cocked hat; the
-central pyramidal portion of the paper boat having given the form to
-the pyramidal sides of the Beothuc vessel. If this be rejected, then
-its history has yet to be told, for no native tribe ever employed such
-a peculiar form unless by inheritance.
-
-Nos. 1248 and 1249 of my collection are South American bark canoes;
-Nos. 1250 to 1252 are bark canoes from North America.
-
-
-4. _Canoes of Wicker and Skin._
-
-As we approach the Arctic regions, the dug-out and bark canoes are
-replaced by canoes of skin and wicker. As we have already seen, in the
-case of the bow, and other arts of savages, vegetable materials supply
-the wants of man in southern and equatorial regions, whilst animal
-materials supply their place in the north.
-
-The origin of skin coverings has been already suggested when speaking
-of bark canoes. The accidental dropping of a skin bottle into the
-water might suggest the use of such vessels as a means of recovering
-the harpoon, which, as I have already shown elsewhere, was almost
-universally used for fishing in the earliest stages of culture. The
-Esquimaux lives with the harpoon and its attached bladder almost
-continually by his side. The Esquimaux _kayak_, Nos. 1253 and 1254 of
-my collection, in which he traverses the ocean, although admirable in
-its workmanship, and, like all the works of the Esquimaux, ingenious
-in construction, is in principle nothing more than a large, pointed
-bladder, similar to that which is lashed to the harpoon at its side;
-the man in this case occupying the opening which, in the bladder, is
-filled by the wooden pin that serves for a cork.
-
-This is, I believe, a very primitive form of vessel, although there
-can be no doubt that many links in the history of its development have
-been lost. Unlike the dug-out canoe, such a fragile contrivance as the
-wicker canoe perishes quickly, and no direct evidence of its ancestry
-can be traced at the present time. It is only by means of survivals
-that we can build up the past history of its development; and these
-are, for the most part, wanting.
-
-The skin of an animal, flayed off the body with but one incision,
-served, as I have elsewhere shown, a variety of purposes: from it
-the bellows was derived, the bagpipes, water-vessels, and pouches of
-various kinds; and, filled with air, it served the purpose of a float.
-Steinitz, in his _History of the Ship_, gives an illustration of an
-inflated ox skin, which in India is used to cross rivers; the owner
-riding upon the back of the animal and paddling with his hands, as if
-it had been a living ox.
-
-In the Assyrian sculptures there are numerous illustrations
-representing men floating upon skins of this kind, which they clasp
-with the left hand, like the tree trunks, already mentioned, that are
-used by the American Indians, and swim with the right. Layard says this
-manner of crossing rivers is still practised in Mesopotamia. He also
-describes the raft, composed of a number of such floats, made of the
-skins of sheep flayed off with as few incisions as possible; a square
-framework of poplar beams is placed over a number of these, and tied
-together with osier and other twigs. The mouths of the sheep-skins
-are placed upwards, so that they can be opened and refilled by the
-raft-men. On these rafts the merchandise is floated down the river to
-Baghdad; the materials are then disposed of and the skins packed on
-mules, to return for another voyage. On the Nile similar rafts are
-used, the skins being supplanted by earthen pots, which, like the skins
-on the Euphrates, serve only a temporary purpose, and after the voyage
-down the river are disposed of in the bazaars.
-
-This mode of floating upon skins I should conjecture to be of northern
-origin, and to be practised chiefly by nomadic races; but we find it
-employed on the Morbeya, in Morocco, by the Moors, who no doubt had it
-from the East. It is thus described by Lempriere, in 1789. A raft is
-formed of eight sheep-skins filled with air, and tied together with
-small cords; a few slender poles are laid over them, to which they
-are fastened, and that is the only means used at Buluane to convey
-travellers, with their baggage, over the river. As soon as the raft is
-loaded, a man strips, jumps into the water, and swims with one hand,
-whilst he pulls the raft after him with the other; another swims and
-pushes behind. This reminds us of the custom of the Gran Chaco Indians
-of South America, who, in crossing rivers, use a square boat or tub of
-bull's hide, called _pelota_. It is attached by a rope to the tail of
-a horse, which swims in front; or the rope is taken in the mouth of an
-expert swimmer.
-
-I have not traced the distribution of these rafts of inflated skins as
-continuously as, I have no doubt, they might be traced amongst nomadic
-and pastoral races, moving with their flocks and herds, the skins of
-which would be employed in this way; nor have I been able to trace
-the connexion which, I have no doubt, existed between the inflated
-skin and the open 'curragh' of wicker covered with skins. Where one is
-found, the other is often found with it. Herodotus describes the boats
-used by the people who came down the river to Babylon, and says they
-are constructed in Armenia, and in the parts above Assyria, thereby
-connecting them with the north. 'The ribs of these vessels,' he says,
-'are formed of willow boughs and branches, and covered externally with
-skin. They are round, like a shield, there being no distinction between
-head and stern. They line the bottom with reeds and straw, and taking
-on board merchandise, chiefly palm wine, float down the stream. The
-boats have two oars, one to each man: one pulls and the other pushes.
-They are of different dimensions, some having a single ass on board
-and others several. On their arrival at Babylon the boatmen dispose of
-their goods, and offer for sale the ribs and straw; _they then load
-the asses with the skins_, and return with them to Armenia, where they
-construct new boats'--just as is now done with the inflated skins of
-the rafts at Baghdad.
-
-In the Pictorial Bible an illustration is given from the Sassanian
-sculptures at Takht-i-Bostan of several of these round vessels,
-probably of wicker, covered with skins. In one of these the principal
-figure carries a composite bow, which, as I have elsewhere shown, is of
-northern origin. Mr. Layard discovered in Nimroud a sculpture in which
-one of these boats is represented. It is round, like those described
-by Herodotus; back and stern alike; carrying two people, one of whom
-pulls and the other pushes; and in the same sculpture are represented
-men swimming on the inflated sheep-skins. He says that these same
-round vessels are still used at Baghdad, built of boughs and timber
-covered with skins, over which bitumen is smeared to render it more
-water-tight. [Hamilton] also speaks of the same vessels (of reeds
-and bitumen) on the Euphrates, at the commencement of the eighteenth
-century.
-
-On the Cavery, in Mysore, Buchanan, in 1800, describes ferry-boats
-that are called _donies_, which are circular baskets covered with
-leather; but whether these vessels, like the composite bow used in the
-same region, can be traced to a northern origin I have not the means
-of determining, nor have I as yet sufficient materials to enable me
-to ascertain whether such vessels are employed in the north of Asia
-at the present time. What the inflated skin is to these circular
-vessels, the _kayak_ is to the _baidar_ of the Esquimaux. Throughout
-the whole region occupied by this race, these two kinds of vessels are
-used, differing only in minute varieties of detail in the different
-localities. According to Dr. King, whose valuable paper, 'On the
-Industrial Arts of the Esquimaux,' was published in the first volume of
-the _Journal of the Ethnological Society_ (1848), the varieties of the
-_kayak_ in the different localities consist merely in the elevation and
-shape of the rim of the hole in which the man sits. In Prince William
-Sound, on the NW. coast, the _kayak_ is frequently built with two or
-three holes to contain two or three men. The bow has two beaks, one of
-which turns up, according to Captain Cook, like the head of a violin,
-as represented in No. 1254 of my collection. This is also used in the
-Aleutian Isles. The meaning of this double beak I have not been able to
-ascertain. The _baidar_ used on this coast has also a double beak, as
-represented in No. 1255 of my collection.
-
-In the British Museum there is a _kayak_ with a single opening, from
-Behring Straits, which differs but little from another in the same
-museum from Greenland; the _kayak_ of Greenland has a knob of ivory at
-each end to protect the sharp point. The _baidar_ is used at Ochotsk
-and Kamtschatka, on the Asiatic coast, and all along the northern coast
-of America, eastward from Behring Strait. Models of both _baidar_ and
-_kayak_ are in the British Museum, from Kotzebue Sound. In Frobisher
-Strait, Frobisher, in 1577, says the boats are of two kinds of leather
-stretched on frames, the greater sort open, and carrying sixteen or
-twenty people (the _baidar_), and the lesser, to carry one man, covered
-over, except in one place where the man sits (the _kayak_). In Hudson's
-Straits and Greenland, where the larger vessels are called _oomiak_,
-they are flat-sided and flat-bottomed, about three feet high, and
-nearly square at the bow and stern, whereas this sort on the north-west
-coast is sometimes pointed at bow and stern. Kerguelen, in 1767,
-mentions both kinds in Greenland; and Kalm, in 1747, speaks of both,
-though not from personal observation, on the coast of Labrador. The
-Esquimaux canoe has been known to have drifted from Greenland across
-the north of Scotland, and has been picked up, with the man still alive
-in it, on the coast of Aberdeen (Wilson).
-
-In Britain the _coracle_ of osier, covered with skin, is mentioned
-by Caesar, and in Britain, Gaul, and Italy by Lucan (A.D. 39-65). In
-Scotland, Bellenden, in the sixteenth century, speaks of the _currock_
-of wands, covered with bulls' hide, as being in use in the sixteenth
-century, and its representative is still used in the west of Ireland.
-Sir William Wilde says that, under the name of _curragh_, it is still
-made of leather, stretched over a wooden frame, on the Boyne, and in
-Arran, on the west coast, of light timber, covered with painted canvas,
-which has superseded the use of leather. I have seen these vessels at
-Dingle, on the south-west coast, where they go by the name of _nevog_;
-they are there 23 feet in length by 4 in width, and 1 ft. 9 inches
-deep, made of laths, and covered with painted canvas; they are used,
-from Valentia, along the west coast as far as Galway. In the south
-they are larger than in the north, where they are called _curraghs_,
-and a single man can carry one on his back, as the ancient Briton did
-his _coracle_. Their continuance is caused by their cheapness, costing
-only L6 when new. Here also they were, until recently, constructed of
-leather. They have a small triangular sail, and, like the most ancient
-forms of vessels, they are guided, when sailing, by means of oars, one
-on each side.
-
-
-5. _Rafts._
-
-The trunks of trees, united by mutual attraction, as they floated down
-the stream, would suggest the idea of a raft. The women of Australia
-use rafts made of layers of reeds, from which they dive to obtain
-mussel-shells. In New Guinea the catamaran, or small raft formed of
-three planks lashed together with rattan, is the commonest vessel used.
-Others are larger, containing ten or twelve persons, and consist of
-three logs lashed together in five places, the centre log being the
-longest, and projecting at both ends.
-
-This is exactly like the catamaran used on the coast of Madras, a
-model of one of which is in the Indian Museum; they are also used on
-the Ganges, and in the Asiatic isles. At Manilla they are known by
-the name of _saraboas_; but the perfection of raft navigation is on
-the coast of Peru. Ulloa, in 1735, describes the _balzas_ used on the
-Guayaquil, in Ecuador, and on the coast as far south as Paita. They are
-called by the Indians of the Guayaquil _jungadas_, and by the Darien
-Indians _puero_. They are made of a wood so light that a boy can easily
-carry a log 1 foot in diameter and 3 or 4 yards long. They are always
-made of an odd number of beams, like the New Guinea and Indian rafts,
-the longest and thickest in the centre, and the others lashed on each
-side. Some are 70 ft. in length and 20 broad. When sailing, they are
-guided by a system of planks, called _guaras_, which are shoved down
-between the beams in different parts of the raft as they are wanted,
-the breadth of the plank being in the direction of the lines of the
-timbers. By means of these they are able to sail near the wind, and to
-luff up, bear away, and tack at pleasure. When a _guara_ is put down in
-the fore part of the raft, it luffs up, and when in the hinder part, it
-bears away. This system of steering, he says, the Indians have learnt
-empirically, 'their uncultivated minds never having examined into the
-_rationale_ of the thing.'
-
-It was one of these vessels which Bartolomew Ruiz, pilot of the second
-expedition for the discovery of Peru, met with; and which so astonished
-the sailors, who had never before seen any vessel on the coast of
-America provided with a sail. Condamine speaks of the rafts in 1743,
-on the Chinchipe, in Peru. They are also used on the coast of Brazil,
-where they are also called _jungadas_, from which locality there is
-a model of one in the British Museum, and another in the Christy
-collection. Professor Wilson thinks it was by means of these vessels,
-driven off the coast of America westward, that the Polynesian and Malay
-islands were peopled; and this brings us to the consideration of the
-peculiar class of vessel which is distributed over a continuous area
-in the Pacific and adjoining seas, viz. the outrigger canoe, which, I
-shall endeavour to show, was derived from the raft.
-
-
-6. _Outrigger-canoes._
-
-The sailing properties of the _balza_, or any other similar raft, must
-have been greatly impeded by the resistance offered to the water by the
-ends of its numerous beams. In order to diminish the resistance, the
-obvious remedy was to use only two beams, placed parallel to each other
-at a distance apart, with a platform laid on cross-poles between them.
-
-Of this kind we find a vessel used by the Tasmanians, and described
-by Mr. Bonwick, on the authority of Lieut. Jeffreys. The natives, he
-says, would select two good stems of trees and place them parallel to
-each other, but a couple of yards apart; cross-pieces of small size
-were laid on these, and secured to the trees by scraps of tough bark.
-A stronger cross-timber, of greater thickness, was laid across the
-centre, and the whole was then covered by wicker-work. Such a float
-would be thirty feet long, and would hold from six to ten persons
-(Herbert Spencer, _Descriptive Sociology_ (London, 1874), No. 3, Table
-V).
-
-In Fiji, Williams describes a kind of vessel called _ulatoka_, a raised
-platform, floating on two logs, which must evidently be a vessel of the
-same description as that used in Tasmania.
-
-From these two logs were derived the double canoe on the one hand, and
-the canoe with the outrigger on the other.
-
-A link between the catamaran and the outrigger canoe is seen in a model
-in the India Museum, from Madras. It consists of the usual catamaran,
-already described, of three beams lashed together, the longest being
-in the centre, across which are attached, their ends extending on one
-side, long outrigger poles, to the extremities of which, parallel, and
-at some distance from the catamaran, is fastened an outrigger log, of
-smaller size and length, pointed at both ends, and boat-shaped, exactly
-like those used with the outrigger canoes to be hereafter described.
-When the art of hollowing out canoes was introduced, then one canoe
-and one log, or two canoes, were employed, as the case might be. This
-I consider to be a more natural sequence than to suppose the outrigger
-invented as a means of steadying the dug-out canoe.
-
-The outrigger canoe, and its accompanying double canoe, is used over
-the whole of the Polynesian and Asiatic islands--from Easter Island
-on the east, to Ceylon and the Andamans on the west. Their varieties
-are also, in some cases, continuous; and I will endeavour to trace
-the distribution of each, commencing with the canoe with the single
-outrigger.
-
-Towards the eastern and northern extremities of the Polynesian Islands
-we find that the canoes have a single outrigger, and that the ends
-of the outrigger poles are attached directly to the outrigger log,
-instead of being connected with it by upright supports, as is the case
-elsewhere. As the outrigger log is on a lower level than the line of
-the gunwales of the canoe, across which the other ends of the outrigger
-poles are lashed, they are generally curved downwards to meet the
-outrigger.
-
-This is the form described by La Perouse in Easter Island. It is
-the same in the drawings of canoes from Marquesas; also in the one,
-figured by Wilkes, from Wytoohee or Disappointment Isle, in the Low
-Archipelago; and in the one from Tahiti, Society Isles; also in those
-of the Sandwich Isles and the Kingsmill Isles; and it reappears again
-on the extreme west of the group in Ceylon, No. 1265 of my collection.
-
-But whilst this peculiarity appears to be constant in the
-above-mentioned region, the form of the body of the canoe differs in
-each group of islands. In the Marquesas the bow turns up very much, in
-the Sandwich Islands only slightly (No. 1264); in Disappointment Isle
-there is a projecting part before and behind, by which they step into
-it; in Tahiti they have a similar projection over the stern only, which
-is used for a similar purpose.
-
-To the westward of these, in a group extending over the centre of the
-region in question, all the outriggers that I have seen described,
-either by means of models or drawings, have upright supports on the
-upper side, and on these the outrigger poles rest, so as to be on the
-level of the line of the gunwales. This is the case in Nuie or Savage
-Island; in Samoa (No. 1262); in the Caroline Isles; in Bowditch Island,
-one of the Union group; in Tonga and Fiji; in New Guinea; in the
-Louisiade Archipelago, and in North Australia.
-
-Another peculiarity in this central region deserves notice. The ends
-of the canoe are covered with a deck extending over about one-third of
-its length fore and aft, and on this deck there is a row of upright
-pegs, carved out of the same piece as the deck, and running down the
-centre of it. Each peg is surmounted by a white _Cypraea ovula_ shell
-tied on. The origin and meaning of this custom is unknown, but it was
-probably adopted originally as insignia of the rank of the owner. Its
-distribution is limited to a group of islands lying between about
-the 10th and 20th parallel of south latitude, and 170 deg. and 180 deg. west
-longitude. Cook, in 1773, speaks of it in the Friendly Isles; and
-Wilkes, in 1838, mentions it in Samoa, Fiji, and Bowditch Island.
-The canoes of the Solomon Isles and other islands are, however, also
-ornamented with shells in different parts.
-
-The canoe with the single outrigger is also used in [Garret Dennis
-Island], which is described by Dampier in 1686; in the Ladrones, by
-Pigafetta, 1519; in the Pelew Islands; in Borneo; in Ceylon; in the
-Nicobar and Andaman Islands.
-
-In Kingsmill and the Caroline Islands, to the north, the outrigger is
-somewhat smaller than elsewhere, its length not exceeding one-third of
-the length of the canoe. In the adjoining groups of the Kingsmill and
-Ladrone Islands we have a variety of this vessel in which the canoe, on
-the outrigger side, is nearly flat, having a belly only on the opposite
-side. This is described by Wilkes in 1838, and Dampier in 1686.
-
-The double canoe represents a variety in which both logs of the
-double-logged raft have developed into canoes. The two canoes are
-placed side by side, at a little distance apart, and transverse spars
-are lashed across the gunwales of both; a platform being built upon the
-cross spars; No. 1266 of my collection.
-
-Double canoes of this kind were used in New Zealand formerly, also in
-New Caledonia. Mr. Baines mentions it in North Australia, but I am not
-aware that it is used in New Guinea. Cook speaks of it in the Friendly
-Isles, Wilkes in Fiji. It was formerly used in Samoa, but Wilkes says
-it has been discontinued, and the single outrigger only is now used; in
-Tahiti; in the Low Archipelago, the inhabitants of which group are very
-expert sailors, steering by the stars, and seldom making any material
-error; in the Sandwich Isles; also in Ceylon, where it is called a
-_paddy boat_; in Burmah and in some of the Indian rivers; at Mosapore,
-where it goes by the name of _langardy_; and in Cochin, on the southern
-portion of the Malabar coast, where it is employed as a ferry-boat. It
-also appears, by a model in the India Museum, that it is used as high
-up as Patna, on the Ganges.
-
-In Fiji we find a connecting link between the double canoe and the
-canoe with the single outrigger. Here the outrigger consists of a boat,
-similar in construction to the large one to which it is attached,
-but smaller, and connected with the platform between them by upright
-supports.
-
-Contrivances for sailing near the wind with the single outrigger canoe
-have led to the introduction of several other varieties of this class
-of vessel. It is necessary that the outrigger should always be on the
-windward side. The outrigger acts as a weight on the windward side, to
-prevent the narrow canoe from being blown over on the opposite side.
-When it blows very hard, the men run out on to the outrigger, to give
-it the additional weight of their bodies. Wilkes says that whenever
-the outrigger gets to the leeward side, there is almost invariably an
-upset. The outrigger probably is pressed too deeply into the water,
-and meeting with too much resistance, breaks the poles. To meet this
-difficulty both the canoe and outrigger are, in some parts, made
-pointed at both ends. When they wish to tack, instead of luffing and
-coming about, they bear away, until the vessel gets on the opposite
-quarter, and then, by shifting the sail, they sail away again stern
-first. This system is pursued in Fiji, in parts of New Guinea, and
-northward, in Kingsmill Islands (Wilkes).
-
-Another mode of meeting this difficulty consists in having two
-outriggers, one on each side. This is employed in the Louisiade
-Archipelago (No. 1260), in parts of New Guinea, and to the north, in
-the Sooloo Archipelago. Yet another method remains to be described. In
-Samoa the canoes are built with bow and stern, and the outrigger is
-pointed towards the fore part only. As these vessels can only sail one
-way, the outrigger, in tacking, must necessarily be sometimes on the
-leeward side; to meet this, they rig out a platform corresponding to
-the outrigger platform on the opposite side; this, for distinction's
-sake, we may term a _weather platform_. It has no outrigger log, nor
-does it touch the water, but when the wind blows so heavily as to
-press the outrigger down on the lee side, they run out on the weather
-platform, and counterbalance the effect of the wind by their weight.
-This contrivance is used in some parts of New Guinea, where, it may
-be observed, the varieties of the outrigger canoe are more numerous
-than in most of the other islands. It is also used in the Solomon
-Isles, where the weather platform is of the same width as the outrigger
-platform; and probably in some of the other islands to the north.
-
-Finally we have, in the Asiatic Archipelago, a contrivance which may
-be said to be derived partly from the double outrigger, and partly
-from the weather platform last described. In proportion as the simple
-dug-out canoe began to be converted into a built-up vessel, and to
-acquire greater beam, they began to depend less and less on the
-support of the outrigger. The double outrigger necessarily presented
-considerable resistance to the water, but the vessel was still too
-narrow to sail by itself. A weather platform had, however, been
-found sufficient to balance the vessel on one side, and the next
-step was to knock off the outrigger log on the other side, thereby
-converting the outrigger platform into a weather platform; the two
-platforms projecting one on each side of the vessel, on the level of
-the gunwales, without touching the water, and thereby acting on the
-principle of the balancing-pole of a tight-rope dancer, whilst the
-resistance to the water was by this means confined to that of the hull
-of the vessel itself. These double weather-platform boats were also
-found more convenient in inland waters, in the canals in Manilla, and
-elsewhere.
-
-De Guignes, in 1796, mentions a contrivance of this sort in the
-Philippines, but from the account, it is not quite clear whether he
-refers to a double weather platform, or a vessel with an outrigger
-and a weather platform. He says that the boats at Manilla are very
-sharply built, and furnished with yards, which serve as _balances_,
-on the windward side of which, when the wind blows hard, the sailors
-place themselves to counterpoise the effect of the wind on the sails.
-This contrivance does not, however, always ensure safety, for at times
-the bamboos which form the balance break, in which case the boat
-founders and the crew are lost. Dampier, however, in 1686, clearly
-speaks of the double weather platform at Manilla. He says that the
-difference between these Manilla boats and those at Guam, in the
-Ladrones, is that, whereas at Guam there is a little boat, fastened to
-the outriggers, that lies in the water, the beams or bamboos here are
-fastened transverse-wise to the outlayers on each side, and touch not
-the water like boats, but one, three, or four feet above the water, and
-serve for the canoe-men to sit and row and paddle upon. He says, that
-when the vessel reels, the ends of the platform dip into the water,
-and the vessel rights itself. Still further north, at Rangoon, on the
-Irrawaddy, we find the same contrivance described by Symes in 1795.
-He says that the boats are long and narrow, sixty feet in length, and
-not more than twelve in the widest place; they require a good deal of
-ballast, and would have been in constant danger of upsetting, had they
-not been provided with outriggers which, composed of thin boards, or
-oftener of buoyant bamboos, make a platform that extends horizontally
-six or seven feet on the outside of the boat from stem to stern. Thus
-secure, he says, the vessel can incline no further than until the
-platform touches the surface of the water, when she immediately rights;
-on this stage the boatmen ply their oars.
-
-This constitutes one out of many points of evidence that might be
-mentioned, serving to show that the arts and culture of the Burmese,
-and of all this part of Asia, have been derived from the Malay
-Archipelago more probably than the reverse.
-
-The outrigger canoe itself has never, I believe, been known on the
-Irrawaddy within the memory of man, but, as already seen, it is used in
-the Nicobar and Andaman Isles and on the coast to the south.
-
-These outriggers, or balancing platforms, appear gradually to have
-diminished in size as the vessel increased in beam, and there can be
-little doubt that the rude stages or balconies outside the gunwales
-represented in the models of many of the larger vessels used in these
-seas are the last vestiges of the outrigger. No. 1278 of my collection
-is an example of this.
-
-
-7. _Rudders, Sails, and other Contrivances._
-
-All the various items of evidence which I have collected, and
-endeavoured to elucidate by means of survivals, whether in relation to
-modes of navigation or other branches of industry, appear to me to tend
-towards establishing a gradual development of culture as we advance
-northward. Although Buddhism and its concomitant civilization may have
-come from the north, there has been an earlier and prehistoric flow of
-culture in the opposite direction--northward--from the primaeval and
-now submerged cradle of the human family in the southern hemisphere.
-This, I venture to think, will establish itself more and more clearly,
-in proportion as we divest ourselves of the numerous errors which
-have arisen from our acceptance of the Noachian deluge as a universal
-catastrophe.
-
-As human culture developed northward from the equator toward the 40th
-parallel of latitude, civilization began to bud out in Egypt, India,
-and China, and a great highway of nations was established by means of
-ships along the southern margin of the land, from China to the Red Sea.
-
-Along this ocean highway may be traced many connexions in ship forms
-which have survived from the earliest times. The _oculus_, which,
-on the sacred boats of the Egyptians, represented the eye of Osiris
-guiding the mummy of the departed across the sacred lake, is still seen
-eastward--in India and China--converted into an ornamental device,
-whilst westward it lived through the period of the Roman and Grecian
-_biremes_ and _triremes_, and has survived to this day on the Maltese
-rowing-boats and the _xebecque_ of Calabria, or has been converted
-into a hawser-hole in modern European craft. The function of the
-rudder--which in the primitive vessels of the southern world is still
-performed by the paddlers, whilst paddling with their faces to the
-prow--was confided, as sails began to be introduced, to the rearmost
-oars. In some of the Egyptian sculptures the three hindermost rowers on
-each side are seen steering the vessel with their oars. Ultimately one
-greatly developed oar on each side of the stern performed this duty;
-the _loom_ of which was attached to an upright beam on the deck, as
-is still the case in some parts of India. In some of the larger Malay
-_prahaus_ there are openings or windows in the stern, considerably
-below the deck, by which the steersmen have access to two large
-rudders, one on each side; each rudder being the vestige of a side oar.
-
-Throughout the Polynesian Islands the steering is performed with
-either one or two greatly developed paddles. Both in the rudder of the
-Egyptian sculptures and in the _gubernaculum_ of the Roman vessels,
-we see the transition from the large double oar, one on each side,
-to the single oar at the stern. The ship of Ptolemaeus Philopator
-had four rudders, each thirty cubits in length (Smith's _Dict._, s.
-v. 'Navis'). The Chinese and Japanese rudder is but a modification
-of the oar, worked through large holes in the stern of the vessel;
-which large holes, in the case of the Japanese, owe their preservation
-to the orders of the Tycoon, who caused them to be retained in all
-his vessels, in order to prevent his subjects from venturing far to
-sea. The _buccina_, or shell trumpet, which is used especially on
-board all canoes in the Pacific, from the coast of Peru to Ceylon, is
-represented, together with the _gubernaculum_, in the hands of Tritons
-in Roman sculptures (Smith's _Dict._, s. v. 'Navis'), and the shell
-form of it was preserved in its metallic representatives.
-
-The sail, in its simplest form, consists of a triangular mat, with
-bamboos lashed to the two longer sides. In New Guinea and some of the
-other islands, this sail, which is here seen in its simplest form, is
-simply put up on deck, with the apex downwards and the broad end up,
-and kept up by stays fore and aft. When a separate mast was introduced,
-this sail was hauled up by a halyard attached to one of the bamboos,
-at the distance of about one-fifth of its length from the broad end,
-the apex of the bamboo-edged mat being fastened forward by means of
-a tack. By taking away the lower bamboo the sail became the _lateen_
-sail of the Malay pirate _proa_, the singular resemblance of which to
-that of the Maltese galley of the eighteenth century (a resemblance
-shared by all other parts of the two vessels) may be seen by two models
-placed side by side in the Royal United Service Institution. Professor
-Wilson observes that the use of the sail appears to be almost unknown
-on either continent of America, and the surprise of the Spaniards on
-first seeing one used on board a Peruvian _balza_ arose from this known
-peculiarity of early American navigation (p. 218). Lahontan, however,
-in 1684, says that the Canadian bark canoes, though usually propelled
-by paddles, sometimes carried a small sail. He does not, however, say
-whether the knowledge of these has been derived from Europeans. Mr.
-Lloyd also mentions small sails used with bark canoes in Newfoundland.
-
-The _crow's-nest_, which in the Egyptian vessels served to contain
-a slinger or an archer at the top of the mast, and which is also
-represented in the Assyrian sculptures, was still used for the same
-purpose in Europe in the fifteenth century, was modified in the
-sixteenth century, and became the mast-head so well known to midshipmen
-in our own time. The two raised platforms, which in the Egyptian
-vessels served to contain the man with the fathoming pole in the fore
-part, and the steersman behind, became the _prora_ and the _puppis_
-of the Romans, and the _forecastle_ and _poop_ of modern European
-vessels. The _aplustre_, which, in the form of a lotus, ornamented the
-stern of the Egyptian war-craft, gave the form to the _aplustre_ of the
-Greeks and Romans, and may still be seen on the stern of the Burmese
-war-boats at the present time.
-
- * * * * *
-
-All these numerous examples serve to show that where civilization has
-advanced the forms have been gradually changed; where, on the other
-hand, it has not advanced, they have remained unchanged. Sir Gardner
-Wilkinson and others have pointed out the striking resemblance between
-the boats of the ancient Egyptians and those of modern India. 'The
-form of the stern, the principle and construction of the rudder, the
-cabins, the square sail, the copper eye on each side of the head, the
-line of small squares at the side, like false windows, and the shape
-of the oars of boats used on the Ganges, forcibly call to mind,' he
-says, 'those of the Nile, represented in the paintings of the Theban
-tombs.' We have also seen (p. 214) that the inflated sheep-skin still
-serves to transport the Mesopotamian peasant across the Euphrates, as
-it did when Nimroud was a thriving city. The skin and wicker tub-shaped
-vessels still float down the Euphrates with their cargoes to Baghdad,
-are broken up, and the skins carried up the river again on mules, as
-they were in the time of Herodotus, upwards of 2,000 years ago. What
-is there to prevent our believing that the primitive vessels which we
-have been describing in the southern hemisphere, the representatives of
-some of which have been discovered in river deposits of the stone age
-in Europe, may have been in use in the countries in which they are now
-found, as long, and longer--far longer?
-
-What reason is there to doubt that the rude bark-float of the
-Australian, the Tasmanian, and the Ethiopian; the catamaran of the
-Papuan; the dug-out of the New Zealander; the built-up canoe of
-the Samoan; and the improved ribbed vessel of the Ke islander, are
-survivals representing successive stages in the development of the art
-of ship-building, not lapses to ruder methods of construction as the
-result of degradation; that each stage supplies us with examples of
-what was at one time the perfection of the art, inconceivable ages ago?
-Some, as we have seen, especially the more primitive kinds, spread
-nearly all over the world, whilst others had a more limited area of
-distribution. Taken together, they enable us to trace back the history
-of ship-building from the time of the earliest Egyptian sculptures to
-the commencement of the art.
-
-Nor does the interest of this inquiry confine itself to the development
-of ship-building. As affecting the means of locomotion, it throws light
-on the development of other branches of culture in early times. For
-even if we set aside exceptional instances in which individual canoes
-have been driven away to great distances--such as the case in which
-an Esquimaux in his kayak was picked up off the coast of Aberdeen, or
-that of a Chinese junk having been wrecked on the north-west coast of
-America, which might or might not have produced permanent results--and
-confine ourselves to those cases in which the distribution of like
-forms of vessels proves that there must probably have been frequent
-communication between shore and shore; and if we further assume, as I
-propose to do, that the existing means of communication in the Pacific
-in a great measure represents the amount of intercourse that took place
-across the sea in prehistoric times, that is to say, in times prior to
-the earliest Egyptian sculptures, we find no difficulty in accounting,
-by this means, for the striking similarity observable in the arts and
-ideas of savages in distant lands; for not only have these vessels
-been the means of conveying from place to place the material form of
-implements, such as celts, stone knives, and so forth, which, being
-imperishable, have been handed down to us unchanged, and the forms of
-which we know to have spread over large geographic areas; but also each
-voyage has conveyed a boat-load of ideas, of which no material record
-remains, in the shape of myths, religions, and superstitions, which
-have been emptied out upon the seashore, to seek affinity with other
-chatter that was indigenous to the place.
-
-Thus, by means of intercommunication, no less than by spontaneous
-development, have been formed those numerous combinations which so
-greatly puzzle the student of culture at the present time.
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[219] A Paper read at the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain
-and Ireland on December 22, 1874, and published in the _Journal_ of
-the Institute, vol. iv (1875), pp. 399-435. (N.B.--This paper was
-not furnished by the author with either plates or references. The
-latter have been supplied, so far as possible, on pp. 229 ff.: for
-illustrations, reference should be made to the section on Navigation in
-the Pitt-Rivers Museum, Oxford.--ED.)
-
-[220] (The _Catalogue of the Anthropological Collection lent by Col.
-Lane Fox to Bethnal Green Museum_ (London, 1874, parts i and ii) only
-contains 'Weapons'; part iii was never issued.--ED.)
-
-[221] _Notes and Queries on Anthropology, for the Use of Travellers
-and Residents in Uncivilized Lands_, drawn up by a Committee appointed
-by the British Association for the Advancement of Science (1874); 3rd
-edition, 1899, published by the Anthropological Institute, 3 Hanover
-Square, W.
-
-[222] 'Primitive Warfare,' pp. 127-30, 148-51, above.
-
-[223] Address to the Anthropological Department at the Brighton meeting
-of the British Association, 1872. _Report Brit. Assoc._ (London, 1873),
-p. 161.
-
-[224] Since writing this I have seen the illustration in Sir H.
-Rawlinson's note to this passage, in which he gives it as his opinion
-that this is the meaning and use to be ascribed to these pins; and he
-says that this system is still employed in Egypt, where they raise an
-extra bulwark above the gunwale. Rawlinson, _Herodotus_ (1862), vol.
-ii. p. 132.
-
-[225] _Denmark in the Early Iron Age_, by Conrad Engelhardt (London,
-1866), p. 31.
-
-[226] 'On Vessels of Papyrus,' by John Hogg, Esq., M.A., F.L.S.;
-_Magazine of Nat. Hist._, vol. ii (1829), pp. 324-32: cf. p. 206, above.
-
-
-
-
-NOTES TO 'EARLY MODES OF NAVIGATION'
-
-
-P. 189. Steinitz, _The Ship: its Origin and Progress_ (London, 1849),
-Pl. ii (frontispiece): cf. pp. ix, 4.
-
- Gregory, 'Expedition to the NW. coast of Australia,' _Roy. Geogr.
- Soc. Journal_, xxxii. (1862) p. 376.
-
-P. 190. Cook, _Voyages_ (ed. London, 1842), vol. i. p. 204.
-
- Kitto, _Pictorial Bible_, note on 2 Sam. xix. 18.
-
- Pliny, ix. 10 (cf. vi. 24); Diodorus, iii. 21, 5; Strabo, p. 773;
- turtle-shell boats were in actual use among the 'Turtle-eaters'
- (_Chelonophagi_) of Carmania and the islands of the Red Sea.
-
-P. 191. Kalm, _Travels into North America_ (London, 1771), vol. ii. pp.
-38-9.
-
- Raleigh's Expedition; Amadas and Barlawe, _The First Voyage to the
- Coasts of America_ (= Pinkerton (1811), vol. xii. p. 567).
-
- Columbus, _The Journal of Christopher Columbus, &c._; transl.
- Markham (Hakluyt Society, 1893), p. 39, mentions dug-out canoes
- (cf. pp. 58, 94), but not the use of fire.
-
- Mouat, _Adventures and Researches among the Andaman Islanders_
- (London, 1863), pp. 315-6; only hand-hollowing in use in his time:
- no mention of Blair here: perhaps a verbal communication to the
- author.
-
- Symes, _An Account of an Embassy to the Kingdom of Ava_ in 1795
- (London, 1800), p. 320 (= Pinkerton (1811), vol. ix. p. 500).
-
- Turner, _Nineteen Years in Polynesia_ (London, 1861), pp. 425-6.
-
-P. 192. Wood, _Natural History of Man_ (London, 1868-70), vol. ii. p.
-732.
-
-P. 193. Wilkes, _United States Exploring Expedition_ (Philadelphia,
-1845), vol. ii. p. 150 (Samoa); vol. v. p. 322 (Manilla); vol. v. p.
-353 (Sooloo).
-
- De Guignes, _Voyages a Peking, Manille, et l'Ile de France_ (Paris,
- 1808), vol. iii. p. 402.
-
- De Morga, _The Philippine Islands_ (1609); transl. by Hon. H. E.
- Stanley (Hakluyt Society, 1868), p. 272; two types, (_a_) 'made
- of one very large tree'; (_b_) 'also _vireys_ and _barangays_ ...
- joined together with wooden bolts.'
-
- Symes, _An Account of an Embassy to the Kingdom of Ava_ in 1795
- (London, 1800), p. 320 (= Pinkerton (1811), vol. ix. p. 500).
-
-P. 194. Turpin, _Histoire de Siam_ (Paris, 1771), vol. i. pp. 34-6.
-
- Pietro della Valle, _Viaggi_ (Brighton, 1843), vol. i. pp. 602-3.
-
- Duarte Barbosa (Magellan), _A Description of the Coasts of East
- Africa and Malabar_ (1514); transl. by Hon. H. E. Stanley (Hakluyt
- Society, 1866), p. 9.
-
- Livingstone, _Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa_
- (London, 1857), p. 64.
-
- Barth, _Travels and Discoveries in North and Central Africa_
- (London, 1857), vol. ii. p. 469; the tributary is the _Faro_; Yola
- is the adjacent town.
-
- Grant, _Walk across Africa_ (London, 1864), p. 304.
-
- Condamine, M. de la, _Relation abregee d'un voyage fait dans
- l'interieur de l'Amerique meridionale_ (Paris, 1745), p. 63 (at
- Laguna).
-
-P. 195. Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. p. 169.
-
- Bartram, _Travels through N. and S. Carolina, Georgia, &c._
- (London, 1792), p. 225.
-
- Kalm, _Travels into N. America_ (London, 1771), vol. ii. pp. 240-2.
-
- Pliny, xvi. 40 _Germaniae praedones singulis arboribus cavatis
- navigant, quarum quaedam et triginta homines ferunt._
-
- Keller, _Lake Dwellings of Switzerland_ (transl. by J. E. Lee, 2nd
- ed., 1878), p. 45, Pl. x. 8.
-
- Sir W. Wilde, _Catalogue of the Antiquities of the Museum of the
- Royal Irish Academy_ (Dublin, 1863), vol. i. pp. 202-4.
-
- Ware, _The Antiquities and History of Ireland_ (London, 1705), p.
- 47.
-
- Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. pp. 153, 160.
-
-P. 197. Cook, _Voyages_ (London, 1842), vol. i. p. 193.
-
-P. 197. Barth, _Travels_ (London, 1857), vol. ii. p. 469.
-
- Byron, _An Account of the Voyages undertaken ... for making
- Discoveries in the Southern Hemisphere ... by Commodore Byron,
- &c._, by John Hawksworth (London, 1773), vol. i. p. 79.
-
-P. 198. Duarte Barbosa, _A Description_, &c. (Hakluyt Society, 1866),
-pp. 14-15.
-
- Denham and Clapperton, _Travels in Northern and Central Africa_
- (London, 1826), p. 60 (Denham).
-
- Barth, _Travels_ (London, 1857), vol. iii. p. 293.
-
- Grant, _Walk across Africa_ (London, 1864), p. 196.
-
-P. 199. Cook, _Voyages_ (1842), vol. i. p. 425 (Friendly Islands); pp.
-95-7 (Otaheite).
-
- La Perouse, _Voyage autour du monde_ (Paris, 1897), Atlas, No. 61.
-
- Wilkes, _United States Exploring Expedition_ (Philadelphia, 1845),
- vol. i. pp. 331-2 (Wytoohee); vol. ii. p. 157 (Samoa).
-
-P. 200. Williams, _Fiji and the Fijians_ (London, 1858), vol. i. pp.
-71-6.
-
- Wilkes, l. c., vol. v. p. 52.
-
- Wallace, _The Malay Archipelago_ (London, 1869), vol. ii. p. 159
- (the long journey); p. 92 (nail-less boats); pp. 183-6 (the Ke
- islanders). [The author's text has been amended to conform with the
- statements of Wallace.--ED.]
-
-P. 201. Dampier, _A New Voyage round the World_ (London, 1729), vol. i.
-p. 429.
-
- Turpin, _Histoire de Siam_ (Paris, 1771), vol. i. p. 36.
-
-P. 202. Duarte Barbosa (Magellan), _A Description_, &c. (Hakluyt,
-1866), pp. 147-8.
-
- Marco Polo, _Travels_, transl. by Sir H. Yule (London, 1903), vol.
- i. p. 108.
-
-P. 203. Lobo, _A Voyage to Abyssinia_ (London, 1735), p. 24.
-
- Isaiah xviii. 2; see Kitto's _Pictorial Bible_, note on 2 Sam. xix.
- 18.
-
-P. 204. Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (1862), vol. i. p. 169.
-
- Sir Gardner Wilkinson, _The Manners and Customs of Ancient Egypt_,
- 3rd ed., 1878, vol. ii. p. 208, No. 403 (No. 399, 1st ed.).
-
- Lucan, _Pharsalia_, iv. 136 _Conseritur bibula Memphitica cymba
- papyro._
-
- Plutarch, _de Iride et Osiride_, 18.
-
- Pliny, vii. 56 _Nave primus in Graeciam ex Aegypto Danaus advenit:
- ante ratibus navigabatur, inventis in Mari Rubro inter insulas a
- rege Erythra_ (cf. ix. 10, and note on p. 190 above). _Reperiuntur,
- qui Mysos et Troianos priores excogitasse, cum transirent adversus
- Thracas. Etiam nunc in Britannico Oceano vitiles corio circumsutae
- fiunt: in Nilo ex papyro, et scirpo, et arundine._ [The quotation,
- as given in _J.A.I._, iv. 414, is inaccurate.--ED.]
-
- Huxley, _Trans. Int. Congr. Preh. Arch._, Norwich, 1868 (London,
- 1869), p. 92; see also p. 147 above.
-
-P. 205. Owen, _Journ. Anthrop. Inst._, vol. iv. p. 240.
-
- Rosellini, _Monumenti dell' Egitto e della Nubia_ (Pisa, 1834),
- Mon. Civ., Pl. cxix. 1, cxvii. 3 (= Plate XV. 109-11 herewith).
-
-P. 206. Prideaux; Markham, _A History of the Abyssinian Expedition,
-with a chapter ... by Lieut. W. F. Prideaux_ (London, 1869), p. 101.
-
- Denon, _Voyages dans la Basse et la Haute Egypte_ (London, 1807),
- vol. ii. p. 72.
-
- Belzoni, _Narrative of Operations and Recent Discoveries ... in
- Egypt and Nubia_ (London, 1820), p. 62; (holds nine persons).
-
- Bruce, _Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile_ (London, 1790),
- vol. v. p. 6.
-
-P. 207. Pliny, xiii. 2 refers to wooden boats; v. 2 to wickerwork:
-_ibi Aethiopicae conveniunt naves: namque eas plicatiles humeris
-transferunt, quoties ad cataractas ventum est_.
-
- Belzoni, _Narrative of Operations_ (London, 1820), pp. 380-1.
-
- Pliny, v. 2 (above). Lucan, _Phars._ iv. 136 (above).
-
- Herodotus, ii. 96. Wilkinson (Birch), 3rd ed., vol. ii. p. 307.
-
-P. 208. Homer, _Odyssey_, v. 241-261. Smith, _Dict. Gr. and Rom.
-Antiq._, s. v. 'Navis.'
-
- Nydam boat. Engelhardt, _Denmark in the Early Iron Age_ (London,
- 1866), pp. 29-39, Pl. i-iv.
-
- Tacitus, _Germania_, 44.
-
-P. 210. Regnard, _OEuvres_ (Paris, 1854), vol. i, _Voyage de Laponie_,
-pp. 51, 100.
-
- Outhier, _Journal d'un Voyage au Nord, en 1736 et 1737_ (Paris,
- 1744), pp. 60-1.
-
- Bell, _Travels from St. Petersburg in Russia to diverse parts of
- Asia_ (Glasgow, 1763), vol. i. p. 168 ff.
-
- Atkinson, _Oriental and Western Siberia_ (London, 1858), pp. 14-15.
-
-P. 211. Belzoni, _Narrative of Operations, &c. ... in Egypt and Nubia_
-(1820), p. 62.
-
-P. 212. Wilkes, _U. S. Exploring Expedition_ (Philadelphia, 1845), vol.
-i. p. 127. [Pritchard.]
-
- Kalm, _Travels into North America_ (London, 1771), vol. ii. p. 298.
-
- Lahontan, _New Voyages to North America_ (London, 1735), vol. i.
- pp. 26-9.
-
-P. 213. Lane-Fox (Pitt-Rivers), _Report of the British Association_,
-Brighton, 1872 (London, 1873), p. 163.
-
- Steinitz, _The Ship: its Origin and Progress_ (London, 1849), Pl.
- xvi. 6.
-
-P. 214. Layard, _Nineveh and its Remains_ (7th ed., London, 1848), vol.
-ii. pp. 381-2. Cf. Herodotus, i. 194.
-
- Lempriere, _A Tour from Gibraltar to Tangier_ (London, 1793), p.
- 421.
-
-P. 215. Herodotus, i. 194.
-
- Kitto, _Pictorial Bible_, note on 2 Sam. xix. 18. Layard, l. c.
-
- Hamilton (Alexander), _A New Account of the East Indies, 1688-1723_
- (Edinb. 1727), vol. i. p. 88. They are described, even later, by
- Sir R. K. Porter, _Travels in Georgia_, &c., 1817-20 (London,
- 1821-2), vol. ii. p. 260; and figured in Rawlinson, _Herodotus_
- (1862), vol. i. p. 268, after Chesney, _Expedition for the Survey
- of the Euphrates and Tigris_ (London, 1850), vol. ii.
-
- Buchanan, _A Journey from Madras through the countries of Mysore,
- Canara, and Malabar_ (London, 1807), vol. ii. pp. 121, 141, 151,
- 163.
-
-P. 216. Cook, _Voyages_ (London, 1842), vol. ii. pp. 303-4.
-
- Frobisher, _The Three Voyages of Martin Frobisher_, ed. Collinson
- (Hakluyt Society, 1867), p. 384.
-
- Kerguelen, _Relation d'un voyage dans la mer du Nord_ (Paris,
- 1771), pp. 178-9.
-
- Kalm, _Travels into North America_ (London, 1771), vol. ii. p. 241;
- iii. p. 16.
-
- Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. p. 148.
-
-P. 217. Caesar, _de Bello Civili_, i. 54.
-
- Lucan, _Pharsalia_, iii. 131-5.
-
- Bellenden, _The History and Chronicles of Scotland_, &c. 1536
- (Edinburgh, 1821), vol. i. p. lix.
-
- Sir W. Wilde, _Catalogue ... of the Royal Irish Academy_ (Dublin,
- 1863), vol. i. p. 204.
-
- Ulloa, _A Voyage to South America, 1735_ (London, 1807), vol. i.
- pp. 182-5.
-
-P. 218. Bartolomew Ruiz. See Benzoni, _Historia del Mondo Nuovo_
-(Venice, 1572), p. 165 (figure): reproduced in Benzoni (ed. Smyth:
-Hakluyt Soc., 1857), p. 243: cf. Winsor, _Narrative and Critical
-History of America_ (London, 1886), vol. ii. p. 508 (figure).
-
- Condamine, M. de la, _Relation abregee d'un voyage fait dans
- l'interieur de l'Amerique meridionale_ (Paris, 1745), p. 30 (on the
- Maranon, not the Chinchipe R.). 'Un expres que j'avois depeche de
- Tupenda ... avoit franchi tous ces obstacles sur un petit radeau
- fait avec deux ou trois pieces de bois, ce qui suffit a un Indien
- nud et excellent nageur, comme ils le sont tous.'
-
- Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. p. 177.
-
-P. 219. Bonwick, _Daily Life of the Tasmanians_ (London, 1870), p. 51.
-
- Williams, _Fiji and the Fijians_ (London, 1858), vol. i. p. 76.
-
-P. 220. La Perouse, _Voyage autour du monde_ (Paris, 1797), vol. ii. p.
-94.
-
- Wilkes, _U. S. Exploring Expedition_ (Philadelphia, 1845), vol. i.
- p. 331.
-
- Cook, _Voyages_ (London, 1842), vol. i. p. 425.
-
- Wilkes, l. c, vol. ii. p. 151 (Samoa); iii. pp. 365-6 (Fiji); v.
- pp. 11-12 (Bowditch Island).
-
-P. 221. Dampier, _A New Voyage round the World_ (London, 1729), vol.
-i. p. 215 (at Guam in the Ladrones; elsewhere he notes them 'only at
-Mindanao' in the Philippines, pp. 298-300).
-
-P. 221. Pigafetta, _Voyage round the World_ (= Pinkerton (1811), vol.
-xi. p. 325).
-
- Wilkes, _U.S. Explor. Exped._ (Philadelphia, 1845), vol. v. p. 52
- (Kingsmill Is.).
-
- Dampier, _A New Voyage, &c._ (1729), vol. i. p. 298 (Kingsmill Is.,
- and Ladrones).
-
- Baines, quoted in Wood, _Nat. Hist. of Man_ (London, 1868), vol.
- ii. p. 8.
-
- Cook, _Voyages_ (London, 1842), vol. i. p. 425.
-
- Wilkes, l. c., vol. iii. p. 365 (Fiji); ii. p. 151 (Samoa).
-
-P. 222. Wilkes, l. c., vol. iii. p. 365 (Fiji); v. p. 52 (Kingsmill).
-
-P. 223. De Guignes, _Voyages a Peking, Manille, et l'Ile de France_
-(Paris, 1808), vol. iii. p. 402.
-
- Dampier, _A New Voyage round the World_ (London, 1729), pp. 298-300.
-
- Symes, _An Account of an Embassy to the Kingdom of Ava_ in 1795
- (London, 1800), p. 223 (= Pinkerton (1811), vol. ix. p. 455).
-
-P. 226. Wilson, _Prehistoric Man_ (London, 1862), vol. i. p. 175.
-
- Lahontan, _New Voyage to North America_ (London, 1735), vol. i. p.
- 28.
-
- Lloyd, _Journ. Anthrop. Inst._, vol. iv. p. 28.
-
-P. 227. Wilkinson (Birch), _Manners and Customs of the Ancient
-Egyptians_ (3rd ed., London, 1878), vol. ii. p. 219.
-
-
-
-
-Oxford: Printed at the Clarendon Press by HORACE HART, M.A.
-
-
-
-
- * * * * *
-
-
-
-
-Transcriber's Note
-
-
-Illustrations have been moved next to the text which they illustrate.
-
-
-The following apparent mistakes have been corrected:
-
-p. xvi "parodoxical" changed to "paradoxical"
-
-p. 35 "haves hown" changed to "have shown"
-
-p. 46 "which I I am" changed to "which I am"
-
-p. 51 "which they resemble." changed to "which they resemble.[19]"
-
-p. 56 (note) "172-80" changed to "172-80."
-
-p. 62 (note) "DC." changed to "D.C."
-
-p. 76 "glaves" changed to "glaives"
-
-Plate XVI. "AUSTRALIAN SHIELDS" changed to "AUSTRALIAN SHIELDS."
-
-p. 158 "Pescheira" changed to "Peschiera"
-
-p. 172 "the Caucasus:" changed to "the Caucasus;"
-
-p. 186 (note) "The former" changed to "The latter"
-
-p. 198 "mats'." changed to "mats.'"
-
-p. 198 "persons'." changed to "persons.'"
-
-p. 214 "Bagdad" changed to "Baghdad"
-
-
-The following possible mistakes have been left as printed:
-
-p. 31 use it.
-
-p. 72 (1846), vol. ii. 1. p.
-
-
-The following are used inconsistently in the text:
-
-blowpipe and blow-pipe
-
-Butan and Bootan
-
-cocoa-nut and coco-nut
-
-firearms and fire-arms
-
-gipsies and Gipsies
-
-pl. and Pl.
-
-sheepskin and sheep-skin
-
-shipbuilding and ship-building
-
-wickerwork and wicker-work
-
-Inconsistent punctuation in plates XV and XVI has been retained.
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Evolution of Culture, by
-Augustus Henry Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers
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