goddess, once arose out of the head of Zeus, beautiful and in full

armor.

Now, Elliot Smith tells us that Perry's researches are "converting ethnology into a real science," and Perry himself notes that

the study of human society has been vitiated in the past by the application of unrestrained speculation to matters that were often capable of easy verification; and this uncritical habit has worked infinite damage to thought, leading to the practice of inventing explanations of facts instead of inquiring strictly into the real meaning of these facts.

As a palliative Perry suggests

the application of the historical method of inquiry. Once events are ranged in their historical sequence, the facts soon begin to tell their own story and speculation can be laid on one side as unnecessary.9

This from two scientists whose theory, if epic in its sweep, is certainly made of the stuff that myths are made of!

It may well be imagined that a speculative structure such as this does not come into being without numerous assumptions. But let us pass these by excepting only one, the assumption, namely, that the intelligence and circumstances necessary for the birth of civilization existed only in ancient Egypt, whereas a large part of the rest of mankind must apparently have consisted of poor imbeciles who could do nothing better with the divine gifts brought to them by the Children of the Sun than to drag them down to degeneration.10

We are now prepared to deal with the school of historical ethnology as it has developed in America.

THE AMERICAN SCHOOL OF HISTORICAL ETHNOLOGY

Contrary to what is often assumed, American ethnology can boast of an evolutionary period of its own. I do not only have in The Evolution of the Dragon, Preface, p. xiii.

"The Origin of Magic and Religion, pp. 2–3.

10

The Elliot Smith-Perry theory brings to mind the story of the special creation of man, only that here not man is created but civilization. The myth of the "archaic civilization" shares with that other great myth the grandeur of simplicity, even though it may limp on the side of truth. Cf. the writer's "Diffusion vs. Independent Origin," Science, XLIV, 531-33, and review of Perry's "Origin of Magic and Religion," The Nation, 1924.

mind the writings of Lewis H. Morgan, one of the pillars of classical evolutionism, but also those of Brinton in mythology, of Powell in social organization, of Cushing and Mason in technology, of McGee in the history of ideas, and somewhat anachronisticallyof MacCurdy in art.

Not until the advent of Franz Boas did Clio visit our shores. The historical school is rooted in this man, a Child of the Sun indeed, but not from Heliopolis. A striking illustration, incidentally, of the diffusion of culture and of Rivers' principle of the small number of immigrants, in this case of one.11

As far back as 189612 Boas attacked the comparative method as practiced by the early evolutionists. He pointed out the difficulty of estimating the extent and significance of cultural similarities, the danger of dealing with large numbers of imperfectly circumscribed facts in the expectation that the errors will cancel out, the necessity of envisaging cultural features in their realistic historical settings, if their full bearing was to be understood.

The evolutionary theory of social organization was taken to task by Swanton,13 then by Lowie," and the writer,15 who combated the assumption of a primitive promiscuity, the early universality of group marriage, and particularly the assumption that clans were once universal and that they were everywhere and always superseded by gentes. Incidentally, they reached the conclusion that the family was to be regarded as a universal as well as the earliest form of social grouping, a thesis amply supported by later research and now generally accepted.1o

"In fact, as one beholds some of the most recent contributions of American anthropologists, he wonders whether Rivers' second principle is not equally well exemplified, the principle of the disappearance of useful arts, in this case of that of critical thought.

12

"The Limitations of the Comparative Method in Anthropology," Science, N.S., IV, 901-8. Cf. also the same author's remarks in “The Mythology of the Bella Coola Indians," Jesup North Pacific Expedition, Vol. I, Part III.

13 "The Social Organization of American Tribes," American Anthropologist (1905), pp. 663-73.

"Social Organization," American Journal of Sociology, 1914.

15 "The Social Organization of the Indians of North America," Journal of American Folklore, XXVII, 411–36.

16

See especially Lowie, "Family and Sib," American Anthropologist (1919), pp. 28-40; and Goldenweiser, Early Civilization, pp. 237 ff.

Lowie" dealt critically with the concept of property, showing that the idea of individual ownership was as old as that of communal ownership. Much earlier Holmes 18 had emphasized the importance of material and technique in the evolution of art, in particular pointing out how the effects of one technique, that of basketry weaving, were observable in pottery decoration. Boas went much farther, and in his study of Alaskan needle cases1o demonstrated that the succession of realistic-geometrical in art was often reversed and that the interplay of technical as well as artistic factors was much more complex than had been assumed by the evolutionist. The study of Plains art20 resulted in a striking demonstration of the priority of geometrical designs in certain cases. It could be shown here that the geometrical unit patterns of bead work agreed in their major features over a wide district, whereas the interpretations of the patterns, among them realistic ones, differed from tribe to tribe. The latter were obviously secondary and of more recent origin.

In a highly elaborate discussion of Northwest Coast art21 Boas succeeded in unraveling the intricacies of the method of dissection and composition of designs used by these people. This method could be shown to be unique. This led to a theory of style22 the essence of which is that the artist, no matter how primitive, never creates out of a free psyche, as it were, but is always limited if not wholly controlled by the prevailing tribal pattern.

The concept of pattern was further elaborated by Lowie in his studies of the Crow and Village Indians,23 by the writer in a specu

"Primitive Society, pp. 205-57.

18

"Origin and Development of Form and Ornament in Ceramic Art," Fourth Report, Bureau of American Ethnology.

19 "The Decorative Designs of Alaskan Needlecases," Proceedings, U.S. National Museum, Vol. XXXIV (1908).

20

"See, for example, Wissler, The American Indian, pp. 95 ff.

"The Decorative Art of the Indians of the North-Pacific Coast," American Museum of Natural History, Bulletin, XI (1897), 123-76.

"Boas, "Representative Art of Primitive People," Holmes Anniversary Volume (1916), pp. 18-23.

""Some Problems in the Ethnology of the Crow and Village Indians,” American Anthropologist, XIV (1912), 60–71.

lative reconstruction of the origin of a totemic complex,24 and by Wissler in his studies of Plains designs,25 of shirt styles in the same area,26 of the acquisition of medicine bundles by transfer among the Blackfoot, and of more complicated culture complexes, such as that of maize cultivation,28 which was taken over bodily by the New England farmers.

27

29

In the domain of mythology Ehrenreich's theory that myths were to be interpreted as attempted explanations of natural, especially of celestial, phenomena was attacked by Lowie, 20 who could show that the supposed "explanations" were as often as not simply tagged on to a story of entirely different origin.

The phenomena of diffusion were elucidated in a series of careful researches. To mention a few among many: Lowie's study of Plains age societies,30 probably the most careful single investigation of diffusion within a limited area and referring to a strictly circumscribed culture complex; Wissler's Plains studies, especially his comparative analysis of Blackfoot culture,1 a veritable tour de force of analytical reasoning in which the author makes out a good case for the assertion that the Blackfoot have originated nothing in the culture which now is theirs, but must be regarded as carriers and propagators of cultural features originated by others; Radin's essay on the Peyote cult32 in which he disentangles native and Christian elements in the ceremonial complex of the Peyote. In

24 "The Origin of Totemism," ibid., pp. 603-5.

25 "Decorative Art of the Sioux Indians," Bulletin, American Museum of Natural History, Vol. XVIII, Part III (1904).

2 "Costumes of the Plains Indians," Anthropological Papers, American Museum of Natural History, Vol. XVII, Part II (1915).

27 "Ceremonial Bundles of the Blackfoot Indians," ibid., Vol. VII, Part II (1912).

29

'Aboriginal Maize Culture as a Typical Culture Complex," American Journal of Sociology, Vol. XXI (1916).

29

"The Test-Theme in North American Mythology," Journal of American Folklore, XXI (1908), 97–148.

Plains Indian Age Societies," Anthropological Papers, American Museum of Natural History, Vol. XI, Part XIII (1916).

31 "Material Culture of the Blackfoot Indians," ibid., Vol. V, Part I (1910). 32 "A Sketch of the Peyote Cult of the Winnebago," Journal of Religious Philosophy, Vol. VII (1914), reprint.

this connection the writer pointed out that the processes of diffusion were not so different on the psychological side from those of cultural growth "from within" as might be supposed, that the principal difference lay in the relation of the new features to the old and that, therefore, the more similar two cultures in contact, the more nearly will the processes of diffusion between them partake of the nature of cultural growth from within.3

34

35

33

36

The problem of the relation of culture to physical environment also received its share of attention in America. The contributions to this topic by Lowie, Wissler, Sapir, and the writer all point in the same direction. It must be admitted that environment has its share in contributing the "brick and mortar" of culture: the materials of technology, the subjects for religion, the characters of myths, as well as certain factors which limit or enhance the growth and spread of social and political systems. But much of the content of culture and all of its formal elements must, by and large, be declared immune from environmental influences. This would comprise the shapes and techniques of material objects, the ritualistic content and spiritual aspect of religion, the plots and magic of myths, the principles underlying social and political structure. To the extent, then, to which culture is form-and it is that before anything else it will brook no environmental determinism. Wissler's particular contribution in this field consists in the thought that environment, while powerless to create culture, is yet capable of holding it to certain forms which develop as one of several possible ways of solving the problem of environmental adjustment. For obvious reasons material culture is especially prone to be thus held in check by environment, and material culture holds the rest.

"The Principle of Limited Possibilities in the Development of Culture," Journal of American Folklore, XXVI (1913), 286–87.

"Culture and Ethnology, chap. ii.

25

"Aboriginal Maize Culture, etc.," American Journal of Sociology, Vol. XXI (1916). See also the same author's "The Psychological Aspects of the Culture-Environment Relation," American Anthropologist, XIV (1912), 217-25, and Man and Culture, chapter xv.

* "Language and Environment," American Anthropologist, XIV (1912), 226-42. "Culture and Environment," American Journal of Sociology, Vol. XXI

(1916).