Man, Past and Present Part 4

Thus is everywhere revealed the background of sheer savagery, which lies behind all human culture, while the "Golden Age" of the poets fades with the "Hesperides" and Plato's "Atlantis" into the region of the fabulous.

Little need here be said of strictly historic times, the most characteristic feature of which is perhaps the general use of letters.

By means of this most fruitful of human inventions, everything worth preserving was perpetuated, and thus all useful knowledge tended to become acc.u.mulative. It is no longer possible to say when or where the miracle was wrought by which the apparently multifarious sounds of fully-developed languages were exhaustively a.n.a.lysed and effectively expressed by a score or so of arbitrary signs. But a comparative study of the various writing-systems in use in different parts of the world has revealed the process by which the transition was gradually brought about from rude pictorial representations of objects to purely phonetical symbols.

As is clearly shown by the "winter counts" of the North American aborigines, and by the prehistoric rock carvings in Upper Egypt, the first step was a _pictograph_, the actual figure, say, of a man, standing for a given man, and then for any man or human being. Then this figure, more or less reduced or conventionalised, served to indicate not only the term _man_, but the full sound _man_, as in the word _manifest_, and in the modern rebus. At this stage it becomes a _phonogram_, or _phonoglyph_, which, when further reduced beyond all recognition of its original form, may stand for the syllable _ma_ as in _ma-ny_, without any further reference either to the idea or the sound man. The phonogram has now become the symbol of a monosyllable, which is normally made up of two elements, a consonant and a vowel, as in the Devanagari, and other syllabic systems.

Lastly, by dropping the second or vowel element the same symbol, further modified or not, becomes a _letter_ representing the sound _m_, that is, one of the few ultimate elements of articulate speech. A more or less complete set of such characters, thus worn down in form and meaning, will then be available for indicating more or less completely all the phonetic elements of any given language. It will be a true _alphabet_, the wonderful nature of which may be inferred from the fact that only two, or possibly three, such alphabetic systems are known with absolute certainty to have ever been independently evolved by human ingenuity[112]. From the above exposition we see how inevitably the Phoenician parent of nearly all late alphabets expressed at first the consonantal sounds only, so that the vowels or vowel marks are in all cases later developments, as in Hebrew, Syriac, Arabic, Greek, the Italic group, and the Runes.

In primitive systems, such as the Egyptian, Sumerian, Chinese, Maya-Quiche and Mexican, one or more of the various transitional steps may be developed and used simultaneously, with a constant tendency to advance on the lines above indicated, by gradual subst.i.tution of the later for the earlier stages. A comparison of the Sumerian cuneiform and Egyptian hieroglyphic systems brings out some curious results. Thus at an extremely remote epoch, some millenniums ago, the Sumerians had already got rid of the pictorial, and to a great extent of the ideographic, but had barely reached the alphabetic phase. Consequently their cuneiform groups, although possessing phonetic value, mainly express full syllables, scarcely ever letters, and rarely complete words. Ideographs had given place first to phonograms and then to mere syllables, "complex syllables in which several consonants may be distinguished, or simple syllables composed of only one consonant and one vowel or _vice versa_[113]."

The Egyptians, on the other hand, carried the system right through the whole gamut from pictures to letters, but retained all the intermediate phases, the initial tending to fall away, the final to expand, while the bulk of the hieroglyphs represented in various degrees the several transitional states. In many cases they "had kept only one part of the syllable, namely a mute consonant; they detached, for instance, the final _u_ from _bu_ and _pu_, and gave only the values _b_ and _p_ to the human leg [Hieroglyph Symbol] and to the mat [Hieroglyph Symbol].

The peoples of the Euphrates stopped half way, and admitted actual letters for the vowel sounds _a_, _i_ and _u_ only[114]."

In the process of evolution, metaphor and a.n.a.logy of course played a large part, as in the evolution of language itself. Thus a lion might stand both for the animal and for courage, and so on. The first essays in phonetics took somewhat the form of a modern rebus, thus: [Hieroglyph Symbol] = _khau_ = sieve, [Hieroglyph Symbol] = _pu_ = mat; [Hieroglyph Symbol] = _ru_ = mouth, whence [Hieroglyph Symbol] = _kho-pi-ru_ = to be, where the sounds and not the meaning of the several components are alone attended to[115].

By a.n.a.logous processes was formed a true alphabet, in which, however, each of the phonetic elements was represented at first by several different characters derived from several different words having the same initial syllable. Here was, therefore, an _embarras de richesses_, which could be got rid of only by a judicious process of elimination, that is, by discarding all like-sounding symbols but one for the same sound. When this final process of reduction was completed by the scribes, in other words, when all the phonetic signs were rejected except 23, _i.e._ one for each of the 23 phonetic elements, the Phoenician alphabet as we now have it was completed. Such may be taken as the real origin of this system, whether the scribes in question were Babylonians, Egyptians, Minaeans, or Europeans, that is, whether the Phoenician alphabet had a cuneiform, a hieroglyphic, a South Arabian, a Cretan (Aegean), Ligurian or Iberian origin, for all these and perhaps other peoples have been credited with the invention. The time is not yet ripe for deciding between these rival claimants[116].

But whatever be the source of the Phoenician, that of the Persian system current under the Achaemenides is clear enough. It is a true alphabet of 37 characters, derived by some selective process directly from the Babylonian cuneiforms, without any attempt at a modification of their shapes. Hence although simple compared with its prototype, it is clumsy enough compared with the Phoenician script, several of the letters requiring groups of as many as four or even five "wedges" for their expression. None of the other cuneiform systems also derived from the Sumerian (the a.s.syrian, Elamite, Vannic, Medic) appear to have reached the pure alphabetic state, all being still enc.u.mbered with numerous complex syllabic characters. The subjoined table, for which I have to thank T. G. Pinches, will help to show the genesis of the cuneiform combinations from the earliest known pictographs. These pictographs themselves are already reduced to the merest outlines of the original pictorial representations. But no earlier forms, showing the gradual transition from the primitive picture writing to the degraded pictographs here given, have yet come to light[117].

Here it may be asked, What is to be thought of the already-mentioned pebble-markings from the Mas-d'Azil Cave at the close of the Old Stone Age? If they are truly phonetic, then we must suppose that palaeolithic man not only invented an alphabetic writing system, but did this right off by intuition, as it were, without any previous knowledge of letters.

At least no one will suggest that the Dordogne cave-dwellers were already in possession of pictographic or other crude systems, from which the Mas-d'Azil "script" might have been slowly evolved. Yet E. Piette, who groups these pebbles, painted with peroxide of iron, in the four categories of numerals, symbols, pictographs, and alphabetical characters, states, in reference to these last, that 13 out of 23 Phoenician characters were equally Azilian graphic signs. He even suggests that there may be an approach to an inscription in one group, where, however, the mark indicating a stop implies a script running Semitic-fashion from right to left, whereas the letters themselves seem to face the other way[118]. G. G. MacCurdy[119], who accepts the evidence for the existence of writing in Azilian, if not in Magdalenian times, notes the close similarity between palaeolithic signs and Phoenician, ancient Greek and Cypriote letters. But J. Dechelette[120], reviewing (pp. 234, 236) the arguments against Piette's claims, points out in conclusion (p. 320) the impossibility of admitting that the population of Gaul could suddenly lose so beneficial a discovery as that of writing. Yet thousands of years elapse before the earliest appearance of epigraphic monuments.

[Ill.u.s.tration: EVOLUTION OF THE SUMERIAN CUNEIFORMS.]

A possible connection has been suggested by Sergi between the Mas-d'Azil signs and the markings that have been discovered on the megalithic monuments of North Africa, Brittany, and the British Isles. These are all so rudimentary that resemblances are inevitable, and of themselves afford little ground for necessary connections. Primitive man is but a child, and all children bawl and scrawl much in the same way.

Nevertheless C. Letourneau[121] has taken the trouble to compare five such scrawls from "Libyan inscriptions" now in the Bardo Museum, Tunis, with similar or identical signs on Brittany and Irish dolmens. There is the familiar circle plain and dotted [Symbol] [Symbol], the cross in its simplest form [Symbol], the pothook and segmented square [Symbol], all of which recur in the Phoenician, Keltiberian, Etruscan, Libyan or Tuareg systems. Letourneau, however, who does not call them letters but only "signes alphabetiformes," merely suggests that, if not phonetic marks when first carved on the neolithic monuments, they may have become so in later times. Against this it need only be urged that in later times all these peoples were supplied with complete alphabetic systems from the East as soon as they required them. By that time all the peoples of the culture-zone were well-advanced into the historic period, and had long forgotten the rude carvings of their neolithic forefathers.

Armed with a nearly perfect writing system, and the correlated cultural appliances, the higher races soon took a foremost place in the general progress of mankind, and gradually acquired a marked ascendancy, not only over the less cultured populations of the globe, but in large measure over the forces of nature herself. With the development of navigation and improved methods of locomotion, inland seas, barren wastes, and mountain ranges ceased to be insurmountable obstacles to their movements, which within certain limits have never been arrested throughout all recorded time.

Thus, during the long ages following the first peopling of the earth by pleistocene man, fresh settlements and readjustments have been continually in progress, although wholesale displacements must be regarded as rare events. With few exceptions, the later migrations, whether hostile or peaceful, were, for reasons already stated[122], generally of a partial character, while certain insular regions, such as America and Australia, remained little affected by such movements till quite recent times. But for the inhabitants of the eastern hemisphere the results were none the less far-reaching. Continuous infiltrations could not fail ultimately to bring about great modifications of early types, while the ever-active principle of convergence tended to produce a general uniformity amongst the new amalgams. Thus the great varietal divisions, though undergoing slow changes from age to age, continued, like all other zoological groups, to maintain a distinct regional character.

Flinders Petrie has acutely observed that the only meaning the term "race" now can have is that of a group of human beings, whose type has become unified by their rate of a.s.similation exceeding the rate of change produced by foreign elements[123]. We are also reminded by Gustavo Tosti that "in the actual state of science the word 'race' is a vague formula, to which nothing definite may be found to correspond. On the one hand, the original races can only be said to belong to palaeontology, while the more limited groups, now called races, are nothing but peoples, or societies of peoples, brethren by civilization more than by blood. The race thus conceived ends by identifying itself with nationality[124]." Hence it has been asked why, on the principle of convergence, a fusion of various races, if isolated long enough in a given area, may not eventually lead to a new racial type, without leaving any trace of its manifold origin[125].

Such new racial types would be normal for the later varietal groups, just as the old types were normal for the earlier groups, and a general application might be given to Topinard's famous dictum that _les peuples seuls sont des realites_[126], that is, peoples alone--groups occupying definite geographical areas--have an objective existence. Thus, the notion of race, as a zoological expression in the sense of a pure breed or strain, falls still more into the background, and, as Virchow aptly remarks, "this term, which always implied something vague, has in recent times become in the highest degree uncertain[127]."

Hence Ehrenreich treats the present populations of the earth rather as zoological groups which have been developed in their several geographical domains, and are to be distinguished not so much by their bony structure as by their external characters, such as hair, colour, and expression, and by their habitats and languages. None of these factors can be overlooked, but it would seem that the character of the hair forms the most satisfactory basis for a cla.s.sification of mankind, and this has therefore been adopted for the new edition of the present work. It has the advantage of simplicity, without involving, or even implying, any particular theory of racial or geographical origins. It has stood the test of time, being proposed by Bory de Saint Vincent in 1827, and adopted by Huxley, Haeckel, Broca, Topinard and many others.

The three main varieties of hair are the _straight_, the _wavy_ and the so-called _woolly_, termed respectively _Leiotrichous_, _Cymotrichous_ and _Ulotrichous_[128]. Straight hair usually falls straight down, though it may curl at the ends, it is generally coa.r.s.e and stiff, and is circular in section. Wavy hair is undulating, forming long curves or imperfect spirals, or closer rings or curls, and the section is more or less elliptical. Woolly hair is characterised by numerous, close, often interlocking spirals, 1-9 mm. in diameter, the section giving the form of a lengthened ellipse. Straight hair is usually the longest, and woolly hair the shortest, wavy hair occupying an intermediate position.

SCHEME OF CLa.s.sIFICATION.

I. ULOTRICHI (Woolly-haired).

1. The African Negroes, Negrilloes, Bushmen.

2. The Oceanic Negroes: Papuans, Melanesians in part, Tasmanians, Negritoes.

II. LEIOTRICHI (Straight-haired).

1. The Southern Mongols.

2. The Oceanic Mongols, Polynesians in part.

3. The Northern Mongols.

4. The American Aborigines.

III. CYMOTRICHI (Curly or Wavy-haired).

1. The Pre-Dravidians: Vedda, Sakai, etc., Australians.

2. The "Caucasic" peoples: A. Southern Dolichocephals: Mediterraneans, Hamites, Semites, Dravidians, Indonesians, Polynesians in part.

B. Northern Dolichocephals: Nordics, Kurds, Afghans, some Hindus.

C. Brachycephals: Alpines, including the short Cevenoles of Western and Central Europe, and tall Adriatics or Dinarics of Eastern Europe and the Armenians of Western Asia.

FOOTNOTES:

[66] Thus Lucretius:

"Posterius ferri vis est aerisque reperta, Sed prior aeris erat quam ferri cognitus usus."

[67] J. Dechelette points out that the term Copper "Age" is not justified for the greater part of Europe, as it suggests a demarcation which does not exist and also a more thorough chemical a.n.a.lysis of early metals than we possess. He prefers the term aeneolithic (_aeneus_, copper, [Greek: lithos], stone), coined by the Italians, to denote the period of transition, dating, according to Montelius, from about 2500 B.C. to 1900 B.C. _Manuel d'Archeologie prehistorique_, II. 1, _Age du Bronze_, 1910, pp. 99-100, 105.

[68] _Eth._, Chap. XIII.

[69] See G. Elliot Smith, _The Ancient Egyptians_, 1911, pp. 97-8.

[70] Paper on "The Transition from Pure Copper to Bronze," etc., read at the Meeting of the Brit. a.s.soc. Liverpool, 1896.

[71] _Loc. cit._ p. 3. But cf. H. R. Hall, _The Ancient History of the Near East_, 1912, pp. 33 and 90 _n._ 2.

[72] G. A. Reisner, _The Early Cemeteries of Naga-ed-der_ (University of California Publications), 1908, and _Report of the Archaeological Survey of Nubia_, 1907-8.

[73] "Campagnes de 1907-8," _Comptes Rendus de l'Academie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres_, 1908, p. 373.

[74] Cf. J. Dechelette, _Manuel d'Archeologie prehistorique_, II. 1, _Age du Bronze_, 1910, pp. 53-4.

[75] Cf. L. W. King, _A History of Sumer and Akkad_, 1910, p. 26.

[76] G. Coffey, _The Bronze Age in Ireland_, 1913, p. 6.

[77] _L'Anthropologie_, 1896, p. 526 sq. This antiquary aptly remarks that "l'expression age de cuivre a une signification bien precise comme s'appliquant a la partie de la periode de la pierre polie ou les metaux font leur apparition."

[78] _L'Anthropologie_, 1896, p. 526 sq.

[79] In _Die Kupferzeit in Europa_, 1886.

[80] "Neuere Studien uber die Kupferzeit," in _Zeitschr. f. Eth._ 1896, No. 2.

[81] Otto Helm, "Chemische Untersuchungen vorgeschichtlicher Bronzen,"

in _Zeitschr. f. Eth._ 1897, No. 2. This authority agrees with Hampel's view that further research will confirm the suggestion that in Transylvania (Hungary) "eine Kupfer-Antimonmischung vorangegangen, welche zugleich die Bronzekultur vorbereitete" (_ib._ p. 128).

[82] _Proc. Soc. Bib. Archaeol._ 1892, pp. 223-6.

[83] For the chronology of the Copper and Bronze Ages see p. 27.