^l-LIBRARY
":
QC
!
ITH THE WORLD'S
PEOPLE
AN ACCOUNT OF THE ETHNIC ORIGIN, PRIMI
TIVE ESTATE, EARLY MIGRATIONS, SOCIAL
EVOLUTION, AND PRESENT CONDITIONS AND
PROMISE OF THE PRINCIPAL FAMILIES OF MEN
TOGETHER WITH A PRELIMINARY INQUIRY ON THE
TIME, PLACE AND MANNER OF THE BEGINNING
By JOHN CLARK RIDPATH, LL. D,
AUTHOR OF "HISTORY OF THE WORLD," ETC.
PROFUSELY ILLUSTRATED WITH COLORED PLATES, RACE MAPS
AND CHARTS, TYPE PICTURES, SKETCHES, AND DIAGRAMS
WASHINGTON, D. C.
CLARK E. RIDPATH
1912
GI0pgrt0ljt 1903-1911
Jlnurs ffinilhrrs IJit'Uinlnnij (Lamyang
All
5
06 6~
2076329
RACE CHART NO. 1
SHOWING THE DISTRIBUTION OF MANKIND ON
THE HYPOTHESIS OF A COMMON ORIGIN.
Ruddy Races on ................... Red Lines
Brown Races on .................. Brou'ti Lines
Black Races on ................... Black Lines
Names of Existing Races in ............ Red
mofthe North American
AJ
ua ^25 Yukalra
Tribe
RACE CHART No. 1.
EXPLANATION.
IT is the purpose of this Chart to show THE DISTRIBUTION OF THB
RACES OF MANKIND, ou the theory that they have all proceeded from a
common source. That source is indicated by the Leavy black line at the left,
marked " Original Stock of Mankind." From this original stock several
great divisions branch off, the first of which is the stem of the prehistoric
Black races; the second, the stem of the prehistoric Brown, or Mongoloid,
races: and the third, the stem of the prehistoric Ruddy, or White, races.
Each of these stems divides into many branches.
In general, the latitude of the given race is indicated in the Chart as on
an ordinary map ; that is, those races having the most northernly distribu
tion are above ; those in the temperate zones come next, as nearly as prac-
ticable ; and those in the tropical regions fall in the center or lower part of
the Chart.
Wherever the red lines extend, there the White, or Ruddy, races are
distributed : wherever the brown lines reach, there the Brown, or Mongoloid,
races are found; while the black lines indicate the distribution of the Black
races.
Nearly one-fourth of the Chart at the left indicates the prehistoric, or
unknown, period of race distribution. Out of this prehistoric period the
various races emerge. There is an Aryan, or Indo-European, family ; a
Semitic family; a Hamitic family; a Mongoloid family; and sundry Bla'ck
races, little known to the present day.
In the greater part of the center of the Chart, and to the right, wherever
the names of races or stocks are printed in black letters, those races, or
stocks, are extinct ; that is, they have either ceased to exist, or are repre-
sented only in their descendants. Examples of such are the Visigoths, the
Carthaginians, the Etruscans, etc.
All the names of races, families, and stocks, printed in red letters, are
existing, or living, peoples. These are found, for the most part, distributed
to the right at the end of race-stems. Thus we have, as examples of living
races, beginning above, the Welsh, the Icelanders, the Red Russians, the
Montenegrins, the English-speaking races, the High Germans, the Swiss, the
Brazilians, the Esquimaux, the Magyars, the Osmanlis, etc.
The Chart enables the reader, in particular, to trace the race descent
of any living variety of mankind. Thus, the English-speaking races are de-
rived (read back from right to left) from Anglo-Saxons, Saxons, Ingavo-
nians, Moeso-Goths, out of the German stem, of the Teuto-Slavic division, of
the West Aryan branch, of the Indo-European family, of the prehistoric
Ruddy, or White, races.
So, in all the cases of race-history, the Chart is intended to show, at a
single survey, all of the leading developments of mankind. Many minor
varieties are necessarily omitted ; but all of the principal stocks of the human
race are here displayed in their proper ethnical and historical development.
(For the geographical distribution of the various races, see Race Charts Nos.
1 to 9, inclusive.)
BOOK IV -DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES.
XXIII. CLASSIFICATION OK THE HUMAN
SPECIES.
T has already been re-
marked that migration
constitutes one of the
leading facts in the
history of the primitive
world o Movement was
the mood of the first
men who possessed the earth. It was
by means of tribal and national migra-
tions that mankind were distributed into
the various regions where they subse-
quently established themselves in com-
munities and states. From certain cen-
ters the human streams arose and flowed
in different directions, bearing afar the
fecund waters of future national life.
Nearly all of these movements are
hidden under the obscurity that clouds
Obscurity of the the beginnings of history.
The vei T best Penetration
of the historian and eth-
nologist can reach no further than the
shadowy confines of the countries and
ages in which these primitive motions of
the human race took their origin and
expended their force. The task of de-
lineating the migrations and dispersions
of the early races may well challenge
the profoundest inquiry, and the prob-
lem must even then be attempted with
extreme diffidence and much distrust of
the existing resources of knowledge.
It is the purpose in the present book to
delineate at least the leading migrations
of the early races of man.
In the nature of the case, the migratory
movements of primitive mankind have
left only incidental traces in ^ aclassifica .
history and tradition. For tion of the races
. , is necessary.
this reason the evidences
of human distribution have to be gath-
ered, for the most part, by indirection
out of collateral branches of inquiry.
As preparatory to a description of these
movements, upon which all future history
in some sense depended, it is necessary to
frame an adequate analysis of the hu-
man family according to those distinc-
411
412
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
tions upon \vnich the tribal and national
life of one people is discriminated from
that of another. It is impossible to
speak intelligently of the early migra-
tions of mankind without a division and
classification of the human species, to
the end that its various parts may be
considered in detail and in relation the
one with another. Such a classification
into different races, families, and stocks
is the first task imposed upon the eth-
nologist, and is a work in every way
race according to its true ethnic distinc-
tions has never been satisfactorily ac-
complished. The principle according
to which the division or divisions are to
be made has never been well determined,
and the problem at the present day is
still to be considered in its original
elements.
It can but be of interest in this con-
nection to present in brief some of the
leading methods which have been adopt-
ed in the attempted classification of the
A METHOD OF MIGRATION. EASTERN CARAVAN. Drawn by W. J. Morgan.
method of clas-
sifying yet dis-
covered.
essential to the understanding of the
beginnings of human history.
The division of the vegetable kingdom
by Linnaeus, and the arrangement of the
NO adequate animal world into genera
and species and varieties
by Cuvier, were not more
essential to the understanding of those
two great departments of nature than is
an adequate classification of mankind
into races, families, and types essential
to a knowledge of ethnic history. Great,
therefore, is the embarrassment of the
inquirer to find that even to the present
day this work of classifying the human
human race. The most learned of the an
cients were profoundly ignorant of the af-
finities of the different fam- The ancients be-
ilies of mankind, and found ^sitVof'the
no pleasure in tracing races -
such relationships. On the contrary, the
mental tone of antiquity was against the
notion of the kinship and common
descent of the nations. Each people
disseminated the belief in its own prior-
ity and preeminence, and discarded as
much as possible those democratic tradi-
tions which seemed to reduce themselves
to a common level with barbarians and
heathen. Not until long after the eclipse
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CLASSIFICATION. 413
of the classical ages, not until the bar-
barism of mediaeval Europe had at length
been pushed back by the revival of
learning, did men attempt in a more
thoughtful and philanthropic spirit to
investigate the beginnings of human
development and the affinities of the
different peoples who inhabited the
earth.
At the time of this reenlightenment
cf the European nations the Roman Cath-
sc.irttiraic pin- olic Church was dominant
io n a S bS a '\ 3d throughout the West. This
unity great organization was
based u )on i 'ie Scriptures of the Old and
New Testaments, and from these ancient
books were derived, either directly or
indirectly, the greater part of the learn-
ing of the Middle Ages. It came to pass,
therefore, that the first rational views
with regard to mankind considered as a
race and the dispersion and affinity of
the nations were derived from scriptural
sources. It was from this origin that
the prevalent opinions of several cen-
turies were deduced, and it will, there-
fore, be appropriate in this connection to
present, first of all, the long prevalent
beliefs which were derived from the
Hebrew Scriptures.
I. THE BIBLICAL ETHNOLOGY. In the
tenth chapter of Genesis we have an ac-
Tne biblical eth- count of the departures and
btiS ; of d s S ne m migrations of primitive
and Ham. mankind. The narrative
begins with the descendants of Noah,
the survivors of a deluge. His three
sons become the progenitors of the three
dominant races which go forth to people
the world. The progenies of Shem,
Ham, and Japheth, according to their
families and tribes, are dispersed in
the various countries of Western Asia,
Northern Africa, and Eastern Europe.
In general, this account assigns to
Shem and his family the Elamites, the
Assyrians, "Arphaxad and Lud and
Aram." According to this scheme Eber
is the grandson or descendant of Arphax-
ad, from which we are able to see emerg-
ing dimly at least three historical peoples
the Elamites, the Assyrians, and the
Hebrews. Among the sons of Ham are
mentioned Cush, and Mizraim, and Phut,
and Canaan, with their respective de-
scendants. To Cush is assigned Nimroct
and his historical progeny. Mizraim is
doubtless the original tribal name of the
Egyptians, while Canaan, whose sons are
Sidon and Heth, is clearly the ancestor
CUSHITE TYPE SHEIK OF CHAMARS.
Drawn by H. Thiriat, from a photograph by Mougal.
of the Canaanitish races of subsequent
times.
The generations of Japheth are said
to be Gomer and Magog and Madai
and Javan and Tubal and j ap heth dissem-
Meshech and Tiras. To %$**% *^ he
each of these is given a fam- gentiles."
ily of sons and descendants, and they
are said to have distributed themselves
among the " isles of the gentiles," " ev-
ery one after his tongue, after their fam-
ilies, in their nations." In the case of
Japheth, also, we are able to detect the
414
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
historical beginning of nations, especial-
ly in the case of his son Madai, who is
thought to have given his name to the
ancient Medes. Besides what is here
presented in outline, a place must be left
in the ethnic scheme for the direct de-
scendants of Noah, who is said to have
lived for more than a century after the
Deluge, and to have begotten sons and
daughters.
Such, in a word, is the biblical scheme
which the first ethnologists of modern
Europe employed to account for the dis-
Summaryofthe persion of the human race
Seo^riS^e in the earth. It gives a fair-
peoples. ly adequate outline of the
peopling of Western and Southwestern
Asia and of the countries around the
eastern parts of the Mediterranean. We
may even allow for the dissemination of
the descendants of Noah eastward from
Armenia, and thus cover a still wider
area of the habitable globe. A sum-
mary, then, of the biblical schedule of
the primitive peoples will give the fol-
lowing results :
1. Japhet 'kites, with seven tribal divi-
sions, migratory in habit, journeying to
the west, and peopling the gentile lands
beyond the limits of Asia.
2. Hamites, with four family, or tribal,
divisions, three of which, at any rate,
may be located, respectively, in Cush and
Canaan and Egypt.
3. Semites, with five tribal branches,
of w r hich the Assyrians, the Elamites, the
people of ancient Aram, called Aramae-
ans, and the Hebrews, became, in their
respective countries, the leading repre-
sentatives.
4. Noachitcs proper, of the divisions of
which the biblical narrative has given us
no outline, but concerning which a ra-
tional inference of eastern migration
may be drawn.
The account in Genesis indicates
clearly a disposition of the Noachite
families to part company and disperse
into various regions. The
Value of the eth-
differentiation of tribes nic scheme out-
-, , , lined in Genesis.
is clearly announced as
the fundamental fact in the first epoch
after the traditional destruction of the
Old World by water. There is thus a
certain conformity in the account given
in Genesis to the actual facts which we
discover on the furtherest horizon of the
primeval world. The jostling and di-
vision of tribes under the impulse of the
migratory instinct is a fact which pre-
sents itself with equal clearness to the
historian, the ethnologist, and the an-
tiquary ; and the correspondence of the
primitive Hebrew narrative with this
manifest tendency among the primeval
families of men gives force and credibil-
ity and corroboration to both branches
of the inquiry.
Concerning the above biblical scheme
of the dispersion of mankind in the
primitive world, it may be fairly urged
that it is hardly as ample as the facts to
which it is applied. Within the limits
of the peoples and countries referred to
in the tenth chapter of Genesis, it ap-
pears to cover approximately the facts
as they have been revealed by other
methods of investigation, but it leaves
many parts of the world unprovided
with the populations which they are
known to have possessed even before
the dawn of authentic history.
Many attempts have been made to strain
and exaggerate the biblical ethnology,
and to compel it, by attenuation and hy-
pothesis, to cover all parts points of map-
of thp "habitable c/lobe plicability in the
ne na Dim Die giooe. Hebrew ciassm-
These efforts appear to have cation.
been inspired by a zeal beyond knowl-
edge, and to have had little success in
application, except in the minds of those
who had been already fixed in belief by
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CLASSIFICATION. 415
preconceived opinions. This is to say
that the attempt to derive such races as
the primitive inhabitants of Western
Europe the cave men, the people of
the shell mounds, and the tumuli from
some branch of the Semites, the Japheth-
ites, -or the Hamites, as those families
are outlined in the tenth chapter 7 of
Genesis, would have no ground on
which to rest at least in the pres-
ent state of human knowledge. In
like manner, the attempted deriva-
tion of the North American In-
dians, of the Aztecs, of the South
Pacific Islanders, of the Fuegians,
of the native Australians, or of the
Hottentots, from the Hebrew plan
of dispersion would be equally
without avail, at least with such
data as are now in the possession
of scholars.
The scheme of family and tribal
division given in the tenth chapter
of Genesis appears to
The scheme sat-
isfactory within the historian and em-
narrow limits. -, , -, , c
nologist to be satisfac-
tory within the narrow limits of the
races and countries to ^(.vJiicJi it ap-
plies ; but it also appears that there
are many parts of the globe which
are known to have been inhabited
at a time even more remote than
current chronology assigns to the
rise of the Noachite nations for
which the plan of dispersion pre-
sented above seems to provide no
likelihood or even possibility of
inhabitants. How far the Hebrew
scheme of dispersion and development
from a Noachite origin through its three
leading branches of Hamites, Semites,
and Japhethites conforms to other ethno-
logical outlines derived from different
data and by means of different methods
of investigation, remains to be elucidated
in the following pages.
II. HISTORICAL ETHNOLOGY. With
the progress of historical investigation
during the last three or four origin and de-
centuries so much
mation has been gathered
relative to the first races of men and
their movements across the ancient land-
infor- "SSSSSJL
INDO-EUROPEAN TYPE THE SULTAN MACOUD MIRZA.
Drawn by H. Thiriat, from a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
scape, that a system of ethnic classifica-
tion has been advanced from a purely
historical basis. It was known, or sus-
pected, by the Romans and Greeks two
thousand years ago that they were re-
lated in their descent. Later on it be-
came known that such peoples as the
Medes and Persians were of the same
race-origin with the Macedonians and
416
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
the Hellenes. In still more recent times
it was discovered that the Teutonic races
had an ethnic affinity with the Graeco-
Italic family and with the Celts of West-
ern Europe. Still more recently it be-
came known that the Hindu races were
descended, in all probability, from a
common origin with the Greeks, the Ro-
mans, and the Teutonic branches of man-
kind. A still higher view
Glimpses of a .
wide application of the whole question has
led to the belief of the ul-
timate affinity of the Semitic nations with
the great peoples mentioned above, and
SEMITIC TYPE THE ARAB BENI LAAM.
Drawn by H. Thiriat, from a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
of the Hamites with all the rest. As
the historical horizon has widened and
the vision of the observer has become
clearer with the increase of knowledge,
the true relations of the various families
of men have been discovered to the ex-
tent of warranting a classification on the
basis of actual history; and many at-
tempts have been made to produce on
this basis a scheme of ethnic dispersion
as broad and comprehensive as the far-
reaching facts which it is intended to
explain.
As a result of this method, several
races of men have been distinguished
from each other and classified according
to their ethnic descent and affinities.
1. The Indo-European Race. It has
been definitely ascertained that two of
the great Asiatic families Meaning and
and at least four of the prev- ^?"l!L
alent peoples of Europe European race."
have had a common descent from a com-
mon ancient origin. To this community
of nations the name Indo-European, or
Indo-Germanic, has been applied by his-
torical writers. The term signifies the two
extremes in place and time of the nation-
al dispersion from the common origin
referred to. It signifies that an Indie
branch of the human family, including
with this term the Iranic, or Persic, di-
vision of mankind, has been derived
primarily from the same fountain with
the Grseco-Italic race and with the Celtic
and Teutonic divisions of mankind in
Europe. From the common fountain,
two Asiatic streams flowing to the south
and the east are known to have arisen in
common with the four westward flow-
ing streams that were destined to bear
into Europe and through all the west
the primitive waters of Hellenic, Italic,
Teutonic, and Celtic nationality. The
term Indo-European is thus devised to
cover N the wide extremes of human de-
velopment which span the world from
the valley of the Indus to California.
2 . The Semitic Race. Under this head
the historians have developed a classifi-
cation very nearly analogous to that em-
braced under the same clas- Races included
sification in biblical ethnol- ^ofs^
ogy. There is, historically itic -
speaking, some indistinctness on the
further borders of Semitic development.
Whether, for instance, the ancient Chal-
dees were to be included under this
designation may be regarded as doubt-
ful. It is sufficient to note that the He-
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CLASSIFICATION. 417
brew race, in its several divisions, ancient
and modern, is included tinder the
Semitic division of mankind, and consti-
tutes, indeed, its most striking repre-
sentatives. So also the more recent
Arabs are included as a cognate branch
of the same great family ; and the an-
cient Aramaeans prevalent in Syria,
Mesopotamia, and other western dis-
tricts of Asia must in like manner be
classified with the Semitic division of
mankind. The reader will not fail to
observe that history, considered as a sci-
ence, and the scriptural account of the
dispersion of the human race are very
nearly in accord as it respects the divi-
sions, migrations, and historical devel-
opment of the Semitic family of men.
3 . The Hamitic Race. This division of
mankind is known to history chiefly by
its greatest representatives, the ancient
Who the Ham- Egyptians. As planters
2as 5 to of the strongest and most
certain races. enduring civilization of re-
mote antiquity, these people could but
make a strong impression on the earliest
historical developments of the world.
Cognate with the Egyptian race were
several other branches of Hamites,
but nearly all of them are obscured
with doubt as to their origin and classi-
fication. Such are the old Chaldaeans,
who planted their empire on the Lower
Euphrates as much as 'two thousand
years before our era ; and such are the
Joktanian Arabs of the south, bordering
on the ocean, and such are several of
the Canaanitish nations, with whom the
greater historical peoples came into con-
tact from the seventh to the third cen-
tury B. C. Many historians have re-
garded the Phoenicians, the Sidonians,
and the Carthaginians as of Hamitic
descent, and it is highly probable that
some of these peoples were at least com-
posite in their ethnic origin. As a gen-
eral fact, it appears that the Semitic and
Hamitic peoples of antiquity were less
completely separated from each other's
influence, less perfectly differentiated
HAMITIC TYPE THE EGYPTIAN SAIS.
Drawn by A. de Bar.
into diverse types of race development,
than any other two branches of the
primitive family of men.
4. The Altaian Races. The great no-
madic peoples having the highlands' of
418
GREAT- RACES OF MANKIND.
the Altais as their original habitat have
been designated by many terms, and
The Altaian there is yet much confusion
SSSSr 1 " in their attempted classifi-
Tartars. cation. Even the major
divisions of these races are not well
made out. One of the broadest divisions
is the Tartar family, spreading to the
north and east over a great part of
Asia. It is still in dispute whether
ALTAIAN TYPE OLD TARANTCHI.
Drawn by E. Ronjat, from a photograph.
the Tartars and Mongolians should be
considered as primary ethnic divisions
of mankind, or whether the Mongolian
branch of the south has been deflected
from the Tartar group of the north. As
we shall presently see, this great assem-
blage of semicivilized races, nomadic
over the vast steppes of the north and
in a low grade of development in the
south, is defined by the term Turanian
in the linguistic division of men. But
for historical purposes the whole group
may best be classified and named from
its geographical center on the northern
slopes of the Altais. The White Tar-
tars, or Turcomans, as the westernmost
division of the great Altaian group,
have, by their aggressions in Asia Minor,
Syria, and Eastern Europe, brought the
family of nations to which they belong
into historical relationship with the Indo-
European race, and have thus preserved
unto the present time at least the rem-
iniscence of the prowess for which
they were characterized in the fifteenth
and sixteenth centuries.
5. Western Aborigines. Besides the
greater peoples with whom history has had
to deal in Western Asia and
Aboriginal races
Europe, the progress of na- of the -western
tions westward has brought
them into contact with new varieties of
the human family, unknown in ancient
times. The limited geographical knowl-
edge of the ancient peoples shut them
out from an acquaintance with the wide-
ly spread barbarian races occupying the
New World, the continent of Australia,
and the islands of the sea. It is not
meant that the inhabitants of the vast
regions here referred to are of a common
ethnic descent. On the contrary, as we
shall see hereafter, many original stocks
of mankind are represented in the exist-
ing savagery of the world. But for his-
torical purposes the aborigines of the
West and of the ocean lands of the
South and west may, for convenience, be
grouped together and considered as an
unclassified mass of peoples, in varying
stages of evolution.
It will be remembered that what is
here attempted is merely to indicate
such results in the way of classification
as are afforded from a purely historical
point of view ; and for this purpose all
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CLASSIFICATION. 419
the outlying barbarous peoples that have
been revealed since the beginning of
Results of the geographical discovery at
method ;imper- th j f th fifteenth
factions in the
scheme. century may be grouped as
one, and considered as a single fact in
the analysis of the human race. If,
then, we collect the results derivable
from this historical view of the disper-
sion of mankind, we shall find the fore-
going five groups of peoples, the first
three of which, the Indo-European, the
Semitic, and the Hamitic branches, are
tolerably clearly defined and separated
by ethnic lines, while the remaining
two, the Altaian group of nations and
the Western aborigines, are banked to-
gether rather for convenience of consid-
eration than by exact principles of clas-
sification.
III. LINGUISTIC ETHNOLOGY. Within
the present century the study of lan-
guage has thrown new light on all the
in what manner disputed questions relative
iom^XSo?' to tb e dispersion and race
classification. developments of mankind.
The scientific investigation of speech
has made clear many vexed questions in
the primitive history of men that to all
seeming could have found no other so-
lution. The general effect has been to
confirm and establish many of the views
already received from tradition and his-
torical inquiry, and to disprove and ren-
der untenable many other opinions con-
cerning the movements and affinities of
the early races. Much that was conjec-
tural has become known as fact. The-
ories have been demonstrated or de-
stroyed, and new views of the extent,
variety, and true character of tribal and
national evolution have been projected.
In some departments of inquiry the new
knowledge has amounted to a revolu-
tion. On the whole, it is almost impos-
sible to overestimate the value of lin-
guistic science in the exposition of all
questions relative to the prehistoric con-
ditions and movements of mankind.
If we take up the results of this study
of human speech as it respects the eth-
nic classification of the race, we find a
certain general parallelism to what has
been presented above as proceeding
from biblical and historical investiga-
tion. To begin with, the science of
WEST ARYAN TYPE ALCIBIADES.
language declares with emphasis and
demonstrates the existence of
I. The Aryan Race. This term, as
elucidated in the preceding book, relates
primarily to a primitive nobility claimed
and maintained by the peo- The Aryan race
r>1pq railed Arv
^ r >
nobility was based upon esses -
the agricultural life as distinguished
from nomadic and pastoral pursuits. It
is not needed to illustrate further in this
connection the meaning and application
of the term. It suffices to note the fact
wTnVh established by
wmcn lin g uistic p roc .
420
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
that the study of language has defined
and proved beyond a doubt the funda-
mental affinity and kinship of the Aryan
folk of Asia that is, the great Hindu
family of Aryans in the valleys of India
and the Iranian, or Persic, division of
mankind with the Graeco-Italic race
and the Teutones and Celts of Europe.
The community of the original speech
of all these peoples, spreading in its wid-
est development from the base of the
Himala)^as westward over the table-lands
of Iran, through the southern peninsulas
Race move- and the transmontane for-
byTinorefa 6 ests of Europe to the Atlan-
of language. ^{ C) an( j through the New
World to the Pacific coast, has been es-
tablished by proofs irrefragable as those
which determine the truths of geology
or the laws of the physical world. The
course of the tribal movements by which
from the countries east of the Caspian
these great and progressive streams of
human life pursued their way to their
destination can be traced by the linguis-
tic phenomena which they left in their
track, and the elimination of the great
family of men to which scholars have in
recent times given the name Aryan
from the remaining races has been com-
pletely effected.
It can but be of interest at this point
to state the linguistic facts upon which
What facts in the classification of man-
kind has been attempted.
It is found that certain peo-
ples, like the Aryan family above defined,
speak dialects of a common language.
In general, they have a vocabulary and
a grammar in common. When we find
two peoples living in different and dis-
tant parts of the earth naming the objects
of sense and reflection with the same
words, and combining those words in
sentences under the same laws of gram-
matical and logical structure, we are corn-
language war-
rant ethnical
conclusions.
pelled to conclude that the two languages
have had a common origin somewhere
in the past ; and if the languages have
thus arisen from a common source, the
two peoples who spoke them had also an
original tribal identity. This is exactly
the case with the great nations called
Aryan. The six branches of this vast
family of mankind, namely, the Indie,
the Iranic, the Hellenic, the Italic, the
Teutonic (including the Slavonic), and
the Celtic, are not only identified by the
laws of history, but also by the laws of
speech. The Sanskrit, spoken in ancient
India, the Persic dialects of the plateau
of Iran, the different varieties of Greek
peculiar to Hellas and the ^Egean
islands, the Latin tongue of the West,
the various Teutonic languages, and the
Celtic, with its two or three derivatives,
have all a fundamental linguistic iden-
tity. Their vocabulary as it respects
the primary objects of sense and the
common actions of life is virtually the
same in all.
More striking still are the fundamen-
tal peculiarities of their respective
grammars. The great fea- inflection the
ture of all these tongues ^If/an'
is inflection. The varia- speech.
tions of thought as, for instance, num-
ber, gender, and case in nouns, mood
and tense in verbs, comparison in adjec-
tives and adverbs, are indicated by
terminational changes in the words of
the language, and these changes obey
the same laws and present the same
phenomena in all the speeches above
referred to. Only the student of lan-
guage can fully appreciate the striking
similarities which present themselves in
all branches of the Indo-European, or
Aryan, tongues. It is as though we
should study a single language with
dialectical variations. And so indeed it
is. The original speech of all these peo-
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CLASSIFICATION. 421
pies was one. Somewhere in the past
and somewhere on the surface of the
earth, before the era of tribal migration,
a family of men had, by reason and
experience, developed a language of the
inflectional variety, had given names to
the objects of nature and the concepts
of the mind, had defined by certain
words the actions and thoughts peculiar
to their volitions and imaginations.
The general result of this evolution
was the production of a great typical
speech, which was spoken
How languages
are modified by by all the members of
environment. .-, , -, , 1
the tribe in its ancestral
home. From this region the migrations
began, and each band of emigrants
carried with them the ancestral speech.
As they entered into new relations with
nature and new experiences in life,
passing through belts of different cli-
mate, encountering new landscapes and
familiarizing themselves with new con-
ditions and environments, their tongues
began to modify the original language,
and to adapt it to the changing panorama
of nature and the varying concepts of
the mind. Generations went by. Differ-
ent regions of the earth were reached.
National developments ensued. But
still the fundamental identity of the
speech of all these peoples was main-
tained. So that in India, in Persia, in
Macedonia and Greece, in Italy, in the
forests of Northern Europe, and in the
outlying portions of Spain and Gaul
and Britain, the scholar of after times
discovers the broken, but clearly identi-
cal, fragments of a common language
once spoken by the ancestors of all these
peoples. Thus it is that the study of
language has furnished one of the surest
criteria by which to determine the ethnic
classification of mankind.
2. The Semitic Race. Following this
same clue, we discover by means of lan-
guage another family of men, to which is
given the name of Semitic. Here we no-
tice the recurrence of the Semitic races
same term which was given **
us in the biblical ethnol- their languages,
ogy and repeated in the historical divi-
sion of the races. The linguistic inquirer
finds in the East a group of nations
speaking languages totally different in
structure and vocabulary from the Aryan
tongues above defined. The speech of
the Hebrews, the old Aramaeans, and the
Arabs is as distinct in its essential char-
acter from Sanskrit and Greek and Latin
as though it belonged to a wholly differ-
ent class of phenomena. The words of
the Semitic languages, instead of being
of all lengths as to syllables and letters,
consisted fundamentally of triliteral sym-
bols. Every word is essentially a word
of three letters and three only. These
constitute the skeleton, so to speak, of
the vocal symbol, and around this skele-
ton the vocalic elements are arranged.
Inflection is almost unknown to the
Semitic languages. The grammar of
these tongues is construct- contrast be-
ed upon a totally different SSSSSSh,
principle from that of the ods of speech.
Aryan languages. Even the superficial
student of human speech must be struck
and astonished from the very first with
the essential difference and contrast be-
tween the Semitic method of expressing
thought and the method of the Aryan
peoples. It is from this distinction that
the linguistic inquirer has constructed
the classification of the Semitic races.
The Hebrews, the Aramaeans, and the
Arabs, with their derivatives in ancient
and modern times, are grouped by them-
selves, and are as certainly defined by
means of the languages which they speak
or have spoken as they are clearly divid-
ed from the other nations in historic de-
velopment.
4-2-2
GREAT RACES OF JL-LYA'LYD.
3. The Turanian Races. The progress
of linguistic science has revealed another
Peculiarities of great group of languages,
. differing entirely in struc-
guages- tural character from the
two varieties above described. It is
found that in general the languages of
TURANIAN TYPE KIRGHEEZ FALCONER.
Drawn by Delort, from a photograph and description.
the nomadic nations of Northern Asia
are monosyllabic. They consisted origi-
nally of words of a single syllable, and
are ncirr inflected. In order, however, to
express the necessary inflection of ideas
and to effect the construction of the
sentence, they adopted what is called
the agglutinative method of combina-
tion. That is, several monosyllables are
put in juxtaposition to express the com-
plex or compound notion which in the
Aryan languages would
be denoted by means of
inflectional terminations.
This feature of combin-
ing monosyllables in
long, compound expres-
sions, partly resembling
words and partly sen-
tences, is common to the
languages of nearly all
the nomadic nations of
the earth.
It is believed by schol-
ars that such languages
have not yet reached the
inflectional Features of ag-
stflcrp of de glutinative
stage o ae- tongues . mean .
Velopment, ingof "tura."
and that, in obedience to
natural laws, they will
ultimately pass into a
form of structure similar
to that of the Aryan vo-
cabulary and grammar.
No example of such trans-
mutation, however, has
been noted in any quar-
ter of the world. The
agglutinative languages
hold fast to their original
character, and the peo-
ples who speak them
prefer to retain their te-
dious, periphrastic meth-
ods of expression to the
adoption of the briefer and more elegant
inflectional forms of speech. Based on.
these agglutinative dialects, the ethnic
classification of races has been extended to
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CLASSIFICATION. 423
include the great group called Turanian.
The word is derived from tura, "a
horseman," and has respect to the nation-
al habit of life peculiar to the semibar-
barous races of
Northern Asia.
In general, the
Turanian fam-
ily, as deter-
mined by the
peculiarities of
language, con-
forms with tol-
erable identity
to the Altaian
group of na-
tions as deter-
mined by his-
torical relation-
ships.
4. The Gan-
owanian Races.
In addition to
the three major
divisions of
mankind thus
determined by
the evidence of
language, a
fourth division
has been sug-
gested to in-
clude the bar-
barian races of
the New World;
and for this
branch of man-
kind the name
Gano wanian has
been proposed
by Profess or
Lewis H. Mor-
gan, of the United States. In the Seneca-
Iroquois dialects the word gano-wano sig-
nifies " bow-and-arrow," and Professor
Morgan has seized upon this expression
as indicating the most universal charac-
teristic of the Indian races. They are,
and have always been, the wearers of
the bow. Just as the root ar has fur-
GANOWANIAN TYPES UCAYLI INDIANS.
Drawn by P. Fritel.
nished to Max Miiller and other Euro-
pean scholars the hint for the ethnic
name Aryan, meaning the races of the
plow, just a.s*tura, meaning a horseman,
424
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
has furnished the root of the word Tu-
ranian, descriptive of the nomadic races
of Asia, so the word Gan-
Tne Ganowan-
ian, or bow-and- owanian may properly be
arrow, races. , , -,
employed to designate the
races of the bow and arrow. Linguis-
SEA NEGRO TYPES NATIVES OF DOREY.
Drawn by P. Sellier, after a sketch of Dumont d'Urville.
tically considered, the various tongues
of the Indian family of men belong by
analogy to the same group with the
Turanian languages of Asia. They
have the same peculiarities. They are
monosyllabic, and all complex and com-
pound ideas are expressed by the agglu-
tinative process ; that is, the mere jux-
taposition of one monosyllable with
another, until the mind of the speaker
is satisfied with the modification.
IV. GEOGRAPHICAL ETHNOLOGY. We
have thus considered three of the
general methods which have been
adopted for classifying
* . s General theory
the human race into of geographical
i ... ethnology.
species and varieties.
Still another plan has been proposed
by a certain class of writers with a
view to the ethnic division of man-
kind. This we will now consider
as the fourth attempt to group the
different families of men according
to their origin and race descent. It
has appeared more feasible to many
inquirers to use geography as the
basis of a classification rather than
alleged affinities of blood or actual
identities of language. It has been
thought that for practical results the
arrangement of the human race ac-
cording to its continental distribu-
tion and its local developments
would be of greater value than the
somewhat theoretical analysis of
mankind according to linguistic
distinctions. The result has beeri
a more elaborate but less valuable
classification than by any of the
other methods. The plan in ques-
tion begins with a hypothetical cen-
ter for the human race, located in
the Indian ocean, west of Hindu,
stan. From this supposed origin
of mankind streams of ethnic de-
scent are carried shorewards from
Lemuria until, touching the various
continents, they are deflected and dis-
tributed into all parts of the earth.
According to this scheme we have the
following results :
I. The Papuans, with their derivative
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CLASSIFICATION. 425
families of Negritos, Papuans proper,
Melanese, and Tasmanians. These
Summary of re- peoples, as their names
suits by the geo- indicate, are distributed
graphical
method. in Malacca, the Philippine
islands, Papua, Melanesia, and Tas-
mania.
2. The Hottentots, with their two lead-
ing- branches, the Hottentots proper
and the Bushmen, both inhabiting Cape-
land.
3. The Kaffirs, with their three divi-
sions, the Zulu-Kaffirs, the Bechuanas,
and the Congo Kaffirs, inhabiting re-
spectively the eastern, the central, and
the western districts of South Africa.
4. The Negroes,
with their four 5
principal divisions
of Tibbu Negroes,
Sudan Negroes,
Senegambians,
and Nigritians,
inhabiting the re-
gions indicated by
their respective
names.
5. The Austra-
lians, with the two
geographical
branches of North
Australians and South Australians.
6. The Malayans, with their three divi-
sions of Sundanese, Polynesians, and
Madagascans, the first two inhabiting
the Sunda archipelago and the Pacific is-
lands, and the latter the island of Mad-
agascar.
7. The Mongolians, with their three va-
rieties of Indo-Chinese,, Coreo- Japanese,
Altaians, and Uralians, the first belong-
ing to Thibet and China, the second to
Corea and Japan, the third to Central
and Northern Asia, and the fourth to
Northwestern Asia and Hungary in
Europe.
M. Vol. 128
8. The Arctics, with the two principal
divisions of Hyperboreans and Esqui-
maux, belonging respectively to North-
eastern Asia and Northeastern America.
9. The Americans, with four leading
divisions, the North Americans (In-
dians), Central Americans, South Amer-
icans, and Patagonians, distributed ac-
cording to their several ethnic names.
10. The Dravidians, with two race de
velopments, the Deccanese of India and
the Singalese of Ceylon.
1 1 . The Nubians, with their three va-
rieties, the Shangallas and Dongolese of
Nubia, and the Fulahs of Fulah.
12. The Mediterraneans, divided EC-
ESQUIMAU TYPES.
cording to this scheme into Caucasians,
Basques, Semites, and Indo-Europeans ;
the first of these four being named from
the range of the Caucasus, the second
belonging to the northeastern portion of
Spain, the third being limited to Eastern
Europe and portions of Northern Africa,
and the Indo-European branch being
nearly coincident with the European
division of the Aryan race as defined in
the linguistic scheme above.
We thus have, according to the geo-
graphical scheme, no fewer than twelve
major divisions of human kind, repre-
sented by thirty-seven different races,
426
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
many of which are in turn divided and
subdivided into various peoples and
tribes, according to their localities, lan-
guages, and ethnic peculiarities.
On the whole, this method of classifica-
tion according to the geographical basis is
Unsatisfactory less satisfactory in its re-
gra a phicai r c2:r sults than any of the others
fication. presented. It assumes that
tribes of a given stock will, as a rule, mi-
associated. A classification like the
above, which places so old and radical a
stock as that of the Semites in the same
group with the Indo-European races,
lacks every element of accuracy, and
tends to perpetuate the worst vices of the
old system of ethnology. None the less,
such a division of mankind as that pre-
sented in the geographical scheme above
has its value when set in comparison and
NUBIAN BOY TVPE. -Drawn by Ishmael Gentz.
grate in *"he same direction and occupy
the same territories. It is based upon the
hypothesis that an aggregation of peo-
ples in any given part of the world is of
itself a proof of a common race descent.
On the contrary, it is well known that in
many parts of the world races and tribes
of men, as wide apart as the poles in
their ethnic affinities, are geographically
parallelism with other and more rational
ethnic classifications.
V. SCIENTIFIC ETHNOLOGY. In the
schemes of race descent thus far pre-
sented the linguistic plan Elements of tm-
nf rliVicjirvn mo^t nparlv certainty in lin-
11V1S leariy guistic me thod
approaches a scientific ba- of race division,
sis. There are in the same, however,
certain unscientific conditions that must
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CLASSIFICATION, 427
be eliminated before the division of the
human race by language only could be
accepted as a finality. One of these con-
ditions is the patent fact that a people of
a given ethnic origin may, in the vicissi-
tudes of history, adopt a speech other
than its own, and thus be thrown in a
classification very different from that to
which it really belongs.
Several instances might be cited in
which this phenomenon has actually
and probability of error in classifying by
means of language only.
But there are other means of a more
strictly scientific character which may be
employed in classifying the Possibility of
divisions of the human ^SSSff
race. Differences or identi- form -
ties in anatomical structure, persistently
transmitted from generation to genera-
tion, constitute a valid evidence of eth-
nic divergence or relationship. The
stature of a given people is generally
uniform. The men are of a uniform
height, and so are the women. In this
respect the different families of man-
kind have presented remarkable varia-
Dolicocephalic skulL Brachycephalic skull.
CRANIAL CONFIGURATION, SHOWING VARIATIONS IN HUMAN FORM.
presented itself. At times the conquer-
ing race absorbs the language of the
conquered people, and, in such a case,
subsequent investigation would be put
at fault if the linguistic affinity of the
people were accepted as the sole criterion
of its race relationship. The conspicu-
ous modern example of the Normans,
who abandoned their own Teutonic
speech and adopted French as their ver-
nacular, carrying the same with them
into England, and effecting in the Eng-
lish language a permanent modification
by the infusion therein of linguistic ele-
ments which they had borrowed from
another people, is sufficiently well known,
and completely establishes the possibility
tions. Some approximate the stature of
giants, and others of pygmies. The pro-
portions of the skeletons likewise con-
stitute a fair basis of distinction between
people of one race and those of another.
The character of the hands and the feet,
the length and proportion of the arm
bones and the legs, the particular figure
of the chest, and especially the facial
angle, are peculiarities which may well
be employed in a scientific way in dis-
tinguishing people of one race descent
from those of another.
More especially the figure and capac-
ity of the skull are typical, each family
of men having a cranial configuration
and development peculiar to itself.
428
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Careful investigations have shown the
limits of these variations, and have de-
tertnined those features of
Crania and
race. are distinctive of several
races of men. The hair of the head,
likewise, has furnished a distinguishing
mark in different peoples. It is found
that the hair in different races ranges
all the way from a woolly fiber, present-
ing a triangular section and having its
vital channel on the exterior surface, to
the straight, tubular filament which
constitutes the head covering of some of
the superior races. Between these ex-
tremes are all varieties of capillary for-
mation. These varieties are found to
PAPl'AN TYPE, SHOWING CRISP HAIR.
be persistent from generation to genera-
tion and from century to century. Spec-
imens of human hair recovered from the
granite crypts of Egypt, where they
were laid more than two thousand years
before our era, exhibit the same pecul-
AMERICAN INDIAN TYPE, SHOWING STRAIGHT HAIR.
Drawn by Riou.
iarities and diversities of structure as are
found on the heads of living races. Such
specific differences in the external cov-
ering of the skull may well be used in a
scientific way as a mark or criterion by
which the different families of mankind
may be discriminated the one from the
other.
The human skin also has its particu-
lar features and peculiarities, unlike in
the different types of man-
~ r Color of the skin
kind. This is said more a true test of
particularly of the color. Of
all the features with respect to which
men differ in physiological constitution
the pigmentary character of the cuticle
is perhaps the most marked, invariable,
and persistent. This fact has been se-
lected by many ethnographers as the
best consideration from which to frame
a scheme of division for the humao
species. It is found that the different
races have different colored skins; that
a given race is sufficiently uniform in its
hue ; that the color once determined, is
persistent, reproducing itself from age to
age, and being recognizable even after
thousands of years as belonging to a cer-
tain species. Why not, therefore, adopt
the color of the body as the most marked
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CLASSIFICATION. 429
and invariable characteristic by which to
distinguish the ethnic classification of
the various peoples?
Such a principle of division appears to
be in every wise scientific. The color
of the skin is a physical fact
Scientific classi- .
ficationmaybe in nature, and its invaria-
lor ' bility in a given species
assures the constancy of the fact and
furnishes a guarantee against error. Xo
anomalous depar-
tures from the
given standard of
color need be ex-
pected except in
the case of indi-
viduals, and such
exceptions would
in no wise disturb
the regularity of
the law. More-
over, the other
sources of infor-
mation, the other
bases of division
of the human fam-
ily, may well be
used as auxiliary
to the truly scien-
tific classification
of mankind by
means of color.
All that is known
historically of the different races, all
that is known of the various branches
of the human family as determined by
means of the languages which they
speak, may be brought to bear upon the
problem to rectify and amend whatever
may be suspected of error in the classi-
fication by means of color.
Such a method of division has been
many times attempted by scholars, but
until recently the results have been
variable and uncertain. The reason of
this is found in the imperfect observa-
mer error in this
method of clas-
tion which has first been given to the
question. What are the different colors
presented on the covering sources of for-
of the bodies of m*<
What primary or secondary
hues are really characteristic of the hu-
man skin in different races #nd coun-
tries ? Error in deciding these questions
has been at the bottom of all diversity
MGRI'llAN TYPES, SHOWING WOOLLY HAIR.
Drawn by Madame Paule Crampel.
It appears strange to the thoughtful
inquirer of the present day that so little
accuracy has been displayed by those
who have attempted to note and de-
scribe the different natural colors of the
human skin. It will readily be allowed
that an examination of the whole race
now occupying the earth will discover
nearly all colors and shades of color,
from one extreme of the spectrum to
another; but a very casual examina-
tion will show that these various tints
are reducible to a few, and these to
430
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
still fewer primary pigmentary distinc-
tions.
The great error made by those eth-
nographers who have attempted to use
color of the skin as a basis
Only three pri-
mary colors of of classification has been
the human skin. ^ a }} ow j n g. too man y dj s .
tinctions of tint. Inability on their part
to generalize the facts, and to reduce the
ENGLISH TYPE (MRS. SIDDONS), SHOWING WAVY HAIR.
different hues to a few radical distinc-
tions, has been the fruitful source of all
inaccuracy and confusion. The first
classifications attempted on this basis
of color resulted in multiplying rather
than in simplifying the classification of
the human race. According to these
first efforts there were white -men, yel-
low men, olive-colored men, red men,
orange-colored men, copper-colored men,
brown men, black men, and many other
slighter distinctions which tended to
confuse rather than to establish a scien-
tific division. All this turned upon in-
accuracy of perception. It is the feature
of modern inquiry that the sense-percep-
tion with which it begins has become
constantly more accurate and penetrating
in recent times. It is now
clearly perceived that there
are by no means so many
fundamental colors to be
recognized as the distin-
guishing characteristics of
the different races. On the
contrary, there are but few.
Without passing through all
stages of the inquiry, it is
sufficient to say that the
very best scrutiny of the
actual facts shows that there
are only three primary colors
peculiar to the human body ;
and that these colors are
ruddy, black, and brown.
From these fundamental
and characteristic tints of
the human- skin all the
other varieties are easily
derived, and to them all
minor distinctions are read-
ily referred.
What, then, is the true
nature of these three fun-
damental colors peculiar to
the races of mankind? It
will be noted that the term white is
rejected. This is done The term ruddy
for the sufficient reason $5f*
that there are not now treatise.
and never were any tribes of people
on the earth to whom the term white
could properly be applied. The fairest-
skinned specimens of the human race
are very far from white. He who has
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CLASSIFICATION. 431
not himself looked candidly and care-
fully at the fact here referred to must
needs be surprised to note how great the
error is in describing the color of any
people as -white. The races that have
been recognized as white are in reality
ruddy in color, and approach much more
nearly to the standard
of red than the Indian
peoples, who have been
erroneously defined as .
red men.
The so-called Cauca-
sians, for instance, who
perhaps present the skin
in its fairest tint, are
truly a ruddy people.
The peculiarity of the
skin is its transparency
and the consequent rev-
elation of the blood in
the capillaries. The red
tinge of the blood is
thus discernible
through the cuticle, and
the flush of color, slight-
er or more emphatic, is
always ruddy in its char-
acter. The peoples hav-
ing this quality of skin
are the blushing races.
With every varying de-
gree of excitement the
blood appears or re-
cedes in the skin at the
surface, giving a deeper
or paler tinge to the
body. But
conditions
to disabuse the judgment of the be-
holder. The term white, therefore, as
one of the definitive epithets descriptive
of the color of the human race, must be
rejected, and its place be taken with the
more accurate term ruddy. We thus
have in a scientific classification of man
under
can the
white.
no
skin be said to be
The fairest in-
ever born into the
THE RUDDY TYPE PAUL CRAMPEL,
Drawn by H. Thiriat, from a photograph.
No races may be
properly defined fant
world, even when bloodless
and cold in death, is so far from being
white that a really white object placed
alongside of the skin furnishes a con-
trast so striking as at once and forever
kind based on the distinction of color,
first of all :
I. THE RUDDY RACES. It is found
when this distinction of color is applied to
the great facts tinder consideration that
the larger part of the historical nations of
the earth come under the classification
of ruddy. The great races who first
432
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
redeemed the world from barbarism
were of this color. It is quite certain
that those strong and heroic peoples who
What races may appear in the remote hori-
SL C s7fie e d as zo * of the primitive world
ruddy. were ruddy in their
complexions. Speaking from a biblical
point of view, all three of the Noachite
THE BROWN TYPE MISTRESS SENKI.
Drawn by E. Ronjat
races, with their several divisions, had
complexions of this hue. This is true
alike of Hamites, Semites, and Japheth-
ites. The long prevalent notion that
the Hamites were a black race, corre-
sponding roughly to what we call
African, in modern history, is utterly
untenable. They had, on the contrary,
the same general complexion some-
what intensified by the scorching sun of
the climates in which they were for the
most part developed with the cognate
races of Shem and Japheth. Or, if we
speak from the historical point of view,
we shall find the same indications of the
fundamental identity in color of the
early races who developed civilization in
the earth. The Indo-Europeans
were all ruddy in complexion.
From the foothills of the Him-
alayas across the table-lands of Per-
sia into Ionia and Macedonia and
Greece and Italy and the " isles of
the gentiles " the same fundamen-
tal race complexion is discover-
able. Likewise, the Semites and
the Hamitic races, noted from the
historical point of view, are found
to be of the same bodily color.
Language contributes its evidence
also to establish the same general
fact as to the complexion of the
Indo-European and other Noachite
families of men. They were all
ruddy, and the hint in Genesis of
the red-earth color of the Adamite
would seem to be justified by the
facts observable in several of the
principal divisions of the human
family.
II. THE BROWN RACES. The
second fundamental division of
mankind determined on the line of
color is by the brown complexion,
which characterizes many of the
leading races. It will be observed
from the selection of this hue that many
varieties of color may be referred there-
to. Several shades o"f yel-
General analysis
low and of red may be cor- of the Brown
rectly carried back into a
fundamental brown, which is the com-
posite of black with one of the two tints
referred to. Careful observation will
show that this is the actual color of the
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CLASSIFICATION. 433
great races of Northern and Eastern
Asia, as well as of all the aborigines of
the two Americas and Polynesia. As
the major division of these races we
may cite :
1. The Asiatic Mongoloids, correspond-
ing in general terms with the Mon-
golian race indicated by historical in-
quiry, or with the two divisions of the
Turanians according to the linguistic
division.
2. The Polynesian Mongoloids, or the
peoples scattered through the islands of
the South Pacific, with the exception of
the Melanesians and the Australians.
3. The Dravidians, or the Deccanese
and the people of the Micronesian is-
lands north and east of Australia.
III. THE BLACK RACES. It is clear,
on an examination of the facts, that
many of the peoples,
The four groups * *
of the Black even the primitive races
distributed in portions of
the world lying in the equatorial re-
gions, are properly denned as Black.
The pigmentary deposit under the cuti-
cle is of such a character as to absorb all
or the greater portion of the rays of
light, and to return to the eye only that
negative sensation which we define as
blackness. The line of chromatic division
between these races of Black men and
those who were defined as Brown, is that
under the cuticle of the skin of the latter
peoples a certain percentage of coloring
matter is combined with the black pig-
ment, producing the various shades of
color known as brown.
This characteristic difference between
the two colors is constant, and tends to
perpetuate itself by the physiological
law called "reversion to the original
type." This is to say that in a contact
of the various races, Black and Brown
and Ruddy, and in their intermingling
of blood, there is a tendency for one or the
other of the elements of ethnic constitu-
tion to declare itself and become domi-
nant over the rest. Given a sufficient
lapse of time, and these intermediate
varieties return to the one or the other of
the original types from which they are
derived. Geographically speaking, the
Black races are distributed throughout
the larger part of Africa and through
the whole of Australia and that portion
of the Pacific archipelago called Melane-
sia. These are the limits of the natural
dispersion of the Black races. The eth-
nic divisions of this third primary family
of men are :
1 . The Negroes, who occupy the larger
band of Central Africa from east to west,
and are also distributed through a great
portion of the southern division of the
continent.
2. The Australians, occupying all of
Central and Southern Australia, except
the coast region on the east and north.
3. The Hottentots, distributed through
the larger part of the southern extrem-
ity of Africa.
4. The Papuans, occupying the island
of New Guinea, the northern and eastern
maritime districts of Australia, the is-
land of Tasmania, and, in general, the
Melanesian archipelago.
The foregoing classification of the hu-
man race on the scientific method and
by the distinction of color is, perhaps, as
nearly a satisfactory solution of the prob-
lem as can be given in the other plans of
present state of knowledge. 2S?
The three distinctions of -with this.
Ruddy, Brown, and Black races are
fundamental. They are broad enough
to include the whole race of man, with
its multiform developments in ancient
and modern times. The classification is
sufficiently ample to embrace in its major
and minor divisions all the races and
peoples which have been distinguished
434
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
from each other by means of historical
and linguistic inquiry. It is easy to con-
form to this plan of division all the others
that have been suggested, and to make
them consistent with the wider and more
scientific scheme. Thus, for instance,
the biblical race of Japheth, the histori-
cal divisions of mankind called Indo-
THE BLACK TYPE NEGRO MAKUTULU.
Drawn by Riou.
European, the ethnic branches of men
called Aryan in the linguistic classifica-
tion, all fall under the common designa-
tion of Ruddy races. With these are
grouped by means of the same color
distinction the Semitic families of men,
and also the Hamitic divisions. These
ten races taken together constitute the
whole group, which may be defined by
the term Ruddy and considered as of a
primary, common descent.
In the second place, the widely dis-
seminated Brown races, covering nearly
the whole of Asia, the
General distri-
two great continents of the button of the
TTT i ,1 , Brown races.
West, and the greater part
of Polynesia, may be grouped together
on the line of color and considered as a
common family in its origin and race
descent. It will be the purpose in
the following' pages of the present
book to trace out the lines of the
great tribal and race divergencies
and migrations which in the lapse
of ages have carried these Brown
peoples over by far the largest dis-
tricts of the earth. It will be un-
derstood, of course, that the race
classification of the peoples of the
two Americas as here presented re-
lates to the original peoples of these
continents, and not to the Indo-
European nations that have taken
possession of them in recent times
by migration and conquest.
The third general division as indi-
cated in this analysis on the basis of
color has already been pointed out
in its ethnic and geographical dis-
tribution. , No branch of the Black
races has of its own motion crossed
the equator of the earth to a point
higher than the twentieth degree of
' north latitude. It will be found in
the subsequent chapters of this
book that the dispersion of this divi-
sion of mankind was by means of a west-
ward stream flowing in from f
Outline of the
Eastern Africa and spread- dispersion of the
i_ -, Blacks.
ing in many branches
through all those parts of the continent
between the equatorial region and the
Cape of Good Hope, while the eastern
stream bore off by way of Southern Hin-
dustan into the great, closely distributed
islands lying to the south of Asia. It is be-
lieved that sufficient is now known of the
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. NOACHITE DISPERSION. 435
movements of the Black races to delin-
eate their tribal divergencies and mi-
grations with tolerable certainty, and
although much will remain to be rectified
and amended by subsequent investiga-
tions, something may be at present ad-
vanced to enlarge the borders of com-
mon knowledge relative to this the least
known and least progressive of the great
divisions of mankind.
From these considerations and others
that may be readily deduced therefrom,
Mankind to be ft h as been determined to
divided into .-,_",
Ruddy races, employ in the present work
Brown races, .-, *_-^ 1 3
and Black races, the scientific method in
classifying the different races of men,
and to use the color of tlie body as the
fundamental fact in considering the
scheme of division. In all the sub-
sequent parts of the present work, in
the description of the migrations of the
primitive tribes and families of men, in
the delineation of manners and customs,
and the peculiarities of national develop-
ment which will in great measure fill
up the body of the work, it is purposed
to keep always in mind this fundamental
division of mankind into, I. RUDDY
RACES; II. BROWN RACES; III. BLACK
RACES;, with their manifest divisions
into the three branches, Hamite, Semite,
and Aryan in the first; three divi-
sions of Asiatic Mongoloids, Polynesian
Mongoloids, and Dravidians, in the
second; and four branches, Negroes,
Australians, Hottentots, and Papuans, in
the third. These ten race classes of man-
kind will constitute the basis of much
of the discussion in the present and the
succeeding volumes.
CHAFTTER XXIV. NOACHITE DISPERSION CONSID-
ERED.
O far as the present re-
sources of human
knowledge have indi-
cated the primary seat
and early movements
of the Ruddy races of
mankind, the same be-
gan on the north shores of the western
gulf of the Indian ocean. The scene of
this important primitive aspect of the
race was probably in the southern part
of Beluchistan, eastward from the Per-
sian gulf. "When these statements are
made the whole of our knowledge on the
subject may be said to
His-
tory knows little besides of
the time or the advent of this primary
stream of human existence ; but it can
nardly be doubted that this is the real
Primitive seats 1 -i j i t
of the Adamites, have been delivered.
seat of the Adamite and his descendants.
Ethnologists have generally been dis-
posed to go further, to trace backwards the
stream of this division of the race to the
shores of ocean, and thence to carry it
by hypothesis far out into the so-called
Lemuria, a supposed submerged region
in the bed of the Indian ocean.
On the theory that the Black, the
Brown, and the Ruddy races of man-
kind have all had a single
. . . Apparent point
ancestral origin, there is of origin for an
some ground for such a eraces<
hypothesis. The first tribes of Black
men appear to have struck the continent
of Africa from the east. In like manner
the Brown races seem to have touched
the continent on the coast line eastward
of the Persian gulf ; while the ancestors
of the Australians and Papuans appear
436
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
to have reached their destination from
the northwest. Thus the observer, stand-
ing on the western shore of India, the
eastern shore of Africa, or the southern
shore of Beluchistan, would seem to see
the three major divisions of mankind ap-
proaching from the deep, as if. from some
common origin under the sea.
Nor has tradition been wholly silent in
witnessing to such a primeval movement
Berosus re- of the race landwards from
the sea - One of the oldest
traditions on record is pre-
served in a fragment of Berosus, and
indicates the ocean origin, not only of
the day with men. But he took no nour-
ishment, and at sunset went again into
the sea, and there remained for the
night. This animal taught men lan-
guage and science, the harvesting of
seeds and fruits, the rules for the bound-
aries of land, the modes of building
cities and temples, arts, and writing,
and all that pertains to civilization."
In the fifth chapter of the book of
Genesis we have an account of the Adatnie
race from the beginning down to the
Deluge. This space is occupied with
ten successive patriarchs and their ex-
panding families. To these great
LANDSCAPE OF THE NOACHITE DISPERSION. BENDER-DILBM. Drawn by Taylor, after a sketch of Houssay.
the arts, but of man himself. A portion
of the story is as follows :
"Then there appeared to them from
the sea, on the shore of Babylonia, a fear-
ful animal of the name of Oan. His
body was that of a fish, but under the
fish's head another head was attached,
and on the fins were feet like those of a
man, and he had a man's voice. The
image of the creature is still preserved.
The animal came at morning, and passed
longevity is attributed, and the nar-
rative indicates in various
. Outline in Gen-
ways the rapid tribal de- esisofthe
1 f , t -r, Adamic races.
velopment of the race. It
will be noted also by a comparison of the
fifth chapter with the fourth that two
parallel lines of descent are recorded,
the one through Cain, and the other
through Seth. "For," said Eve, " God
hath appointed me another seed instead
of Abel, whom Cain slew."
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. NOACHITE DISPERSION. 437
The Adamic descendants are traced in
the fourth chapter down to the children
of Adah and Zillah, the two wives of
Lamech ; that is, to Jabal, ' the father
of such as dwell in tents and such as
have cattle;" to Jubal, "the father of
all such as handle the harp and organ;"
and to Tubal-cain, "an instructor of ev-
ery artificer in brass and iron." Here
the narrative ends, and the other branch
of the Adamites, that is, the descendants
of Seth, are taken up, down to Noah, the
son of Lamech. The recurrence of
common names in both lines of descent
introduces a good deal of confusion, but
the line of Seth, considered by itself, is
straight through ten generations.
The Hebrew narrative of the Adamite
and his posterity to the Deluge is here
value of the cited in part because of its
strikin S Parallelism with
the secular tradition
handed down by Berosus. This cele-
brated ancient author was a priest of
Bel, at Babylon, and flourished there in
the first half of the third century before
our era. He was a native oT the coun-
try and well acquainted with its earlier
and later history. He knew as well as
one might know in an uncritical and
credulous age the annals not only of the
later Babylonian empire, but also of the
older Chaldsean dominion which . had
been established on the lower Euphrates
in the very earliest stages of human
history.
In that part of his work devoted to
the chronology of the Chaidsean king-
Ten cnaidee dom, Berosus describes the
mythical kings ;
conformity to epoch before the flood ; for,
the Hebrew -., .. TT 1 ,
scheme. like the Hebrew author
of Genesis, he has an account of a uni-
versal deluge of waters, through which
a single great captain named Xisuthrus,
with his family, came safely in a ship
and descended from a mountain, to re-
people the earth. To the antedeluvian
era Berosus also assigns a dynasty of
ten kings. To these reigns of fabulous
duration are given the ten eons of their
dominion, being as follows:
Years.
1. Alorus, a Chaldaean, who reigned 36,000
2. Aloparus, son of Alorus, who reigned. . . 10,800
3. Almelon, a native of Sippara, who reigned. 46,800
4. Ammenon, a Chaldaean, who reigned .... 43,200
5. Amegalarus, of Sippara, who reigned. . . 64,800
6. Daonus, of Sippara, who reigned 36,000
7. Edorankhus, of Sippara, who reigned. . . 64,800
8. Amempsinus, a Chaldaean, who reigned 36,000
9. Otiartes, a Chaldaean, who reigned 28,000
lo. Xisuthrus, the Chaldaean Noah, who
reigned 64,800
A total of ten kings, reigning 431,200
The general conformity of these two
schemes of ethnic descent must be pat-
ent at a glance. The Chaldsean and the
Hebrew accounts of this dim age of an
ancestral race agree in the important
consideration of ten successive patri-
archical kingships. It is easy to observe
the more moderate conception and out-
line of the Hebrew scheme of descent and
longevity, and the wild extravagance of
the Chaldaean tradition. But the pattern
and outline of the progress of the race
are alike in both, and in either case this
line of long-lived mythical rulers ends
with a righteous captain, whose virtue
and wisdom, in the wickedness of his
surroundings, enable him to go safely
through the waters of a deluge and re-
people a new world on the hither side
of the catastrophe.
The identity of the two narratives in
their essential spirit and leading features
can hardly be doubted. We
* . . The headmen
thus see in the maritime of the Adamite
parts of Beluchistan, at a
time almost unimaginably remote, even
from the standpoint of the oldest histo-
rians who have attempted to trace the
course and development of mankind,
438
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
the apparition of a ruddy race of men
expanding through a mythical age of
unknown duration, and entering at least
three stages of civilizing activity. Jabal
was the "father of such as dwell in
tents and of such as have cattle." This
is manifestly an outline of the begin-
ning of the pastoral life which occupied
so large a part in the subsequent his-
tory of the races of Western Asia. Ju-
instruments as have pleased the senses
of men in all subsequent ages with the
concord of sweet sounds.
To the same epoch, or a little later, in
the tribal evolution, is assigned Tubal-
cain. He is represented as Question of the
a worker in brass and iron. gJJJrfSJ***
Very notable is the fact Semites,
that the composite metal brass is here
mentioned as the material of the earliest
THE FATHERS OF "SUCH AS DWELL IN TENTS" OLD SEMITIC TYPES.
bal, the brother of Jabal, is represented
as being the ' ' father of all such as
handle the harp and the organ." From
this we are to infer that at least the
musical branches of art made their ap-
pearance in the East contemporaneously
with the development of the pastoral
life. The makers of tents and the
keepers of flocks and herds discovered
harmony, and became the makers of such
metal work of the Adamites. Iron also
is named as the other substance in which
Tubal-cain and his successors became
proficient as workmen. It would appear
in accord with right reason that both of
these names of the metals are errone-
ously deduced from some original which
has been misunderstood in translation.
The primitive men could hardly have
begun as workers in brass, since the
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. NOACHITE DISPERSION. 439
copper and zinc of which it is composed
must first have been employed and the
ratio of their combination discovered
before brass could have an existence.
Moreover, the extraction of iron from
the matrix is a process so difficult and so
late in the order of metallic discovery
that, as we have already seen in another
part of this work, it follows and does
not precede the discovery of copper, of
tin, of the precious metals, and, indeed,
of nearly all the other metallic ele-
ments common to the surface of 'the
,arth.
At the close of this Adamite period in
the history of the Ruddy race we come
to that great catastrophe.
Dissemination *
of traditions of the Deluge of waters. In
respect to this event tradi-
tion was busy throughout the primitive
world. Among almost every people
there was a mythical reminiscence of a
flood by which their ancestors were
destroyed from the earth. The diluvian
legend generally assigned the wickedness
of the race as a cause of its overthrow.
The tradition of such a visitation always
presented itself most emphatically in
countries so situated as to be subject to
inundations. Perhaps the greatest seat
of such a belief was in the valleys of
the Lower Euphrates and Tigris. It
was from this region that the Hebrew
account of the Deluge was transmitted by
Abraham and his posterity to the west,
and there recorded in the annals of that
people. At the same time a like tradi-
tion was handed down among the
Chaldaeans, and at a later epoch in
history was repeated and modified by
the Assyrian seers, on the Upper Tigris.
The story of Deucalion and his survival
of the Deluge was rife among the primi-
tive Greeks, and other primeval nations
had like accounts of a like disaster.
To this general dissemination of the
belief in a deluge of waters by which
the race of man was swept away, the
ancient Egyptians furnish whytheEgyp-
a remarkable exception. ^TnVsuth
Their legends and mythol- tradition,
ogy furnish no account of any such
event, either in the primitive or later
ages of their country. It is easy to see
in this fact the action and reaction of
natural and supernatural elements in the
primitive history of a people. The Nile
is, perhaps, the only river in the world
whose swellings and fallings obey a
certain law, the knowledge of which
secures the inhabitants of the valley
from disastrous consequences. The
regularity of the coming and the reces-
sion of the waters furnishes a guarantee
against all harm. A curse is thus con-
verted into a blessing; and the river
becomes, instead of an object of dread
and superstition, an object of reverence
and worship ! The uniformity of nature
stood guard over the welfare of the
people who built the pyramids, and even
. if a prehistoric deluge had occurred be-
fore the civilized development of the
Egyptian race, the tradition of it would
have perished in the presence of the
future beneficent conduct of the great
river. In other valleys of the East
irregularity rather than uniform flood
and subsidence was the law, and where-
ever, as a result, disaster on many oc-
casions and from natural causes must
necessarily have ensued to the people
living on the river banks, the tradition
of a great catastrophe overwhelming all
would be perpetuated and handed down
as a distinct and memorable crisis in the
past history of the world.
However this may be, we find a
remarkable conformity between the
Chaldasan and the Hebrew account of
the disaster by which the race of man was
swept away at the close of the Adamite
440
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
era. The well-known narrative of the
Deluge given in the seventh chapter of
the Book of Genesis need not be here
Generaihar- repeated. Nor is it desir-
monyofChal-
deean and He- able to recount in full the
of the a flood nt story of the flood as recorded
by the ancient Chaldasans and Assyr-
ians. The principal features of the
destroy the world by a flood. The great
captain was ordered to bury the records
of his country in Sippara and to embark
in a ship, with his kindred and friends.
He was also directed to take into the ark
with him all manner of living creatures.
When everything was completed and the
ship, nine thousand feet in length, was
MESOPOTAMIA!* LANDSCAPE. VIEW OF MOSSUL. Drawn by E. Flandin.
latter, however, will serve to show the
fundamental identity of the three prin-
cipal narratives of the Deluge. The
Chaldaean and Assyrian accounts differ
in this, that the latter assigns as a cause
for the destruction of the human race
by a flood the wickedness of mankind in
the earth, whereas the older, or Chal-
dsean, account simply recites that the god
Bel revealed to Xisuthrus his purpose to
closed, the Deluge came. In course of
time Xisuthrus sent out birds, which at
first came back without evidence of rest-
ing, but afterwards with mud on their
feet. At length the ship rested on the
Gordyaean mountain, and the inhabitants
came forth to repeople the earth.
In the Assyrian account the divinity
who revealed the flood is Hea, and the
Assyrian Noah is named Sisit. He, as
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. NOACHITE DISPERSION. 441
in the case of his Chaldsean prototype,
gathered all manner of living creatures
The Assyrian and seeds of the vegetable
paSo^he world into his ship. Then
older forms. Samas, the sun god,
sent the flood. There was a great storm
that went over the nations, and the
waters reached up to heaven. Even the
gods had to ascend to their highest
thrones and sit there until the subsid-
ence. All living things outside were
drowned. At last the waters abated;
the ark rested on Mount Nizir, and Bel
led forth Sisit by the hand to repopulate
the country. It is sufficient to note that
the narrative given of the great catas-
trophe in the seventh chapter of Genesis
is much more serious and elevated than
the two forms of tradition which were
preserved to after times in the valleys of
the Euphrates and the Tigris.
Apart from these traditional accounts
of the manner in which the Adamite
Early division of race came to its termina-
intVtS iteS tion, we turn to a more scien-
branches. tific aspect of the question.
It appears that before the destruction of
this people, before they had reached the
scene at least the central scene of
their disaster, they had already begun
to part into the three branches of ethnic
life already mentioned as the major
divisions of the Ruddy family of man-
kind. It is in evidence that the Noa-
chite race, from its old maritime debou-
chure on the shores of Gedrosia, the
modern Beluchistan, made its way first
to the north, in the direction of the Car-
manian desert, and was thence deflected
to the west. It was here, on the table-
land of ancient Iran, in the district of
country east of Yezd, that the ancestors
of the Ruddy races of mankind seem to
have felt for the first time the impulse
of westward migration. Here, at any
rate, they were deflected toward the
M. Vol. 129
setting sun. Here, too, they appear to
have begun that threefold ethnic separa-
tion which was destined, in far ages
and countries, to give to history some of
its most vigorous and highly developed
peoples.
If we fall back again for a moment
upon the classification the nomenclature
of which is derived from uncertain eth.
the three sons of Noah,
we find here the begin- tamians.
nings of the division. So that if we re-
gard the valley of the Euphrates and the
Tigris as the center, or seat, of the great
diluvian disaster which subsequently oc-
curred, we must conclude that the Ruddy
peoples who made their way into these
valleys from the east had already sepa-
rated, or at least begun to separate, into
Hamites, Semites, and possibly Japheth-
ites. The adoption of such a hypothe-
sis would tend to explain or remove the
difficulty which historians, ethnologists,
and linguists alike have experienced in
the attempted classification of the most
ancient peoples of the Tigrine and Eu-
phratine valleys. This work has never
been satisfactorily and conclusively ac-
complished. In a general way it has been
decided that the oldChaldaeans were Ham-
itic in their origin and development. In
like manner the preponderance of evi-
dence has tended to show that the Assyri-
ans were Semitic in their race descent and
character. But the evidences also indi-
cate much mixture and confusion in the
primitive history of these regions.
It is extremely difficult, either by
means of historical traditions, ethnic
traces, or linguistic proofs, Point of disper-
to determine satisfactorily
to which branch of the orig-
inal threefold division the Assyrians
and the Chaldseans respectively belong.
Moreover, at later periods, when the
Hamitic race has well emerged from this
442
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
region, and is discovered with all its pecul-
iar traits in Southeastern and Southern
Arabia and in Egypt, and when the Sem-
ites have likewise appeared, with their
distinctive peculiarities well developed, in
the West, the course from which the two
races have manifestly come into subse-
quent fields of activity, when traced back-
the center, and the Japhethites close up
to the Caspian.
From these evidences and by this just
train of reasoning, it would appear con-
clusive that the primary division of the
Noachite family took place in the up-
lands of ancient Iran, at a point more
than ten degrees of latitude eastward
IN KURDISTAN. VIEW OF LITTLE ARARAT, WITH GROUP OF KURDS IN FOREGROUND. Drawn by Alfred Paris.
wards, shows a conjuncture much to the
east of the Mesopotamian region and
not in the valleys of the Euphrates and
the Tigris. This is to say that at the
time when the Hamite, the Semite, and
the Japhethite races made their way
tlirough Mesopotamia to the West, they
were already separated geographically,
the Hamites being on the south, pressing
close to the Persian gulf, the Semites in
from the Mesopotamian region, which
may be regarded as the center of the tra-
ditions of the Deluge. It is safe, there-
fore, in the ethnic scheme, to mark the
division of the Noachites far beyond and
to the eastward of the low-lying alluvial
plains of Mesopotamia.
If, then, the observer should take his
stand in the Arabian desert west of
Mesopotamia and look thitherward in
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. NOACHITE DISPERSION. 443
the earliest epoch of human develop-
ment, he might see emerging from the
shadows the vanguard of
Issuance of the
Noachites to the two races, with possibly a
third on the north. The
Hamitic division of mankind would be
seen making its way to the westward,
close to the head-waters of the Persian
gulf and bending, as if by preference, to
the south into Old Arabia, next to the
sea. The central phalanx would be the
descendants of Shem, heading for the
west, and, perhaps, deflected somewhat
to the north, on its way from Ur of the
Chaldees into Canaan. The Japhetic
division, if seen at all, would be well to
the north, close to the southern shores
of the Caspian, and bending in a north-
westerly direction toward the eastern
limits of the Black sea. This may be
called the Noachite dispersion of the
human race. The lines of its progress
westward lie between the southern ex-
tremity of the Caspian and the northern
limits of the Persian gulf. This region
is to Europe and Southwestern Asia
what the wrist is to the extended palm.
Mesopotamia, considered longitudinally
from east to west and in connection
with Kurdistan, is a strait, and through
this strait the streams of the Ruddy
races of men flowed out toward the open
regions in the prehistoric ages.
It is from this point of view that we
may, in part at least, apprehend the
Probable direc- ethnic characteristics of the
primitive peoples of Elam
an( j Chaldsea. Through
these most ancient countries the Ham-
itic division of men made their way
in their earliest departure and migra-
tion from the parent stock. It is, per-
haps, safe to say that the Elamites were
the first development of a Hamitic na-
tionality in the world. This earliest
lodgment of the oldest branch of the
Noachites was in the country afterwards
called Susiana by the Greeks, and the
dominion established here remained for
many ages a seat and stronghold of the
primitive race. Historical traditions in-
dicate that the Hamites came into this,
region by invasion, and that they dis-
placed, by conquest, the original Semitic
and possibly Turanian peoples who were;
there before them.
This view, however, is a doubtful
hypothesis. As already stated, it is
likely that the disentangle- Traces of ethnic
ment of the Semitic and J^J^^
Hamitic tribes had not yet ites -
been completely effected when the Elam-
ite nationality was founded; and it
may well be confessed that Semitic
influences were afterwards discoverable
in the development of what was truly
a Hamitic dominion. Geographically
considered, the country here referred to
was bounded on the north by the river
Diyalah, on the east by the Kebir Kuh
mountains, on the west by the Tigris,
and on the south by the Persian gulf.
It was a low-lying country, fertile and
inviting, identical almost in character
with those other regions of the world
Chaldaea, Southeastern Arabia, the val-
ley of the Nile where the Hamites es-
tablished in subsequent ages the seats
of their dominion.
Primitive Assyria may be assigned to
the Semites. Asshur was the son of
Shem. The position of First distribu-
Assyria, east of the Tigris
rather than in Mesopotamia
Proper, would indicate its planting by
early tribes of the Semitic race coming
from the east. There are evidences
that such a dominion, north of the
Greater Zab and east of the Tigris, was
planted as early as the fourteenth cen-
tury before our era.
The Japhetic branch is generally re
444
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
garded as the oldest division of the No-
achite family. The movements of this
race have been by far the most compli-
cated and difficult to trace. The first
deflection from the parent stem was
doubtless to the north, or northwest of
the common stream flowing 1 westward.
The point of departure of the Japheth-
ites has already been indicated. It is
more than likely that their first course
after separation from the ancestral
tribes was so well to the north as to
bring them into contact with the lower
extremity of the Caspian, in which
event they would be turned back or de-
flected more directly toward Northern
Asia. It may be fairly conjectured
that this geographical circumstance lies
at the bottom of the formation of that
great ethnic whirl, or center, from
which the Aryan races of subsequent
times were all descended. It is not pur-
posed in this connection to trace out the
after ramifications of the Japhethites, or,
indeed, of the cognate races of the south.
It is sufficient to note that from the
Japhetic center the subsequent nrgra-
tions took place in both directions, east
and west, while the Semitic and Hamitic
movements followed a more orderly
progress, the one toward Canaan and
the other into Southeastern Arabia.
It has been intimated above that the
Old Chaldaean dominion on the Lower
indications that Euphrates was Hamitic in
d^s^rf *s origin. Several circum-
Hamitic. stances besides the mere
course which the tribal migrations were
then pursuing may be cited for assign-
ing Chaldaea to the Hamites. Historical
evidence shows almost conclusively that
there were race prejudices and frettings
between the Chaldaeans and the Assyri-
ans on the north. The two peoples were
hardly ever at peace. There was a di-
vergence of language, of tradition, and
of religious ceremonials, but at the same
time such striking analogies in all as to
indicate close affinities of race.
It was the preponderance and pressure
of the stronger Assyrian nationality on
the north that, at the close Race troubles
of the fourteenth century ^SfSt
B. C., finally overpowered em Semites.
the Chaldsean dominion and replaced it
with Semitic influence in the south. By
careful observation we are able to see,
long anterior to this period, the race
troubles between the northern and the
southern people. There are indications
of invasion and oppression on the part
of the Assyrians respecting their south-
ern kinsmen. It is not improbable that
these difficulties were at the bottom of
some of the earliest migrations to the
west. Perhaps Eber, the father of
Abraham, had drifted from beyond the
Tigris into the low-lying country of the
south. His name is said to signify
"from beyond;" that is, from beyond
the rivers. Doubtless he was either an
immigrant into the low country or an
invader. A family so situated, expand-
ing into a patriarchical tribe, would soon
find itself with unpleasant surroundings,
and a cure for local troubles might be
sought and found in a further migration
into the freer west. Hence the Abra-
hamic exodus from Ur of the Chaldees.
Another proof of the race diversity
already existing between the Old Chal-
daeans and the people of As- Differences in
shur is found in the monu- ^^2^
mental remains of the two Syrians,
countries. There is already a clear de-
parture in the typical physiognomy of
the Chaldaeans and the Assyrians. The
former are like the Elamites in personal
characteristics, while the latter are of
the well-known Semitic type, with hints
of Medo-Persian modifications. It is
easy for the ethnographer to see in the
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. NOACHITE DISPERSION. 445
features and person of the ancient Chal-
daean the antitype of the Cushite, the
Old Arabians, the Hamitic Canaanites,
and even the Ethiopians and Egyptians.
It will be readily agreed that the Semitic
peoples became, in the course of time,
predominant throughout Mesopotamia.
It is likely that the Hamitic race, by pres-
sure from the north, became attenuated
even to actual separation around the head
of the Persian gulf, and that the Elamite
dominion on the east preserved the prin-
cipal, if not the only, remnants of that
race beyond the meridian of Chaldsea
and Assyria.
Several facts of some interest come to
light on an examination of the ethnic
names of the three branches of the No-
achite family. The -word
Significance of
the Noachite Shem mean s a " name, or
more properly, - sons of a
name." The sense isj that this division
of the Noachites was an aristocracy
having a name, that is, a lineal descent
from reputable fathers, as distinguished
from the no-name, or base-born, descend-
ants of other stocks. The early Sem-
ites evidently regarded themselves as
peculiarly the representatives of the
Noachite race, and perpetuated the be-
lief in the nameless, that is, the gentile,
character of the cognate families of their
own'descent. The innuendo was direct-
ed against both the Japhethites and the
Hamites, particularly against the de-
scendants of Canaan in the west, whom
the sons of Shem afterwards overcame
and expelled from their territories.
The evidence of this race contention
and feud is plentifully scattered in the
Contention for Hebrew writings. The old
precedence
among Shem, prejudice lies at the bot-
Ham, and Ja- ~ ^ - , .
pheth. torn of the relative priority
of the sons of Noah. As a matter of
fact, the Japhethites were the eldest,
the Hamites second, and the Semites
the youngest division of the Noachite
family. But there was a constant effort,
extending through many centuries, on
the part of the Hebrew scribes and
chroniclers to change this order and to
give to Shem the rank peculiar to the
eldest son. In the biblical ethnography
the order of the three descendants is
always given thus: Shem, Ham, Ja-
pheth. But it will be observed that even
in the tenth chapter of Genesis, while
the first verse preserves this order, giv-
ing priority to Shem, the analysis of
tribes which immediately follows places
Japheth in his true position, and assigns
the place of youngest son to Shem.
Such primitive quarrels as to the senior-
ity of descendants were very common
among the early families of men, and
are of little value to modern scholarship
except as illustrative of a striking and
persistent feature of organization and
belief existing in the earliest ages of
human development.
All the ancient nations strenuously
insisted that they were respectively the
most ancient of all. Pri- strife of the
ority seems to have been
an idea which sufficed to
establish right, and make all things
legitimate in primeval society. "We
were here first, and therefore possess
this region, and are greater than you,"
was the language of every primitive
people to its neighbors. As a result of
this disposition, claims to extravagant
antiquity were advanced by all, and
were attested by long lines of successive
monarchs, in successive dynasties, ex-
tending through fabulous ages. One of
the principal devices to make good such
claims was to extend the lives of their
rulers to hundreds and thousands of
years. The Berosian scheme presented
above of the Noachite dynasty in
Chaldaea down to the epoch of the
'DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. NO AC HI TE DISPERSION. 447
Deluge is a sample of the plan which
the ancients adopted to make good their
claim of primogeniture and prescriptive
right. The Egyptians, not satisfied
with even the fanciful expansion of their
dynasty, were wont to abandon terres-
trial criteria and appeal to the planets for
their antiquity. It was a common boast
among the Egyptian priests that their
people were Proselenoi, that is, pre-
Moonites, older than the moon in their
occupancy and possession of Mizraim.
In the discussion of the Mesopotamian
development of the different branches of
Chronology at the Noachite races, no at-
fault respecting f prnr)< - 1,0,5 hppn made to f:
the Noachite
faces, tablish the chronological
relations of the several ethnic divisions
in the dispersion, or even to date the
general epoch to which they all be-
longed. In fact, chronology is wholly
at fault in considering such primitive
movements of the race. As to the time
when the Noachites may be said to have
been deflected to the west, and to have
begun their separation into different
peoples, nothing can be alleged with
even approximate certainty. The whole
tendency of recent inquiry has been to
extend the time relations of these early
events. It is clearly perceived that the
notions formerly prevalent about the
time required for the peopling of differ-
ent and distant regions of the earth, and
the development therein of distinct na-
tionalities, must be abandoned as totally
inadequate for the ethnic evolutions to
which they refer. It is known that the
first progress of men gathering into tribes
and nations is exceeding slow as com-
pared with subsequent stages of human
development. There is an accelerating
tendency in the progress of mankind,
and this manifest fact emphasizes the
necessity of widening and enlarging the
whole scheme of ancient chronology.
As it respects the Semitic and Hamitic
peoples who created the earliest civil so-
cieties in Elam, Chaldaea, and Assyria, a
few suggestions maybe of- Evidence of
fered as to the time when f^g^S" 7
the same occurred. If we Hamites.
look at the rise of the Hamitic race in
the valley of the Nile we discover the
most emphatic evidence of a very remote
antiquity. It is safe to affirm that almost
as early as four thousand years before
the common era the primitive Egyp-
tians, who themselves seem to have taken
possession of the valley by conquest,
were already a strong and progressive
people. They had civil organizations
and many well-developed institutions of
religion and secular society. They were
magnificent builders in stone, and appear
to have been, from the earliest date
of their debouchure into Northeastern
Africa, in possession of considerable sci-
entific knowledge. These Egyptians
were descendants of the older Hamites
in Asia. They came by migration and
invasion into the country of their sub-
sequent development. For this move-
ment out of Asia much time must be
allowed.
A greatly extended period must have
elapsed between the founding of the first
Hamitic societies in Lower Mesopotamia
and that subsequent time Probable deriva.
when the Hamitic tribes, ^tomcST
making their way westward dea -
through Syria, established themselves in
Egypt. It is true that the formal chro-
nology, so far as it has been recovered
and reconstructed for the Chaldaean as-
cendency, does not by any means reach,
a period so remote as that of Egypt. But
the movement of the race to the west-
ward points unmistakably to the fact
that the Chaldaean ascendency and the
dominion of Elam were long anterior to
the creation of political power in the val-
448
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
ley of the Nile. This indicates for the
primitive peoples of Mesopotamia an an-
tiquity far greater than history, or even
ethnology in its current phases, has been
accustomed to assign or accept.
The country lying between Arme-
nia and the head of the Persian gulf
Effects of enVi- furnishes a good example
of the influence of phys-
ical environment on the
movements and development of the
early races. Mesopotamia constituted a
TOnment on the
migrant Noa-
Chites.
its way, while through the gaps of the
Zagros the Semites would precipitate
themselves into Upper Mesopotamia.
Before the immigrants would spread
an open country, traversed by two great
streams of living water, fertile in natu-
ral products, and inviting to settlement.
The alluvial plain in Lower Mesopotamia
would in a special manner provoke to
permanent residence from the ease with
which multiplying tribes could here sup-
port themselves by the resources of the
PASS IN THE ZAGROS MOUNTAINS. Drawn by D. Lancelot, from a photograph.
natural, perhaps an inevitable, stopping-
place in the westward movement of the
Noachites. Such was the situation as
to make it necessary for them to pause,
and to pause meant the growth of fixed
societies. On the east of this region the
country is defended by the bulwark of
the Zagros and Kebir Kuh mountains.
It is easy to see how the already half-
separated races, drifting from the east,
would be impeded for a time by the in-
terposition of the mountain range. Pres-
ently, however, through the southern
passes, the Hamitic division would make
earth. Adventure would soon carry the
still half-nomadic peoples across the
country to the western borders. Here,
however, there would be a pause. Even
the civilized man hesitates long, and the
compulsion must be extreme ere he
throws himself into the desert. Perhaps
of all the natural landscapes presented
on the surface of the globe the most for-
bidding and repellant is the desert.
West and southwest of Mesopotamia
is a wide stretch of desert country. It
fatigues the eye and scorches the feet.
On the north is the Assyrian desert, and
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. H AMI TIC MIGRATIONS. 449
to the south and west stretches away the
seemingly infinite waste of Arabia. Here
Chaidaeaana are the fundamental con-
^y y of a tL n e e aT; ^ons which made Chal-
peoples. dsea an d Assyria a sort
of necessity in the progress of the early
jace. It is not needed in this connection
to enter elaborately into the geography
of the valleys of the Euphrates and the
Tigris and the adjacent upland coun-
tries. On the north, from the Caspian
to the Black sea, stretch the Armenian
mountains ; on the south, is the sea ; on
the east, the Zagros range, and beyond,
the great plateau of Iran ; on the west,
the boundary line is the long stretch of
the Syrian desert.
At the time of the development of the
early empires in these valleys and for
The Ruddy ages afterwards the two
JSse^sin S rcat rivers still discharged
Mesopotamia, their waters by separate
channels into the Persian gulf. Meso-
potamia reached to the sea, and the
mouths of the rivers were fully a hun-
dred miles south of the present shore
line. Along the banks of these streams,
high up to the foothills out of which
their upper waters are drawn, especially
on the east by a multitude of smaller
streams, the earliest, or at least one of
the earliest, civilizations was developed
in the world. It was the work of the
Ruddy races coming from the east.
Here they planted themselves at the
north and the south, according to their
race descent, and became in course of
time much more strongly marked by
ethnic differences than they were on
their first arrival in the country. It is
from this region that the different races
belonging to the Hamitic and Semitic
families of mankind made their way at
length into the western foreground of
history, where we shall discover them in
a somewhat clearer light than that in
which they have thus far been revealed.
Here, then, is the end of what may be
appropriately called the Noachite dis-
persion of mankind.
XXV. THE HAMIXIC MIQRATIONS.
N the current chapter
the attempt will be
made to trace out
geographically the va-
rious lines by which
the Hamitic race was
distributed, first into
Southwestern Asia, and thence through
a large part of Northern Africa, to the
borders of the Western ocean. The
Hamitic races lie inquiry will begin with the
movements of the Hamitic
division of mankind, not
from any preference for that race as a
dominant people of antiquity, not be-
cause their civilization reached a higher
nearest the
Blacks in race
distribution.
stage than that of the cognate races, but
rather for geographical reasons. The
Hamites were distributed to the south
and west, and are thus the southernmost
branch of the Ruddy races. It will,
therefore, be convenient to begin on that
side of the ethnic distribution which lies
nearest to the lines marking the disper-
sion of the Black races, and thence to
pursue the inquiry northward until the
Hamitic movements have been ex-
hausted. In the next place, the various
branches of the Semitic family may be
taken up and considered in like order,
leaving the Aryan, or Indo-European,
divisions of mankind, most important of
450
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
all, historically considered, for the con-
cluding chapters on distribution.
The historical circumstances which
gave rise to the first departure of the
Historical rea- Hamitic emigrants from
sons for the mi- L ower Mesopotamia for the
grations of the
Hamites. southwest are not known.
It is not unlikely, however, that the
pressure of the stronger Assyrians on
the north, who by repeated invasions
and conquests reduced the old Chaldeean
empire to a condition first of dependency
and then of actual subversion, may have
been the occasion, if not the real cause,
of the first migratory movements of the
Hamites in the direction of Arabia. It
is not known whether this primitive
impulse was coincident with the Chal-
daean ascendency in Lower Mesopotamia
or subsequent thereto, but the former
supposition is more in accord with right
reason and with such other facts as bear
upon the question. At any rate, the first
dispersive migration of the Hamitic family
was from the primitive seat of the Chal-
dasans toward the south and into the
maritime parts of Arabia.
It is likely that the first progressive
people in the Arabian peninsula were
Primitive Ara- the descendants of the mi-
bian population g ratory movement here de-
of Hamitic de-
scent, scribed, and that they be-
longed to the maritime parts adjacent
to the Persian gulf. The primitive
Arabians of the eastern parts next to the
sea were of Semito-Hamitic origin, and
that they antedated the Central and West-
ern Arabians may be safely inferred from
the ethnic movements then prevailing in
the world, and also from an old prefer-
ence of the early races for the seashore
and the regions adjacent. A glance at
the geography of the peninsula will
show a range of mountains between the
modern Arab state of Hasa and the great
desert. It was through the strip of
territory lying between these mountains
and the Persian gulf that the earliest
tribes of the Hamitic family made their
way to the southwest. In the lower part
of the peninsula the migration divided,
throwing off one branch into the modern
province of Oman, while the major di-
vision was deflected somewhat in conform-
ity with the coast line to the southwest,
toward the modern state of Yemen, adja-
cent to the strait of Bab-el-Mandeb. Such
in general was the direction of the oldest
ethnic line in the Arabian peninsula, and
it was from this primitive migration
that the Old Arabs, as contradistinguished
from the more recent Ishmaelites, were
derived. The former were, in general
terms, a maritime people, and to the
present day the distinctions between their
descendants and the Arabians of the re-
gions bordering on the Red sea are suffi-
ciently marked.
Throughout the whole of Southern
Arabia, especially toward the south-
western termination of the Himyaritic writ-
peninsula, are found lin- ^gs^ow traces
of Hamitic pro-
guistic traces of this ancient duction.
people. A class of primitive writings,
called HimyaritU Inscriptions, testify un-
mistakably of the presence of a peculiar
people in the regions where they are
found. These writings, generally en-
graved on stone, have been one of the
most interesting and puzzling studies pre-
sented to modern students of language,
and there has been great diversity of
views in regard to classifying the origi-
nal speech to which these writings belong.
Many most eminent linguists have re-
garded them as of a Semitic origin. An-
other plausible view is that of Renan,
who holds that the inscriptions in ques-
tion differ too widely from Arabic and
cognate varieties of Semitic speech to be
classified therewith.
These facts open a question of much
452
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Affinities and
connection of
importance respecting " the affinities of
the Hamitic and Semitic languages. It
appears that the linguistic separation of
these two races was never
so complete as the division
guages. of either of them from the
Aryan families of the north. It is likely
that in manners, institutions, language,
and laws the primitive Hamitic tribes
held together with their Semitic kins-
men until common linguistic forms had
been in a considerable measure fixed in
each, from which circumstance consider-
able similarity would appear in the sub-
sequent development of the respective
languages. On the whole, it is safer to
classify the Himyaritic inscriptions with
the other Semitic dialects, and to admit
the influence of the Hamitic Arabs in
giving particular features to the writings
of Southern Arabia.
Wherever the inscriptions in question
maybe placed in linguistic classification,
it is certain that their origin is extremely
Wide distribu- ancient, and that they were
yaritic f ins e c5p m - deduced geographically
tions< from Lower Mesopotamia.
The line of these writings has been
traced from about the junction of the
Euphrates and the Tigris all the way
around through Southeastern and South-
ern Arabia to Yemen, and even across
into Africa. The explorer Loftus found
a sandstone slab covered with Himyaritic
inscriptions in one of the mounds of
Warka, in ancient Chaldaea. Two speci-
mens of gems covered with like charac-
ters are preserved in the British Museum.
Coghlan and Playfair made similar dis-
coveries at Amran, near Sana. In short,
the identity of the writings along the
line of the extreme southern dispersion
of the Hamites is clearly established.
The Himyarites, as a people, occupied
the southwestern extremity of the Ara-
bian peninsula. They are nearly iden-
tified geographically with the inhabit-
ants of the modern Yemen, though
the Himyarites were fur- Geographical
ther south and more mar- *?.
itime than the modern rites -
Arabic state. It will thus be seen that
the Hamitic branch of mankind which
we have been tracing was brought,
in its southwestern migration, to the
southern neck of the Red sea. It was
not likely that so narrow a strait of water
would prevent the further dispersion of
the ancient stock. The opposite African
shore is embraced in the small maritime
districts called Samara. More generally,
it is Abyssinia to the north and Somali-
land to the south.
The fact has long been recognized that
there was an ancient race identity be-
tween the peoples inhabit- Race kinship of
ing the countries on the ^l^ 3
two sides of the strait of Africans.
Bab-el-Mandeb. The belief that the
Old Abyssinians were of Semitic deri-
vation, and the knowledge that they
were of the same race with the people
of the Himyaritic district in Arabia,
has led to the conclusion that the lat-
ter were Semites, and this belief has
been perpetuated by the discovery of
strong Semitic traces in the Himyaritic
writings. The Abyssinians and other
ancient Ruddy races of this region of
Africa were clearly in some sort of race
affinity with the Egyptians, the Canaan-
ites, and the Old Arabians, as well as
with the Semites proper. The whole
question clears up on the hypothesis that
this most southerly division of the Noa-
chite descendants was Semito-Hamitic,
and that the Semites proper were dis-
persed toward the south about to the cen-
ter of the Arabian peninsula. It is true
that some ethnographers have carried the
Ishmaelite migration southward along
the eastern shores of the Red sea to the
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. HA MI TIC MIGRATIONS. 453
strait, and thence into Africa, which
would bring the Semitic tribes into the
same country with the cognate Hamites,
but it may be doubted whether the true
line of Ishmael was ever carried so far
in that direction.
If we attempt to trace the Hamitic dis-
persion beyond the crossing into Africa,
Distribution of we shall find the migration
toTiXS 00 * pursuing the same general
Africa. course to the southwest
which it had taken while in Southern
Arabia. It appears that the peoples of
this stock were thinly distributed from the
bearing divisions of the Black races. The
ancestors of the Hottentots and the Ne-
groes made their way from the east
through this same region of Gallaland,
and their migratory intersection with the
south-bearing progress of -the Hamitic
family must have constituted one of the
earliest, if not, indeed, the very first,
contact of the Ruddy with the Black
races of antiquity.
Meanwhile Syria, almost directly
west from Chaldasa, had also been pre-
occupied by Hamitic tribes. While the
movement into the maritime parts of
DESERT COUNTRY OF THE SYRIAN BORDERS.-THE PLAIN OF TORTOSE. Drawn by A. de Bar, from a photograph by
Lockroy.
strait of Bab-el-Mandeb, in the general
direction of the Victoria Nyanza, and
that the westward progress of the Ham-
itic race was finally checked in this re-
gion. The Somalian peoples of the
extreme eastern portion of Africa were
doubtless derived from a deflected branch
of this Semito-Hamitic migration; and,
in general, the Noachite races of Galla-
land had the same origin.
One peculiar feature of this African
distribution of the Ruddy
Crossing of the
ethnic lines in peoples from Arabia wasthe
fact that the lines of their
progress to the southwest into the con-
tinent must- have crossed the westward-
Arabia had been going on, another di-
vision of the Hamitic stock had made its
way out of Mesopotamia to syriaispre-
the west. It appears that g^SiSii.
this migration divided in grants,
the desert country on the Syrian borders,
one branch being deflected into Western
Arabia, and the other pursuing its direct
course toward the sea at Suez. If we
take up the first division, we shall find
the line of its dispersion drawn through
Southeastern Syria and thence in the
direction of Medina and Mecca. There
can be no doubt about the race descent
of the original peoples of this region.
They were prior to the first Semitic mi-
454
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
grations or invasions of the west ; and
the aboriginal substratum of the more
recent Ishmaelites and Joktanians was
undoubtedly of Hamitic origin.
It was the peculiarity of the westward
course of the Hamites from Central
Divisions and re- Mesopotamia that they di-
$%. vided north and south in
gration. their progress. At first,
the volume of national life which flowed
off toward Syria contained the potency
of the Western Arabs, the Canaanites,
and the Egyptians. The Canaanitish
deflection from the main migratory line
was northward, and occurred in the re-
gion of Central Syria. The northward-
bearing branch from this point entered
Canaan Proper and Phoenicia ; and here
began the development of one of the
most prominent divisions of the Hamitic
family.
Traditional Canaan takes its name
from the son of Ham. In the chronicles
Ham founds Ca- of the Hebrew race this
d?s a pi? g e e b theTr S division of the Hamites is
kinsmen. most prominent. They
were greatly disparaged by the early an-
nalists of the Hebrew race, and through all
subsequent ages were despised and con-
temned by them as gentiles and servants
of servants. It was against these de-
scendants of Canaan in their tribes and
generations that the wrath of invading
Israel was turned, after the Egyptian
exodus.
The progress of the Hamitic migra-
tions to the northwest, around the east-
ern extremity of the Med-
Extent of Ham- . .
itic migrations iterranean, introduces the
into Asia Minor. ,. ,.,
inquirer to one of the most
difficult passages in the ethnic distribu-
tion of mankind. The problem is the ex-
tent of the migration in the direction of
Asia Minor. Ethnographers are not
agreed as to how far the Hamitic move-
ment in this direction continued. One
class of writers are of the opinion that
the traces of this branch of the human
family extend no further than the south-
ern regions of Asia Minor, or, at most,
the eastern borders of the ^Egean sea.
Some are of opinion that the line wa
deflected into the island of Cyprus,
and there terminated so far as its west-
ward progress was concerned. Still an-
other class of inquirers hold that the
Hamitic progress extended westward
through the ^gean archipelago and into
Southern Greece. This view of the case
makes the Pelasgians, to whom consid-
erable space was devoted in a chapter of
the preceding book, to be the descend-
ants of the Hamitic stock. It will be
remembered that the view of a northern,
that is, a Thessalian, origin for the Pe-
lasgic race was advanced in the former
account of that people. This view of
the case is not fully established. Nor
can it well be said that the opposite
opinion, namely, that the Pelasgians
came from the archipelago into Argolis,
and thence continued their progress to
the West, is more than tentative.
Winchell, in his Chart of the Pro-
gressive Dispersion of Mankind^ holds to
the view that the Hamitic migration was
carried through the south- Wincheii's
e . news regarding
ern parts of Asia Minor, the European
T ... ., ,-. ~ 1 j dispersion of the
and thence by the Cyclades
into Peloponnesus. From Southern
Hellas this distinguished ethnographer
extends the Hamitic line first into
Northwestern Greece, where, in Epirus,
as we have seen, one of the principal
Pelasgic developments occurred. But
the main line is carried across the
Southern Adriatic into Italy, whence
one branch is turned to the left, to fur-
nish an aboriginal stock for the island
of Sicily, while the other line bifurcates
on the two sides of the Apennines, giving
in Central Italy an origin for the prob-
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. HAMITIC MIGRATIONS. 455
lematical Etruscans and their primitive
development. It may be possible, even
probable, that this scheme furnishes the
best solution as to the race-origin of the
first peoples of the Ruddy race in South-
ern Greece and Central Italy. If so, we
may regard the valley of the Po, the in-
land region of Etruria, and the remote
parts of Sicily as the westernmost limits
Egypt. But a better view of the whole
subject shows that if any such race
movement occurred it was of a later, and
perhaps a Semitic, origin, from Arabia
into North Central Africa.
The original occupancy, then, of the
Nile valley by the Ruddy races was
certainly by the incoming of the Ham-
ites, first into the eastern delta, and
ROUTE OF THE HAMITE MIGRATION, NEAR SUEZ. LAKE TIMSAH. Drawn by Dom Grenet.
of the European excursion of the Ham-
itic race.
We now turn to the central progress
of the same race to the west. From
Syria, the Hamitic movement continued
directly through the isthmus of Suez
into the valley of the Nile.
The race enters J
and occupies the It has been believed by
some historians that the
invasion by which the aboriginal Egyp-
tians were expelled from their country
was carried, in part at least, across the
Red sea into Central, or even Upper
thence southward along both banks of
the river to Upper Egypt. The progress
of Hamitic civilization from the vicinity
of Memphis and Cairo southward to its
extreme limit at Elephantis has been
traced by ethnographers and historians
until its course and character are no
longer doubtful. The oldest occupation
was in that part of the delta lying next
to the isthmus, and from hence the prog-
ress of the race was constant until the
whole valley was populated by tribes of
a common descent.
456
GREAT RACES OF MANKIXD.
The account of the original dispersion
of mankind may well pause at this point,
that the attention of the reader may be
Extreme antiq- once more called to the ex-
mo?el e its n here trcme antiquity of the move-
described. ments here described. It is
worthy of special note that the civiliza-
tion of Egypt tended, in virtue of its
own character, to transmit better evi-
dences of time-relations and the succes-
sion of events than that of any other
country. One of the fundamental ideas
of the civilization created in the Nile
valley was architectural grandeur, and
closely connected with this was the no-
tion of perpetuating the records of hu-
man life by means of colossal tombs and
imperishable inscriptions. Fortunate-
ly the granite quarries of the country,
especially in Central Egypt, gave oppor-
tunity to gratify this disposition, if
indeed the presence of such materials
did not first provoke the habit. The
peculiar priestly organization of the
race, in close union as it was with the
secular dynasty, also tended to the crea-
tion and preservation of records.
From these circumstances the great
antiquity of Egypt became a marvel to
the earliest historians and
Old travelers
marvel at the travelers of other races.
age of Egypt. NQ d()ubt the . Egyptian
scribes profited by the credulity of the
age in which they flourished, and en-
larged as much as possible the ancient
records which they possessed. When
Herodotus came into the country, about
the middle of the fifth century B. C., he
was shown the records of the old dy-
nasties, from the founding of the first by
Menes down to the reign of Seti. From
this scheme he made up his estimate of
the antiquity of the nation, producing as
a result something over 12000 B. C.
as the epoch of Menes. Four centuries
afterwards, when Diodorus traveled
in Egypt, he also studied the records
of the country, and made out the found-
ing of the first dynasty to have been
more than twelve thousand years before
the common era. According to Manetho,
a native historian, the span between
Menes and our era is reduced about one
half, the accession of the first dynasty
being fixed at about 5706 B. C.
The mediaeval historians did nothing
with the question, but in recent times
many learned inquirers have taken up
the subject, and the result Modem inquiry
has been the almost concur- SS
rent agreement of modern Menes.
scholars that the epoch of Menes, founder
of the oldest dynasty, goes back to the
year 3892 B. C. This date is now ac-
cepted as approximately correct. Indeed,
it appears to be rather within than be-
yond the true limits. Meanwhile a fact
in astronomy has thrown perhaps the
strongest light on the true era of the
founding of Egyptian nationality. By
the rate of the great movement called
the precession of the equinoxes, it is
now known that the equator of the
heavens accomplished on the ecliptic a
complete circuit in about twenty-five
thousand years. It is also known that a
certain star, which was. polar at the time
of the building of the oldest pyramids in
Lower Egypt, has been, at the present
time, turned by torsion just about one
fourth of the way around the circuit of
the heavens. This would imply the
lapse of a little over six thousand years
since the construction of the first pyra-
mids ; and the date indicated would be
somewhat more than four thousand
years before the common era.
It is safe to fix upon this date as a fair
approximation for the time of the in-
coming of the tribes and the beginning
of the great architectural era of the
Hamitic race in Egypt. And it will be
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. HA MI TIC MIGRATIONS. 457
remembered that the ethnic movements
which have furnished the subject-matter
of the preceding paragraphs belonged to
a still earlier period in the history of the
race ; all of which facts tend most
strongly to emphasize the necessity of a
great extension and widening out of the
whole scheme of ancient chronology.
It is difficult for. one removed to mod-
ern times and distant countries to realize
the nature and method
True nature of .
primitive tribal of the ethnic migrations of
antiquity. It is not pur-
posed in this connection to attempt to
hard to obtain. But ever and anon this
rapid volume of the moving race, most
rapid in the vanguard, w r ould flow into
a region which, from its geographical
situation and its fertility, would invite to
settlement. Here there would be a
pause. The tribe would spread over the
surface of the country like a lake of
water running into an inclosed lowland.
For a long time the incoming tribes
would pour along and discharge their
volume into the reservoir. If the situa-
tion were sufficiently auspicious, there
would be, in a short time, the begin-
A
VERTICAL SECTION OF THE GREAT PYRAMID FROM SOUTH TO NORTH.
A, debris ; B, vault ; C, passage of entry ; D, abutments ; E, chamber of the queen ; F, chamber of the king ; G, ancient entrance ; H,
primitive facing of granite ; I, K, ventilators.
depict the actual manner of tribal
removal from place to place to final
settlement. One great feature, how-
ever, of the migratory progress of ancient
peoples was the alternate speed and
cessation of the movement. Sometimes
the migrating horde would pour along
like a swift stream, traversing in a short
time vast stretches of country. Such
was the rate of progress in desert regions
and in mountainous districts where the
means of subsistence were scattered and
M. Vol. i 30
nings of a national development. The
more conservative elements of the tribes
would establish themselves j n what manner
on the soil. Hunting would
give place to the pastoral
pursuit, and the pastoral pursuit to agri-
culture. Permanence would assert it-
self, and vacillation cease. Institutions
would soon be planted. Architecture
and the other practical arts would arise,
and society would emerge from the tribal
chaos which had preceded it.
458
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND,
Into such situations, however, a rest-
less element is always poured, along
with the calmer varieties of humanity.
The radical eie- This radicalism would first
*way Smthe flow to the furthest-gen-
conservative. erally the western limit
of the locality. Ere long, dissatisfied
with the situation and longing for the
old tribal freedom, these elements would
burst away from the restraints of the
civilizing communities and resume the
migratory habits of antiquity. They
would draw after them all adventurers,
all the unprosperous parts of the half-
formed societies behind them. They
would strike out into new regions, driven
by an impulse which they had no dis-
position to understand or check.
We may conceive that ancient Egypt
furnished one of the most striking ex-
amples of this debouchure
Egypt a striking r
example of the of tribal waters. Here
ethnic sack. , 1 . -, ., j
they were gathered, and
here, out of the fecund soil, the ele-
ments of primitive life drew at first the
means of subsistence and afterwards of
development. How long the general
progress of the Hamitic race to the west
was checked and hindered by the out-
spread of the incoming volume in the
valley of the Nile, it were, perhaps, vain
to conjecture. For many centuries, no
doubt, the outline was sufficient, and
the auspicious character of the valley for
succeeding ages appeased and satisfied
the cupidity and restlessness of the im-
migrants.
In course of time, however, the more
nomadic elements of Egyptian life
Migration at climbed the western slope
length resumed r f -L v ~11~ v ~ n A f n11Tl /1
through North- vauey, anc
em Africa. the sand waste of Africa
before them. Migration was resumed,
and the first line of the new movement
was stretched along the Mediterranean
in the direction of Barca. It may be
safely affirmed that the first tribes which
were dropped into permanence in the
country west of Lower Egypt were the
ancient Marmaricans. It is well known
that in after times Cyrenaica was col-
onized by the Greeks, but the primitive
people whom they expelled from the
coast and forced back into the interior
were the descendants of the ancient
Hamitic exodus from Egypt.
The main line of migration continued
to the west, branching into the interior
south of the modern Greek Branchings and
colony, and also turning Sa
into the peninsula toward itic dispersion.
Ptolemai's. When we consider the ge-
ography of Northern Africa we shall
find the country well adapted to the
maintenance and perpetuation of such a
movement. Throughout the whole ex-
tent of the region, from Egypt to the At-
lantic, a mountain range of greater or
less elevation defines the coast region
from the desert to the south. Toward
the eastern terminus this range is of
slight elevation, being in the plain of
Barca no more than a thousand feet in
height. Toward the western extreme
the peaks of the Atlas rise to a much
greater elevation, reaching the line of
perpetual snow. Throughout the whole
extent the range approximates the sea,
and the country between the mountains
and the Mediterranean slopes down rap-
idly to the level of the ocean. It was
through this region that the African
Hamites made their way to the west,
through Barca and Tripoli, into the an-
cient state of Africa Proper, and thence
into Mauritania, and finally to the ex-
treme west.
This region, thus peopled in the pre-
historic ages, became one of the most
important of the subsequent historical
countries. The ancient states along the
southern shores of the Mediterranean
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. HAMITIC MIGRATIONS. 459
never attained with the exception of
Egypt the power and importance of
Rank and char- those situated on the north-
acter of North coasts, but they reached
African states >
and peoples. a considerable degree of
development, and were able to compete
with the Mediterranean peninsular pow-
ers for the mastery of the west. Funda-
stream flowed still further to the south.
It may also be noted that the seafaring
Semitic Phoenicians who passed west-
ward through the Southern Mediterra-
nean skirted the coast of Africa, and
touched the islands rather than estab-
lished colonies or built states on the
mainland.
TUNISIAN COAST. GULF OF HAMMAMET. Drawn by Eugene Girardet, after a sketch of Saladin.
mentally, the people of the North Afri-
can provinces were Hamitic in their
origin. It is true, a's we shall see here-
after, that parallel streams of a different
race descent were at a subsequent time
led westward through the same region.
But the Brown race division of mankind
carried its migration toward the Atlantic
on the southern slope of the North
African mountains, while the Semitic
The main stream of Hamitic migration
may be said to have reached its terminus
with the Atlantic, or at TheHamites
least with the islands west SjgJmia
of Morocco. It is believed the sea.
that the original tribes inhabiting the
Canary islands were the westernmost dis-
persion of the human race, so far as the
Hamitic migration from the east was
concerned. As a rule, the Hamites no-
460
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
where took to the sea. They were a
land people, and while preferring the
coast regions of the ancient world, they
avoided the open ocean and formed very
few insular settlements. They had far
less dread of the perils of the desert than
of those peculiar to the deep. An exam-
ination of the movement of the race west-
ward through Northern Africa will show
a much greater number of tribal de-
partures toward the south than toward
the north. The inviting character of the
Mediterranean islands seems to have
appealed less strongly to the people of
this descent than did even the desert
wastes of Sahara.
It is possible that the Hamitic move-
ment, considered as a whole, was some-
what determined by latitude and tem-
perature. The race appears
Hamitic prefer- r
cncesforthe to have had a preference
nd ' for the southern climates.
If we consider the central line of migra-
tion from the original seat of the race
to its extreme western limit in the
Canaries, we shall find only one or two
considerable developments toward the
north. The whole expansion of the
Hamites was in the direction of the
equatorial regions. If we allow the
Pelasgians and the Etruscans to have
been of this descent, we shall find this
single stream to have attained a north-
ern limit of a little more than forty-five
degrees, in the valley of the Po. Other-
wise, the northernmost deflections were
scarcely above thirty-five degrees north.
The main line of westward population
was about the parallel of thirty degrees,
and from this line nearly all the depar-
tures, both in Asia and Africa, were to
the south and southwest. From the
main course, the various tribal migra-
tions into the regions of the equator and
their ramifications filled a considerable
portion of the old countries from the
Persian gulf to the Atlantic south of the
thirtieth parallel and north of the equa-
tor. None of the Hamites crossed the
equatorial line southward in their origi-
nal dispersion, the nearest approach
thereto being made by the Galla tribes
of Eastern Africa.
Among these various lines of southern
deflection, the two principal were, first,
the great Cushite departure The Berber
into Southeastern Arabia %?*+
and Eastern Africa; and movements,
secondly, the West African division*
which left the parent stem on the bor-
ders of the Libyan desert, in the modern
state of Algeria. From this point the
secondary current turned to the south-
west into the Moorish states and again
divided in the Sahara, one stream con-
tinuing the original course and the
other bending back toward the east,
forming a loop whose southern line
reached nearly to the parallel of twenty
degrees north. It was thus that the
aboriginal population of the Moorish
and Berber states was supplied. Here
sprang the desert people of the African
waste, and from this source have been
derived at least a majority of all the
Berber, Tuareg, and Imoshag nations.
In following the course of the Ham-
itic progress toward the Atlantic, the
ethnographer meets some
Ethnic place of
peculiar difficulties. The the Carthagin-
. ., . . ,* .. f ,-, ians considered.
ethnic classification of the
Carthaginians has been the source of
much perplexity ; and there are even yet
unsolved elements in the problem. By
language and many of their institutions
the ancient Carthaginians seem to have
been closely allied with the Semitic
races of the Orient. Tradition has dis-
tinctly and emphatically assigned to
them a Phoenician origin. Many ripe
scholars have not hesitated to classify
them as Semitic.
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. HAMITIC MIGRATIONS. 461.
In the first place, it must be remem-
bered that the institutions and languages
Institutional o f the Hamitic race were
and linguistic
intimacy of by no means clearly sepa-
Hati e e S s r nd rated from those of the
Semites. Linguistically and institution-
ally, as well as ethnically, these two
branches of the human family appear to
have hung together until the forms and
characteristics of each had to a consider-
able degree become fixed by develop-
ment. The selvages, so to speak, of
the various Hamitic and Semitic migra-
tions lay together and overlapped each
other in a measure that could not be ex-
pected in the case of the Aryan nations.
For these reasons, identities and analo-
gies of language and of institutional
forms of both public and private life are
abundant between the earliest Hamitic
and Semitic nations. The Phoenicians
were doubtless in the first place Hamitic
in their origin. With the Semitic con-
quest of Canaan, that race became domi-
nant to the sea. To what extent they
were modified in their Phoenician de-
velopment by Hamitic Canaanites it were
impossible to tell, but doubtless the
more recent Phoenician character was in
its ethnic origin the product of both
elements.
Moreover, in this region, the common
forms of the two races were especially
Semitic influ- abundant. So if we con-
ence prevails mVlpr the Ph rpn i pi a n q in thp
over the Hamit- '
ic at Carthage. ac t o f colonization in the
west, as at Carthage, we shall find them
planting on that shore a mixed race in
which the oldest blood was Hamitic, and
the more recent Semitic, in its deriva-
tion. Again, the later commercial
relations of the Phoenicians brought
many of their merchants and not a few
Eastern institutions into the mart of
Carthage. If, then, we look at the Car-
thaginian state, particularly at the city,
in the time of its ascendency, we shall
find a people marked in all of their civic
and private life with the unmistakable-
traces of Shem. But it need not be
HAMITIC TYPE OF THE UPPER NIGER BAMBARRA.
Drawn by Riou, after a sketch of Valliere.
forgotten, at the same time, that the
westward progress of the Hamites along
this coast must, almost of necessity,
have furnished the aboriginal element
and germs of all the states primarily
462
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
of Hamitic dis-
tribution in the
west.
created between Egypt and the Pillars
of Hercules.
' Continuing the course of Hamitic
migration in the west of Africa, we find
the main line of progress passing 1 to the
south from the Moorish states across the
Extreme limits twentieth parallel and into
the more habitable coun-
tries of the Upper Niger.
Here there was another bifurcation, the
western branch reaching- out to the coast
and furnishing- the original elements of
the Fulah tribes of Western Guinea.
This was the second extreme limit in
westward extent of the Hamitic migra-
tions, being- almost as far in that direc-
tion as the Canary islands. The other
branch of the race appears to have turned
eastward in the lake region of the
Upper Niger, and to have thence de-
scended the valley of that river into the
Sudan and as far east as the country
drained by the streams which flow into
lake Chad. It is likely that the Baghirmi
nations, lying southeast of the lake just
named, mark the remotest point to
which the original impulse carried the
race of Ham into Central Africa.
The whole course of the migration,
considered from the standpoint of Lower
Egypt, resembles a fishhook bending
southward around the larg-
er part of the desert region
of the African continent
and presenting an interior and an ex-
terior line, the latter of which reaches
back toward the country of the original
exodus, about one half way from the
western coast of the continent to the
Red sea. The final distribution of tribes,
by means of this great migration in the
prehistoric ages, was in a region of Africa
into which the Black races, coming from
the east, had already been poured, and
with which the Hamitic peoples have in
all subsequent ages been intermingled,
Nature of the
dispersion in
African interior.
until it were difficult, if not impossible,
in modern times to discriminate the
diverse race elements in the peoples
of this region.
This, then, concludes the summary of
Hamitic migrations in Southwestern
Arabia and Northern Africa. No doubt
all such movements are Ethnic move-
more clearly drawn, more ;
definitely indicated, in dis- icaL
cussions of the kind here presented than
they were in fact. In the physical
world nature abhors a line, and the
same may be affirmed with emphasis of
the movements and phenomena of the
world of life. Of a certainty, tribes
migrate from place to place. They flow
here and there into favorable localities,
and there possibly develop into nations.
But the movement is not so exact and log-
ical as it appears to be when viewed
through the medium of description.
There is, on the contrary, much that is
desultory and irregular in the course of
migration from one country to another.
Much allowance must be made for de-
lays and deflections, and still more for
the intermingling of one tribe with an-
other on the way. The incoming peo-
ple frequently disperse themselves
among the original inhabitants, and are
mixed with them in the race develop-
ment of the future.
In some cases the migration is more
exact and definite, and in such instances
the facts correspond more General sum-
nearly to the concept of the Stfcmfgra-
movement as it is trans- tions -
mitted by description. In the case of
the Hamitic dispersion over the coun-
tries to which we have referred in the
current chapter, it must be constantly
remembered that these people were not
so different typically from their Semitic
kinsmen as the latter were from the
Indo-European races. From this source
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. SEMITIC MIGRATIONS. 463
also much confusion has necessarily
arisen in the attempted classification of
these people by their ethnic affinities.
But it is believed that, on the whole, the
Hamitic race took in prehistoric times
the general lines of distribution which
are here indicated ; that it was distribu-
ted first into Southeastern and Southern
Arabia, then into the western portions
of the same peninsula, and then into
Canaan. From this position the lines
of migration part around the Mediter-
ranean north and south, the lower de-
parture being into Egypt, and after-
wards into Northern Africa. In the
course of ages the movement continued
to the west, along the southern shores of
the Mediterranean, to the Atlantic, and
was thence deflected to the south into
the equatorial regions, and finally turned
back into the desert wastes covering the
central and north-central parts of the
continent.
It is not intended in this connec-
tion to trace further the historical de-
velopment of the various peoples who
sprang up on the line of these migra-
tions. That part of the work will be at-
tempted in another book. For the
present, we turn from this cursory out-
line of the Hamitic distribution of man-
kind to consider another of the great
primitive races in its similar dispersion,
first through a great part of the Orient,
and afterwards into different parts of the
Western continents.
XXVI. MIGRATIONS OK THE SEMITES.
OUGHLY considered,
the great monarchies
in the valleys of the
Euphrates and the Ti-
gris were planted and
developed by people
of the Semitic race.
It was in Mesopotamia that the first
striking evolution of this branch of man-
kind was manifested. This is said of
civil and political expansion, and of the
establishment of social and linguistic
forms. It is here that ancient history
Mesopotamia finds its first great buttress
ESS* a S ainst the unknown. If
Semites. we i oo ^ a t the upper part
of the valley, below the Armenian
mountains on the north and the range of
the Zagros on the east, we find a region
in which Semitic elements followed their
natural course of evolution and were un-
adulterated by foreign nations. In the
south of Mesopotamia, as we have seen,
there was a mixture with the Hamitic
stock. But in the later Babylonian as-
pect of these nations the influence of the
Hamites had waned to such an extent
as to leave the Semitic races dominant
throughout the whole region drained by
the great rivers.
We have already noticed the fact of
the prevalence of this division of the
race in the Tigrine and Euphratine val-
leys. It remains in the present chapter
to take up the course of Semitic life and
follow it on its migration Central position
into western lands. For a ?' ***
long time after their de- movement,
parture from the Mesopotamian regions
the different branches of the traditional
Noachite descent were held well together
by the geographical environment. On
the whole, the Semitic stock was cen-
tral in its movement to the west. The
Syrian desert was entered from about
the middle of the valley of the Euphrates,
464
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
and was traversed by the migrating fam-
ily directly into Canaan:
It is here, moreover, that the eth-
nographer, in his attempted delineation
of the prehistoric move-
Tradition of the . r . .
outgoing of the ments of mankind, is rei'n-
Abrahamites. forced by tradit i O n. One of
the oldest and most authentic of these is
the story of the migration of Abraham
el-Hie. The place is called Mugheir,
meaning ' ' supplied with bitumen. " The
outline of a most ancient
. .-,,1. 1 Place and char-
temple IS Still discoverable acter of Ur of
, 1_ 1 j , -i the Chaldees.
in the place ; and the plan
of the foundations, and indeed of the
whole structure, has been made out by
Rawlinson and other Oriental scholars.
It was from this vicinity that the Abra-
RUINS AND PLAIN OF MUGHEIR.-Drawn by W. H. Boot.
from Ur of the Chaldees into Canaan.
This, viewed from the Semitic stand-
point, is one of the most famous move-
ments of the early world. The tradition
of it exists among all the cognate races
of the Hebrews, and with themselves it
is the virtual founding of their race.
The position of Ur in Mesopotamia is
well known. It is identical, in site at
least, with the extensive ruins about six
miles to the west of the Euphrates and
nearly opposite its junction with the Shat-
hamic tribe took its way, first ascending
the valley of the Euphrates for a consid-
erable distance, and thence traversing
the country into Canaan.
All, or nearly all, the names that have
been preserved to us of this period are
significant of tribal move- special signifi-
ments. Eber, the ancestor
from whom the name of
Hebrew is taken, means "from be-
yond," that is, he was an emigrant
from beyond the Euphrates, perhaps the
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. SEMITIC MIGRATIONS. 465
Tigris. The name of his elder son, Pe-
leg, signifies "division," "because in
his time the earth was divided." The
name of Salah, the father of Eber, sig-
nifies "departure," and evidently refers
to a title which that patriarch received
in departing, or setting out, with his
tribe for a new home. Everything per-
tains to migration. If the meaning of
the name Arphaxad has not been ascer-
tained, the position of his tribe at least is
known. Arphaxad is a mountain district
of Southern Armenia, between lakes
finally of his really serious battle with
Chedorlaomer, or according to the As-
syrian spelling, Kudur-Lagamer, is suffi-
ciently striking and impressive. Kudur-
Lagamer was king of Elam, or rather
the Elamite king of Chaldaea, and had
followed the Abrahamic tribe out of the
East, with the hope of falling upon it and
gathering great spoil. There is little
doubt that this Elamite dynasty in Chal-
daea was of Hamitic origin ; and the de-
parting Abraham was thus the object of
race antipathy, as well as the possessor of
LAND OP THE ARPHAXAD. VIEW OP KOPANS KALE. Drawn by T. Deyrolle, from nature.
Van and Urumiah ; and there is no doubt
that the primitive clan of this ancient
Semite had its original locus at this place.
Nahor, the son of Serug, means "the
river," that is, the Euphrates and so of
scores of other proper names referring
to Mesopotamian localities or to family
or tribal movements in that region.
The pastoral picture which is drawn
Contact of the in Genesis of Abraham on
SSSSZ. his wa y to the Promised
of Canaan. Land, and of the troubles
which beset him on his journey, of his
contention with his kinsman Lot, and
flocks and herds. According to the He-
brew account of this migration, which
was the origin of Israelitish greatness in
Palestine, there was a division of the
family which appears to have been on
the borders of Canaan, about the time
of the invasion. Ishmael, the oldest
son of the patriarch, had married an
"Egyptian bondwoman and had become
the head of a tribe. The troubles
arising out of this heathen alliance
led to a separation of the families, and
Ishmael was carried off into the south,
into Arabia.*
466
GREAT RACES OF MANKIXD.
plantings of
Joktan in
Arabia.
Several generations before this time,
however, another branch of the Eberites
Outgoing and had already made a de-
parture into Arabia. This
movement was made by
laktan, or Joktan, his elder brother
being that Peleg who was the ancestor
of the Abrahamites. Joktan was thus
five generations before the patriarch of
Israel. A large list of twelve sons and
a daughter are assigned to Joktan as the
heads of the tribes which he led off into
Northern and Western Arabia.
The movement was at a very early
date. Joktan was the great grandson of
Arphaxad, and the latter, as is well
known, belonged to the extreme north
of Mesopotamia, in the mountainous re-
gion of Armenia. So the Joktanites
must have been strongly in the migra-
tory spirit. Eber, the father, had come
* ' from beyond. " Salah, the grandfather,
was the "departer." It is thus evident
that the whole race of Arphaxad was in
process of removal and migration.
Ethnographers, ancient and modern,
have made out and identified several of
the tribes having: their or-
Modern traces . .
of the ancient igm in the Joktanian de-
Joktanians. -, -,-., -,
scendants. Ptolemy men-
tions the Almodceci dwelling in the cen-
tral portions of Arabia Felix, and it can
hardly be doubted that the name is de-
rived from Almodad, the oldest son or
tribe of Joktan. Another people called
the Salapeni by the same geographer,
are thought to have been derived from
Sheleph, the second son of the same
patriarch. This branch of the race was
set down by Ptolemy as having its abode
near the modern Mecca. A third divi-
sion called the Cathramitae were presum-
ably the descendants of the third son of
Joktan, named Hazarmaveth. It is like-
ly that the modern provincial name of
Hadramaut preserves the reminiscence
of the original Semitic tribe by whom
this region was peopled. There is also
a modern tribe called Yarab, having its
territories on the Arabian -gulf border
and thought to have been descended
from Jerah, the fourth division of the
Joktanian progeny.
The Semitic inhabitants of Yemen are
believed to have descended from Uzal,
Sixth SOn of Joktan. The The Joktanidse
Himyaritic tribe, called the 5Si
Dulkhelitae, are believed and races.
to be the descendants of Diklah, the sev-
enth branch of the original family. The
tribe called Mali by Theophrastus, the
Malichae of Ptolemy, stand for the de-
scendants of Abimael, the ninth Joktan-
ian. The name of the modern town
Malai, in the vicinity of Medina, pre-
serves the same word. The tenth issue
of Joktan was that Sheba, which is men-
tioned in the Hebrew writings and still
more frequently among the local names
of Southwestern Arabia. The eleventh
Joktanian branch was called Ophir, and
preserves another name famous in the
Hebrew writings of the time of the king-
dom of David and Solomon. It is be-
lieved that Havilah, a name common
to one of the descendants of Ham, is
represented by the modern Semitic peo-
ple at Chaulan, in Arabia Felix. The
tribe of the lobaritag, mentioned by
Ptolemy, have their ancestral represent-
ative in lobab, or Jobab, the thirteenth
member of the Joktanian tribe.
We thus see, with more than usual
certainty, considering the extreme re-
moteness of the time, the
Relations of the
Outlines Of a distribution Joktanians and
f T-, .. . . - T j_-i the Eberites.
of Eberites into Northern
and Western Arabia. If we accept the
extreme longevity assigned by the sacred
writings to the patriarchs of this era, we
shall find that the six generations be-
tween Joktan and Ishmael would cover a
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. SEMITIC MIGRATIONS. 467
period of thousands of years. However
this may be, it can not be doubted
that the Joktanians departed from the
parent stem at a date much more re-
mote than the more recent Abraham-
ites, and that when Ishmael, with
the descendants of the Egyptian bond-
woman, turned off into the "wilder-
ness," he found already in Arabia
Felix the half-nomadic and half-set-
tled descendants of the older branch of
the Eberite race. It will be borne in
mind, however, that the progeny of Jok-
tan, the younger brother of Peleg, would
be displaced in rights and prerogatives
by the descendants of the senior branch
of the family; so that the Ishmaelites
would have precedence in these regions
as the representatives of the common
father Arphaxad. The accompanying
diagram will illustrate the tribal rela-
tionships of the descendants of the Joktan
and the Ishmaelites:
Ishmaelitic migration was from the bor-
ders of Syria to the southwest and thence
to the south, until the coast of the Red
sea was reached, and skirted southward
to the extreme limit of that body of
water. If, as some ethnographers main-
tain, the Semitic race crossed at Bab-el-
Mandeb into Africa, it was an Ishmael-
ite removal, and whatever elements there
may be of Semitic descent among the
Galla races of Eastern Africa, the same
must be traced to Ishmael rather than
to the Joktanian branch of the original
Semitic family.
In the course of their progress through
the peninsula, the Ishmaelites appear to
have divided east and west The western
about the eastern border
of Hejaz, and to have
thrown off one branch toward the cen-
tral desert and another across the Red
sea into Africa. This latter movement
of the race must not be confounded with
SHEM
1
1 1
| |
|
Aram Elam
Asshur Arphaxad
Lud
1
1
Salah
1
Ui Hul Gether Mash
Eber
1
1
Peleg
1
1
JOKTAN
Reu
1
Serug Almodad Sheleph Hazarmaveth
1 1 I 1 I
Jerah Hadoram Uzal Diklah Obal
Abimael Sheba Opnir Uavilab Jobab
Nahor
Terah
1
Sarai Abraham=Hagar Nahor
Haran
1
Isaac ISHMAEL
lit
DIAGRAM SHOWING TRIBAL RELATIONSHIPS OF JOKTAN AND ISHMAEL.
The career of the Ishmaelites in
Arabia was one of aggression. They
encroached, especially in
Spread of the f
Ishmaelites the northern part of the
through Arabia. ., ^1 1 i
peninsula, upon the older
Joktanians and also upon the original
Hamitic Arabians, who were anterior to
both branches of the Semitic immigrants.
In general terms, the course of the
the supposed one at the southwest angle
of the peninsula. The real Semitic line
was carried into the continent about the
parallel of twenty-four degrees north,
across Middle Egypt, and almost directly
west into the Great Desert. The migra-
tion of the Ishmaelites in this direction
appears to have extended as far as the
Imoshag races, to the southwest of
468
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Fezzan ; and this point may be regarded
as the extreme landward progress of the
Semitic race south of the Mediterra-
nean.
In general, the modern Arabs are
regarded as the lineal descendants of the
Ishmaelitic branch of the Semitic family.
In the main, this opinion is verified by
extent the Joktanian influence of later
ages. Finally, in the north and west of
Arabia, the immigrant Ishmaelites over-
came and subordinated all the peoples
that had previously occupied the country.
The antipathy between Shem and Ham,
however, was never great except in
matters of religious dogma and cere-
ARAFAT DURING A PILGRIMAGE (LAND OF OPHIR). Drawn by D. Lancelot, from a photograph.
the facts in possession of the ethnogra-
pher and historian. But the Arab char-
Composite race acter is, to a considerable
mo a dSlra f - the extent, composite. Several
bians. ethnic elements have con-
tributed to its formation. The Ham-
itic race, especially in the southern part
of the peninsula, underlay the national
development of subsequent times. With
this oldest stock was blended to some
monial. For this reason the original in-
habitants, already a composite people in
Arabia Felix, may be supposed to have
contributed not a little to the ultimate
formation of that type known in modern
times as Arabian. But the dominant
stock, at least in the important regions
bordering the Red sea from Suez to
Yemen, was Ishmaelitic in its origin and
development.
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. SEMITIC MIGRATIONS.
469
We have thus considered the south-
ernmost migratory movements of the
vicissitudes of Semitic race. The Abra-
tribe entered and
the Abrahamites
in possessing
Canaan. possessed Canaan. This
movement of the principal stock, repre-
sentative of the family of
Eber, is better understood ^
in its character and re- f ;
suits than any other sin-
gle migration at a time
equally remote from the
present. The story is
elaborately expanded in
the Book of Genesis. All
the principal episodes in ,.!?
the career of the Abra-
hamic tribe are narrated,
even to details. The pa-
triarch became the pro-
genitor of a famous race
which he planted in Ca-
naan. The extent and
variety of his tribe are
indicated by the conduct
toward him of Melchize-
dek, King of Salem, and
by many other incidents
and events. A great de-
velopment of the immi-
grant race took place in
the time of Israel, grand-
son of Abraham, whose
twelve sons became the
progenitors of the twelve
tribes and the origin of
the twelve geographical
divisions of the rising
race. It is not needed to recount the epi-
sode of the sojourn in Egypt and of the
rapid multiplication of the foreigners
about Pelusium. The return out of
bondage and the repossession of Canaan
by conquest furnished the material for
the heroic aspect and story of the Israel-
itish nation, which became dominant
from the borders of the Syrian desert to
the Mediterranean.
It is worthy to be noted in this connec-
tion that the Hebrews were never a seafar-
ing people. It was against the economy
of the state, and regarded perhaps as in-
LIFE OF THE ABRAHAMITES SHEPHERD WITH LAMBS.
Drawn by Paul Hardy.
jurious to the theocratic principle upon
which the government was founded, to
make commercial excur- Noncommercial
sionsand contract relations pSt^He-^
with foreign powers. A brews,
student of history will not forget that
the narrow strip of coast called Phoeni-
cia, with its great seaports, lay between
470
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
brew influence
on the Mediter-
ranean.
Israel and the Western ocean. This
fact has an ethnic signification also ; for
the Tyrians and Sidonians and other old
stocks of mankind, hanging in their
rookeries along the eastern end of the
Mediterranean, represented races long
anterior in their western distribution
and development to the immigration and
conquest of Canaan by the Eberites.
In course of time the Semitic stock
became dominant to the sea. But the
spirit of navigation which prevailed in
Extent of He- the ports of Tyre and Sidon
must be attributed* to a
race impulse other than
that of the Hebrews. To the extent
that the Phoenicians had accepted the in-
stitutions and blood of the invaders who
conquered Canaan, we may regard the
outgoing fleets from these shores as car-
rying Semitic influences through the
Mediterranean. But it is doubtful if
these fleets of outbound merchants car-
ried to the western parts anything dis-
tinctively Hebrew. All the traces of the
Semitic race which have been found in
the Mediterranean islands, on the shores
of Spain, and beyond the straits of Gib-
raltar, in Wales, and in the littoral
islands of Western Africa, must be at-
tributed to that community of language
and institutions which the Phoenicians,
particularly the Sidonians, possessed in
common with the race of Abraham.
Time and again we have shown that the
Hamites had common forms of language
The Azores and a common institutional
mark the Atlan-
tic limit of He- development with the cog-
tureT epai nate nations of Shem, and
the original Canaanites could thus carry
into western waters evidences of a race
affinity with the dominant Semitic stock.
However this may be, ethnographers
have agreed in extending the Semitic
line of dispersion through the Phoenician
coast and around the northern shores of
Africa by water. As just indicated,
this line extends beyond the Pillars of
Hercules, and is deflected northward to
Britain and southward to the twentieth
degree of latitude. The western limit
of this maritime migration is thought to
have been in the Azores ; and this group
of islands may be said to mark the ex-
treme Atlantic progress in the natural
dispersion of the Semitic family.
It must be noted in connection with
the foregoing schemes of dispersion that
most of the names employed appear as
the names of individuals use and signif-
as the sons of a household. %%>**-
This fact gives to the dis- names,
cussion a Strictly famify aspect which is too
exact and too narrow for the facts which it
represents. Many of the names in the
above classifications are known to be the
names of tribes and of whole divisions,
or even of whole peoples. It is impos-
sible from a study of primitive Semitic
records to make out precisely which of
the ancestral names employed in geneo-
logical tables are intended to represent
single ancestors, and which are designed
to specify households, tribes, and peoples.
It is the custom in the Semitic languages
to prefix to many personal names, espe-
cially such as have a descriptive significa-
tion, the definite article, thereby giving
to the word an ethnic turn of sense dif-
ferent from what would be expressed in
the Aryan languages. Such names,
moreover, are frequently in the plural ;
and the Hebrew Scriptures, taken as an
example of all such records, have, in
many instances, intermixed these tribal
or ethnic epithets with individual names
until even the closest criticism is put at
fault in determining precisely what is
meant. On the whole, it is safe to
make considerable allowance for this
circumstance in estimating the value of
the names, apparently individual, given
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. SEMITIC MIGRATIONS.
471
to the ancestors of the Semitic and Ham-
itic races. This fact must always be
taken into account in attempting to esti-
mate the time and the extent of a given
migratory movement.
If we look to the north of the central
line of the Semitic dispersion into Ca-
and it has already been suggested that
in Cyprus itself the aboriginal develop,
ment was of Hamitic origin. The primi-
tive history of the island is exceedingly
obscure, but all that is known with
reference thereto points to an early
colonization by the Phoenicians from the
" LAND OF THE SCORCHED FACES." ABU SENOUM, ON FRONTIER OF KORDOFAN, TOWARD DARFUR. Drawn by Karl
Girardet, after a sketch of Lejean.
naan and the west, we shall find only a
single significant departure. This leaves
The Hebrew the main stem on the north
branch entwines i-t,,, c< *.,',,.. A^r ^~t- -~A
with the Ham- m the Sy n an desert, and
itic in Cyprus, bears off in the direction of
the northeastern extremity of the Medi-
terranean, where it touches the coast,
and is thence carried over to the island
of Cyprus. It is hardly to be doubted
that along the line of this migration
other peoples had preceded the Semites,
neighboring coast. The ancient wor-
ship of Ashtaroth in Cyprus seems to be
identical with the corresponding cult in
Phoenicia, and it may be concluded that
the first race, by which is meant the first
progressive race, in the island was of
the old Canaanitish stock which fixed
itself in the earliest ages along the
eastern shore of the Mediterranean.
Such, then, is the general view of
the dispersion of the Semitic nations-
472
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Geographically considered, the race
was narrow and intense. Its migra-
Bummaryand toiy excursions did not
H U ebS!cd e reach out so extensively
tribution. as those of other peo-
ples. The extreme western continental
limit was, as we have seen, in North
Central Africa. The southern departure
dropped down as far as the limits of
Arabia. The northern limit was the
island of Cyprus; and the maritime
expeditions if we regard the Phoeni-
cians as representatives of this race
extended through the Mediterranean and
to a certain distance around the western
coasts of Europe and Africa. Taken
altogether, the dispersion is the smallest,
that is, the most limited in geographical
extent, of all the great ethnic departures.
The dispersion of Japheth in compari-
son with that of Shem was, as we shall
presently see, world-wide in its extent.
But within the limited territories oc-
cupied by the Semitic race a very intense
form of religious and civil development
ensued, making the Semites conspicuous
among ancient peoples for their pecul-
iarities and persistence and force of
character.
In the course of the current chapter
little has been intimated relative to the
Question of the primitive populations of
Ethiopia. This name was
given by the Greeks to the
region lying immediately south of
Egypt. The word means ' ' the land of
the scorched faces," and was doubtless
applied by the Hellenic ethnographers
to the Ethiopians on account of their
swarthy hue. This, however, by no
means implies that they were a branch
of the Black races of mankind. It is
well known, on the contrary, that this
people were allied with the Hamitic and
Semitic families of men, and not with
the Negroes or Hottentots.
The early history of Egypt indicates
close relationship between that country
and Ethiopia. At one epoch an Ethi-
opian dynasty is found in western ish-
fhe fl<;rpnrlant in the Ni1p mael combines
me ascenaani in me i\ne the rein with the
valley. There was much Hamites.
community of religions and of civil in-
stitutions between the two peoples, who,
however, frequently went to war. To
what extent, in the prehistoric ages, the
Hamitic race had made its way up the
valley beyond the falls of the Nile and
contributed a first population to Ethi-
opia can not be well ascertained. But
that the original race of this region was
at least to some extent Hamitic in its
origin can hardly be doubted. We may,
nevertheless, accept the current view of
ethnographers that the western division
of the Ishmaelites crossed the Red sea
and gave a Semitic character to the first
Ethiopian tribes. It is possible, more-
over, that the same race, after making
its way to the southern extremity of the
Red sea and passing thence into Africa,
doubled back into Ethiopia and dis-
seminated certain tribal elements in this
obscure but important region of the
earth.
We thus note three great divisions of
the Semitic stock. The primary depar-
ture Sent Off the Aramaic Aram the seat
branch of the race. In gen- gS^E*
eral terms the people of opment.
Aram, known ethnically as Aramaeans,
were distributed from the Zagros and
Kebir Kuh on the east, to the borders of
Canaan on the west. Aram embraced
all of Mesopotamia except Chaldaea,
subsequently known as Babylonia, and
all of Syria in the west except Pales. tine
and Phoenicia. The seat of Aramaic cul-
ture was Mesopotamia. Here was ex-
hibited the strongest development of the
race. Geographically, Aram was the
northern division of the Semitic family,
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. EAST ARYAN DEPARTURE. 473
as the Hebraic stock was the central and
the Arabic division the southern evolu-
tion of Shem.
In considering the race characteristics
and historical progress of these peoples,
we shall have occasion to revert to this
division of the Semitic family, and to
make the same the basis of a discussion of Japhethites.
the national life of the Mesopotamian
nations, the Hebrews and the Arabs.
We turn, then, in the next place, to a
discussion of the far wider, and in many
senses more important, development of
the oldest branch of the Noachite
family of mankind the Aryans, or
XXVII. THE EAST ARYAN DEPARTURE.
HE dispersion of the
Japhetic, Aryan, or
Indo-European race
for the three ethnic
names are virtually
synonymous consti-
tutes the most pictur-
esque chapter in the prehistoric annals
of the world. We are brought in the
investigation to what appears to have
been an inexhaustible fountain of hu-
man life, and are led to view the issu-
ance from this common source of at
Determination least six of the great races
the th A e r raSi- f ^ich became in their de-
grations. velopment the principal his-
torical forces in the ancient world. It
will be of primary interest in this in-
quiry to note, first of all, the geograph-
ical location of this common fountain
wherefrom issued the best, or at least
the strongest, peoples who have, by
their energy and genius, transformed
the primeval world into its present civil-
ized and auspicious condition.
With the map of Asia before him the
student need not be long in fixing the
great ethnic center which we are about
to consider. Regarding the ancient
country of Carmania as the seat of the
Noachite division of peoples, and fixing
the line of Japheth on the north, it may
be .easily perceived that its westward-
M. Vol. 131
bearing course would come against the
Hyrcanian mountains and the Lower
Caspian, and be deflected or doubled
back toward the Upper Oxus into Mar-
giana and Bactria. It was in this region
that the great ethnic whirl was estab-
lished, where the Aryan race seems to
have found itself turned by torsion for a
season under the dominion of cosmic
forces, which it were, perhaps, vain to
attempt to analyze and define.
Ethnographers have differed some-
what as to the true seat of the great
races which we are now to Region of the
consider. The better opin- J3
ion places the center of parture.
the distribution about the Lower Cas-
pian, or eastward toward the borders of
Bactria. It is likely that the rapidly
multiplying race covered geographically
the larger part of the country between
the Bactrian borders and the Lower Cas-
pian. At least this is the general local-
ity from which the most powerful ethnic
forces have ever proceeded. In viewing
the situation, we may discover once more
how the laws of physical environment
cooperated with the laws of instinct in
producing such marvelous results.
There is little doubt, in the first place,
that evenness of surface and approxima-
tion to sea level have a marked influence
in preserving the aggregation or compact-
474
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
ness of tribes in the formative state, and
in conducing to certain religious and po-
litical types of development.
In the next place latitude, with its
invariable concomitant of temperature,
contributes much to modify the peoples
who are subject to given
Karaites are eth- J 111
nicaiiy modified degrees of heat and cold.
by environment. ^^ ^ ^ in particular of
tribes who are still in the plastic state.
There can be no doubt that there is a
childhood and a youth to mankind an
men. They also grew sedate and aus-
tere, less disposed to highly developed
forms of society, and, in brief, more
like the desert and rainless countries in-
to which they penetrated than were the
races which distributed themselves fur-
ther northward.
Among the oldest monuments of thd
Egyptians there are pictorial represen-
tations of the differences which had al-
ready been produced among the Noa-
chite descendants by the influences of
LANDSCAPE OF OLD ARYA. RUINS OF Tous. Drawn by A. de Bar, from a photograph.
impressionable stage of evolution in
which the influences of the external
world are more potent in their reaction
upon the mental and physical constitu-
tion than they are in later stages of de-
velopment. In these early stages of so-
ciety there are infantine susceptibilities
and diseases from which the race re-
covers at a stage of fuller maturity. For
this reason the early peoples in their
migratory epochs have developed a con-
stitution peculiarly significant of the
climate and region of their tribal so-
journ. The races of Ham became much
darker in color than their Semitic kins-
environment. The sculptors, in these
representations, have unwittingly borne
evidence of the tendency of Egyptian sculp
fares evidence
races in the plastic Stage Of the early differ-
., , ,. entiationof
their evolution to con- races>
form to climatic conditions. The
Egyptians defined themselves as Roth,
meaning red, or ruddy, as to complexion.
They pictured the cognate Semites as
Namahu, meaning yellow; and the
Japhethites, or North Mediterranean
peoples, as Tamahu, or white. Yet it is
now well known that these three types
of color and the associated form, feature,
and stature of the three peoples to
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. EAST ARYAN DEPARTURE. 475
which they belong, were all of a com-
mon ethnic descent.
The race of Japheth on the north and
east of Mesopotamia was, in its earliest
stages of development, thrown into a
Primitive ja- region where nature had
phethites affect-
ed by climate greater variety than in any
and surround- / . i , ,
ings. of the countries where the
Semitic and Hamitic families were dis-
persed. It was a region of uplands, ris-
mer, the quick oncoming of the storm,
the biting frost of a comparatively early
autumn, the high winds, the blasts of
snow and sleet peculiar to the winter
months. It is in some sense a climatic
maelstrom, and the Japhetic race was
whirled and beaten in its childhood by
the wild elements that dashed and
turned from alternate calm to tempest ,
and from warm airs to biting blasts and
-
-W"- r K^-V-. . v ^>t.
PASS OF THE ARAXI
ing easily into mountain ranges of con-
siderable elevation. It was a country of
snows, and particularly of storms in
winter. There are few parts of the
earth in which vicissitude in temperature
and the whole external mood of nature
are more pronounced than in the region
south and east of the Caspian.
The primitive Japhethites were ex-
posed from the beginning to the full
force of these climatic changes to the
flush of early spring, the heat of sum-
freezing sleets. For these reasons the
early Japhethites would, by the turbu-
lence of nature, be impressed with great-
er restlessness, hardihood, and adven-
ture than might be expected in the case
of any other primitive people.
How great must have been the influ-
ence of such an environment upon sen-
sitive peoples recently liberated from a
parent stock in a more genial latitude!
We have already seen that the Adamite
seems to have come up from the low-
476
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
lying seashore, where the Ichthyophagi
afterwards roamed, half-naked in the
seashore sunshine, gathering shellfish
from the brine. Many of these moder-
ating influences had been carried by the
Noachites into the Carmanian uplands ;
and it was from thence that the Japheth-
ites were deflected to the northwest into
the region of snow and mountains.
Before beginning a review of the
wider aspects of the Japhetic dispersion
indefimteness j n t o re mote continents, it
of biblical refer-
ences to the can but prove of interest to
Japhetic disper- ,
sion . note, as we have already
done in the case of the Joktanian migra-
tions, the narrower biblical plan of dis-
tribution presented in the tenth chapter
of Genesis. Japheth signifies, etymo-
logically, " widespreading," from which
meaning of the word the inference is
drawn that the name was applied to the
Northern Aryans after they had shown
the migratory disposition. Far back in
the Noachitic era there was a prophecy
that Japheth should be enlarged. Every-
thing from the biblical point of view
points to the expansion of this branch
of the Noachite family. The close
relation of the western division of the
race with European tribes is shown in
the fact that the Greeks had a myth of
their own ancestor under the name of
lapetus, which is clearly the same as
Japheth. In general terms, the countries
assigned to the descendants of this
branch of mankind are called the * ' isles
of the gentiles." Doubtless the expres-
sion is poetical. The Oriental imagi-
nation substituted " isles " for countries
in general, no doubt from the remote
and seagirt meaning suggested by the
word.
If we scrutinize carefully the Japhetic
family as recorded in Genesis, we shall
find seven sons, or founders of tribes,
assigned to the head of the race. These
are, first of all, Gomer. Among the de-
scendants of this ancestor many names
are found, even in Europe, seven tribes of
which preserve the ety-
mology of the ancestral
title. Rawlinson has noted the presence
of the Gimirians among the cuneiform
inscriptions, belonging to the age of
Darius Hystaspes. The Cimmerians,
dwelling on the northern shores of the
Black sea, are believed to have their name
from Gomer. The word Cymri (Kymri),
one of the Celtic names of Western Eu-
rope, is thought to have the same origin ;
and the words Cambria, in England, and
Cambrai, in France, preserve, perhaps,
an etymological tradition of the oldest
branch of the Japhethites.
The first son of Gomer was Ashkenez,
from whom, no doubt, the ancient tribe
of Ascanians, dwelling to the south of the
Black sea, were descended. These are
believed to have been the ancestors of
the Phrygians, and were therefore closely
related with the Hellenic emigrants
who subsequently peopled Greece. The
country of Ascania extended over the
land of Troy, from which circumstance
we may deduce something of the ethnic
relations existing between the Trojans
and the Hellenes. It is worthy of note
that "the boy Ascanius," the son of
w^Eneas, founder of mythical Rome, per-
petuated the ancestral name of Ashkenez.
It is not impossible that the classical
name Euxine, formerly spelled Axenus,
is also derived from the ethnic designa-
tion of the early race dwelling on the
southern borders of this sea.
The second branch of the Gomerites
was, according to Genesis, deduced from
the tribal ancestor Riphath.
Place of the Ri-
From him are thought phacesmthe
, , -i i , 1 ethnic scheme.
to have descended the
ancient Paphlagonians, whom Josephus
designates as Riphaces. This people,
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. EAST ARYAN DEPARTURE. 477
like the Ashkenites, dwelt on the south-
ern borders of the Black sea, though the
location has not been so definitely deter-
mined as that of the first Gomeritic
division. On the whole, it is likely that
the Riphaces had their dwelling place
somewhat toward the east, in a district
which was properly included in Arme-
nia. The third son
of Gomer was To-
garmah, who is be-
lie v e d to have
founded an Arme-
nian tribe which
may be identified
with the modern
Thorgonites inhab-
iting the same re-
gion.
The next branch
of the Japhethites
was deduced from
the second son,
called Magog. But
it is difficult to de-
, . ,
termine into which
of the Black sea
provinces this di-
vision was led and distributed. There
is general consent that the famous savage
race of Scythians were the
Distribution of ^
the Magog and offspring of Magog. Some
the Madai. .-, -t i
ethnographers have re-
ferred the Turanians in general to this
origin, and others have derived the
Circassians, inhabiting the mountainous
district between the Caspian and the
Black sea, from the Magogian stock.
Concerning the Madai, who are record-
ed as the third tribe of Japheth, there can
be little doubt that these were the ances-
tors of the great race of Medes, whose
country spread from the Upper Zagros
toward the east, as far as Hyrcania and
the desert of Aria. Subsequently, in the
development of the Median race, the
nation spread southward over the Irani-
an plateau, and passed by conquest into
Assyria, and even to Babylonia. But
the prehistoric tribes descended from
Madai were limited to the northern prov-
inces east of the mountains.
The fourth son of Japheth was Javan,
easily identified with the Greek ancestral
OLD MEDIAN TYPES THE SASSANIAN PRINCES (OF THE SCULPTURES).
Drawn by H. Chapuis, from a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
name laones, from whom, according to
the Hellenic tradition, the lonians of
Asia Minor and the ^Egean
Traces of the
islands were descended, dispersion of the
rr, * ,, T ., Javanites.
Traces of the Javanites
have been discovered among the inscrip-
tions of Egypt ; and the Greeks as a race
were called Javanas among the ancient
Hindus. The Arabic word for Greeks
is Yunan, which is evidently of the same
etymology with Javan. In later times
the Hellenic ethnographers were dis-
posed to accept laones as the ancestor of
their whole race, and to make Ionian
and Greek equivalent terms.
From the Javan, several ancestral
stocks are said to have been derived. The
first son bore the name of Elishah, and it is
478
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
possible that the Greek state of Elis, in
the eastern part of Peloponnesus, perpet-
uated this name. Some have suggested
that Hellas itself is a derivative from
Elishah. Tarsus, on the Cilician coast,
has been derived from the word Tarshish,
assigned as the name of a second son of
Javan. A third tribe was called Kittim,
which is believed to have been distrib-
uted near Paphlygonia, or possibly into
the island of Cyprus. A fourth division
of Javanites were the Dodanim, which
we may possibly identify with the Do-
donians of Macedonia. The tribal name
GATEWAY OF THE EAST ARYANS INTO INDIA THE BOLAN PASS.
is sometimes spelled Rodanim, which
would point to the island of Rhodes as
the locality of this branch of Javan.
The race of Tibareni, mentioned by
the Greek historians, have generally
Probable identi- been referred to the Tubal,
fication of the c.ci\* ...."1,,, ~.r T_.~I 1.
Georgians with tn tnbe f Japheth.
the Tubaiites. They have been identified
with the original Georgians, but the
name in itself does not indicate the
descent. In the Iberians we may dis-
cover traces of the original name. The
latter had their habitation bordering on
the Black sea and reaching out on the
southern slope of the Caucasus.
The sixth son of Japheth is called
Meshech, whose descendants were doubt-
less the ancient Moschi. The territory
of this tribe lay next to that of the
Tibareni. The Moschian range of
mountains preserves the word in the
north of Armenia to the present time.
According to a conjecture of Rawlinson,
the modern national name of Muscovite
is derived, through Moschi, from the
Japhetic Meshech.
It is believed that the great Thracian
stock of mankind may be traced up to
Tiras, the seventh and last of the Japhetic
progeny. It is
thought that the
coun try into
which this
branch of the
race was distrib-
uted was on the
north of the
Black sea, on
the banks of the
Dniester, the
name of which
river is believed
to preserve the
etymology of
Tiras. After,
wards the same
geographical name was carried into Eu-
rope. The Thracians were possible deriva-
originally distributed over
a wide range of country,
extending from the Black sea as far as
the borders of the Cimmerians.
It will be seen that according to this
genealogical scheme, deduced from the
Book of Genesis, the dis- Biblical scheme
represents the
persion of the Japhethites japhethites as
, , . developed -west-
Was wholly to the westward wa rd.
from the point of departure. This in-
dicates that the eastward migrations of
the race, so important in the subsequent
development of the Medo-Persian up-
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. EAST ARYAN DEPARTURE. 479
lands and India, were unknown to the
Hebrews, or at least omitted from the
ethnic tables which they preserved. As
a general fact, the Hebrew accounts of
peoples other than themselves were lim-
ited to the necessity of the case, while
the movements of the Abrahamites were
expanded and developed in full propor-
tions.
A second observation relative to the
Japhetic dispersion is that according- to
this sevenfold tribal scheme all, or near-
ly all, the races of Indo-European origin
HOW far the He- are located in Armenia and
SSet?? of Around the shores of the
tended. Black sea. The territory
contemplated by the Hebrew author ex-
tended westward into Phrygia and at
least as far as the ^Egean islands. It is
safe to mark out the wilds of Thrace and
the island of Rhodes as the western-
most boundaries of the Japhetic disper-
sion as deduced from the tribal refer-
ences in Genesis. But if we examine
the geographical knowledge which was
possessed in the times of the composi-
tion of the earlier Hebrew books, and
join to this the comparative indifference
of the race to the movements and distri-
bution of the Japhethites,, we can dis-
cover sufficient reasons for the imperfec-
tion or inadequacy of the ethnic scheme.
It now remains to look at the question
in the broader light of historical and
linguistic indications.
It has already been indicated in the
first chapter of the preceding book that
Great contribu- the study of language has
Se^'SS 10 led to many rectifications
nography. j n the general scheme of
knowledge. In no other department of
science has this correction and emenda-
tion of previous opinion been more
manifest than in ethnography. One of
the most striking examples of the im-
provement of the old scheme of learning
by the new linguistic contribution is
found in the discovery that the Indie
peoples of Hindustan have certainly
been derived from the same origin with
the great nations of Europe and Amer-
ica. The bringing to light of the iden-
tity of Sanskrit in its elements as a lan-
guage with the Greek and Latin opened
up a totally different view of the move-
ments and distribution of the Indo-Eu-
ropean family of men. The slightly
subsequent demonstration of the iden-
tity of the language in which are re-
corded the sacred writings of the Iranic
or Persic race, added proof to proof of
the great community of the six or seven
branches which are now known to com-
pose the Aryan family of nations.
Ethnographers were quick to seize
upon these additions to their previous
knowledge ; and one of their first works
was to trace backward the Discovery of
Indie streams of mankind ^tesTymeLs
through the passes of the of Sanskrit.
Hindu-Kush to its confluence with the
Iranic stream, and then to follow up the
Old Indo-Persic family in its descent
from an ancestral home common to
themselves and the Graeco-Italic stock in
Europe. These ancient and shadowy
movements, most important in the dis-
semination of the strongest peoples in
the world, have now been sufficiently
delineated, and the scholar of to-day
may trace with comparative certainty
the ethnic lines which mark the course
of primitive peoples from the great cen-
ter which they had in common, east-
ward of the Lower Caspian, to their sev-
eral destinations in distant continents.
The primary movement of the Old Ar-
yans in the geographical First move-
vortex just referred to ap-
pears to have been a sort of
spiral, throwing off streams east and
west from its circumference. The oldest
480
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
of these departures was that toward the
southeast. It contained the potency of
two principal developments, an older
and a younger; the former finding its
geographical area of expansion on the
table-lands of Iran, and the latter con-
tinuing in migratory movements to the
east, until it descended from the moun-
tain gaps into the Punjab, and thence
down the Indian valleys to the sea.
The first peculiarity of this remarka-
ble departure is the fact that it stands
alone of all the Aryan migrations in
having a general direction toward the
east. All the other dispersive move-
ments of this race were to the west, the
tendency being in common with that
of the Semitic and Hamitic families on
the south. The Eastern Aryans, how-
ever, made their departure against the
course of nature, and followed it per-
sistently across nearly a third of Asia to
their final lodgment and distribution in
the East.
The reason for this reversal of the
general migratory movement to the
Hints of physic- West, and of the departure
al laws govern- f ^ "Fact^m Atn/a-nc
ing the move- eastern Aryans
ments of races, from what appears to be a
common ethnic law, is difficult to deter-
mine. The earth is held in equipoise by
the electric currents with which it is
girdled and by which all its magnetic
elements are polarized. These encircling
influences, which are doubtless deter-
mined in their fundamental direction by
the diurnal course of the sun, extend into
and control all the vegetable and animal
life on the surface of the planet. Every
vine and tendril that springs from the
earth and seeks a support twines around
the object to which it fastens in obedi-
ence to a common law which determines
the method and direction of the growth.
No mechanical means or contrivance can
prevail against this obvious and invinci-
ble tendency of a vine to turn in its own
direction about the object on which it
seizes. In general, the tendrils of the
vegetable kingdom follow the course of
the sun, from left to right in a circle. In
the animal kingdom the same phenom-
ena recur. Bees departing from the
parent colony follow, in every country,
a given line of migration. Birds and
quadrupeds also obey these cosmic in-
fluences, but are somewhat more variable
in the directions of their tribal move-
ments. As we shall see further on, the
Brown races of mankind have in general
carried the lines of their migration to the
east instead of the west ; and the same
is true of the Australian and Papuan
streams of dispersion among the Blacks.
But the Aryans have shown almost
a passion for the westward course. All
the original ethnic move- Possible reason
ments of this great division %^*
of mankind were toward migration.
the setting sun, with the single excep-
tion of that which we are now consider-
ing. Why should the Indo-Persian mi-
gration have disobeyed the general law?
Why should the Ruddy race have con-
tributed to populate the valleys of India
at a distance so great from the original
tribal departure ? It may be said in
answer, that the vegetable kingdom is
not quite uniform in the directions of its
growth. There are a few exceptional
instances in which vines and tendrils are
specifically opposed in their method of
growth to the action of the common
law, and when such reversal of the
usual order is discovered in a given
plant, it is found to be as obsti-
nate in its manifestation as are those
which conform to the usual methods of
development. It is possible that some-
thing analogous to this may have pre-
vailed among the Eastern Aryans to the
extent of a prevalent instinct contrary
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. EAST ARYAN DEPARTURE. 481
in its action to the usual desires and dis-
positions of the race.
At any rate, the first great migration
of this family of mankind was toward
the rising sun. The epoch in time in
which the movement began
Light derived .
from iranic and can not be ascertained,
Vedicliterature. of
migrating nation has fortunately been,
to some extent,
preserved in the
language. The old
books of the Iranic
and Indie races
have been to the
ethnographer what
the stone-leaves of
the earth are to the
geologist. There
are even to be dis-
covered in these
works some hints
of chronology. It
is now conceded
that the Rig- Veda
is the oldest book
in the possession
of the human race.
It may be that in-
vestigations here-
after among Ori-
entals, particularly
the Chinese, may
substitute some
other work for the
Hindu Bible. It is
now generally ad-
mitted that the
earliest hymns of the Vedic collection
go back to wellnigh three thousand
years before our era. The sacred
books of Zoroastrianism were compiled
at a later date. The evidence of lan-
guage is sufficient to show that the
Iranic speech and religious institutions
were developed at a period considerably
subsequent to that from which the Rig-
Veda proceeded. It is possible that the
hymns and ceremonials composing this
most ancient book were sung or chanted
by the Aryan tribes long before they
descended into the valleys of India. It
is certain at least that the language was
well forward in evolution of structure
and determination of vocabulary while
TYPE OF THE ANCIENT BRAHM LEPER KING OF ANGCOR WAT.
Drawn by E. Tournois, after a sketch of Delaporte.
the Iranians and Indicans still drifted in
a common migration toward the south
and east.
The distribution of the Indie peoples,
first into the Punjab and afterwards
into the lower valleys, thence into the
uplands, and finally eastward to the
foothills of the Himalayas, has already
482
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
been described. It was here that the
great race of Brahm expanded through
centuries of progress into
Expansion of ''
the race of that fixed national form
Brahm in India. 1-1 j , 1.
which we discover in the
earlier epochs of authentic history.
Here the Brahmanic form of worship
prevailed. Here the Indian castes were
established in society. Here those
peculiar philosophical theories of life
and duty and destiny were evolved
which seemed to be an exact reversal of
the beliefs and dogmas of the Western
nations. It will be the work of a sub-
sequent chapter to trace out this eastern-
most development of the Aryan peoples,
to note its peculiarities and tendencies,
and to contrast the life of the Hindu
peoples with the more aggressive and
active social phenomena exhibited by the
primitive races of Europe.
In the case of this migration we have
another example of the disposition of
Primitive tribes primitive tribes to hang
S&3S? 111 together and maintain their
movement. solidarity for a consider-
able distance toward their unknown
destination, and then to depart into two
or more courses of independent develop-
ment. While the Indie branch of the
eastward-bearing Aryans had been mak-
ing its way farther and farther toward
the Indian valleys, the Iranic division
gradually spread from the common
movement and turned into the half-
desert plateaus on the south. The move-
ment was first into Media Proper, and
then into Persia. The course of this
branch of the race, which may be defined
as Indo-Iranian, appears to have been
almost exactly the reverse of that of the
original Ruddy stock making its way
north and westward from the shores of
the Indian ocean.
It is not the purpose at the present
time to note in extenso the establish-
ment of the Median tribes The Medes pre-
and their organization sfa^fs^hTstoric-
first into a political COm- al development.
munity and then into a kingdom. It is
well known that the Medes preceded the
Persians in the formation of a body pol-
itic and in the development of the arts.
We are here, however, on the borders
of history, and pass, for the present,
from the eastward dispersion of the
Aryans, to note the still wider and more
significant distribution of the race into
the westernmost parts of Asia and thence
into Europe.
CHAFTER XXVIII. THE WEST ARYAN MIORATIONS.
T is clear from the evi-
dence in possession of
modern scholars that
there was an attempt
on the part of the
original Aryans to
make their way around
the eastern shores of the Caspian and
thence westward across the Ural river;
and it is also clear that this movement
did not succeed. The migrations in
this direction reached no further to the
north than the sea of Aral, where the
course of the tribes was permanently
checked. It is more than likely that
the climate in this region was so severe
as to prevent further progress in that
direction. The country between the
Lower Ural and the Aral sea is one of
the bleakest and most forbidding in the
world, and Aryan adventure was stayed
in this direction.
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. WEST ARYAN MIGRATIONS. 483
Sense in which
" migration " is
to be under-
stood.
In these facts we discover another ex-
ample of the peculiarities of migratory
tribal movements. Eth-
nic progress is by no means
so rapid and exact as the
word migration would imply. These
north-bound Aryans, if they had been
' emigrants " in the modern sense of that
word, would have
continued their
course around the
Caspian to the north,
and would have found
an ample vent for
westward expansion
afterwards. But the
movement of primi-
tive tribes is a prog-
ress rather than a mi-
gration. The removal
from place to place is
slow. It involves
camping, temporary
settlement, and a test
of the locality as to
its resources and suit-
ableness for perma-
nent abode. The
ethnic movement is
thus tentative in its
whole course. It puts
out in this direction
and in that, testing
the climate and the
resources of the re-
gion, and spreading
into different tracts adjacent until the
course of further migration is determined
by the inviting or uninviting character of
the borders beyond. There is a sense in
which the migrating tribe is always
tempted to proceed on its way in a given
direction. The imagination is allured
to the extent of inciting a new depar-
ture. While the natural instinct of the
race, in the form of cupidity or the
spirit of adventure, furnishes the bottom
impulse of the progress, the suggestions
of the natural world determine its course
and the rapidity and oscillations of the
forward movement.
The north-bound migration which we
have here described, and which ended
with the Aral sea, contributed an abo-
KARAKALPACK TYPES TWO USBEKS.
Drawn by A. Ferdinandus.
riginal race between the Oxus and the
Caspian. Here a single Indo-European
family is represented which
Northern limits
doubtless Owes its Origin of Aryan disper-
.., ... sioninAsia.
to the very primitive
movement just described. The Kara-
kalpacks, whose territory lies immedi-
ately north of the Atrek river, which
empties into the Lower Caspian from
the east, are probably of Aryan descent.
484
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
as are also a second tribe, called the Us-
beks, who have their habitat further to
the north ; also the Tadshiks, holding the
country immediately south of the sea of
Aral, at the debouchure of the Oxus, are
Indo-Europeans, and are the northern-
most of the Aryan peoples of Asia east-
ward of the Caspian sea.
the Caucasus. Defined in terms of an-
cient geography, the course was across
Media, through Atropatene and Ar-
menia Major. In all this region such
was its geographical constitution the
migratory race appears to have held to-
gether. Indeed, it was not possible that
there should be dispersion in a country
CAUCASIAN TYPES. GEORGIAN WOMEN. Drawn by Eugene Burnand, from a photograph.
In the meantime a still stronger mi-
gratory movement of the Aryans had
taken place directly to the
Sources of the i
race movement west. The stream of de-
into Europe. . , . . ,
parture in this case carried
in its current the potency of all the Eu-
ropean nations. It extended primarily
south of the Caspian along the upper
parts of Mesopotamia, and was held
from northern deflection by the spurs of
so confined. All of the ancient states
which we have just mentioned were
strongly Aryan in their original popula-
tion, from which circumstance it is easy
to discern how Aryan influences would
press upon ancient Assyria from the
east and modify that nationality by the
infusion of many foreign elements. The
modern countries of Mazanderan, Arda-
lan, and Adarbijan hold a similar rela-
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. WEST ARYAN MIGRATIONS. 485
planted on the
lines of the out-
going.
tion to the Mesopotamia!! regions, and
the pressure of the Kurds upon the peo-
ples between the Tigris and the Euphra-
tes has in progress of ages amounted to
a conquest.
After reaching the more open region
midway between the Caspian and the
Black sea, the Aryans divided into two
major streams, one continuing the west-
ward course, and the other passing
through the Caucasus mountains into
Armenia. It is at this point that the
line of departure to the right enters the
Russian empire of modern times.
The first peoples of Aryan stock de-
posited in the region of this divergence
First races were the Armenians and
Georgians Here is the
^cuigicuib. -tacic
sea t of that great division
of mankind to which the ethnographers
of the last century gave the name of
Caucasian. Until the more compre-
hensive scholarship of recent times
had thrown a stronger light on the
question, it was supposed that the
White, or Ruddy, races had all issued
from this source, the southern branch
passing into Asia Minor, and the north-
ern being carried around the Black sea
into Europe. It is now seen, however,
that the real origin of the Aryans lay
further to the east, and that the starting
point of dispersion in the Caucasian re-
gion was only secondary to an older de-
parture beyond the Caspian.
It will be desirable in following out
the great migrations which we are now
Origin of the to consider to take up first
the western branch of de-
parture and follow the same
into Asia Minor, and thence into penin-
sular Europe. If from the eastern ex-
tremity of the Black sea to the north-
eastern limit of the Mediterranean a line
be drawn, we shall find that all of the
original peoples of peninsular Asia lying
Minor Asians ;
Hamitic influ-
ences.
west of the line and east of the Black
sea were contributed by the principal
stream of Aryan migration to the west.
This movement entered the peninsula
centrally from the east and was distrib-
uted into all parts, especially around the
southern shores of the Black sea. The
only exception to the ethnic distribution
here stated is the possible Pelasgic line
of the Hamites, carried around from
Syria into the archipelago. Otherwise,
all of the prominent nations who, out of
prehistoric shadows, came into view
with the beginning of authentic history
in Asia Minor were of a common Aryan
descent, and this descent was immedi-
ately from the point in the Caucasus
where the primitive races of Northern
Europe took their departure into Great
Russia and the West.
The Aryans, once in Asia Minor,
found themselves in a region inviting to
development. The result Multiplicity of
was that in the earliest ^S^SS^
ages of history many states Asia -
were created within a comparatively
limited territory. Kingdoms and em-
pires that even contended with the great
powers of Mesopotamia arose in several
parts of this Lesser Asia; and if the
country had been as fortunate in the
preservation, by literature and monu-
ments, of the story of its past as were
the states of Assyria, Egypt, and Greece,
we might expect some of the most strik-
ing contributions to the ethnography
and annals of primitive times. It will
be fitting in this connection to notice a
few of the leading peoples who were
developed from the Aryan stem in the
country between the Black sea and the
Mediterranean.
If any of the nations within the limits
here defined belonged, in whole or in
part, to other than an Aryan stock, it
was the Cilicians, lying at the extreme
486
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
east of the peninsula and along the
Mediterranean border. The physical
features of this country are
composition of the Taurus mountains and
theCilicians.
famous from the remotest ages for their
historical associations. The belief is
prevalent that the Phoenicians were first
to colonize these regions, and it is quite
likely that their adventurers and seamen
passed around the coast and established
settlements as far west as Lycia. To
the extent that the Phoenicians had as
the basal element in their race character
an element of Hamitic descent, it will be
proper to regard the Cilician race, espe-
cially of the seacoast provinces, as de-
scended from the southern branch of the
Noachites. But subsequently the in-
coming Aryans gave another complexion
to the people. Cilicia was Aryanized,
and remained ever afterwards virtually
an Indo-European state. In the times
of Hellenic colonization the Greeks sent
around maritime bands, who settled
along the Cilician coasts, and thus com-
pleted the race revolution which their
ancestors had begun iu prehistoric ages.
North of Cilicia lay the still greater
country of Cappadocia. The primitive
Beginnings of race inhabiting this region
was contributed directly
from the Aryan migration
westward. Indeed, the region lay im-
mediately in the path of the great move-
ment, and the people sprang up from
the elements which were dropped by the
race on its progress toward the Black sea.
The same may be said of Paphlagonia,
lying in the inner curve of that sea
on the south. We have already seen
that these countries were assigned by
the Hebrew account to the sons of
Japheth. Paphlagonia is believed to
have belonged to the Kittim of the
Japhetic dispersion, while the same
nian races.
country is by other writers assigned to
the Riphaces, descendants of Riphath,
the second tribal head of the Gomerites.
Immediately west of Cappadocia lay
the still more important country of Phryg-
ia, with its northern penin- Riseof the
<?n1a npvt to fhp Prrvnnnf-i Phrygians : their
uia next to tne rropontis. kinship with the
This region also lay imme- Armenians,
diately under the center of the migratory
line, and the primitive population was
distributed in the manner already de-
scribed for Cappadocia. The political
power subsequently developed in this
part of Asia Minor was of great impor-
tance in the earlier historical times. The
state was touched on its various borders
by Bithynia, Paphlagonia, Cappadocia,
Lyconia, Pisidia, Lycia, Caria, Lydia,
and Mysia. It was the center of the
Lesser Asia. The country of which we
here speak was called Greater Phrygia,
to distinguish it from the extension of
the same region along the Propontis,
which was known as Lesser Phrygia.
According to the traditions of the
various races of the peninsula, the Phryg-
ians were the most ancient nation of
Asia Minor. They were thought by the
Greeks to be in close race affinity with the
Thracians. There are also hints of their
relationship with the Armenians on the
east. Both of these conjectures of the
ancients were correct. The Phrygians
were the result of a migratory move-
ment out of Armenia into the countries
of the West, and the people were accord-
ingly allied, by race descent, on the east
with the Armenians, and on the west
with the Thracians. It is not the place
to review the important historical bear-
ings of Phrygia in the earlier ages of
Grecian history, or to repeat the tradi-
tions and legends which have been pre-
served of the nation.
South of Phrygia lay the smaller states
of Caria, Lycia, and Pisidia ; and to the
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. WEST ARYAN MIGRATIONS. 487
north, on the shores of the Black sea and
reaching to the Bosphorus, was the coun-
try of Bithynia. All of these
. . i j 1.
districts were peopled by
tribes ^ Q were dispersed
right and left from the original Aryan
migration which brought the ancestors
Other Minor
Asians ; Lydi-
ansinparticular.
the ^Egean were from the earliest ages
intimate. The Lydians were to the
^Egean sea what the Phoenicians were to
the Eastern Mediterranean. In the arts
and sciences they antedated the Greeks,
and their history is only second in im-
portance to that of the Hellenic states.
ROUTE OF WEST ARYANS THROUGH ASIA MINOR. PASS OF HADJIN, IN CAPPADOCIA.
Drawn by Grandsire, after Langlois.
of the Europeans to the eastern bor-
ders of the ^Egean sea. Immediately
west of Phrygia, next the archipelago,
was the important state of Lydia. The
history of the people who were here de-
veloped is better known than those who
grew into importance further east. The
Lydians were nearly allied to the Greeks.
The Ionian cities were on the Lydian
coast, and the commercial relations be-
tween the peoples on the two sides of
We have thus noted the westward
progress of the Aryans through the
whole country from Upper Mesopotamia
to the JEgean sea. This Minor Asians
region of Lesser Asia pre- SSSTSS-
sented one of the earliest ansandindicans.
fields of Aryan development. While
the Medes and Persians on the east of
the Zagros, and the Indie Aryans in
the Punjab, were laying the foundations
of their respective nationalities, the
488
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
various peoples of Asia Minor, all
closely allied by race descent and com-
mon institutions, were settling from the
nomadic state into permanent residence,
discovering the native resources which
were richly distributed in their country,
and creating those institutional forms
out of which great monarchies, rivaling
those of the valley of the Euphrates and
the Nile, were to spring and flourish.
It is probable that the westward prog-
ress of the Aryan race was considerably
Reasons for the delayed by its course
stf^ofHei- through Asia Minor. The
lenic migration, richness of the country in
resources, the fertility of the soil, the
abundance of the forests which prevailed
in prehistoric times, the acceptability of
the climate, and the general beauty of
the landscape invited to residence ; and
here the migratory and adventurous
spirit would be checked. It was only
after -the peninsula began to be well
filled with the immigrant race, when the
nations began to contend and displace
each' other by conquest, that the old
migratory impulse revived and progress
toward the west was continued. These
circumstances may account for the fact
of the different streams of migration which
appear to have discharged their volume
into the Hellenic peninsula.
With the resumption of the movement
to the west from the shores of Lydia we
Race progress have the picturesque epi-
sode of a race crossing the
^Egean by means of the
archipelago. The Cyclades are gener-
ally within easy sail the one of the
other, and the passage of a primitive
people would be easy. The gradual
spread of Phrygian and Lydian adven-
turers into these waters presents an
aspect of dispersion quite as unique as it
is poetical. Some ethnographers main-
tain that the incoming of the Hellenic
through the
Cyclades into
Hellas.
race into Hellas Proper was by means of
this island progress across the ^Egean,
while others hold that the true Hellenes
dropped into Greece from the north, out
of Thrace, whither they had drifted out
of Lesser Phrygia, across the Helles-
pont.
Perhaps the truer view would be to
ascribe the Hellenic peoples to both of
these origins. Several principal migra-
kinds of evidence point ^^Th^ce
unmistakably to the con- andThessaiy.
elusion that the Hellenes were out of
Phrygia. The Greeks themselves,
though many of them held to the myth-
ological opinion of an earth-born, or
autochthonic, origin, recited the legend
of a northern descent, and it is almost
certain that a majority of the incoming
tribes descended out of Thrace through
Thessaly, w r here they had found a foot-
ing and partial development, after their
migration from Asia. But that the
general progress of the Aryan peoples
was continued out of Asia Minor across
the ^Egean archipelago into the main-
land, thus making the two streams con-
fluent in the Hellenic peninsula, can
hardly be doubted.
Great was the restlessness of the early
races in Greece. They were, perhaps,
the most turbulent tribes of Ethnic restless-
whom history has made ^i?Lan-
a record. Ages elapsed ing of the name,
before permanence of settlement was at-
tained. They were ages of myth and
adventure. The gods were mixed with
the men, and the Titans stood between.
It now appears that the older name of
the people was in their own language
Graikoi, a term which the immigrants
had evidently applied to themselves
with a view to distinction from more
barbarous peoples. The word Graikoi,
which subsequently, in the Latin form of
Graeci, became the designative of the
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. WEST ARYAN MIGRATIONS. 489
Hellenic race among all peoples, signi-
fied old, or honorable. It was thus very
nearly equivalent to the Latin senator.
Aristotle declares that ancient Hellas
was the country about Dodona and
Achelous. "Here," he adds, "lived
the Selloi and the people then called the
Graikoi, afterwards the Hellenes." Thus
itself the elements which were after-
wards to be distributed in Italy and to
become the germs of the The Greek mi-
gration con-
Italic, or Latin, race. The tamed the po-
. - , - . tency of the
exact shape of the mi-
gration in this respect is, of course, un-
known. It is sufficient to allege that
the migratory wave out of Asia carried
*?fe ^^%^' '"" ?'-'?-: '-
<*- ^S*!^r> -'W - 3^-^^Xaifc.^ 2t-ifc.^?-'?>^.' '_" *&.
ROUTE OF THE GREEK ARYANS INTO HELLAS. PASS OF KALABAKA, THESSALY. Drawn by Taylor, from a photograph.
it appears that the Greeks, in course of
time, rejected the older national name
and substituted Hellenes as the title by
which they would be known among the
nations.
We may here pause to anticipate what
will appear in a subsequent part of the
present chapter ; that is, that this Greek,
or Hellenic, volume of tribal life flow-
ing into Hellas contained along with
M. Vol. 132
the potency of both the Greek and
Latin peoples. The uncertainty is as to
which foreran the other. It is possible
that those tribes which were destined to
plant themselves in Italy were the van-
guard of the whole movement. Again,
it is possible that the Celts of the ex-
treme west went before the Latins, but
the likelihood is that the Celtic stem
was bent around from the north of Eu-
490
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
rope and did not cross by way of the
peninsulas. It is possible also that the
prehistoric Greek and Latin stocks held
together as far west as the Hellenic
peninsula, from which point the Latin
branch continued its course to the
west. It is sufficient to know that the
name Graeco-Italic, designating the whole
stock, is appropriate as descriptive of its
ethnic character, until the two peoples
were differentiated and distributed into
their respective countries.
Students of language have been curi-
ous to inquire into the relative antiquity
of the two races as determined by their
Linguistic hints respective dialects. It is
G S r eeks ri o r r Ro. 0f a remarkable fact that the
mans. evidence points both ways.
There are parts of the Greek grammar
and vocabulary which are manifestly
older than the corresponding parts in
Latin, and, on the other hand, there are
Latin constructions and words which are
just as clearly of a higher antiquity than
those of Greek. Thus the preservation
of the ablative case in Latin points to
the retention of a form of grammar
which had died out of the more recent
grammar of the Greeks. Sumus, the
first person, plural, of the verb to be, is
much more nearly identical with the
Sanskrit asamas than is the correspond-
ing esmbn of Greek ; that is, esmbn is the
more recent grammatical inflection. On
the other hand, the retention in Greek
of the dual number in nouns and of the
middle voice in verbs indicates an older
grammatical structure than that exhib-
ited in Latin grammar, where no such
nominal and verbal inflections exist.
Likewise, the much more complete evo-
lution of the Greek verb, considered in
its entirety, and of the adjective, with
its one hundred and thirty-five inflec-
tional blossoms, shows a closer alliance
with the full tables of the older Sanskrit
than the narrower and later forms of
Latin. There is, however, nothing
really paradoxical in this seemingly con-
tradictory testimony of language as to
the relative age of the two races ; for it is
easy to perceive that in some respects the
Greek tongue might preserve the older
forms, while in other peculiarities
Latin would retain the ancient structure
and vocabulary less impaired by time
and migration than in the corresponding
linguistic development of the Hellenes.
Early in the mythical age, the incom-
ing tribes superimposing themselves
upon the Pelasgian peoples
r r Rise of the sys-
already in the peninsula, tem of ancestral
ceased to designate their myt
race as Graik, and took up a sort of
ancestral mythology, which they ever
afterwards zealously disseminated. The
story ran thus: The ancestor of their
race was the immigrant hero Hellen.
He was the son of Deucalion and Pyrrha.
He led his tribe into Hellas after the
Deluge. Hellen had three sons, Dorus,
^Eolus, and Xuthus. Dorus became the
founder of one race and JEolus of
another, while the two sons of Xuthus,
Ion and Achasus like Ephraim and
Manassah, sons of Joseph, in the Hebrew
scheme rose to equal rank with their
uncles, Dorus and JEolus, and became
the heads of the lonians and Achseans.
It will be noticed in this table of family
dispersion that the name Ion reappears,
recalling the Hebrew Javan and also the
Hindu name Javanas, which occurs in
the Laws of Menu, and is thought to
designate the lonians. This legendary
account of the origin of the principal
Greek races was accepted by the credulous
Hellenes as an ample and final ex-
planation of their origin and diversities
of national development.
Historically considered, the Hellenes
present two great branches of race
DIS TRIB UTION OF THE RA CES. WES T ARYAN MIGRA TIONS. 491
evolution : the one Dorian, and the other
Ionian. These two are separated from
each other by such marked
Place and char- .
acteristics of characteristics as to distin-
guish them in all epochs
of Greek history. The yEolian tribes
do not appear to have diverged greatly
from the common ancestral type. The
term ^olian may well be regarded
as discriminative of a number of partly
developed Greek peoples dwelling in
the northern part of Hellas, particularly
in the plains of Thessaly. With the
jostling of the other races from their
original seats, however, the JEolians
became more distinct as a people. When
the Dorians possessed themselves of the
Peloponnesus, the ^Solians passed over
to the northwest coast of Asia Minor and
established there a confederation of
cities under the name of ^olis. They
also populated the islands of Lesbos and
Tenedos, from which insular seats the
JEolic dialect of Greek spread into other
regions, and left behind some scanty
specimens in Hellenic literature.
The ^Eolian was the least important
development of the Hellenic race. ' The
Dorians were far more powerful and
famous. Their native seats
in the peninsula appear
to have been between the
ranges of Olympus and Ossa. At one
period they invaded Macedonia and
took possession of a part of the country,
but were afterwards expelled. They
established themselves in the island of
Crete, and made the little state of Doris
the seat of their power until the so-
called " return of the Heraclidae " carried
them into Peloponnesus. Here they
became predominant, and were the
virtual founders of the powerful states
of Sparta, Argos, and Messenia.
It was from this epoch in their de-
velopment that the Dorians became so
Evolution and
race character
of the Dorians.
strongly discriminated in their character
from the other Hellenes. They became
austere, rough in manners, and laconic
in speech, to the extent of transmitting
their name to all after times as a synonym
for the peculiarly selfish, stoical, and in-
different character which they presented
in their own age. Even the architecture
which they cultivated retained tinmis-
MODERN ACHAEAN TYPE ODYSSE.
Drawn by E. Ronjat, from a photograph.
takable traces of the simplicity and
severity of the Doric race, and the same
may be said of that variety of Greek
which they spoke, and out of which the
dramatists, especially the tragedians, of
the literary age were prone to draw
those archaic and rude forms of versi-
fication peculiar to the Greek tragical
chorus.
Ancient Ionia was on the coast of Asia
Minor, between the rivers Hermus and
492
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Situation of
Ionia;
decapolis.
Maeander. The adjacent islands of
Chios and Samos were included with
this dependency. How far
the lonians, or Javanites,
had been distributed along
this shore before their migration into
European Greece can not be stated with
certainty. The country above defined
was determined in its limit after the
return of the lonians, in later times, and
their resettlement in the region of their
ancient home. Here it was that they
founded the Ionian confederacy of twelve
states or cities called the Dodecapolis.
It remains to note the geographical
situation of the Achaeans. It is believed
that in the heroic age Mycenae, Argos,
and Sparta were peopled Rank and reia-
by tribes of Achaean de- L^
scent. This race also ex- the Greeks,
tended into Thessaly. Indeed, the
latter country is thought by ethnog-
raphers to have been their original
seat, whence they migrated into Pelo-
ponnesus. The importance of this
branch of the Greek race was greatly
lessened in the time of the Hellenic
ascendency. In the Homeric age the
ROUTE OF THE GR^ECO-ITALICANS. SEBENICO, ON THE DALMATIAN COAST. Drawn by Charles W. Wyllie.
Many of the most important maritime
towns of the fifth, fourth, and third
centuries B. C. were included in the list.
Here were Miletus and Ephesus, Clazom-
enae and Phocaea. The city of Smyrna
was transplanted, about 700 B. C., from
the JEolic to the Ionian confederation.
In course of time this assemblage of
important communities became subject
to Lydia, and after the overthrow of
Crcesus they were annexed to the Per-
sian empire by Cyrus. Ionia furnished
the field of broken faith and conflicting
interests from which began the great
struggle for the subjugation of Greece
by the Persian kings.
leadership of the Achaean s was con-
stantly recognized, and in the Iliad their
name is many times employed as a
synonym for the whole Greek host
engaged in the Trojan War. They
appear, however, to have been lacking
in the elements of intellectual greatness.
In the later epochs of Greek history the
term Achaean sank from its old heroic
sense into a name of contempt. But it
is of interest to note that, geographically
at least, the relative importance of the
race was acknowledged by the Romans,
who, on their conquest of Greece, gave
the name of Achaia to the whole prov-
ince.
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. WEST ARYAN MIGRATIONS. 493
Such is the outline of the distribution
of the early Aryan tribes in Hellas. The
geographical relations be-
Easy ethnic re-
lations of Greece tween that peninsula and
taly ' Italy were always easy.
The Adriatic is, even in its widest part,
a narrow body, easily crossed from shore
to shore. The course out of Epirus
around the coast into Upper Italy is
crossed with no barriers and attended
with no difficulty. It can not be known
by which of these routes the primitive
peoples of Italy were distributed to their
several tribal localities in the West, prob-
ably by both. It is safe to assume
that a race which had made its way from
beyond the Caspian, passing centuries
en route in a contest with the forces of
nature and crossing from island to island
in more remote ages, would easily navi-
gate the Adriatic. And this is the more
likely highway of the prehistoric Ital-
icans.
According to our best information
there were four principal groups of peo-
ples in primitive Italy. On the south we
find the lapygians, or OEnotrians, with
their several branching tribes, occupying
first the peninsular projection next to
Greece, and afterwards the
Place of the
lapygians; races whole country across to the
of the north. ^ < ^
Tyrrhenian sea. Some
ethnographers have concluded that these
southern peoples were not of Aryan de-
scent, and it is possible that the Hamitic
lines which we have agreed to carry into
Italy distributed some branches in the
southern parts as well as in Etruria.
Upper Italy was occupied on the east by
Gaulish, that is, Celtic, tribes, of which
the Lingones and Insubres constituted
the chief. On the west, as we have al-
ready seen, were the Etruscans, who
were clearly a foreign race, differing
radically in language and development
from the other Italic peoples.
The greatest group of primitive tribes
belonged to Central Italy and were nearly
allied in ethnic descent.
Distribution of
Of these peoples there the umbro-sa-
were five distinct stocks, * 5Uiantribes -
namely, the Umbrians, the Sabines, the
Latins, the Volscians, and the Sabellians,
commonly called Oscans, with their two
branches of Samnites and Campanians.
This scheme covers in general the popu-
lations which were distributed in the
country stretching across from the Cen-
tral Adriatic to the western shores of
Italy.
The first of these nations, called Um-
brians, had their original seats on the
Adriatic, between the Rubicon and the
^Esis. The western boundary was the
Apennine range and the Tiber. It is
likely that in early times their territories
were still more extensive. But before
the rise of the Roman gens the Umbri-
ans had already declined, and were easily-
subordinated by the dominant people.
The territory of the Sabines lay close to
Latium, and they and the Latins had in-
timate relations from the earliest times.
The Sabine district was rugged in physi-
cal features and inclement in climate,
and the opportunities of development
were much less favorable than those of
the people on the west.
The origin of the Latins is involved in
inextricable myths. Poets and fable-
makers of republican and
Myth and tradi-
imperial Rome elaborated tion of the prim-
and inflected the legendary
lore which they had received from antiq-
uity until it resembled the Greek fables
in complexity and contradiction. One
myth assigned to the Latins a Pelasgic
origin, in common with the Pelopon-
nesian Greeks and the Etruscans. More
famous was the tradition of a descent
from the heroic families of Troy. A
more obscure legend assigned the moun-
LAND OF THE ANCIENT LIGURIANS MASSA. NEAR CARRARA Drawn by J. Fulle> love
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. WEST ARYAN MIGRATIONS. 495
tainous parts of Central Italy as the native
seat from which the founders of Latium
had descended into the low countries of
the west. There was an attempt in all
this to bring in, after the Greek fashion,
the agency of the gods, and to make it
appear that the Latins were of divine
origin and fatherhood. It is sufficient
to recognize the kinship of these peoples
with the other races associated with
them in historical development in Cen-
tral Italy.
The Volscians were prominent among
the prehistoric peoples of the peninsula.
They had for their neighbors the Sabel-
Scantyknowi- lians, or Oscans. Their
SsfS:- home was in the forbid-
situation. ding mountain district with
which their name is geographically asso-
ciated. At the beginning of authentic
history they had ceased to be a separate
people, and the remains of the race are
scanty and imperfect. It may be said,
however, that their isolated situation in
the mountains tended to preserve their
dialect from the mutations to which the
languages of the neighboring tribes were
subjected.
In the earliest times the Oscans pos-
sessed the largest territory in Central
Predominance Italy. Their country ex-
tended well to the south,
an( j this wide region they
continued to dominate until Rome be-
gan by conquest to become mistress of
Italy. Of the various Oscan peoples,
the Samnites were the most powerful
tribe, though the Campanians, Luca-
nians, and Bruttians were all impor-
tant peoples before the ascendency of
Rome.
If we glance to Northern Italy, we
find three peoples of different ethnic de-
scent in that region. The Gauls proper
occupied the great plains in the valley of
the Po and its tributaries. Their coun-
?neit e a?ian ans;
try extended from the Alps to the Apen-
nines and the Adriatic. It was com-
monly conceded that their immigration
into Italy had been of a later date than
that which must be assigned for the
coming of the central nations. The
principal divisions of the Gaulish race
were the Insubres and the Senomani
on the north of the Po, and the Boii and
the Lingones on the south of that river.
The second general division of the
peoples of Upper Italy were the Veneti,
whose country covered the
Plcics Lxicl clGri*
whole head of the Adriatic vationof the
from Istria on the east
to the valley of the Po in the west. Cor-
responding with what is now the south-
ern part of Piedmont lay the territory
of the Ligurians, of whose origin not
much is known. They came into the
country, however, before the Gauls,
and were doubtless allied in their
race descent with the peoples of Cen-
tral Italy. Such in general was the
tribal distribution of those primitive races
which in process of time were consoli-
dated under the leadership of the Latins,
and ultimately forged into the most pow-
erful nationality of the ancient world.
It appears tolerably conclusive that the
Graeco-Italic migration reached its limit
with the Alps on the north T
Limits of the
and Liguria on the west. Greece-italic
^ .. . . .. migrations.
Other Aryan tribes in
course of time found their way through
the Alpine passes, and penetrated the
civilizations established by their kins-
men in the south of Europe. But the
Italic race proper was stayed with Italy.
We therefore return to the East and
again take our stand in the region of the
transcaucasus. Here, on the northern
slopes of the Armenian mountains, we
find the Aryan dispersion pressing bold-
ly to the north.
In the country between the Caspian
496
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
and the eastern shore of the Black sea
at least two ethnic departures were made
from the main branch of migration. The
Origin and first of these was to the right
NoTthAry'an 6 of the line of progress, and
distribution. contributed the Ossetes and
perhaps one or two other stocks of Indo-
Europeans on the western borders of the
Caspian. The other division seems to
have been maritime in its plan, to have
entered the Black sea, and to have car-
ried itself in the direction of the Bos-
phorus. It is not unlikely that the
ancient Phrygians, especially that part of
the race inhabiting the Black sea coast,
were contributed by this deflected move-
ment out of Upper Armenia.
By the course of the line we are now
pursuing we are unexpectedly brought
into proximity with that country in Asia
Ethnic move- Minor which received the
SSSS" 1 ** final migratory impulse of
reached Galatia. the Celtic race. Though we
have not yet reached the point in ethnic
dispersion from which that race took its
departure from the main northwestern
stem of Aryan progression, we may well
anticipate sufficiently to account for the
presence in Asia Minor, on the southern
borders of Bithynia and Paphlygonia, of
a country peopled by Celts. This is the
province of Galatia. The population of
this country was contribiited by the bend-
ing back of the Celtic race from its west-
ern limits of migration in the remote
parts of Europe. The movement in
question presents one of the strangest
aspects of race progress. It is that of
an ethnic line carried backward from the
lower parts of Spain, in the old country of
the Iberians, around the northern coasts
of the Mediterranean, across Upper Italy,
and down through the valley of the Dan-
ube to the Bosphorus. The latter part
'of this movement took place in the his-
j
torical era. In the third century B. C.
the Gallic people crossed over into Asia
Minor and conquered the province to
which they gave their own name. This
invading migration was carried forward'
by three principal tribes and twelve
tetrarchies, each directed by a chief,
after the Celtic manner of warfare. It
is instructive to reflect, while we here
have our stand on the highlands of
Phrygia or PontUs, that we are able to
observe, as with a field glass, the north-
ward movement of the old Aryan stock
on the eastern borders of the Black sea,
while, on the other hand, we can look
down into Galatia, which was the ter-
minus, after perhaps two thousand
years, of one branch of the great migra-
tion.
If then, for a moment, we anticipate
the departure of the Celts from the main
Aryan stem, which we are now tracing, to
the north, we shall find the point of depar-
same to have occurred about *,*
the valley of the Upper in Europe.
Dnieper. From this point the migra-
tory impulse bore off almost due west,
across the larger part of Europe. It
traversed Germany, and crossed the
Rhine in general conformity with the
coast line of the Baltic. It is probable
that by this first movement to the west
no races were deposited in anything like
permanence until the stream was dis-
persed in Gaul. If we seek for time rela-
tions in this great movement we are at
fault, but the period of the Celtic migra-
tion could hardly have been less than
two thousand years B. C.
It would appear from the invasion of
Gaul and Britain by the Romans, in the
first century B. C., that the complete
rVH-io ranp "harl nlr
naa air
been long established in Britain.
those regions, and that it had matured
its institutional forms without disturb-
ance. This is especially true of the
opmentofthe
rac em&auiand
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. WEST ARYAN MIGRA TIONS. 497
western parts of Gaul and of Britain,
where the completeness of the druidical
ceremonial and perfect condition of
tribal government indicated a long oc-
cupation of the country. Ethnographers
have not attempted to decide with cer-
tainty the priority
of the respective
mo vem en ts by
which the British
Isles received their
primitive Celtic
population and
Central Italy
passed under
the dominion of
Graeco - Italic im-
migrants.
In the begin-
nings of authentic
history the Celts
had already trav-
ersed Northern
Europe, and had
left traces of their
progress in the
east and actual
tribes in the west.
It was from this
source that the
Gauls (Celtae),
whom Caesar de-
clares to have been
divided into three
races of Galli ,
Aquitan i, an d
Belgae, were dis-
tributed. In all of
Europe west of the Rhine the Celtic
wide distribu- race became predominant,
almost to the exclusion of
other people. If we ex-
cept the Basques and Iberians, it may
be said that the whole country between
the Rhine and the Atlantic was Celtic
as to its primitive population.
In the preceding book we have already
pointed out the fact that prehistoric
races occupied this part of The Celtic races
Europe before the Aryan SSSS?
migration. What the COn- barbarians.
dition of the aborigines was at the time
tion of the Celts
throughout the
West.
THE CELTIC VANGUARD, OF THE AGE OF BRONZE.
Drawn by Emile Bayard.
of the incoming of the Celts we are left to
determine by conjecture. We have seen
the extreme barbarity which character-
ized the aboriginal life of the cave
dwellers and other savages to whom
primeval Europe seems to have belonged.
Upon these rude races the Celtic tribes
were superimposed, and the foundations
498
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
were laid of that condition which we
perceive when the expanding power of
Rome brought her legions into Gaulish
territory.
As the Celtic race continued its way to
the south, several streams of migration
put off laterally to the coast. The most
Ramifications of important of these crossed
3KSSS2* the channel into . Britain >
isles. where it again divided, one
branch being carried over into Ireland,
.and the other penetrating the Highlands
of Scotland. An examination of the
Celtic languages has enabled the modern
.ethnographer to determine with toler-
OLDEST CELTIC TYPES.
From the Gaulish bas-reliefs found at Entremont, near Aix.
.able certainty the original distribution
of the race in the British islands. There
were two general Celtic stocks. The
first of these was the Gadhelic, or Gaelic,
branch, which was divided into three
.departures : the Irish stem proper, called
the Erse, the Scottish Gael, and the
Manx. These linguistic divisions point
unmistakably to the tribal separation of
the Gael of the Highlands, the Irish folk,
and the inhabitants of the Isle of Man.
The second stem presents the British
division proper of Celtic. This also
parted into three : the first of which was
the Kymraeg, softened into Cymric,
meaning the original speech of the
Welsh; the second was the Cornish;
and the third the Armorican, being the
language of Bretagne.
We thus note the dispersion of the
Celts in our ancestral islands, and dis-
cover the parts Of the COUn- Bending back of
try appropriated by the SSSSSr"
several tribes. Meanwhile, beginning,
far down in Spain the main continental
stream of Celtic migration was bent
backwards, as we have seen above,
through the greater part of Southern
Europe, making its way finally to the
valley of the Danube and thence to the
Bosphorus. From this point migration
and warfare carried the race, as has been
said, into Galatia, thus bringing it in
its final distribution to a point so near to
the original Aryan movement east of the
Black sea that the old departure of the
race to the northwest and its last distribu-
tion in Galatia after thousands of years of
wandering might almost be seen with a
field glass in the hands of the observer
from the highlands of Eastern Pontus !
In resuming the consideration of the
movement of the great northwestern
branch of the Aryan race, Question of the
race connection
making its way between of Teutons and
the Black sea and the Cas- er ed. S C *
pian, from the transcaucasus toward
the Don, we are confronted by another
of the disputed questions in ethnogra-
phy. This relates to the independent
or dependent origin of the Slavic peo-
ples in their relations with the great
Teutonic family. Were the Slavs and
Germans involved originally in a com-
mon movement out of Asia? Were
they still a common people in their
progress from their Asiatic origin to
their European dominions ? If so,
where and when did they part com-
pany in linguistic and institutional de-
velopment ? Which is the older of the
two races ? Which, if either, is derived
DIS TRIE UTION OF THE RA CES. WES T ARYAN MIGRA TIONS. 499
Branches and
directions of the
Teuto-Slavonic
from the other ? Was the migration
common to both, or were there tivo mi-
grations, one Slavonic and the other
Teutonic ? These problems have been
variously solved by different ethnogra-
phers, and the whole ground has been
hotly contested since the question of
race distribution assumed its present
scientific aspect.
On the whole, it appears that the
movement was common which carried
these two raCCS OUt of
A : ^f^ Fnrrvnp Tt mav
ASia ini -^ ur P e - mav
be safely alleged that the
Teutonic and Slavonic peoples held to-
gether on their way to the north and far
into the heart of Great Russia. It would
be proper to call the whole line of prog-
ress from the Caucasus to the north, well
tip to the northern borders of the Russian
empire, thence westward and southward
to the borders of Poland, the Slavo-
Teutonic stem. It certainly carried the
volume of both races, both languages,
both varieties of institutional forms.
Above the sea of Azof, on the left as
the migratory progress continued, a
branch was thrown off into Sarmatia,
from which that division of the modern
Slavs, called Little Russians, have
sprung. But the main line continued
northward in the direction of the sub-
sequent site of Moscow, and afterwards
toward the gulf of Riga, on the Baltic.
It was, however, to the south of the
gulf of Finland, and perhaps nearly
midway between that water and the
northern bend of the Black sea that the
final separation took place between the
Germanic and the Slavonic races. In
the meantime, a branch had been thrown
off northward toward that collection of
inland waters extending from the White
sea to lake Ladoga, and another divi-
sion to the west, into the country of the
Letts.
If, then, we take our stand on the
head-waters of- the Dnieper, we shall
not be far from the ethnic division on
which was based the subse- Point of division
quent _ separation of the
Slavonic and Teutonic peo-
pies. The two stocks were both char-
acterized for extreme fecundity and
power of development. There are at
the present time within the limits of
European Russia and Poland about sev-
enty-five million of people of Aryan
descent. These may be divided into
Russians proper, Poles, Bulgarians,
Czechs, and Serbs, all of which are
Slavonic in their ethnic origin.
The Russians are subdivided into
Great Russians, Little Russians, and
White Russians. The Letto-Lithua-
nian peoples are divided into Lithua-
nians proper, Zhmuds, and Letts, with a
total of over three million. This is the
summary of populations which have
sprung in modern times from the sin-
gle ethnic stem called Letto-Slavonic.
The Great Russians themselves number
forty-two million, and the Little Rus-
sians more than seventeen million.
Besides the above peoples, the Graeco-
Roman population in Russia numbers
considerably over a million, while the
Germans, in admixture with the Arme-
nians, Georgians, and Tsigans are repre-
sented by considerable communities.
Geographically, the Great Russians
are grouped in the states and provinces
around Moscow, extending Distribution of
northward to Novgorod and * %*
Vologda, southward to Russians.
Kiev, eastward to Penza and Vyatka,
westward to the Baltic provinces and
the borders of Poland. The Little Rus-
sians are distributed chiefly in Galicia
and Bukovina. In general, they belong
to the southern parts of Russia, next to
the Caucasus. The White Russians are
500
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
distributed throughout the western gov-
ernments of the empire. The Bulgari-
ans inhabit Bulgaria Proper, Eastern
Roumelia, and Roumania, and are scat-
tered into Austria, Russia, and Mace-
donia. The other ethnic divisions are
dispersed into the countries to which
they have given their respective names
Servia, Lithuania, Croatia, etc.
Second only in importance as to num-
bers and first in importance in civiliz-
ing energy are the Teutonic
of the race. mon with the peoples de-
scribed above from the Slavo-Germanic
stem. A glance at the map will show
that Europe is divided from southeast to
northwest by the two great rivers Dan-
ube and Rhine, whose waters issue from
the same upland region, in the central
part of the continent. It was on the
right bank of the Rhine, extending
down to the Baltic from the great cen-
tral region, that the Germanic nations
were first distributed. As the left bank
of that river and hitherward to the west-
ern parts of Europe belonged roughly
to the Celtic race, so the right bank east-
ward to the Vistula was Germania.
Into this great region was extended
and dispersed the Teutonic stream of
immigration. Roughly speaking, the
whole Teutonic stock was parted into
three divisions, which correspond rough-
ly with the modern linguistic distinc-
tions of High German, Low German, and
Scandinavian. In prehistoric times,
however, one of the first distinct de-
partures of the primitive stock was that
which carried down the great race of the
Goths into the valley of the Danube.
They issued from the southern portion
of the Baltic region, and appeared on
the scene of their subsequent activities
during the fourth century B. C.
The family known as Gothic has been
somewhat unscientifically divided into
the Vandals, the Heruli, the Rugii, the
Gepidae, the Alani, the
. Analysis and
buevi, the Longobards, the distribution of
-D j' -, , -, the Goths.
Burgundians, and the
Franks. On their arrival on the Lower
Danube the Gothic race began to di-
vide into the two major families of Os-
trogoths and Visigoths, meaning the
Eastern and Western Goths. The for-
mer had a habitation originally in South-
ern Russia, between the Dniester and the
Don, while the latter held their terri-
tories from the Lower Danube to the
Carpathian mountains. In course of
time the Goths were pressed on their
eastern frontiers by various invasions,
until they were aggregated and heaped
up on the left bank of the Danube,
whence they ultimately burst into the
Roman empire. After this event, as is
well known, the Ostrogoths found an ul-
timate lodgment in Italy, while the Vis-
igoths continued their progress into the
Spanish peninsula and became a sub-
stratum of population in the modern
ethnic development of that peninsula.
The Franks appeared as an aggrega-
tion of Teutonic tribes on the Lower
Rhine as early as the middle of the third
century B. C. At the first Franks people
they were confined to the *?,
right bank of the river, distribution.
but in course of time passed over and
began their settlements in the northern
part of Gaul. They were ultimately
divided into two families, known as the
Salian Franks and the Ripuarians. It
was the former division of the race that
was thrown by impact on Gaul, and that
was established within the limits of that
country as a barbarian empire under
Clovis and his successors. The Ripua-
rians spread southward and occupied first
the right and afterwards the left bank of
the Rhine, whence they carried their
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. WEST ARYAN MIGRATIONS. 501
incursions on the west to the Meuse and
on the east to the Main. It was from the
Ripuarian Franks that the Teutonic
state called Franconia took its name.
The Salians constituted one of the ethnic
elements in the
formation of the
French people.
It will prove of
interest to note
only the ultimate
distribution of the
other branches of
the Teutonic stock.
The Vandals were
essentially of this
race, but had taken
into their constitu-
tion Slavonic and
Celtic elements.
They belonged to
the general divi-
sion of Goths. One
of their oldest seats
was in the Riesen-
Gebirge. After-
wards they occu-
pied Pannonia and
Dacia. In the fifth
century of our era
they played an im-
portant part in the
overthrow of the
Roman empire. In
the Spanish penin-
sula they founded
the state of Anda-
lusia. Under Gen-
seric they crossed
into Africa, and
there developed
their greatest strength and nationality.
The Heruli were the earliest of the
German races to make their way into
Italy. There they established themselves
under their great leader Odoacer, and
the Herulian kingdom was the first bar-
barian empire created within the limits
of the home government of Rome. The
Gepidas were likewise of Gothic extrac-
tion. Historically, they are first known
THE PRANKISH VANGUARD.
Drawn by Emile Bayard.
to us in the third century B. C., in their
territories on the Baltic. They also
came into Pannonia, and were interposed
for a while between the Ostrogothic and
Visigothic divisions of the race. They
502
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
were joined to the armies of Attila, and
were subsequently successful in gaining
a province for themselves,
Movements of
the Hemii and on the Lower Theiss and
Danube . Here they were
finally overrun by the Longobards and
the Avars, with whom the remnants of
the race were amalgamated.
One of the most powerful of the Ger-
man migratory tribes was the Suevi.
Their territories lay between the Rhine
and the Weser. In their
Progress of the
Suevi; the Lon- progress and development
gobards in Italy. ^ spread southward as
far as the Upper Danube. On the north
they reached the coasts of the Baltic. It
was with the Suevians that Caesar had
one of his hardest contests in his
struggle for dominion north of the Alps.
The Longobards, commonly called Lom-
bards, were nearly related to the Suevic
branch of the German race. From their
seats in the valley of the Elbe they
made their way into Italy, within the
historical period, overthrew the Heru-
lian monarchy, and established one of
their own on the ruins of the empire.
In later times they contributed their
name to the modern state of Lombardy
in Italy, and it is likely that their ethnic
influence entered more largely into the
formation of the northern Italian race
than did the qualities of any other bar-
barian people.
The Burgundians were a branch of the
Gothic family, and first established
Ethnic place and themselves in Europe, in
the country between the
Oder and the Vistula. The
Gepidae drove them from their seats, and
they sought refuge in the territory lying
between the Main and Neckar. Here
they were combined in common enter-
prises with the Suevi and Alani and the
Vandals in their wars with the remain-
ing powers of Rome. Afterwards they
struggled with the Franks, by whom
they were restricted to the province
bearing their name. Such, in brief, was
the European distribution of the prin-
cipal barbarian nations of the Gothic
stock. .
Meanwhile, another division of the
Teutonic race had made its way along
the shores of the Baltic, outspread of
and in Jutland, Friesland, %*
Angleland, and in Hollow- Norse,
land had possessed themselves of the
country and begun the formation of in-
stitutions. This is the so-called Low
Germanic branch of the Aryan family.
The tribal ramification in these lowlands
was extraordinary. It was from this re-
gion that the Angles and Saxons and
Jutes took their rise, and, in the fifth
century, carried their battle-axes and
spears into the forests of Britain.
From the southern coast line of the
North sea the race next made its way
into Scandinavia. Two branches of mi-
gration sprang from this region, one
penetrating the great peninsula of Nor-
way and Sweden, and the other making
its way by water to Iceland. It was in
the latter island that the Norse, or Scan-
dinavian, race presented, and does until
the present exhibit, the purest aspect of
Scandinavian life and manners. There
have always been such intimate race re-
lations between the southern and north-
ern shores of the Baltic that the Low
Germans inhabiting the two countries
have intermingled almost to the extinc-
tion of ethnic differences. But in Ice-
land the old Norse, or Scandinavian,
stock has been allowed to develop accord-
ing to its own laws into an independent
race character.
Such, then, was the distribution of the
great Teutonic and Slavonic races in the
northern parts of Europe. It will be of
interest to note the extent of the complete
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. WEST ARYAN MIGRA TIONS. 503
dispersion of the Aryan family of men.
On the east the Indie branch of the race
reached the meridian of
Extent of the
dispersion of the ninety degrees east from
Aryan family. Greenwich . Qn the west
the extreme limit of the primary Indo-
European development was in Iceland
and Ireland, under the meridian of ten
tively. In the latter country the race was
dispersed as far south as Beluchistan,
and in the former to the bay of Bengal,
in latitude twenty degrees north. But
turning to the westward branches of the
Indo-Europeans, we find them invaria-
bly bending to the north. Perhaps the
only exception to this general law was
NORTHERN LIMIT OF THE ARYAN DISPERSION. VIEW IN UPPER NORWAY. Drawn by Myrbach, from a photograph.
degrees west, making a complete diver-
gence east and west of one hundred de-
grees of longitude.
It was a peculiarity of the Aryan race
General and ex- never to be deflected to the
Stsofthe - ^uth; that is, in its west-
Aryans. ward movements. The In-
dican and Iranian branches of the family
dropped into India and Persia respec-
in the case of the Celts, who, from their
somewhat northern range in Germany,
turned to the southwest across the Rhine
into Gaul, and thence continued their
course in the same direction as far as the
country of the Basques and Iberians in
Spain.
The northernmost limit of the whole
movement was reached in the upper parts
504
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
of Norway and Sweden, about the parallel
of seventy degrees north. The migra-
tion thus, in its entirety,
Extent and ,
boundaries of presents a band very nearly
the Aryan belt. coi - ncident with the north
temperate zone. The belt is forty-five
degrees in width, reaching a little above
and extending a little below the limits of
the zone referred to. The next conspicu-
ous feature of this great distribution is
the fact that it is essentially European.
The exceptions within the borders of
that continent of peoples derived from
any other than Aryan stock are so few
and insignificant as to be neglected with-
out hurt to the general scheme. Europe
is Aryan, and the Western Aryans are
Europeans.
It is, of course, not the purpose to
extend the lines of race movement by
Only conscious tracing out the continental
KoSSSdto colonization and develop-
migration. ment of the two Americas
by people of Indo-European blood, or to
note the world-wide colonization which
has been effected within the last two or
three centuries, by people of the same
race. These secondary movements, if
developed in this connection, would con-
fuse the concept of the original or
natural distribution of mankind in the
prehistoric ages. There is a sense in
which men have moved from place to
place on the surface of the earth imcon-
sciously. That is, the movement has
been accomplished while the race was
still in the unconsciousness of childhood.
There is another sense in which civiliza-
tion has consciously carried forward the
work of peopling the earth. All the
latter movements are of record in the open
annals of authentic history, and with
such development and expansion the
ethnographer has not much to do. His
work is primarily with those prehistoric
movements in which the races of men
were distributed, under the influence of
instinct and environment, to their
destination in different quarters of the
earth.
At this point, then, we touch the
limit of the primeval excursions and
settlements of the Ruddy races of man-
kind. To these races We General view of
have given the general eth- gj ^g of
nic name of Noachites, but races -
have chosen to define them more scien-
tifically by the term Ruddy, as indica-
tive of their color. We have now traced
out the dispersion of the three families
to which ethnography has assigned the
popular and traditional names of Ham-
ites, Semites, and Japhethites. We
have seen the first dropping southward
into a form of geographical development
very similar to" that which the Japheth-
ites, or Aryans, have exhibited in the
north. The whole scheme of migratory
dispersion resembles the two sides of a
leaf, having its stem between the Cas-
pian and the Persian gulf, its point in
the Atlantic west of the Pillars of
Hercules, its left-hand side in Arabia
and Africa, and its right division in
Europe. The central lines of this leaf
correspond in general with the move-
ments of the Semitic races to the west.
The right-hand lines are those of the
Aryans, and the left-hand departures
those of the Hamites.
The limits of the present chapter are
reached when we have marked out
the migratory movements by which
they were distributed into their re-
spective countries. It now remains
to take up another general division of
mankind, and to note in like manner
the course which the Brown races have
pursued on their way to their destina-
tion in the great arena of Asia, in the
islands of the Pacific, and ultimately in
the two Americas.
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BROWN DISPERSION. 505
xxix. DISPERSION OK THE BROWN RACES.
F it were , not for the
Black races of man-
kind distributed in
Equatorial and South-
ern Africa, in Aus-
tralia, and Melanesia,
the primitive seat of
the human family might perhaps be dis-
covered. If the observer should take
his stand upon the mountains of West-
ern Afghanistan, he would not be far
from such a crossing and divergence of
ethnic lines as might indicate the original
center from which the human race was
Common source distributed into all quarters
may be found. sav that in the country be-
tween the Afghan borders and Beluchis-
tan the Brown races of men, as well as
the Ruddy races, seem to take their
rise. All the Mongoloid varieties of
mankind can be traced back to this
geographical center, and we have already
seen that the Noachite, or Ruddy, race
had its origin somewhere in the same
region.
It will not do, however, to press these
indications too far. The Dravidian peo-
Dravidians ap- pies, also brown as to their
SSSSSS*. color ' had a departure
of departure. somewhat further south, on
the coast, between the mouth of the
Indus and the Persian gulf. In fact, the
origin of this branch of the human fam-
ily appears to have been nearly coinci-
dent with what may be supposed to have
been the seat of the pre-Noachites. But
a greater obstacle in the way of deter-
mining an ethnic center for all the divi-
sions of mankind is encountered in the
case of the Black races, who seem not to
have originated from this region at all.
M. Vol. i33
Some ethnographers, going beyond
the limits of determined fact, have at-
tempted to find the origin Hypothesis of
of the Brown races in the common origin
for all in Le-
Indian ocean ; that is, in a
submerged continent formerly occupying
the bottom of that sea. This theory has,
no doubt, been put forth with a view to
reconciling existing facts with the hy-
pothesis of a single origin for the whole
human race, and it maybe admitted that
such a hypothesis would fairly explain
the facts to which it is applied. In the
present state of knowledge, however, the
line of demarkation between ascertained
truth and hypothetical explanation must
be strictly observed ; not with a view to
the denial of the possible truth in the
supposition of a submarine continent un-
der the Indian ocean, with its Lemuria.
a thing indeed probable; not with a
view to the positive assertion of such an
opinion as the truth, but simply to main-
tain a definite boundary between knowl-
edge and conjecture.
We must, therefore, content ourselves
to note the issuance of the Brown races
from Beluchistan, and to trace from that
origin the course of the tribal migrations
which ensued. It maybe Criteria for de-
inquired by what right or *"
for what reason the eth- migrations.
nographer fixes upon such a locality as
the point of departure for great races in-
habiting distant quarters of the earth,
particularly since the movement which
has distributed those races to their re-
spective countries was prehistoric, and
therefore not to be ascertained by the
usual methods of proof. It may be well,
at this point, to satisfy the reader as to
the validity of that course of reasoning
506
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
which leads inevitably to the conclusion
of certain race origins and divergencies
beyond the borders of authentic history.
In the first place, the testimony of
language is nearly always available in
in -what manner carrying the inquirer back-
the language .JJ .
and institutions ward to a point wnicn ne
estored. may ' could not otherwise reach.
Suppose, for instance, that all authentic
from the minds of men. Would it be
possible, under such circumstances, to
revive, by means of existing languages,
a knowledge of the Latin race, of its in-
stitutions, its practices, and, in general,
its history?
Undoubtedly such a revival could be
easily produced. Take the six modern
Roman languages, called Italian, French,
ROUTE OF'THE DRAVIDIAN DISPERSION. GORGE AND FORTRESS OF ARDERBEND. Drawn by A. de Bar, after a sketch o I
Blocqueville,
knowledge of the great political power
called Rome was obliterated from the
annals of mankind. Suppose that every
book in which a trace of the Latin lan-
guage and literature is recorded were
utterly destroyed. Suppose that the
memory and tradition of the people
e-alled Romans had passed completely
Spanish, Portuguese, Wallachian, and
Provencal, and examine their structure
and peculiarities. It is found that they
have been originally deduced from some
common speech having a grammar and vo-
cabulary of a determinate form. Out of
the study of these six languages that old
grammar and vocabulary can be recon-
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BROWN DISPERSION. 507
structcd, and when reconstructed, they
are Latin. If Latin, then there was a
Latin race that spoke it. If a Latin race,
it had its seat and its institutions. The
seat of the race can be discovered geo-
graphically by tracing back the lines of
departure by which the six nations re-
ferred to have reached their respective
countries ; and the institutions of Rome
can be largely redeveloped by means of
tions of a method which may be univer-
sally pursued. Wherever two kindred
tribes are found on the earth an ex-
amination of their language and of
their geographical environment will
lead, if carefully carried out, to a dis-
covery of their common origin, or of the
divergence of the one from the other.
By this and analogous processes, strictly
scientific in their nature and peculiarly
LAND OF THE DRAVIDIANS. CAPE COMORIN, INDIA.
the etymological hints and inherent reve-
lations of the descendent languages.
In like manner we may group togeth-
er Latin and Greek and Old High Ger-
man, Celtic, Slavic, Persic, and Sanskrit,
The -whole Ar- and, by means of a similar
yan group may orvmnaricrm nf tTip>c^ o-r^at
be reconstruct- comparison c . tnese great
ed likewise. varieties of speech, can
revive the grammar and vocabulary of
the primitive Aryan race lying, in all of
its activities, completely below the day-
dawn of history. These are but illustra-
interesting as methods for the increase
of human knowledge, the ethnic lines
of the prehistoric nations may be traced
over continents and across seas until, by
their conjunctions, convergencies, and
parallelisms, we are able to determine
with approximate accuracy the earliest
movements of the human race.
We will begin the examination of the
migrations of the Brown races of men by
tracing out the coiirse of the Dravidians,
these being the southernmost of the
508
GREA T RA CES OF MANKIND.
2S2SX?"
peraion.
ethnic divisions which we are to consider.
Perhaps they were the oldest. At any
Direction and rate, their origin appears
to have been nearer to
the Indian ocean than
was the line of the Asiatic Mongoloids.
As already intimated, the point of de-
parture between this branch of the hu-
man family and the primary stem of the
Ruddy races may be fixed in southern
Beluchistan. From this region the Dra-
vidian migratory movement was toward
the east, into the valley of the Indus. It
is probable -that the place at which the
Brown tribes first entered the country
was near the junction of the several
streams which, converging from the
north, inclose the Punjab. From this
region the dispersion of the race began,
eastward across the uplands of Northern
Hindustan and southward into the penin-
sula proper.
It can not be doubted that from the
region here described the great country
between the bay of Bengal and the Ara-
invading Aryans bian sea received its original
SSSirf populations. It will be re-
India. membered that in the pre-
ceding book we had occasion, in speak-
ing of the incoming of the Old Aryans
into the Punjab and their dispersion
hence through Hindustan, to refer to the
preoccupation of the country by aborigi-
nal tribes. These, then, are the peoples
whom the Aryans found and overcame
on their entrance into India. It was,
perhaps, the first contact of the Ruddy
races of the northwest with the Brown
peoples of the southeast, since the orig-
inal dispersion if such there were of
the race.
No historical record has been preserved
of the conquests or other measures by
which the Aryans became dominant in
India. But there are the best of reasons
for believing that the original population
was spared by the stronger people, and
was absorbed or amalgamated into the
Hindu races of after times. The conquerors '
One of the principal evi- SSSJSf 11 *
dences of such amalgama- races -
tion is found in the color which peop.le of
this region of the earth subsequently as-
sumed. The modern Hindu is a living
witness of some prehistoric change in
complexion, in all probability the direct
result of the admixture of the primitive
Brown races of the peninsula with the
dominant Aryan conquerors from the
north and west.
The fact to which we have just re-
ferred of a permanent modification in
the color of the skin by the Probability that
admixture of races, and
the establishment thereby iona>
of a typical complexion different some-
what from that of either of the original
peoples from which it is derived, are
general phenomena which recur, under
like circumstances, in different parts of
the world. In all probability every
race now existing on the face of the
earth has been somewhat modified in its
complexion by the absorption of foreign
elements, and it is only by a recognition
of this fact and a reference of it to its
true causes that the ethnographer has
been able to discover that underlying
all the shades of complexion in the
world are only a few fundamental colors
from which every intermediate hue has
been obtained by admixture and amal-
gamation.
For a long time after the attempt was
first made to classify the human race on
some rational plan, the color of the dif-
ferent families of men was coiorofthehu-
regarded as an incident of S^ESSSf
climate. It was believed mate,
that races transferred from one region
to another suffered a change of complex-
ion under the influence of sun and air.
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BROWN DISPERSION. 509
Beginning with the general fact that the
darker races are, for the most part, equa-
torial in their distribution, it was con-
cluded that the Black races had become
so from the high heat, the scorching
sunlight, and the arid atmosphere to
which they were exposed. It was as-
sumed that the White races belonged to
the higher latitudes and that the Yellow
and Brown peoples have been made so
by their respective geographical, or
rather climatic, environment. It has
remained for more careful investiga-
tions to show that these opinions have
but little foundation in fact.
It appears, then, that instead of the
colors of the different races being de-
Variations of pendent upon the latitude
*. am* other conditions of
nic conditions. ^Q country into which
the tribes were dispersed, the different
complexions of the primitive peoples
were almost independent of their posi-
tion with respect to the equator. The
relation, or correlation, between color
and climate is neither constant nor ex-
act in any particular. It has been found
that some of the Indians of Upper Cal-
ifornia, under the latitude of forty-two
degrees north, are as black as the Ne-
groes of Guinea; and it is also noted
that those Negroes who are at a de-
parture of as much as fifteen degrees
from the equator are much more nearly
absolutely black than those who dwell
along the equatorial line ; that is, in
this region the race seems to grow whiter
with its approach to the center of solar
influence.
In the southernmost parts of North
America, namely, in the extremes of
Evidence of the Mexico lying between the
insufficiency of lofifii/lpq n f fifteen rlpoTPP<;
climate to make ^iiiuaes oi nneen degrees
complexion. an( j twenty-three degrees
north, many of the aboriginal peoples
Were of a reddish or olive complexion,
almost as light as that of the Ruddy
races. The Esquimaux of the extreme
north of Europe and America are very
dark as to their complexion, while the
Finns, who are almost as near the polar
regions as it is possible for men to live,
are comparatively white. The concom-
itant facts of light hair and blue eyes,
along with the lightness of skin color,
belong to many tribes that are dispersed
well toward the tropical regions. The
Afghans of India and the Taureg tribes
of the Sahara desert and the Amazonian
nations of South America are of this
character. Humboldt has pointed out
the fact that the South American In-
dians inhabiting the plateau of the Cor-
dilleras, clearly within the torrid zone,
are identical in color with others whom
he had observed as far down as the forty-
fifth degree of south latitude. We are
thus constrained by undeniable facts to
refer the extremes of complexion in the
human race to an origin other than cli-
matic environment. In fact, the races
of men differ in color absolutely, and have
done so independently of their geograph-
ical position from the earliest ages in
which human phenomena began to be
observed and recorded.
Returning from this digression, we
find the lines of distribution for the
Dravidians to be drawn course of the
around by the valley of the
Ganges, skirting the south- Ceylon,
eastern coast of the Indian peninsula to
its southern extremity. Thence the
race passed, by easy migration, into the'
island of Ceylon, where it received per-
haps its most characteristic development.
It is here that the modern Veddahs, of
whom mention has been previously
made, display the old race character in
its recent aspects. In the island, as
well as on the continent, however, the
dominant Aryan peoples have pressed
510
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
upon the natives, until the latter now
represent only about thirty per cent of
the whole population. In the prehistoric
age all the aborigines of Ceylon were of
the same Brown family with the people
of Southern India and Eastern Beluchis-
tan. At the present time the Dravid-
ian population is compacted in the east-
ern and southern parts of the island,
where the condition and character of the
race are still subject to the study of
travelers and scholars.
MODERN DRAVIDIANS KOTA TYPES.
Drawn by P. Fritel, from a photograph.
Returning to what may be called the
intersection of the original Brown and
The Maiayo-Chi- Ruddy races of mankind
St d o e s P a a nT e; ** Afghanistan, we find
Burmese. that the first principal Asi-
atic stream of the former family was the
Malayo-Chinese departure. This took
its course in the direction of the Upper
Punjab, and crossed directly to the
east into Thibet. There appears, how-
ever, to have been thrown off to the
southeast, into the Himalayas, a branch
of this family, which is at the present
time represented by the Lohito tribes,
between the Ganges and the Himalayas.
These are evidently Mongoloids, and
must thus be in race alliance with the
Thibetans north of the mountains. A
second stream carried down the Burmese
to their destination on the east coast of
the bay of Bengal. From this line
there appears to have been deflected,
somewhat above its intersection with
the Lan-Thsang river, a secondary move-
ment, tending almost directly to the
southeast and termi-
nating in two
branches, the one
in Southern Annam
and the other on the
'3 gulf of Tonquin.
By this latter
movement the An-
namese peninsula,
between the Cam-
bodia and the South
China sea, was pop-
ulated. It appears,
however, that the
Siamese peninsula,
west of the Cambo-
dia, received its eth-
nic stream from a
departure which was
made high up in
Thibet, and that this
latter migratory line crossed the Annam-
ese dispersion on -its way to the south.
Another peculiarity of the Doubts respect-
ethnic distribution of Siam
is found in the fact that
the populations south of latitude fif-
teen degrees north all partake of the
character of the Polynesian Mongo-
loids, as distinguished from the Asi-
atics. Ethnographers have therefore
agreed to regard the extreme of the
peninsula and the adjacent islands
of Sumatra and Borneo as having re-
512
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
ceived a Polynesian stream either
turned back by reversal from the Micro-
nesian archipelago, or else deduced by a
change of ethnic character from the
Malayo-Chinese stem. The Polynesian
line which we are here considering may
be traced through Sumatra and North-
ern Borneo, from which the migration
appears to have turned northward into
the Philippine islands, and thence to the
east into Micronesia.
Here it is that we begin to consider the
VIEW IN EASTER ISLAND IMAGES AT RONOBORAK.
Drawn by E. Meunier.
great problem of the original peopling
of the islands of the South Pacific. Ex-
cept in Melanesia, all of the great
group lying between the coast of China
and South America are inhabited by
people of the Brown race. They are
manifestly allied with the
Problem of the . . J
peopling of Asiatic Mongoloids and
the Dravidians in their
ultimate origin and descent. No meth-
od more rational, more consistent with
the facts can be devised than to sup-
pose their distribution into the great
archipelago from the smaller group of
islands directly east of the Philippines.
This group is generally known as the
Caroline islands, or Micronesia. From
this point the archipelago eastward is
exceedingly dispersed through a distance
of more than twenty-five degrees of
longitude. Yet the progress northward
'into the Ladrones could have been easily
made.
From the Caroline group eastward to
the Marshall and Gilbert islands was a
more extended and difficult voyage.
Thence the
Hne contin-
ued to the
southeast,
through the
Ellice group
to Samoa,
where there
was an evi-
dent bifurca-
tion into two
great lines of
progress.
Meanwhile,
from the El-
lice a stream
of island mi-
gration ap-
pears to have
been carried
out to the Phcenix islands, where we may
suppose the movement in this direction
to have ceased. From Sa- outreaching
moa one line of departure gSSSSf " 1
Was tO the West of SOUth into Gilbert islands.
the Friendly islands, then southwest to
Norfolk, and then southeast to New
Zealand. Here, in the North island and
the South island, were distributed the
ocean tribes from which has sprung the
remarkable race of Maoris, of whose char-
acter and peculiarities a sketch will be
presented in a subsequent book.
Eastward from Samoa the line of
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BROWN DISPERSION. 513
migration was carried to the Society
islands, whence it again divided north
Dispersion from and south for two great
grotp^nTthe departures toward the con-
Marquesas. tinents of America. The
southern line passed down to the Austral
islands, and then southeastward to the
Oparo group, one hundred and forty-five
degrees west from Greenwich. From
this point, about latitude twenty-eight
degrees south, the line of departure,
through seventy-five degrees of longi-
tude, appears to have been almost di-
rectly to the east, through the Elizabeth
islands, the Easter group, Saint Am-
brose, and finally to the coast of South
America, about the center of Chili.
The other branch of Polynesian dis-
persion from the Society islands was
borne to the northeast, to the Mar-
quesas group. On this line there was a
departure to the right, from which the
Low Archipelago may be supposed to
have been peopled. From the Marque-
sas the island migrations bore backward
to the northwest, through more than
twenty degrees of latitude, passing, by
way of Maldon and Fanning, to Carson.
Here the course was again changed to
the east of north, to the Sandwich
islands. From this noted ocean group
the migration continued islandwise to
the northeast, passing through the
sparsely scattered points for a distance
of twenty degrees of longitude, to the
Pasaries. From this group the line was
carried away through Henderson on a
long curve a little to the south of east,
until it entered the gulf of California
and touched the coast of Mexico.
These migratory movements which
ethnographers have attempted to trace
through the South Pacific represent, of
course, only the major lines of dispersion
along which the Polynesian Mongoloids
Were carried to their almost infinite dis-
tribution in these limitless waters. It
was essentially a progress from island to
island. The stages were Easiness and
difficulty of
sometimes easy and the the progress
, , . through Poly-
movement by no means in- nes ia.
credible. In other parts of the migra-
tions the distance was great from point to
point of departure and lodgment. Nor
may it be easily conceived how the prog-
ress was continued by races whose skill
in navigation must have been limited by
the conditions of savagery. It must be
borne in mind, however, that for weeks
and months together the waters of the
South Pacific are as placid as an unruffled
lake. The trade winds are equable and
of constant direction. The climate is
mild in the last degree. Under such
conditions even savages, in open boats,
with a modicum of sail, would drift, as
in a dream, for hundreds, perhaps thou-
sands, of miles. These are the circum-
stances which make it possible for the eth-
nic distribution through the islands of
Polynesia to have been effected in the
manner above described.
It is not the purpose, at this point, to
develop the dispersion of the Polynesian
races through the two COn- Probable deriva-
tinents of America. The J^f^e"* 068
distribution of the vari- "World,
ous branches of the human family in
these continents will be considered when
the Asiatic Mongoloids have also been
traced to the western shores of North
America. Grave questions arise in the
mind of the inquirer relative to the cer-
tainty or uncertainty of the movements
by which the first men were distributed
on our continent. In the present state
of knowledge the bottom problems aris-
ing in this connection must be passed by
as unsolved. The best that ethnography
can do in the premises is to trace out the
possible, even probable, approximation of
the Polynesian and Asiatic Mongoloids
514
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
to the western parts of the two Ameri-
cas. It is certainly not impossible that the
race of man may have thus made its ap-
pearance in the New World, and may
have been disseminated from ethnic
stocks which were derived from the
northeasternmost parts of Asia and the
islands of the South Pacific. The im-
mediate task before us is to resume the
consideration of the migratory lines by
which the Brown races were dispersed
through the larger parts of Asia.
dispersed, and where they have since
developed into the type of Chinese prop-
er. All the races south of the Hoang-Ho
and north of the Yang-tse-Kiang are
of this common stock, which is one of
the most distinct and persistent types of
mankind.
The East Mongols, as distinguished
from the Chinese and the Malayo-Chi-
nese, flowed from a branch of the Asiatic
Mongoloid family known as the North-
east division. Its course from AfVhan-
ROUTE OF THE MONGOLIAN DISTRIBUTION. THIAN-SHAN MOUNTAINS. Drawn by Riou.
We have now followed the lines of
distribution from Thibet, in the south-
eastward direction, to the
Outbranching
of the Asiatic Annamese and the Siamese
Mongoloids. .. ,-,
peninsulas. Returning to
the point of departure we find from the
valley of the Lan-Thsang a full stream of
migration, tending directly toward the
east and into the heart of the Chinese
empire. From the head-waters of the
Lan-Thsang to those of the Yang-tse the
migratory movement carried the true
Mongolians into the valley of the great
central river of China, where they were
istan was through Eastern Turkistan and
into that part of China which is known
geographically as Mongolia. This coun-
try occupies the great re-
' Distribution of
gion between the Amoor the Northeast-
-i.-i TT TT .,-1 .-, ern Asiatics.
and the Hoang-Ho, with the
exception of the eastern part, next to
Corea and the sea of Japan, which is
called Manchuria. The people known
as Manchus are also descendants of the
northeast stream of Asiatic Mongoloids.
It is in this region, near the mouth of
the Amoor, that the great movement of
the Brown races of men in their progress
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BROWN DISPERSION. 515
eastward was checked and turned back
into the almost limitless regions of North-
Dispersion of ern Asia. First of all the
the Brown races Mnno-rYlian stream after
deflected in the Mongolian iream, aner
Amoor valley. crossing to the north of the
Amoor, was reflected into a loop, and the
migratory movement was resumed to-
ward the head- waters of the Hoang-Ho.
appears that the reverse line represent-
ing the departure of this race reaches
throughout the entire breadth of Asia,
having its origin as a separate ethnic
division in the Russian province of
Amoor, north of the river of that name,
and extending westward through Mon-
golia into Turkistan. The main migra-
CHUTE OF TCHIMBOULAC. Drawn by D. Lancelot, after Atkinson.
In the upper valley of this great river
the Calmuck Tartars were deposited, as
the result of the backward migration just
described. A second stream was deflect-
ed from the main line of this movement
and contributed the Buriats, holding the
country south of lake Baikal. More ex-
traordinary still was the departure from
the backward curve of the Mongoloids
of the Turkish division of mankind. It
tory line seems to have passed south of
lake Balkash, and to have thence contin-
ued its western progress across the Ural
and the Volga to tne northern shores of
the Black sea. On the whole, this progress
of the Turcomans is one of the most re-
markable among the ethnic movements
of mankind. The principal families de-
posited at the extreme of the migration
on the line we are now considering were
516
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
the Nogaians, whose territory reached
from the Volga to the Caucasus and the
Black sea.
Before attempting to define all the
dispersions of the Turks in their back-
ward movement into West-
Race lines of .......
Samoyeds and ern Asia, it is desirable to
Ural-Altaics.
turning
note some of the other re-
ethnic curves of the Brown
gration from the departure of these two
peoples was, for the Samoyeds, some-
what south, through the region between
lake Baikal and the desert of Gobi;
thence the line extended westward
until it crossed the river Obi, near its
junction with the Tobol. West of this
great stream began the dispersion of the
so-called Turanian, or Ural-Altaic, na-
OFF THE COAST OF COREA. Drawn by Theodore Weber, after Zuber.
races to the north of the Turkish line.
From the same origin with the Turks
themselves, in the country north of the
principal bend of the Amoor, extended
westward another great stream of mi-
gration, which bore at first the com-
bined volume of the Samoyed and Ural-
Altaic nations. The course of the mi-
tions, whose development covers, in
general terms, the whole region be-
tween the Baltic and the Obi. From
the central line of migration westward,
having its termini among the Finns and
Lapps in the extreme north of Europe,
many subordinate migrations turned to
the left and right, the principal of which
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BROWN DISPERSION. 517
were the streams which contributed cer-
tain Mongoloid families in the valleys
of the Ural and the Volga, and the de-
parture on the south which ended with
the Esths, on the eastern coast of the
Baltic.
Returning to the point of division be-
tween the Ural-Altaic and the Samoyed
families east of lake Baikal,
Distribution of
the Twagi and we find the latter stream
the Juraks.
pursuing its way westward,
dropping one branch of the family in the
valley of the Upper Angora, and carry-
ing its volume thence northward to the
Twagi tribes, east of the gulf of Obi, un-
der latitude seventy degrees north. The
main stream continued westward to about
the meridian of eighty degrees east
from Greenwich, where another branch
was thrown off northward, contributing
the Juraks to the peninsula west of the
Yenisei river. Still a third departure
entered the Yalmal peninsula, where the
Juraks also bear witness of the Mongo-
loid origin. The westward course of the
Samoyed dispersion ended between the
meridians of forty degrees and fifty de-
grees east, with the tribes of Vanuta and
Laghe.
If then once more we take our stand
in Manchuria, we shall find still an-
other great curve, to which.
Outline of the
Tungusian dis- the ethnic name of Tun-
persion. . 1 .
gusian has been given,
bending in like manner close along the
sea of Japan, and thence turning to the
west and north. It was from a branch
of this Tungusian stem bearing off to
the south through Manchuria that the
Coreans were deduced, and an extension
of the same migration carried into Nip-
pon the primitive Japanese. The Ainos,
also of Yezo, on the north, may be a
derivative of the same branch which
here perhaps reaches its limit ocean-
ward. The main line also divides in
high latitudes, throwing out branches,
especially on the right, which find the
limits of their departure among the Ya-
taks, the Tunguses, and other arctic
tribes, in the extreme limits of North-
eastern Asia. From this same origin,
moreover, the eastern movement was
continued through the great Asiatic
peninsula which stretches out between
the Arctic ocean and the North Pacific
toward Behring strait. There can be
little doubt that the Mongoloid tribes
inhabiting this region, such as the La-
muts, the Itelmes, the Koriaks, and oth-
ers, are of the same Mongoloid origin with
the Tungusians, the Manchurians, the
East Mongolians, the Ural-Altaics, and
the Samoyeds, the difference being
chiefly in modifications of development
effected by the peculiar geographical
environment into which the eastern di-
vision of the race was thrown on its
progress to the northwestern extremity
of North America.
Such, in brief, is a sketch in outline
of the distribution of the Brown races
through the continent of Asia. We
have now traced the Polynesian lines to
the western coasts of South outer circuit of
America and Mexico, and JS^g^JJ 1
the Asiatic Mongoloid lines races,
through the eastern extension of North-
ern Asia and the Aleutian islands, to
the northwestern shores of North Amer-
ica. Before beginning an account of
the distribution of these various Mongo-
loid races in the New World, it will be
desirable to notice some exceptional
lines which they seem to have followed,
even to the extreme west of Europe.
It is claimed by ethnographers that
the Basques and Iberians, Question of the
the ancient nations of the
Spanish peninsula, were of Iberians.
Mongoloid extraction. The question
has been much debated and the argu-
518
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
ments fortified with every variety of
proof. On the whole, it may be conceded
that these primitive peoples of Spain
were allied in their race descent with the
Mongolians of the Asiatic continent.
Between the straits of Gibraltar, how-
ever, and the main line of the original
Mongoloid dispersion where it passes
northward through Beluchistan, there
have been found no Mongoloid tribes, or
indeed any distinct traces of their pres-
ence. In some manner, then, we may
assume that the Basques and Iberians
reached their destination in the extreme
west. By what route they did so must
remain conjectural. It may have been
by transnavigation of the Mediterranean.
But the greater likelihood seems to be
that in very primitive times a branch
put off to the west from the pre-Mongo-
loid stem, passing through the countries
of the Hamites about the head of the
Persian gulf, across Upper Arabia, and
through the whole extent of North Afri-
ca to the straits, and thence into South-
ern Spain. Such a line may, at any
rate, without undue straining of the
hypothesis, account for the presence in
the west of Europe of nations evidently
allied in their ethnic descent with the
Thibetans and Malayo-Chinese.
The presence of the Esths between
the Letts and Finns on the eastern
shores of the Baltic has
also constituted a problem
for which a solution has
already been found in the deflection of a
southern line from the Ural-Altaic
migration in Northern Europe. Some
ethnographers have not hesitated to
mark out a route of migration from the
country of the Basques in a north-
eastern direction, across Gaul and Ger-
many, into Esthonia! But, considering
the general course and character of the
movements by which Central Europe
Place of the
Esths in the
scheme of races.
was peopled, the latter supposition ap-
pears to be altogether unwarranted.
A general comment or two will be
appropriate as to the character of the
dispersion of the Brown races in the
countries which we have
Ethnic connec-
thus far considered. In tionsofthe
the first place, it is remark-
able, in view of the early preferences
which the Mongoloids showed for warm
climates, that Africa has been untouched
by their migrations. The nearest ap-
proach to this continent which the Brown
races has made is that of the Polynesian
Mongoloids in Madagascar. It is in
evidence that from the island of Java a
branch of this race made its way through
the Indian ocean, touching perhaps at
the southern point of Ceylon, and thence
passing in a southerly direction from
island group to island group to its
destination and development in the
natives races of Madagascar. To these
peoples ethnography has assigned the
ethnic name of Malagasy.
In the second place, it may be noted
that the Brown races, in the primary
stages of their distribution, appear to
have been drawn by cosmic General and
* special direc-
forces toward the east. In tions of the
. . Brown disper-
general, Southern Asia re- S i 0n .
ceived its population from movements in
this direction. These movements con-
tinued until the Pacific was reached, and
was even carried forward through the
Polynesian archipelagoes until, as we
have seen, the race lines probably touched
the western shores of the New World.
But on the continent the eastern migra-
tions of the Mongoloids seem to have
fallen into a whirl in Manchuria, and to
have been bent backwards, as above de-
scribed, through the whole extent of
Northern Asia and even far into Eu-
rope. The world- wide extent of these
movements can with difficulty be appre-
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BROWN DISPERSION. 519
elated or understood even by the student
of history, to whom great continental
stretches and far-reaching developments
are familiar. As compared with the
limited dispersion of the Hamitic and
Semitic nations, or even with the greater
and more populous distribution of the
Aryans in the small continent of Eu-
rope, the Asiatic and Oceanic disper-
sion of the Mongoloids appears to the
scholar in ethnography and history as
world-wide and limitless.
We come, then,
to look briefly at r
the primitive dis- ~
tribution of man- \
kind in the two *
Americas. For |
many reasons the
ethnology of these
continents is be-
set with special
difficulties. The
aboriginal peoples
inhabiting them
were uncivilized
races in the prelit-
erary stages of de-
velopment. Their
monuments had
already fallen into
the domain of
archaeology before the coming of the
White races. The peculiar family rela-
tion existing among nearly all the tribes
Difficult eth- of the New World tended
to confuse the lines of race
distinction and to blur the
whole ethnographic outline. The house-
hold was generally based upon a system of
marriage differing but little from poly-
andry, the result of which was to con-
verge the lines of descent through the
woman instead of the man. The tribes
were largely nomadic in their disposi-
tion. War and conquest were frequent,
and one race, by means of aggression
and victory, was many times super-
imposed territorially on another.
Behind all this confusion there ap-
pears to the ethnographer the shadow
of the bottom question rel-
- 1 Ultimate deriva-
ative to the primary origin tionoftnein-
r ,1 -TIT -, dian races.
of these races. We have
agreed to regard the Polynesian islands
and Northeastern Asia as the sources of
the American aborigines, but it may be
frankly confessed that so much has not
COAST OF MADAGASCAR AND
nography of the
American ab-
origines.
VIEW OF MAJONGA. LIMIT OF THE BROWN DISPERSION.
Drawn by De Berard.
been established by irrefragable proofs.
Nevertheless, the affinity and diversity
of languages prevalent in the New World
give many evidences, when compared
with Polynesian and Asiatic tongues,
of a common paternity; and ethnic
and tribal lines have been in many
parts sufficiently maintained to indi-
cate with tolerable certainty the direc-
tion of migrations and the ultimate
derivation of these barbarous peoples.
The physical peculiarities of the Red
men, the primitive Mexicans, and the Es-
quimaux have alsc been of advantage in
520
GREA T RA CBS OF MANKIND.
clearing up many questions relating to the
first people of North America; and the
persistency of manners and customs that
great fact which has often come to the
rescue of embarrassed scholarship has
thrown its constant light on many ob-
scure parts of the questions acre before
us. We shall now attempt, following the
hypothesis of an Asiatic and Polynesian
origin, to delineate the course of dis-
O '
tribution of the primitive races through
the two Americans, and their develop-
the Koriaks and Chuk-chee tribes, that
has warranted the conclusion of an Asi-
atic derivatiori for the Orarians.
The line, therefore, marking the dis-
persion of the northeastern stream of
Asiatic Mongoloids into Easy derivation
1 1 r A of Alaskan ab
these extreme parts of Asia engines from
may well be drawn across the Asiatics.
the strait and distributed into the penin-
sular region of Northwestern North
America. In like manner, the clear
relationship of the people inhabiting
ROUTE OF THE ORARIAN DISPERSION. PERIL SrRAixs.-Drawn by Theodore Weber.
Place and affln.
ities of the
Orarians.
ment into distinct families of the hu-
man species.
In the extreme northwestern portion
of North America we find a rather wide-
ly dispersed race, to which
ethnographers have given
the name of Orarians. In
general, they are distributed in that penin-
sular part of the continent which extends
from the meridian of about one hundred
and twenty degrees west to Behring
strait. It is the affinity, almost unmis-
takable, of these people with the Yakuts
of Northeastern Asia, particularly with
the southern part of the Alaskan penin-
sula with the Pacific peoples of the
Aleutian islands, gives warrant for the
derivation of the former from the latter.
It is in this Alaskan portion of the
country that ethnographers have placed
the Orarians proper, while to the north,
in Upper Alaska, that is, between the
Yukon and the Arctic ocean, we have a
distribution of the Western Esquimaux.
Further to the east and central to the
peninsula are the Tinneh races, or at
least a branch thereof, while to the
south of these and around the coar.t of
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BROWN DISPERSION. 521
the Great archipelago are located the
Tlinkets and Nasses. The outlying-
islands are inhabited by other branches
of the same race called the Yakuts,
the Sitkans, and the Hidahs.
By the time that the ethnographer has
advanced thus far to the east, in follow-
ing the lines of the Asiatic Mongoloids
the Polynesians who had come primarily
to the shore of the continent in the re-
gion of Old California. Advancing still
further to the east, and following the
same Asiatic Mongoloid line of disper-
sion in the extreme north, the inquirer
will make his way above the region of
the Great Bear and Great Slave lakes,
ROUTE OF THE CHONTAL DISPERSION SOUTHWARD. COAST OF PANAMA. Drawn by De Berard.
goloids mix
with. Asiatic
derivatives.
continentward, he finds himself con-
fronted with what appear to be return-
Polynesian Mon- ing races of Polynesian
extraction. The Tinneh
family above referred to
are a people different apparently in race
characteristics from the other stocks of
Alaska, and it is generally conceded
that they have been carried into this re-
mote position by a returning migration of
M. Vol. i 34
in the country of the widely spread fam-
ily called the Tinneh. The territory
occupied by this division extends from
about the meridian of one hundred and
twenty-five degrees west, eastward to
Hudson's bay and the gulf of Boothia.
Its limits northward are the Arctic
ocean and the countries of the Eastern
Esquimaux, whose line of dispersion
reaches the coast of Labrador. On the
522
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
south, the great river and lake system
which discharges its waters through the
Nelson into Hudson's bay mark the
boundaries of the Tinneh.
It is in the latter region that the re-
turning lines of the Polynesian Mongo-
Generai course loids are again encountered.
TSu The whole movement of
migrations. the latter races here ap-
pears from the east to the west, while
the Asiatics flow from the west to the
TYPE OF AMERICAN MONGOLOIDS THE INDIAN BARRE.
Drawn by Riou.
east. The main migration of the East-
ern Esquimaux may be regarded as ex-
tending through the arctic archipelago,
perhaps by way of North Devon island,
or Ellesmere land, across Smith's sound
into Greenland, where the final distribu-
tion of this family has its limits.
It will be seen by an examination of
the map that this region is under the
meridian of fifty degrees west from
Greenwich, while the original source
which we have assigned to the Brown
races in Beluchistan is very near the
meridian of sixty -five degrees east,
from which it is manifest that the di-
rect dispersion east and west of the
Asiatic Mongoloids has covered a longi-
tude of one hundred and sixty- five degrees ;
and if we take into account the multi-
farious departures to the right and left
the endless curves and windings by
which such a move-
ment would be car-
ried forward from
its initial departure
to its final destina-
tion we shall see
that the Brown
races of men have
virtually encircled
the earth in their
wanderings !
Meanwhile, the
migration of this
same family of
Mongoloids had ex-
tended down the
Alaskan coast to
Vancouver's island.
Here, in the north-
western part of
what is now the
United States, the
great family of the
Selish was dis-
tributed. By hy-
pothesis, a deflected branch of this
family may be traced eastward and
thence southward to about
Distribution of
the fortieth parallel of lat- the seiish; the
, , ., . Mexican races.
itude and the ninety-
fourth west from Greenwich. From
this center several lines of departure
may be noted upon which, in the south-
ern parts of the United States, the
old nations of Choctaws, Creeks, and
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BROWN DISPERSION. 523
persion of the
Central Amer-
icans.
Natchez Indians were developed. An-
other line, perhaps, passed from the same
origin to the west, thence southward into
Mexico, and from the latter dispersion
we gather the old races of the Toltecs,
the Aztecs, andtheOttomies, who played
so important a part in the quasi civili-
zation which the Spanish invaders dis-
covered and destroyed.
From another branch of the same dis-
persion arose the Cholulans. Still south-
origin and dis- ward the course of migra-
tion was continued into
Central America, where the
nations called the Mayas, the Nahoas,
the Quiches, and the Chontals were dis-
tributed north of the isthmus. We may
even continue the same line of southern
departure through the isthmus of Panama
and down the whole coast of Western
South America. The native races along
this extended seashore, from Panama
through Peru and Chili to Patagonia
and finally to Terra del Fuego, have
been found to be allied throughout with
the Asiatic Mongoloids rather than with
the Polynesians. The greatest of these
families are perhaps the Aymaras, the
Quichuas, the Araucanians, the Pampas,
and the Patagonians, named in the order
of the descent from the north. The
Fuegians mark the extreme of this dis-
persion. The lines indicating the prog-
ress traverse the entire extent of the
two continents, besides many meander-
ings, the limits of which could hardly be
determined in terms of current geog-
raphy.
At this point it may be well to note
also some special developments north of
Place of the Mexico. The Californians,
i?atL h n n o e f S t ; he er - together with the Sho-
six Nations. shones, the Mutsun, and
Yuma nations, may be regarded as dis-
persions from the north.
It may be, however, in the case of the
Shoshones, that they proceeded from an
eastern migration, having its origin in
the center of the United States. There
appear to have been a good many inter-
changes of character in the central
nations of North America, the Asiatic
Mongoloids taking on the character of
Polynesians, and vice versa. The great
nations of the Eastern United States
TYPE OF AMERICAN MONGOLOIDS MONDURNCA
INDIAN WOMAN.
the Onondagas, the Oneidas, the Sen-
ecas, the Mohicans, may be referred
ultimately to the same stock with the
Cherokees, the Muskogees, and other
families of the Southeastern United
States, and these in turn seem to have
originated in the Antilles, and to have
arisen ultimately from a Polynesian
source.
It will be well, therefore, at this point
to take up the course of dispersion of the
Polynesian races from the center of the
west coast of South America and follow
the same in its divisions through that
524
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
continent. Perhaps the first deflection
from the main line of eastern departure
was to the right, into the
The Polynesian . .
Mongoloids in countries now occupied by
SoutnAmerica. ^ Ar ^ entine Republic.
The native races of this region are known
by the name of Guaycurus. They be-
long in general to the country between
the mouths of the La Plata and the Rio
Negro. The coast nation of this part of
the continent are known as the Puelches.
A second migratory stream put off about
the head-waters of the La Plata, taking
its course eastward, and was thence
deflected to the coast, in Uruguay, where
the people called Charraks bear evidence
of the dispersion. Higher up, the
Guarani were distributed, and from this
region the main line extended in a
course nearly parallel with the sea, into
the heart of Brazil. The mountain races
to the left of this line are known by the
name of the Parexis, while the still
greater family of nations between the
river Amazon and the San Francisco
are called Tupis. The latter are sub-
divided into the Crans, the Crens, and
the Gucks, with many subordinate tribes
and ramifications.
One branch of this same Polynesian
migration turned from this country up
Origin of tne the valley of the Amazon
and was distributed among
the initial streams of
that great river, while another branch
crossed the Amazon to the north and
contributed the Caribbean nations in
their various families and tribes. It ap-
pears that from the coast at the mouth
of the Orinoco, almost directly north-
ward, and thence westward through
the islands to Hayti, and thence by way
of the Greater Antilles to the southern
extremity of Florida, the line of migra-
tion was carried, depositing the Sem-
inoles in the latter country, and thence
West Indians
and the Semi-
noles.
bending eastward through the coast re-
gions of the United States. It is proba-
bly true that the kinship and affinity of
so great numbers of the Indian tribes of
North America with the Polynesians of
the South Pacific must be referred to this
almost infinite line of departure which
we have been following from Sumatra
and Siam across the South Pacific to the
western coast of South America.
Hereafter, in noticing the peculiarities
of the Indian races of the New World,
we may have occasion to speak again of
their geographical positions Universality of
and mutations. It is be- ***?
lieved that this cursory out- Americas.
line of the general movements by which
the New World was probably peopled with
inhabitants belonging to the Brown races
of mankind, will be sufficient to give an
adequate idea of the development of
these races. The great peculiarity which
impresses itself most upon the mind of
the ethnographer and historian is that
all the aboriginal families of these con-
tinents belonged to the Brown family of
mankind. In those primary movements
which may be called natural, as contra-
distinguished from the somewhat artifi-
cial migrations and colonizations which
are projected from civilized countries
into the barbarous territories of the
world, not a single Black or Ruddy tribe
of men reached the shores of either
America.
It is, indeed, a reflection well calculat-
ed to astonish the inquirer that the most
progressive and energetic peoples of the
world have not, until times most recent,
carried the lines of their Astonishing ex-
dispersion into the remoter ?
parts of the habitable globe. Brown races.
It is true that the Aryan races have at
present extended their languages and
institutions even their blood progeny
into the uttermost parts of the earth, but
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BLACKS.
525
these movements do not belong to the
same class of phenomena by which the
primitive, unconscious peoples were dis-
tributed to their several destinations.
If we look at these primary movements
only, our surprise may well be great at
the indescribable extent of the wander-
ings and ethnic dispersions of the Brown
i-aces of mankind and the comparatively
small areas in which the progressive
and civilizing peoples have borne them-
selves and their institutions. With a
map of the world drawn on Mercator's
projection before the student who de-
sires to inform himself of the prehistoric
movements of mankind, the great, well-
nigh universal, diffusion of the Brown
races throughout all Asia, several parts
of Europe, and the whole of Polynesia
and the two American continents must
impress his mind with the striking char-
acter and singularity of these human phe-
nomena.
Before dismissing the subject of the
distribution of the Brown races, we will
point once more to the outer geograph-
ical limits of the dispersion in different
parts of the world. The migratory lines
in South America drop to the extremity
of the continent in latitude fifty-five de-
grees. The Fuegians rep- outer periphery
resent the nearest approach gjg*^
of the Brown races to persion.
the south pole. The next limit in the
same direction may be found in the
Chatham islands and the southern parts
of New Zealand, extending from lati-
tude forty-five degrees to fifty degrees
south. As already noted, the western
stream of this family terminates in
Spain, at about ten degrees west from
Greenwich. The eastern boundary of
the Greenland Esquimaux may be given
at about twenty degrees west. The
northern excursions of this race have
reached to at least the eightieth paral-
lel north; from which we may gather
that through three hundred and fifty de-
grees of longitude and a hundred and thirty*
five degrees of latitude the descendants of
the Brown races of mankind have been
dispersed by the natural forces to which
barbarians in their migratory movements
are subject!
XXX. DISTRIBUTION OF* THE BLACK
RACES.
S compared with the
complexity and extent
of the dispersion of the
Brown races of man-
kind, the Black divi-
sions and departures
of the human family
are simple and easy of apprehension.
They are confined, in general terms, to
that portion of the African continent ly-
ing south of the twentieth parallel of
north latitude, and to Australia and the
Micronesian islands. The fact that the
Indian ocean lies between these African
and Australian dispersions of the race,
and that the presence of General oharac-
Black peoples isnotdiscov- ^^^^
erable in any other of the tion '
great continents, except by reason of re-
cent civilizing movements, introduces
the one great difficulty in determining
the origin whence both streams of the
race have flowed. It is this circum-
stance, moreover, which has in a great
measure fortified the hypothesis that
under the Indian ocean lies the sub-
526
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
merged continent of Lemuria, the an-
cestral home of all the races of men.
Granted the existence in prehistoric
ages of such a continent, and the sub-
Lemurianeces- sequent dispersion of man-
sary to unify the kind Qn t ^ Q mo nOgenetic
Black disper-
sion, hypothesis becomes not
only plausible, but easy and natural.
But the continent is a supposition so
Africa seems to have been on the east-
ern or peninsular coast where the conti-
nent juts OUt into the In- Origin of the eth-
dian ocean, about the par- n of S t^ ma
allel of ten degrees north. African races.
It has been stated above that most of
the peoples of this coast region as far
west as about the thirty-seventh degree
of longitude are of Semitic origin, with
MEURKA. Drawn by Y. Pranishnikoff.
far as the present knowledge of man-
kind is concerned, and we are obliged
to consider the African and the Aus-
tralian distribution of the Black races as
separate phenomena, one presenting it-
self with a westward and the other with
an eastward migratory tendency.
As already remarked, the beginning
of the Black populations of Southern
perhaps a mixture of Hamitic stock.
Such peoples are the Somali, the Dona-
kil, the Galla tribes, and others, inhabit-
ing this peninsular part of Africa. It is
somewhat to the west of these, there-
fore, that the actual dispersion of the
Black peoples seems to have its center.
This is to say that the lines indicative
of the migration of the Black races from
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BLACKS.
527
the eastern coast of Africa are for a dis-
tance of about ten degrees from the
ocean hypothetical, the country through
which they pass being now occupied by
tribes of another race.
It may be conceded that the oldest
branch of the Negro family, upon the
Place and dis- consideration of which we
are now to enter, are the
Fundi-Sudanese, who oc-
cupy the country between the Blue and
the White Nile for some distance south of
tribution of the
Fundi-Sudan-
ese.
At this point it may be well to des-
ignate the principal branches into which
the Negro race proper is divided. The
northern stem, next to the Kinship of Fuiah
Fundi just mentioned, car- ^ F r ^ d at r e acesJ
ried into Central Africa families,
the Negroes of the Sudan and perhaps
the Fulah races lying to -the north.
Some trouble has arisen as to the classi-
fication of the latter peoples, and there
are traces in their color and other pecul-
iarities indicative of an admixture of
BAMBARRA TYPES. Drawn by Emile Bayard
their intersection. It is likely that this
was the first territorial dispersion of the
family which afterwards spread through
the larger part of the continent to the
west and south. The Fundi seem never
to have removed very far from their
original seats. They founded here the
kingdom of Sennaar. They have the
same peculiarities of person and tribal
character with the Negroes of Southern
and Western Africa, and are certainly in
affinity with them by race descent.
Hamitic blood. By the Sudanese, how-
ever, the Fulahs are regarded as of the
same race with themselves, and, on the
whole, the evidences of kinship with the
Black peoples on the south are sufficient
to warrant this classification.
Several subordinate families were
thrown off from this same northernmost
stem of Black dispersion. Among these
are the Haussa tribes, the Sonhrays in
the valley of the Niger on the extreme
west, the Jolofers between the Senegal
528
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
and the Gambia on the coast. There is
no doubt that the Hamitic line of migra-
tion, bending to the south out of the
Moorish states of Western Africa, pen-
etrated the valley of the Niger, and that
this stock has contributed somewhat to
modify the Black peoples in the north
of the Sudan.
The Sudanese proper are likewise
divided into many peoples, distributed
from the Upper White Nile, across the
Distribution of continent to the westward,
tSSSS^to the Mandingos and
eans - other tribes of Guinea.
Glancing over the whole field of Central
Africa, between the twentieth parallel of
north latitude and ten degrees south, we
may, on a geographical basis, note four
principal ethnic divisions of peoples :
i . West Sudan and Guinea. In this re-
gion there are beside the Fulahs six other
groups, distinguishable by sufficient dif-
ferences to warrant a classification. The
Mandingos, with ten or twelve subordi-
nate tribes, occupy Upper Guinea and
Southern Senegambia. The Woloffs have
seven divisions, or tribes, which are dis-
tributed inland between the Senegal and
Gambia rivers. The Felups are divided
into twelve tribes, or nations, scattered
over the territory between the Gambia
and Sierra Leone. The Liberians have
seventeen tribal divisions scattered along
the Grain coast and the Ivory coast.
The Ewe group consists of ten different
nations, and are distributed along the
Gold and Slave coasts. The Ibo group
also embraces ten subdivisions, having
their territories in Benue and along the
Lower Niger. The Sonhray family, with
many subordinate tribes, occupy the
country along the Middle Niger, from
Timbuctu to Gando. The Fulahs, already
described, are divided into eight nations,
inhabiting the eastern parts of Sene-
gambia and distributed eastward to the
Baghirmi country. All these peoples
except the Sonhray and Fulah nations
speak dialects of a common language,
but the latter peoples appear to have
each a distinct vernacular.
2 . Central Sudan and the Chad Basin."
In this region there are five separate
groups of peoples. The
Central Sudan-
first are the Adamawa ese and tribes of
., .. . , the Chad Basin.
group, with some sixteen
tribal branches, belonging to Upper
Benue and scattered thence eastward to
Logo. The second division, called the
Tubu nations, embraces twelve tribes,
inhabiting Tibesti, Kanem, and the
countries extending to the northern part
of Darfur. The third, or Logon, group
includes about fifteen branches, inhab-
iting Bornu, Lower Shari, and the Chad
islands. The fourth group, called the
Baghirmi, is divided into fifteen nations,
occupying the lower and middle parts
of Shari and the territories eastward to
Runga and Darbanda. The fourth, or
Waday, group, including a vast number
of tribes, occupy the country of Waday
and the districts eastward to Darfur.
3. East Sudan and Upper Nile. In this
region there are four race families. The
first, known as the Dar-
Place of the
banda group, has eleven East Sudanese
, ., 1 ,. . . . and the Nilotes.
tribal divisions, occupying
the country of Upper Shari and the ter-
ritory eastward to Dar-Fertit. The sec-
ond family of tribes, called the Fur
group, have about seventeen nations oc-
cupying the country of Darfur and Kor-
dofan, between Waday and the White
Nile. The third group, called Nilotes,
are divided into more than twenty tribes,
living along the White Nile and its trib-
utaries, eastward to Kaffa and Gallaland,
and southward to Uganda. The fourth
group of tribes are known as the Zandey,
and are better organized as a nation than
any of those above enumerated. They
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BLACKS.
529
live about the Welle, and extend south-
ward to the Lualaba.
The above three general divisions are
all included under the general head of
Ethnic traces Sudanese, and are all Ne-
? groes though consider-
gritians. ably differentiated in ethnic
character except in so far as they have
been modified along the northern and
j)
BANTU TYPE CHIEF N'DOUMBA.
Drawn by Riou.
western borders by Hamitic influences.
It has already been noted that the Fulah
nations, especially the West Fulahs,
have been influenced not a little in their
race development by the impact of the
Hamitic migration, turning from the
north into Senegambia. We now come
to the fourth general division of the Ne-
gro race.
4. The Bantu Family. This great race
occupies South Central Africa, between
the Sudanese on the north and the Kaf-
firs and Hottentots on the south. The
Bantus have been classified,
. Classification
according to SUch dlStinc- and subdivisions
tions as they present, into f the Bantus<
five ethnic groups. These are arranged
principally on the lines of geographical
locality: first, the Zulu-Kaffir group,
embracing many tribes, are scattered
through Zululand, Natal- Kaffraria, and
in the region northward toward the
great lakes of Eastern Africa; second,
the Central group, divided into about
sixteen nations, occupy the Upper
Orange river, Transvaal, the shores of
lake N 'garni, and portions of the Zam-
besi. The Eastern group, also includ-
ing many subordinate tribes, fill the ter-
ritories on the east coast from the equa-
tor southward to the edge of Delagoa,
and westward to lake Nyassa; fourth,
the Equatorial group, including more
than twenty nations, fill the regions of
the great lakes, the upper part of Lua-
laba, and the country southward to the
Lokinga mountains; fifth, the Western
group, including about forty nations,
are distributed along the west coast of
the continent, from Damaraland north-
ward to the Cameroon mountains, and
eastward to the twentieth meridian of
longitude.
Within these vast regions, almost in-
comprehensible in their extent and char-
acter by people of the
-A.fri.C3, tli IPs/triS!
Western continents, there Doiorosaofthe
are distributed about one
hundred and thirty million of people of
pure Negro origin, besides about twenty
million who have received, from one
circumstance or another, the traces of
foreign blood. These are the parts of
the earth out of which the conscience-
less states of the Middle Ages, and the
great nations of modern times as well,
have gathered their cargoes of human
530
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
chattels for the slave markets of the
world. It is the region of infinite sor-
rows, to which the inhabitants of a bet-
ter universe might point with shame, as
to the Patria Dolorosa of all planets,
upon which the stronger races of man-
kind have preyed with the cruelty of
tigers and the gluttony of wolves.
If we resume the consideration of the
migratory lines by which the widely dis-
persed races of the Sudan and the Bantu
countries were distributed, we shall find
one great departure turning
Limits of the
Zulu and Kaffir to the south, from the coun-
try included between the
Blue and the White Nile, and bearing
down the eastern coast of Africa the
primitive races of that region as far as
the Zulus and Coast Kaffirs of the south.
It appears that this branch of the dis-
persion was limited to the country be-
tween lake Nyassa and the sea, thus con-
stituting a marked division between the
coast Negroes of Eastern Africa and the
Hottentots of the central and western
parts of the continent.
In the district immediately east of the
Victoria Nyanza the migratory line
Ethnic relations seems to have bifurcated,
a Weste br anch Fating
o ff from the Coast Kaffir
division and extending around lake Tan-
ganyika and into the heart of the Bantu
country. It was by the ramification,
very extensive and multifarious, of this
line that the Bantu nations and the great
family of the West Kaffirs were distrib-
uted. The dispersion continued to the
western coast of the continent, the rami-
fications in this region reaching from
above the equator to the parallel of twen-
ty degrees south. On the lower coast,
however, the Bantu tribes were some-
what restricted to the interior by a line
of Hottentot migration from the south,
which distributed the Obongas and
Kaffir e s C andthe
Bantus.
other tribes between the Kaffirs and the
sea.
Such, then, in general terms, are the
limits and extent of the Negro dispersion
of mankind. Geographically, its south-
ernmost point is With the General bound-
Zulus, under the parallel of Xf]2k
thirty degrees south. Its tion -
northernmost departure is with that eth-
nic line which carried the Jolofers to their
place on the south banks of the Senegal,
in latitude twenty degrees north. The
eastern divisions of the Negro family
are conterminous with the African coast
adjacent to the Indian ocean, and the
western distribution of the race is along
the shores of. the Atlantic. Measured
by meridians of longitude, the dispersion
reaches from fifty degrees east to twenty
degrees west. The whole area, therefore,
included by the dissemination of Negro
races, extends through about fifty degrees
of latitude and seventy degrees of longi-
tude, being, in general terms, coexten-
sive with Central and Southern Africa.
We come, in the next place, to con-
sider the dispersion of the Hottentots.
These constitute the remaining major
division of the Black race
Race origin of
in Africa. It is claimed by the Hottentots
... ! .1 .if considered.
ethnographers that the line
of migration which carried this people
into the south extremity of the continent
entered from the side of the Indian
ocean at a point on the coast somewhat
below the entrance of the Negroes. We
have, however, in the case of the Hot-
tentots the same uncertainty that con-
fronted us in the case of the Negro race.
This is to say that Hottentot tribes have
not been found, within the historical era,
in that part of the country where they
are supposed to have entered. The line
from the coast, running in a southwest-
erly direction between lakes Tangan-
yika and Nyassa, is carried by JiypotJiesit
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BLACKS.
531
through more than twenty degrees of
latitude before the borders of the Hot-
tentot dispersion are reached. Such is
the theory. All probabilities, however,
point to the incoming of these tribes
from the direction indicated, and their
affinity with the Negroes fully warrants
the assumption of a common origin with
them.
It is not until the inquirer reaches the
valley of the Upper Zambesi in his jour-
Where the Hot- ney across Southern Africa
distributed. comes upon the first tribes
of Hottentots. They are virtually lim-
ited in their actual distribution to the
BECHUANA TYPE A PAHOUIN.
Drawn by Riou.
country south of the Zambesi. The first
nation of importance is the Makololo
people, on the right bank of the river
and in the central part of the country.
They have the Negro Ovambos and Bun-
das on the west and the Coast Kaffirs on
the east. The Makololo may be regard-
ed as the oldest existing branch of the
Hottentot race, though it is in evidence
that in former times they extended much
further to the east, and that they occu-
pied the country from which they were
subsequently expelled by the Kaffirs
and other Negro tribes.
The next branch of the race is found
on the head-waters of the Gariep, or Or-
ange, river, and is known by the ethnic
name of Bechuanas. Some ethnogra-
phers have been disposed to make them a
race of different origin from the Hotten-
tots. It can not be denied that they are
distinguished from the aborigines of Cape
Colony by several important -character-
istics. The nation has been consider-
ably compressed by wars with the peo-
ple of the south and with the Kaffirs on
the east ; and in recent times the Boers
have established themselves within the
Bechuana territory.
The family of Hottentots are, like
the Negroes further north, divided into
many subordinate tribes, subordinate
of which the Bassutos are %%%?
the principal. They have tots -
their territories to the west of the Quath-
lamba mountains. A second tribe is
called the Batlapi, having their habitat
on the borders of the Kalahari desert.
A third family, known as the Barolong,
dwell to the north of the last named
people, but these have been nearly ex-
terminated in warfare with the Kaffirs.
Still north of the Barolong are the Bang-
waketse, while the Bahurutse have their
territories close alongside. The Badoana
are scattered on the north coast of lake
N'gami, and the Bakwains occupy the
hill-country whence the rivers Notuani
and Marqua descend to the coast. These
are the principal tribal divisions of the
Hottentot family. In the extreme south,
however, the most characteristic of all
these races, the Bushman and the Nam-
aqua are found, whose names have been
synonyms for one of the lowest types of
aboriginal life known in the annals of
existing races.
532
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
There are not wanting evidences, suffi-
ciently conclusive to the ethnographer,
Indications that that the peoples whom-we
gofte^tfare are here considering-Ne-
primitive races, groes and Hottentots are
among the most ancient races on the
face of the globe. A single fact may be
cited, or rather repeated from a former
chapter, of the monumental delineation
of Negroes among the captives of the
primitive Egyptians. All the race char-
acteristics of the two peoples were al-
ready distinctly developed. The eth-
nologist of to-day could not detect any
radical mark of difference between the
Negro as he is depicted among the
sculptures of the Egyptians or unwrapped
from the mummy cases of their tombs
and the living specimen of the same
race taken from the heart of Bantuland.
But the Negro of the sculptures and he
of the valley of the Livingstone are
separated in time by a period of hardly
less than six thousand years. Yet before
Egypt ivas Egypt the Black race was dis-
seminated in Central Africa, and was in
all probability at that remote prehistoric
epoch not different in characteristics
and tendencies from what it is to-day.
Still further away from the historical
era are the primitive Hottentots. All
Probability that the ethnic qualities of these
2l2SS P e P le P int to an extrava-
oped of mankind, gant antiquity. An argu-
ment would not be far to seek from
these premises in favor of the evolution-
ary hypothesis of the human race, and
the assignment of a primitive, or in-
digenous, race center to the southern
parts of Africa. The cranial capacity of
the Hottentot is considerably less than
that of the Negro, as the Negro's bulk
and weight of brain are less than those
of the Turanians. Following the same
line of development we note the still
more extended brain evolution of the
Indo-Europeans, reaching its maximum
in Europe and North America. In what
direction soever these hints, drawn from
the natural history of man, may lead,
we may safely conclude that the Hot-
tentots are the oldest and least developed
of all the races which we have thus far
attempted to trace in their migratory
movements. No sketch of their char-
acteristics as a people is here attempted.
It has been the purpose in the current
chapter merely to mark out the course
of dispersion and distribution by which
the Black races of Central and Southern
Africa have reached their respective
destination.
It now remains to notice the migra-
tory movements of the primitive Austra-
lian branch of the human family. Viewed
as a whole continent. Aus-
Homogenity of
tralia presents in its abong- the Australian
* . i f aborigines.
mes only a single type of
people, to whom ethnographers have
given the name Australians. If there
be any trace at all of another race in the
great island continent, it is on the ex-
treme eastern borders where the Papu-
ans of Tasmania may have left some
evidences of their presence or at least
their transmigration.
If the inquirer should begin his inves-
tigations from the standpoint of Aus-
tralia, he might Well COn- The Australians
elude that the native races
are indigenous to the coun-
try, being apparently without derivation
from any other race. In color, it is true
that the primitive people are in affinity
with the Negroes and Hottentots, but
their general characteristics and person-
ality would seem to set them apart from
almost every other type of mankind. It
has been agreed, however, that, pro-
ceeding on the monogenetic hypothesis,
that is, on the supposition of one com-
mon origin for all the races of men, the
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BLACKS.
533
Australians may best be classified with
the Black races of Africa, and that their
incoming into the island should be reck-
oned from the northern coast.
AUSTRALIAN TYPE JOKKAI.
Drawn by Tofani.
Ethnography has not hesitated to trace
backwards from this point, by way of
Java and thence across the Indian ocean
to Southern Hindustan, the prehistoric
line of Australian dispersion. This, of
course, is done to carry out the ever-
present supposition of a submerged con-
tinent in the region between India and
Africa. Thus much being Lemuria seems
0-rflntr.rl if i<i pa^v to dp necessary to the
granted, it is easy to - supposeddis .
velop the line of probability tribution.
by which the primitive Black tribes of
Australia may have made their way
from Lemuria into the country of their
present occupancy. We shall therefore
follow the hypothesis to its legitimate
conclusions, and regard the Australian
branch of mankind as an eastern deflec-
tion from a parent stream, which was
common in its origin with the Negritic
and Hottentot divisions on the other side
of the Indian ocean.
It appears, then, that from the north-
west coast, near the gulf of Cambridge, or
Arnhem's land, the primitive Australian
migration was extended by
J Lines of the
divergencies through the Black dispersion
. - j it 3'tv . j' in Australia.
island in three different di-
rections. The first extended laterally
from north to south to the coast in the
vicinity of Spencer gulf and the gulf of
St. Vincent. The second branch turned
to the west coast, which it followed as
far as the valley of Swan river, and was
thence extended to King George sound.
These divisions were subordinate, how-
ever, to the third ethnic branch which
turned to the east, near the head of tha
gulf of Carpentaria, and was thence
parted into several divisions, losing
themselves in the modern Queensland.
It appears that New South Wales was
populated by tribes from the Upper
Darling, and that the whole of South-
eastern Australia was filled from the
same general source.
The inquiry will again suggest itself
by what means these prehis-
Valid grounds of
tone movements have been ethnographic
indicated to the ethnog- yp<
rapher. What are the sources from
which he has drawn his conjectures and
534
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
proofs? In the first place, a comparison
of the different dialects spoken by the
native Australians indicates sufficiently
their affinity and common origin in some
single parent linguistic stock. But sec-
ondly, the general community of manners
and customs, the identity of the barba-
rous institutions, of which at least the
rudiments are discernible, lead to the
same conclusion of a common origin for
all the natives of the continent. In the
third place, what may be called personal
peculiarities, identical in different and
of mankind has apparently taken its
rise. In general, the Melanesian islands
are peopled with races de- origin and
rivedfromthissource. New
Guinea has drawn its pop-
ulation from this Papuan stock, and has
taken their name as the modern designa-
tion of the island. Traces of the same
race have been followed to the east
and south as far as the Fiji islands,
where the migratory movement seems
to have terminated. In short, through-
out Melanesia the Papuan lines have
\J3Stfffl
tjfa*
PAPUAN TYPES MALE AND FEMALE HEADS. Drawn by E. M&plfe.
widely spread tribes, point likewise to a
common descent from a single ethnic
branch of the human family. It will be
the aim in a subsequent part of the pres-
ent work to give an account of the man-
ners and customs of these native races,
and to outline the institutional forms of
which their savage state has shown some
traces and beginnings.
From the main line of pre- Australian
migration a secondary ethnic develop-
ment has apparently occurred in the
archipelago lying north of Australia.
From this origin the Papuan division
carried peoples of this stock north,
south, east, and west, as far even as the
coast of Japan, and westward to the-
Andamans.
Southern Borneo and a great part of
Sumatra have felt the like influence
among their aborigines,
Geographical
and nearly all of the islands limitations of
between Australia and the
coast of China are infected with the
same blood and derivation. The south-
ern limit of the dispersion is reached
in Tasmania where the Papuans took
one of their most characteristic and
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BLACKS.
535
undisturbed developments. The geo-
graphical limits of the race are the
great ocean region between the forty-
second degree of south latitude and the
thirty-fifth north. Eastward the Fiji
islands, under the meridian of one hun-
dred and eighty from Greenwich, and
westward the Andaman islands under
ninety-two degrees east, define the lat-
eral distribution of the Papuan race. Its
peculiarity is that it is wholly insular.
The great country of Australia, though
lying in what might be called the heart
of this ethnic development, seems for
some reason to have shed the Papuans
and to have taken a family of native
peoples peculiar to itself.
We have thus attempted to trace out
the geographical distribution of man-
kind according to their sev-
Legitimate use
of Hypothesis in eral races and kindreds.
inquiry ' All parts of the globe have
now been considered, including the re-
mote islands of the South Pacific. It will
readily be allowed that in many places
the course of migrations, as indicated in
the foregoing discussion, is hypothet-
ical. It may be claimed in this partic-
ular that in a scientific age, such as the
present, all work by hypothesis and con-
jecture ought to be eliminated from a
discussion which pretends to partake of
the nature of the exact sciences. This
view of the case is too extreme and se-
vere. The progress of knowledge de-
pends not infrequently upon stepping
from shore to shore by means of hy-
pothesis and theory. This method of
human investigation in many cases fore-
runs the observed order of nature and
indicates the place and limitations of
law. It is only in this sense that we
have here ventured to fill up certain
gaps in the movements of mankind by
theoretical lines. All such work is, in
the nature of the case, tentative, and sub-
ject to revision and correction, as dis-
covered and discoverable data may
hereafter indicate the necessity of such
modification.
Before dismissing this part of the sub-
ject, several topics present themselves
for passing consideration.
_ f Question of
In the first place, the long- time, place, and
standing dispute about manner recurs '
the place, the time, and the method of
man's appearance on the earth obtrudes
itself constantly into the inquiry. It is
pressed upon the mind of the ethnog-
rapher not only by the ever-recurring
suggestions of traditional belief, but also
by the very necessities of his theme.
Almost in despite of those restraints and
cautious methods which he imposes upon
himself and upon every branch of the
subject, he finds himself disposed to
favor the one or the other of the several
current theories respecting the original
locus of mankind and the nature of the
genesis of the race.
The fundamental question is whether
the facts of ethnology on the whole tend
to strengthen or to weaken Theory of Mon-
the monogenetic theory of
the human family. Did facts -
the race of man arise from a single
source and a single pair, at a single time
and under simple conditions? or did the
various branches of mankind have poly-
centric origins and independent lines of
development? In this form the ques-
tion is simply anthropological. Carried
into the domain of natural science, how-
ever, the problem has become one of
creation by evolution or immediate and
phenomenal creation; and the inquiry
takes the same form which it has respect-
ing all other animals and all plants on
the face of the earth, namely, did they
originate by evolutionary processes of
growth and adjustment from a single
germ or a few germs of life, scattered in
536
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
the soil of possibility, or did the exist-
ing forms of life appear phenomenally
in time and place and in complete de-
velopment? On the whole, it may be
said that the theory of a monocentric
origin for the human race gains under
the addition of facts and the readjust-
ments of right reason ; while on the other
hand, it may well be allowed that the
universality of the evolutionary process
as applied to all other forms of life would
seem to demand a like process of growth
and development for man.
It is also fitting in this connection to
add a paragraph in the way of further
True aspect and explanation of what may be
SynfovSnts called the true aspect and
considered. form of those migratory
movements which have been delineated
in the present book. In several places
the reader has already been put on cau-
tion against the too exact representation
of these human phenomena by means of
lines and the other physical terms made
necessary by the nature of the discus-
sion. Ethnic lines drawn on a map
from place to place as indications of
the movements of tribes of men in
process of natural dispersion must not
be understood as a narrow highway or
as a river channel bearing a single
definite volume of water from its source
to its mouth from its departure to its
debouchure. Human progress over the
face of the earth has never been in this
exact similitude. If any tangible symbol
could be adopted to express to the senses
and receptive faculties of man the exact
nature of tribal diffusion, it would be
that of a film spreading over the face of the
earth. Nevertheless, this filmy and
irregular dispersion of mankind does
proceed from one place to another. It
starts from a definite origin and rees-
tablishes itself in another locus far re-
moved. A line drawn from one of these
places to another subserves an excellent
purpose as indicating the direction which
the movement, considered as a whole,
has taken, and also as defining the points
of departure and arrival. But in other
respects the line is altogether mislead-
ing, as being too mathematical and precise
for the fact which it is intended to repre-
sent. If a map could be so constructed
as to bear broad, thin bands of color,
widening and contracting and bending
in likeness to the expansion and narrow-
ing and eddying of actual tribal move-
ments, the representation would be more
in conformity with the facts. The stu-
dent of ethnography must, therefore, be
on his guard lest the notion or concept
which he receives of the migrations of
mankind, deduced from the drawing of
lines across the map through continents
and over seas, be inadequate, and, in-
deed, erroneous in its nature.
Many familiar illustrations drawn at
random from the movement of peoples
within the historical era may be deduced
in illustration of the misconceptions into
which the inquirer is likely Familiar nius-
to fall. For instance, the e ,7of S
passage from the shores of races.
the Old World, in ships, of the colonists
who planted themselves in little rook-
eries on the eastern seaboard of America
might well be represented by lines drawn
across the Atlantic from point of de-
parture to point of settlement. But the
diffusion of those peoples inland from
the Atlantic shores, though it had a di-
rection and a tendency, could hardly be
given a linear representation. With the
development of the Old Thirteen States,
the overflow of their population by
adventure came through the passes of
the Alleghanies into the Ohio and
Mississippi valleys; but such a move-
ment would be very poorly represented
by lines.
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BLACKS.
537
The peopling of the trans- Mississippi
states and territories was in the nature
Gradual diffu- of a gradual spreading of
sionof the t k American race toward
Anglo-Ameri-
cans westward. the Rocky mountains.
The colonization of Kansas and Ne-
braska may in general be traced to an
origin in New England. But a single
line drawn from Western Massachusetts
across New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio,
Illinois, and Iowa, and bifurcated at its
passage of the Missouri river into East-
ern Kansas and Nebraska, would be a
very inadequate, not to say an errone-
ous, representation of the actual facts.
Yet the movements which we have here
described were projected in the open
daylight of history, under the conscious
and rational forces of civilization. They
were consequently much more exact than
those natural expeditions and swarmings
forth which characterized the barbarous
epochs of human society. The progress
by which the colonists have peopled
the western portions of America by mi-
gration from the east is much more
susceptible of exact delineation than
were those prehistoric movements which
were directed by the blind forces of bar-
barism. An attempt to point out with
geometric curves the course taken by the
Teutonic hordes who came into Britain
in the fifth century, or by the Northmen
into Neustria in the ninth, would be not
only conjectural but exceedingly ineffi-
cient as a pictorial method of symboliz-
ing the things it is intended to express.
The movements of human society on
the surface of the earth are as multifari-
Exactitude not ous as the swarming of bees
It is easy to indicate the
general direction of the swarm, to point
out its origin and its ultimate destination
in the distant forest ; but its exact course
and the manner of its going are phe-
M. Vol. 1-35
nomena exceedingly difficult of definition
and description. Human migrations are
even more intangible and multifarious
in their manifestations than are the blind-
er circlings about and the final settlings
of animals and birds, and the reader
must be on his guard against the exact
and mathematical delineation of such
movements on maps and globes. They
are, at best, the vague indications of the
places from which and to which and the
space over which the tribes of men have
drifted and turned and whirled on their
way to a final occupancy of a different
and distant part of the earth's surface.
Still another important consideration
arises with respect to the classification
and tribal dispersion of mankind. This
relates to the precise scpara-
* f Separation of
tion of tribe from tribe and tribes and races
/. , . , , i not complete.
race from race which the
ethnographers have employed in their
schemes of division. These plans of
distribution and of race partition are
drawn up as if they were mathematical
formulae. It is assumed that the Ruddy
races are clearly defined from the Brown,
and the Brown races from the Black;
that is, that the lines of demarkation be-
tween these major divisions of mankind
are clearly and definitely draw r n. Such
a supposition is as wide from the fact as
is the use of a line to represent the pre-
historic movements of a tribe. It is true
that there are Ruddy races, that there
are other races which are Black, and
others Brown. But the lines of division
which are supposed to separate the one
from the other, that is, the ethnic dis-
tinctions by which the one is separated
from the other, would be difficult to
discover.
It is here, as in all natural analysis,
that nature hangs together. The races
of men grade off, the one into the other,
by imperceptible degrees. This is true
538
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
of their physical characteristics, of their
mental habitudes, of their morality, and
)ff-grading of of their institutional forms
c?e e stnoSi; ^ life. It would perhaps
nature. be impossible to find the
exact points of division between the
TYPE OF RUDDY RACE APPROXIMATED TO BROWN
A NATIVE OF MADRAS.
Drawn by Emile Bayard.
Black peoples of the world and those
who are classified as Brown. Nor could
the Ruddy peoples be separated from
either by a precise line of demarkation.
Nature abhors a line! The physical
world does not present a single instance
of what may properly be called a line.
Every phenomenon is shaded off on all
sides into the other facts with which it
is associated. It is true that the dis-
tinction between night and day is suffi-
ciently striking; but all the scien-
tific tests in the world could never
define the limits of that dawn which
separates the one from the other.
The cloud is discriminated from the
sky, and yet by what kind of test
could the edge of a cloud be de-
fined from its atmospheric envel-
ope? It is not possible to produce
even on the edge of the finest cut-
lery an actual line. Everywhere
there is a blending of the phenom-
ena that lie on the two sides of the
demarkation. In the world of life
this absence of exact outlines by def-
inition is equally noticeable. The
differences between races of men are
among the most striking and inter-
esting facts with which historical in-
quiry has to do; but these condi-
tions are graded down until at the
selvage they blend with one another
into a common character.
This, however, is not to assert
that there is no difference between
one race of men and species a mis-
another. It is only to ^T^S^
deny the division of the ture -
one from the other by those exact
lines of discrimination which ethnog-
raphers are wont to employ. Those
thinkers who have made the widest
application of the hypothesis of evo-
lution to the various forms of life on
the globe have become satisfied that
all varieties of living forms merge into
each other, and that the method of clas-
sifying by genera and species is in reality
fictitious a convenience of science per-
haps, but having no corresponding fact
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. THE BLACKS.
539
in nature. It is held that whereas there
are almost infinite varieties among liv-
ing creatures, there are no species in the
sense in which that term has been
hitherto understood by natural phi-
losophers. In many places in the
world of life great gaps and chasms
are discovered which it is necessary to
bridge over by supposing intermediate
living forms which have disappeared.
But it is believed that if all the phenom-
enal exhibitions of life which have been
seen on the earth could be restored, the
artificial methods of classification now
employed would disappear; in other
words, that all life would become one,
the various formal manifestations of the
same being shaded off by such fine de-
grees as not to warrant the fixing of the
great classes and smaller divisions which
furnish the nomenclature of biology.
If this view of nature be accepted as
applied to the human race, we should be
Races of men led to regard the chasms
SSSr between the Different divi-
acommoniife. sions of mankind as the re-
sult of the perishing and dropping out
of certain intermediate types that, on the
whole, were less able to perpetuate them-
selves than were those varieties of men
who were differentiated under more fa-
vorable conditions on either side of the
departure. We should thus be led to
regard a given "race," so called, as a
certain form of humanity which nature
had proved and ratified under the laws
of environment and survival. A differ-
ent family would present simply another
aspect of the one common fact adjusted
to new conditions and developed on new
lines of activity. Intermediate between
these two separate forms of human evo-
lution we should find both branches-
grading toward each other and approxi-
mating to a common type. The type
itself would perhaps be absent, but the
shades on either side of the line of de-
markation would be so slightly different
as to be hardly distinguishable the one
from the other.
Such conditions are discovered along
the edges, or selvages, of race develop-
ment. The Danube in peoples approx-
ancient times constituted S^X
a kind of geographical bar- margins,
rier between the Teutonic and the
Graeco-Italic races. The Goth, consid-
ered as a Goth, was sufficiently distinct
from the Greek considered as a Greek,
or the Roman as a Roman. But the
two races at their margins approxi-
mated a common ethnic form, and this
independently of the admixture of blood.
All of these considerations are adduced
and urged upon the attention of the in-
quirer to the end that his concept of
race divisions may be somewhat more
in accordance with the facts, than would
likely happen if he were trained to con-
sider the different streams of mankind
distinctly separated by the exact lines of
ethnography.
540
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
XXXI. MIXED RACES OK
IE are thus led to the
consideration of an-
other fact of no little
importance in the gen-
eral apprehension of
the movements and
dispersion and devel-
opment of mankind. This is the exist-
ence and character of intermediate or
mixed races. It has always happened
that wherever two families
Existence of
mixed or inter- of men have touched each
mediate races. , -L- n .1
other geographically, they
liave also touched by the more intimate
admixture of blood. In the early ages
of history, when race antipathy was
stronger than it is under the light of
civilization, the intermingling of differ-
ent branches of the race was less fre-
quent and conspicuous than in modern
times. But intermarriages were com-
mon from the remotest epochs, and are
mentioned as common circumstances in
the most primitive traditions of the
-world.
As a result of the cross-relation-
ships thus established between fami-
Uace offspring lies of different blood an
ltm S b C o h than! er offspring, possessing some-
cestors. thing of the traits of both
-ancestors, would arise, intermediate be-
tween the two ; and when the departure
between the two stocks thus blended
was strongly marked in color and other
ethnic qualities, the result of the union
would present a type sufficiently distinct
to be classified by itself. An interme-
diate group, or branch, of people would
thus be established who, preferring as-
sociations with their own kind, would
become a tribe, and finally a nation.
Such is the somewhat theoretical
view of the genesis of a mixed race of
people.
Strangely enough, however, the facts
do not seem to warrant the conclusion.
This is tO Say that the But intermedi-
tribal and race development JJJ^S^J not
of the intermediate stock themselves.
has never seemed to answer to the ex-
pectation of the premises. That is,
there is an apparent law in the natural
world which forbids the propagation and
expansion of these intermediate varieties
of mankind. The law in question is
common ,to man, to the lower animals,
and to plants. The hybrid does not
procreate its kind. It is incapable of
doing so. This is to say that if the two
animals which have been united in the
production of a third be sufficiently dif-
ferentiated from each other as to belong
to what the naturalist calls diverse " spe-
cies," then the offspring can not procre-
ate its kind, and the movement in the
direction of a new variety of animals
ceases with the first stage. If, how-
ever, the two animals are so near to-
gether in structure and characteristics
as to fall within the limits of what is
called a "species," then, indeed, the off-
spring of their union can procreate along
the new line of life. But it has been
universally observed that such propaga-
tion is extremely feeble, and that it
tends to weakness and early extinction.
In cases where this does not actually
happen, the offspring of the original
union, after a few generations, reverts
to the type of the one or the other of the
ancestors from which it was descended.
This reversion to the character of an
ancestral stock appears to be the case
with the union of the different branches
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. MIXED FORMS.
541
of mankind. That is, considered accord-
ing to the biological classifications
until recently acknowledged as the best
APPROXIMATION OF BLACK. AND BROWN RACES THE
MOOR FAGHE.
Drawn by E. Ronjat.
expressions of the different orders of
nature, all men fall within a single spe-
cies, having- its varieties
All varieties of
men fail within a which may unite despite
single "species." ,. ,-, ,. ,
of their strong distinc-
tions, and produce a progeny having
the qualities of both parentages. It has
been maintained by many naturalists,
and until recently has been generally
believed, that these hybrid forms of hu-
man life have in them the elements of
perpetuity, that the new variety of man-
kind thus established is fecund in its
kind, and as well qualified to maintain
its independent characteristics as is
either of the types from which it has
been derived.
A closer study of the situation, how-
ever, has established the opposite view.
It is now known, and wellnigh universal-
ly recognized by biologists,
3 ' Short-lived
that the intermediate va- character of ail
rieties, or so-called mixed mixed varieties -
races of men, are, considered as distinct
types, exceedingly short lived, unable as
a rule to continue their existence or to
maintain the distinct features which they
present in the first generations after the
original admixture. Such intermediate
peoples, therefore, constitute, not, as was
hitherto supposed, distinct races in the
ethnography of mankind, but a kind of
floating population interfused among
the nations of the world, mixing and
APPROXIMATION OF THE RUDDY AND BROWN RACES-
DON MARIANO TERAN, PRIEST OF COPORAQUE.
Drawn by Riou, from a photograph.
mingling dimly with the other human
elements, but really effecting no changes
in the general constitution of any type.
542
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
In all ages this impermanent compound
of humanity has shown itself along the
Results of inter- margins of race contact,
^felf the the but has never exerted other
indo-Aryans. than a modifying influence
on the separate peoples from whom the
mixed type has been deduced. We have
already seen that the valleys of India
were populated before the immigrant
Aryans took possession of the country.
In another chapter the presence of this
aboriginal population has been accounted
for by the hypothesis of a Dravidian mi-
gratory movement across the peninsula
before the deflection of that race into the
great archipelagoes of the East. The
Aryan tribes were not severe with the
aborigines, but absorbed them by blood
union and amalgamation. The result
was, not the establishment and perpetu-
ity of an intermediate or mixed race, but
merely a modification in the Indo-Aryan
character. It is believed that the immi-
grant and superior race took a consider-
able percentage of the Brown color of the
Dravidians, something of their tropical
suppleness of body, and a certain mental
quiescence favorable to the genesis and
propagation of the dreamy philosophies
and negative religions of India. These
results have continued to the present
time, and are quickly discernible by the
ethnographer in the swarthy complexion,
litheness, and subjective moods of the
peoples of Hindustan. But the Hindus
are not to be regarded in the light of a
mixed race. They are essentially Ar-
yan, not only in their genesis and evolu-
tion, but in their present character as a
race. The tint of the Old Dravidians is
in their countenance, and their blood is
tinged with the influences of aboriginal
descent ; but the ethnic type is the same
that it was beyond the Hindu-Kush and
in the old Aryan nidus in Bactria.
The same phenomenon has occurred
and recurred in hundreds of instances in
the history of mankind. In fact, it is ex-
ceedingly exceptional to
& J r Examples of like
find a race of men who have ethnic phenom-
, -u 1 ena elsewhere.
not been more or less in-
fected in blood and development by alien
influences. But each race has continued
its course of evolution under the domin-
ion of the original ethnic impulse ; and
while it has accepted modifications from
foreign peoples, it has persisted in main-
taining its own type. The attention of
the reader has already been called to the
fact that the Assyrians were a people
who had been thus modified by two or
three contacts with other races. The
Hamites on the south had somewhat in-
fected the ethnic character of the people
in Upper Mesopotamia. Later on, the
Aryan Medes penetrated the country on
the east and gave another modification
to the people. So great were the changes
thus effected in the Assyrian race char-
acter that ethnographers have been con-
fused in their classification. Even the
language was so much infected as to mis-
lead the inquirer in regard to the lin-
guistic stock from which it was deduced.
But all of these foreign influences were
no more than modifications in the real
Semitic constitution of the Assyrians.
The foreign admixture deflected some-
what the course and character of the
people of the Upper Tigris, but did not
subvert their fundamental constitution
or substitute one ethnic descent for an-
other.
The peoples of Western Asia Minor,
especially on the south, were regarded
as Composite. This fact Further exam-
has been pointed out in g^SSST
a former chapter. But acter -
the persistency of the strongest stock,
whatever that was in a given instance,
preserved the original type, however
modified and diverted from its earlier
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. MIXED FORMS.
543
standards. All the western nations of
primitive Europe might be cited as ex-
amples of the absorption, to a greater or
less degree, of preceding populations
that were overcome by conquest and
taken up by the process of amalgama-
tion. The Hamitic Basques and Ibe-
rians of Spain were in this manner
absorbed by the Aryan Spaniards of a
later age, and the latter received from
the former a darker tinge of color, and
perhaps other physical and mental char-
acteristics which they carry to the pres-
ent day.
The modern world presents still more
strikingly the modifications resultant
The Israelites from the intermixture of
SSSESrf Distinct types of people,
races. Perhaps no stock in the
world can better exhibit the persistency
of the original type under infinite modi-
fications of environment and foreign im-
pact than the Israelites, who are at present
interfused among the Western nations.
The " Abrahamic face " is seen in all the
marts of the world. The original char-
acter is strong upon him. He has inter-
mingled with all the races. The Spanish
Jew is very different in constitution and
ethnic character from the German or
Polish Jew ; but each and all have pre-
served an original type under diverse
and divergent aspects.
Modern ethnography has taken note
of an almost endless variety of mixed
races which present the beginnings, but
never the results, of new ethnic develop-
m ments. The distribution
Wide diffusion
of mixed types; of the Black and Brown
the Mulattoes. . . . / , 1
races into regions of the
earth now occupied by the Ruddy fami-
lies of men has given occasion for the
production of these multiform cross-
bloods whose interest as races lies
not in their perpetuity, but merely
in their present aspect. Wherever the
Ruddy and the Black race have come
into contact, that type known as Mulat-
toes has appeared, and until recently it
might have been thought that the Mu-
latto was destined to permanence as an
intermediate type of mankind. This,
however, is the very thing which, under
the law of nature, can not, or at least
does not, occur. The Mulatto is fecund.
It has been noticed by statisticians that
the first generation of Mulatto children,
that is, Cascos, or those who have Mu-
lattoes for both parents, are unusually
numerous; but it is also observed that
the tendency to reversion immediately
appears, some being blacker, like the
ancestral mother, and others whiter, like
the first father of the admixture.
The latter type of Mulattoes, that is,
those who gravitate toward the white
parentage, are almost in-'
. . Instability of
variably weak and spirit- the Mulatto
less. If they procreate at all,
the offspring dies, and the reversion to-
ward the white parentage soon ceases
for want of material. The blackward
tendency goes on for several genera-
tions, when the distinction between the
Mulatto progeny and the children of
Blacks is no longer noticeable. The
type has reverted on the side of the
original mother. The same phenom-
enon recurs with the Mestizo, or the
half-breed of the Mexican and the
Spanish-American states. As a rule,
the father, in this case, is a white
Spaniard and the mother an Indian
woman. Here, again, in the first gener-
ation a distinction appears among the
children. The Mestizos fluctuate from
the father's to the mother's side, and,
though somewhat more persistent than
the Mulattoes, they either revert or
perish.
That indefinable type, called Creole
in those countries where the word is
544
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Used to designate half-breeds, shows
the same or analogous tendencies. The
Zambo, or cross between
Crosses of Amer-
lean aborigines the Negro and the Indian,
with Negroes. . g ^^ & few generadons
undiscoverable as a separate type. That
is, the Zambo can only be perpetuated
by the repetition of the original cross.
or forces which occasion the departure
of one type of people from another, and
the development of each Ethnic instincts
into diverse forms of ac- creatfo^and 15 "
tivity, we should, perhaps, birth,
find the answer to our inquiry in the
nature of procreation and birth. There is
a human instinct which, in virtue of its
MIXED TYPES MEXICAN WOMEN. Drawn by Riou.
So, likewise, of the Cholo of South
America, the Pardo and the Mamaluco
of Brazil, the Chino of Mexico and
Spanish America, the Cafuso, or Negro-
Indian cross, of Brazil, and in general of
all varieties and shades of the so-called
mixed races of mankind.
If we are disposed to look into what
may be called the origin of races,
that is, the very primary circumstances
own nature, hovers around the fact of
maternity. Still deeper down than this
somewhat generalized sentiment that
covers the mother, there is an instinct of
the mother herself for her offspring.
This is sufficiently strong even in ani-
mals to stimulate intelligence and fore-
thought. The mother does not abandon
her child. She protects it, nurses it.
Otherwise, there were no perpetuity.
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES.MIXED FORMS.
545
This maternal impulse is the bottom
fact in the ethnic dispersion of mankind.
The mother is bound to her
All race disposi- ,.,,,,,-, , ,
tions arise from child by the law of her be-
ing. Therefore she keeps
it, first on her breast, afterwards at her
side. She is the mother, not of one,
but of many. She nurtures and gathers
all of them about her, and puts herself
between them and danger. This phe-
nomenon is perfectly natural, and, like
other elementary facts, is incapable of
explanation. To the mother and her
group the father is drawn. They con-
stitute a complex fact, and he a simple
fact. Even in savagery he is tied to
this group, with one of whom he has
the most intimate association, and of the
rest of w r hom he recognizes himself as
the creator.
The ties which bind the father to
the mother and to his offspring are
place of the not so permanent and abso-
lute as those between the
mother and her children.
But they are, nevertheless, sufficient to
hold him, with tolerable singularity, to
her and to them, and, indeed, to con-
stitute him their head and defender.
Doubtless the sentiment of fatherhood
arises at a very early period in the
breast of the savage, and, though it is
not constant and dominating in the bar-
barian, it nevertheless is sufficiently
pronounced to complete the elementary
conditions of the family. The family,
then, begun on these simple and natural,
we might say inevitable, conditions, is
the beginning of race divergence.
Out of the family springs the gens.
The brothers of a given family, mayhap
In what manner the sisters, become the
ST>m heads of other families,
families. bearing an intimate rela-
tionship the one to the other. They have
a common blood. They dwell together
or in proximity. Their interests are, in
large measure, mutual. They help each
other, prosper together, suffer together,
and struggle in common causes. They
call each other by the common ancestral
name, and are thus all grouped as one,
constituting that fact in the evolution of
man called the gens, the clans, the sept,
the totem, or some such name significant
of a single blood origin and develop-
ment. The gens, then, is the second
stage of race evolution.
Out of the gens arises the tribe. That
strange fact which we call by the general
name of nature does not
The tribe in like
freely permit the mtermar- manner springs
j , 1 j r fromgentes.
riage and blood union of
intimate kinspeople. There is a revul-
sion against it as a method of procreat-
ing and extending the race. The natural
affections of brotherhood and sisterhood,
even in the most savage state, are totally
different from those sexual affections
upon which the multiplication of the
race depends. It is thus found con-
venient and desirable, in the very earli-
est stages of society, that the members of
a given gens do not intermarry with one
another. It is found to be more fitting
that the man of one gens take the
woman of another to his wife, and vice
versa. For convenience, we call the
members of a given gens gentiles, and
the rule of even the most profound bar-
barism is that gentiles shall not inter-
marry. With the cross unions which take
place under these natural laws, relations
are at once established between two or
more gentes. These cross relations bring
the several gentes together in a common
cause. The selvages of all are knit to-
gether by the marriage unions among
them, and the offsprings of such unions
are allied to all in common. This union
of several gentes constitutes the tribal
or third stage in race evolution.
546
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
It must be borne in mind that the
threefold process which we have here
described occurs in the plastic stage of
human development. It may be assumed
that the primitive gentile
The gentile life
astateofsus- was in a state of youth as
ceptibility. f amily child .
hood that had been and the race man-
hood that was to be. It is well known
that throughout all nature plants and
animals pass through a state of suscepti-
bility in which and out of which they
may be deflected into almost any form
of growth. There is a time in the his-
tory of a tree when, as a mere withe, it
can be tied into a knot without injury
to the organism. There is a time when
the husk of corn may be opened and a
row of the grains cut out, and the wound
will close and the completed ear give no
hint of the process by which the number
of rows thereon has been reduced from
even to odd. Aye, more, in the early
stages of life all animal forms are virtu-
ally identical. But at a certain period
they begin, in obedience to their own
laws, to differentiate into the several
types which they are ultimately to bear.
The gentile age of man appears to be
his " age of susceptibility," as it respects
the form and character of
race toward which
he tends. Something of
this susceptibility is carried forward into
the tribe, which is the next higher form
of human structure. It is likely that
after the tribe has been well constituted,
the features of the race are not only dis-
coverable in the tribal lineaments, but
are in a measure fixed so as to be subjected
to little additional modification. Thus, if
we trace the barbarian unit of the primi-
tive world toward the coming race of
which his descendant is to be the epitome
and brief abstract, we shall find that his
actual differentiation into race form takes
In the tribal life
ethnic features the
are established.
place while he is passing through the
gentile and tribal stages of develop-
ment.
It happens has happened in a vast
number of instances that the develop-
ment of mankind has been arrested in
the gentile Stage. This is The horde arises
to say that the organic tend- SS5?
ency ceases at this low ment -
point in the scale, and instead of reach-
ing a tribe by the evolution of the gens,
we come to that other remarkable fact in
the prehistoric world called the horde.
A horde is not a tribe. We have in the
vegetable kingdom a phenomenon called
blasting. The grain that is to be, in-
stead of coming to development and
maturity, suddenly passes, as in the
ergot of rye, into a blasted and inorganic
condition. The horde is a blasted tribe.
It happened in the ancient world that
the growing gens sometimes expanded
sparsely into a vast and cheerless region,
unfavorable for aggregation and, per-
haps, already thinly populated by some
aboriginal form of humanity. The dis-
persing members of the gens that might
have become a tribe under more favora-
ble circumstances, inviting them to unite
with some other gens into a more com-
plex form of organization, merely diffuse
and scatter among the barbarians already
existing, intermingle with them, become
a common mass, without discoverable
features or form, and presently, after
multiplication without development, roll
away, under the influence of some blind
force, into the form of a horde. This
phenomenon recurs and re-recurs beyond
the horizon of history, and even on this
side of the dawn. To the present day
there are hordes drifting over the waste
regions of the earth, without form and
void. They are the miscarried aspects
of tribal development, the ergot of races
that have suffered abortion.
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. MIXED FORMS.
547
The surviving tribe, however, situated
tinder more favorable conditions and
urged by a more rational
The race is the . . . .
result of tribal instinct, fixes itself in the
soil, and presently, by its
growth, expansion, and maturity, pre-
sents us with that aspect of humanity
to the divisions thereof, and sometimes
even to minor stocks. But, as we have
said, the context generally shows in
which sense the word has been em-
ployed. Race, then, may be understood
as an expression for a given type of
mankind sufficiently differentiated from
THE HORDE. ENTRANCE OF THE MOORS INTO ALCAZAR.
which we call a race. The word is very
inexact. It has a wider and a narrower
sense. Its merit is that it generally con-
veys to the mind, in its relations with a
given context, the true sense which it is
intended to give. The term race is some-
times applied to all mankind, sometimes
all other types to present and maintain
certain characteristics easily distin-
guished from those of other branches
of the human family.
Such a differentiated form of mankind
is the product of tribal evolution into
permanency and persistency of structure.
548
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
The genesis begins with the instinctive
preference and passion of the mother for
The successive her own offspring, and the
association and binding of
the father to the mother
and child as the head of the f amily. The
evolution passes easily into the gentile
form, which is the first stage above the
family development. The gens unites
with another gens, or with other gentes,
to produce a tribe. This is the migra-
tory, and also the differential, period of
the human career. When the tribe has
become fixed in a favorable locality it
expands, under auspicious conditions,
into the permanent form of a race, and
the evolution is complete.
The gradual and toilsome spreading of
mankind over the surface of the globe
has been a process bo'th
Slow and toil- -~
some progress of striking and wonderful.
the human race. T , 1 / , -i
In the course of ages the
planet came into the habitable condition
into the epoch of life. Life appeared.
The lower forms w r ere succeeded by the
higher. Man came as the master race
of animals. He came with reason, at
least potentially, and with possibilities
of improvement, of adjustment and re-
adjustment to his environment, of change
and growth and high achievement.
With the development of his tribes mi-
gration became a necessity, not, indeed,
a definite movement from one locality to
another far distant, but a spreading first
into adjacent regions, and afterwards to
lands afar.
With this outbranching from old eth-
nic centers there came, in the plastic
stage of mankind, the differentiation of
tribe from tribe, of race from race.
Possibly a diversity of individual in-
stinct was the small source from w r hich
the differential tendency arose. Some
cause there certainly was for the branch-
ing forth into different forms of the
common stock of humanity. Long,
tedious, and variable have been the proc-
esses of movement and evolution un-
til, at last, all parts of the habitable
globe have come under the dominion,
or at least the occupancy, of the race.
It has been the aim in the current
book to give merely a cursory sketch of
the principal movements
, . , . ... ., . Synoptical view
by which this distribution of the dispersion
P i . T . . -M f of mankind.
of mankind into all parts of
the earth has been effected. In tracing
out these migratory waves we have only
incidentally touched upon the peculiari-
ties and characteristics which w r ere
meanwhile manifesting themselves
among the various races and nations.
While the distribution has been in
process of accomplishment, the distinct
features by which race is distinguished
from race have been evolved. The con-
spicuous differences which discriminate
one people from another have appeared,
until the modern inquirer is more sur-
prised at the variable aspect of mankind
than he is with those movements which
have preceded the present conditions of
the race.
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 549
XXXII. GENERAL VIEW OK ETHNIC CHAR*
ACTERISTICS.
EFORE passing to an-
other general division
of the subject, we pause
to look somewhat more
attentively at the gen-
eral ethnic peculiarities
by which the different
races of mankind are discriminated the
one from the other. The inquiry will
include not only distinctions, but also
analogies and identities among the dif-
ferent branches of the hu-
Fersonal charac-
teristics of races man race. It is intended
dered ' to note the traits and quali-
ties of life and manners among at least
the principal divisions of mankind, to
the end that the race characters of all
may be clearly discerned. The study
before us will include what may be
called the personal characteristics of the
various races, together with their means
of subsistence, their habits and manners,
their primitive institutional forms, their
intellectual appetencies, their arts
where the same exist and their influ-
ence as a modifying force in the phys-
ical world, or, in general, the traits of
mankind and their relations with the
laws and conditions of environment.
It is purposed in the present chapter
to glance briefly at these ethnic pecul-
Racesofmen iarities from a general
bySSSetd- Point of view. There are
mg features. a f ew leading features by
which the races of men may be strongly
discriminated, and it is perhaps along
these primary lines that their differenti-
ation has b^en chiefly accomplished.
After noting these first principles of
divergence, we may, in the following
chapters of the present book, descend
into the particulars of tribal life, devel-
oping, according to the present resources
of knowledge, the whole aspect of the
race as the same is displayed in differ-
ent parts of the world.
In the first place, it may prove of in-
terest to note, as we look down upon the
whole scene of human Ability of man-
development, from the be- S^gSSJ*
ginnings of race evolution environment,
unto the present day, the extent to which
the different kindreds of mankind have
been able to modify the conditions of the
physical world. The observer will be
struck at the beginning with the fact
that some peoples have effected a very
considerable change in the surface of the
earth, while others have in no wise modi-
fied the primitive aspect of nature.
There are parts of the earth in which
the change effected by human agency
has been very considerable, insomuch
that if the earth were viewed, planet-
like, as we view the moon, the modifica-
tions effected by human agency would
be easily discoverable. It has happened
that all such changes have taken place
in the north temperate zone, or possi-
bly to a small extent within the tropics.
Western Asia and Europe throughout
have been, until the present century,
the scene of the largest modifications
produced by the agency of man. At the
present time the most rapid change in
the general aspect of the world is that
which is taking place in the central zone
of North America, under the impact of
the English-speaking race.
If we look at these changes from an
ethnic point of view, we shall soon dis-
cover that they have been effected most
550
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
largely by the agency of the Ruddy, or
so-called White, races of mankind. In
The Ruddy the countries of the Brown
lecte^ellllt races * is not in evidence
modifications. that the surface of the
earth has been transformed to any con-
siderable degree, except in Eastern Asia,
been changed by the massing of a great
population and its necessary subsistence
from the soil. Native woodlands could
not possibly coexist with so dense a pop-
ulation. Forests have entirely disap-
peared, and the rivers have no doubt
shrunk considerably in their volume.
MODIFICATION OF THE NATURAL WORLD BY MAN. VIEW OF THK FORTIFICATIONS OF BELFORT. Drawn by Taylor,
from a photograph.
where the Chinese Mongolians, through
long occupancy of a given country, have
wrought a considerable change in its as-
pect. The original physical condition
of China is a matter of conjecture, but
it is not unlikely that forests were prev-
alent, and that much greater humidity
prevailed in primitive ages than within
the historical era. As a matter of course,
both of these former conditions have
In most parts of the earth, however,
the Brown races have little concerned
themselves with the physic- Brown races do
* J not concern
al conditions around them, themselves -with
_. .. 1 1 ,i_ physical con-
More particularly, they ditions.
have made few efforts to transform the
primeval state of the countries into which
they have penetrated. Asia north of the
Altais remains virtually as it was before
the race of man had taken possession if
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 551
possession that may be called which con-
sists in mere occupancy. Doubtless
considerable cosmic modification has oc-
curred since the coming of mankind, and
those limitless steppes and cheerless
mountain slopes have shared in common
with the rest of the earth the slow proc-
esses of climatic change ; but the actual
agency of man in the Turanian countries
has been but slight in so far as the
conditions of physical nature are con-
cerned.
One of the first instances of the mas-
tery of the earth's siirface was in the
Mesopotamian region, where the strong
tide of the Noachite family flowed to the
west. In Chaldaea, about the
Modifications ef-
fected by man head of the Persian gulf,
the whole surface of the
low-lying plain has been raised to an
elevation of many feet above its prehis-
toric position. It has not been deter-
mined by geologists and ethnographers
by what process the surface of thickly
inhabited countries is elevated to higher
levels ; but that such is the actual fact
the old Chaldaean burying grounds and
the level of the whole region around
Rome conclusively show. It is well
known that the two great rivers, Eu-
phrates and Tigris, were thrown to-
gether either by the elevation of the
country along their banks or by the cut-
ting of canals through the alluvium.
Another marked variation in the Chal-
daean landscape was the extension of the
verdant region on the side next the
Arabian desert. In this direction the
waters of the Euphrates were carried off
by the agency of man to a distance of
a score of miles, by which agency the
fertile extent of Lower Mesopotamia was
perhaps doubled in area. In the north-
ern region the native woods from the
foot of the Armenian mountains down
into Central Mesopotamia were removed,
and the desert character of the country,
such as it was in the days of Herodotus
and afterwards in the times of Xenophon,
was the result.
To what extent nature sympathized
with these changes on the surface of the
earth we may not well determine; but
there was doubtless a COn- Nature changes
qi (\ P ra hi p rl i m a t i r m nd i fi pa somewhat under
inca " the influence of
tion resultant from human
agency. Through all of Asia Minor to
the u^Egean the same kind of modifica-
tions were effected. On the whole, the
country between the Black sea and the
Eastern Mediterranean was greatly de-
teriorated by the influence of the early
peoples who planted themselves in this
fertile region.
It is here that we may consider for a
moment the great injury done to the
face of the world by the injury done to
bntrhprv nf frvrpqK Tr is the -world by
erv ( IS ' " lb destruction of
true that the relations of forests.
man with the earth require the conver-
sion of wild woods into fields and gar-
dens, but the wise energies of the race
should be directed to the redistribution
of the tree-growths on the face of the
earth rather than to their mere destruc-
tion. Nothing is more certain than the
desert tendency which immediately ap-
pears in every country which is reck-
lessly denuded of its trees. No country
has suffered in this respect more than
has Asia Minor. Its extreme fertility
in ancient times can not be doubted.
For a long time after the institution of
civilized states in this peninsular portion
of Asia the country was proverbial for
its great yield of grains and fruits. Man
has virtually exhausted the whole region
by his careless administration. He has
consumed the current resources of the
country and provided nothing in their
place. The result has been the creation
of great deserts on this area once cov-
552
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
ered with grain -bearing fields and or-
chards and vineyards.
This was the work of the Aryan peo-
ples who came into Lesser Asia and
Asi f .Mi^ormore there developed the early
modified than J
Easterner states which flourished un-
NorthernEu- ., ,, 1-11
rope. til they were crushed be-
tween Persia and Europe. But if we
follow the northwestern line of Aryan
The migratory tribes generally effect-
ed no change in the regions through
which they passed. Their
Variable power
vocations of hunters and of races as mod-
mast-eaters did not inter-
fere with the natural course of the phys-
ical world. At the beginnings of au-
thentic history Germany and Gaul and
Britain were in the primeval condition.
UNMODIFIED ENVIRONMENT OF MAN. VIEW OF SONMARG. Drawn by G. Vuillier, from a photograph.
migration into Northern Europe, we
shall pursue our inquiry far before we
come upon another country so greatly
modified by the agency of man. The
southern peninsulas of Europe were
early transformed from their native
state into habitable territories, but the
vaster regions north of the Alps and the
Carpathians remained in the wild.
In general, the Celtic race accomplished
but a slight transformation in the phys-
ical landscape. The Graeco-Italic peo-
ples wrought successfully in establish-
ing themselves locally upon the soil and
in changing the face of nature. Indeed,
this is what is implied in civilization.
Within certain limits, the transforma-
tion of the surface of the earth is coi'n-
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 553
cident and coextensive with the march
of the general fact which we call the
Modification of civilized condition of man.
ativ e e a ^th C cTv r . el " This Principle, however,
iiization. nas its limitations. It
is only within certain bounds that man
can effect any change in his environ-
ment. It is probably true that in such
a country as France, or Belgium, or
Great Britain, the limit of man's agen-
cy as a cosmic force has been reached.
This is to say that nature will hardly
feel any additional modification from
the continuance of the established status
in these countries. Of course, if civili-
zation should decline, there would be a
reversion to the primitive condition, as
has actually occurred in other quarters
of the globe.
It is, then, the civilizing Ruddy races
which have effected the largest modifica-
tion in the surface of the earth, and by
Europe more this means have given a cer-
chancy hu- ^in direction to the ebb
man agency. an ^ fl ow o f nature. The
changes effected primarily in the southern
parts of Europe, and, in later times,
throughout the whole continent, have
been more conspicuous than those pre-
sented in other portions of the ancient
world. Along the northern shores of
Africa, except in the extreme northeast,
only slight modifications were made by
the races occupying these countries. It
should be noted that the earth is much
more refractory in some parts, much
less susceptible of receiving and express-
ing the agency of man, than in other
parts.
There are three general features on
the surface of the globe that strongly
Man success- resist the influence of its
thrLTrSs 6 ^ 7 inhabitants. These are the
nature. mountains, the desert, and
the sea. Perhaps a slight exception
ought to be made in the case of the
M. Vol. 136
desert; but the mountains and the sea
are absolute. It is possible, indeed, that
all the deserts of the world may finally
be reclaimed by the agency of man, but
the mountains will hardly ever submit
to his dominion. As to the ocean, its
exemption from human authority has
been happily discovered by the poets.
Here the human race loses completely
its power and ascendency.
" Man marks the earth with ruin his control
Stops with the shore ; upon the wateiy plain
The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain
A shadow of man's ravage, save his own,
When, for a moment, like a drop of rain,
He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan,
Without a grave, unknell'd, uncoffin'd, and un-
known."
The narrow countries of Northern
Africa were held between the mountain
ranges and the Mediterra- Great modifica-
nean. These two facts de- SSSS^
termined the climate and races,
the aspect of nature. The Hamitic peo-
ples who built the primitive states on
these shores effected but a slight change
in the physical environment. The
Teutonic races in the north of Europe
have accomplished a great work in the
transformation of nature. This region
was exceedingly obdurate as it stood in
the primeval ages. But the race which
\vas precipitated along the Baltic was as
persistent as the physical world was for-
bidding. In one part the primeval
forest, dark and ominous, and the great
sluggish rivers, rolling do'wn their beds
of ooze, were the enemies of progress and
development. In another part it was
the ocean, surging back and forth over
the lowlands, alternately covering and
uncovering the vast and coveted regions
which were only exhibited for a few
hours at a time. The Teuton made a
league against the woods and the sea.
The one he destroyed, and the other he
554
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
forced back and compelled to stand
aloof. If Northern Europe could be
viewed with a telescope from the inter-
planetary spaces, a great change would
be noticed in this region of our world-
Semitic and Hamitic tribes we shall
find but little modification in the track
which they have pursued. This is part-
ly attributable to the nature of the coun-
tries into which they threw themselves
INABILITY OF BLACKS TO MODIFY ENVIRONMENT. AFRICAN TOWN ON RiVER.-Drawn by Riou.
disk from the dark and dolorous aspect
which it presented in the prehistoric
ages.
We thus note that the conspicuous
changes which have been effected on the
The Aryan belt surface of the earth by the
Stable Agency of man have been
transformation, measurably limited to the
great belt through which the Aryan races
flowed to the west. If we take up the
in their primitive migrations. The cir-
cuit of Arabia furnishes little oppor-
tunity for the agency of man as it re-
spects the landscape. At the present
time it may readily be observed how
little, on the whole, the Arabs, from
their manner of life, and particularly
from the nature of the countries which
they hold, have been able to transform
the physical condition of the earth.
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 555
But apart from the fact that nature
in a treeless and riverless region
Hamiticand does not invite the trans-
l^olSTo Arming power of man to
physical change, play upon her features,
there has been much in the character
and instincts of the Hamitic and Semitic
peoples averse to that kind of exertion
which modifies the surface of the earth.
It is true that the Hamites and Semites,
especially during the ancient activities
of these races, were great builders, and
in some instances large producers from
the soil. But the mere fact of building
does not bring about the transformation
of the landscape. In the lapse of time
the structures which men rear go down
to dust, and things are as they were be-
fore, particularly in a country such as
Egypt, rainless, cloudless, snowless,
treeless. However greatly the building
energies of the early race might display
themselves, the country itself would be
but little modified. It is doubtless
true that the valley of the Nile has suf-
fered as little change in its physical con
dition, under the dominion of the many
races which have succeeded each other
there, as has any other part of the
globe.
In general, the countries into which
the Hamites and Semites were dispersed
'were less subject to the vicissitude of
Countries of climate and more uniform
Karaites and
Semites not sus- in aspect than the variable
ceptible to mod- -. ~ . , .. ..
tfication. and changeful lands to
which the Japhetic nations were as-
signed by their destiny. It will be con-
ceded that in Syria, notably in the
Mediterranean states of Palestine and
Phoenicia, the Semites accomplished a
considerable change in the physical con-
dition of the earth. If we may trust
the ancient descriptions which tradition
has handed down of the aspect of these
lands, it will certainly appear that great
modification has been produced by the
agency of the peoples dwelling therein.
If we turn to the Black races of man-
kind, it will be perfectly reasonable to
assert that they have effected, in the
countries to which they were distributed,
no perceptible 'changes in the conditions
of their environment. The Negro races
inhabiting the great central belt of Af-
rica have never shown a disposition to
struggle with the forces of the natural
world and to subordinate them to the
purposes of life. The same is true of
the Hottentots. Along the great Afri-
can rivers the forests stand as they were
from the beginning. The towns are
built in the forests by the river banks
and nature is unchanged. Though the
country is peopled and occupied, it is in
no sense possessed to the extent of mas-
tery and dominion. The same is true
in Australia and Melanesia. We speak,
of course, of the influence of the native
races in these countries. It is a mere
truism to assert that barbarians so low
in the scale as the Australian and Papuan
races neither would nor could modify
the surface of the earth by their indus-
tries and enterprises. The great differ-
ence, indeed, between the barbarian
and the civilized states is that in the one
the man is the master and in the other
the slave of the natural world.
On the whole, we see that the great
modifying influence of man on his phys-
ical environment has been Modifying infln-
exerted most largely by *
the Ruddy races, in their Ruddy to Black,
progress to the West. The Brown races
in Southern Asia have effected certain
changes of like kind in the aspect and
conditions of the outer world ; but these
results have been rather incidental to the
massing of vast populations within small
areas of territory than from any direct
and energetic assault of man on the nat-
556
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
iiral world. In other regions, the Brown
races have in no wise modified the nature
of the earth or directed the forces and
conditions of their environment. The
nomadic Turanians and the Polynesian
islanders have submitted themselves to
the laws of the material world, and turned
their whole activities to other fields of
exertion. The Black races, as we have
seen, have in a still less degree influ-
enced the physical surroundings where
they have held their career. They have
simply yielded to the blind elements of
the natural world, and have resisted the
swirl of the forces to which they were
exposed only so far as to cling to the
surface of the earth and maintain there-
on a precarious existence.
If we seek for the reasons of this di-
versity in the relations of the different
races with the planet on which they hold
The countries of their career, we shall find,
nav^faed ces first of all, that the severer
development. aspects of nature in those
countries where the Aryan races have
been dispersed have invited and pro-
voked the energies of man to the con-
flict. This is to say that life mere life
> has a harder contest under the condi-
tions which have been imposed on the
Ruddy races than in other parts of the
world. We have seen that the Black
races have all been tropical in their nat-
ural development. Under the influence
of the blazing sun the earth brings forth
in the tropics, .and the eater eats. He
has no need to subsist upon the heavy
carbonaceous and nitrogenous foods
which are a sine qua non amid the rigors
of the north. There is much of the
same condition in the Orient and in the
islands of the Pacific. It still remains a
disputed question whether the higher
energies of civilization can be displayed
under the effeminating influences of
southern climates. However this ro^v
be, it is certain that the vigor and an-
tagonistic spirit of man have been most
highly provoked by the bluster and cold,
not to say the fury, of northern climates.
Thus far in the history of the world
Egypt and Carthage furnish the only
conspicuous examples of really vigorous
peoples who have arisen without the
spur of the frost and the sting of the
snowflake.
There are also certain subjective rea
sons for the preeminence of the Aryan
race as a modifying force subjective rea-
rm the smrfane nf tVip
r ine
sons for the
stron g evolution
These peoples have an of the Aryans.
instinctive curiosity to scrutinize and
manage the elements of nature. The
Aryan, from our first acquaintance
with him in the shadows of prehistoric
ages, has been curious to know, to the-
orize, to experiment with, the phenomena
and laws of the material world. In the
most primitive epoch of his activity he
created a mythology in explanation of
the aspects and conditions around him.
From the time of the awakening of his
tribal consciousness he was on the alert
to note, and even to record, the move-
ments and caprices of physical nature.
He was quick to discover the identities
and antagonisms of natural facts, and
thus were laid the foundations of those
classifications which, in the riper ages of
the world, have become science.
In this respect the Aryans have been
strongly discriminated from the peoples
of Brown descent, and Still Natural science
more strongly from the ^nlanl
Black races of the tropics. Blacks.
It is doubtful if any such thing as nat-
ural science has ever suggested itself to
the inquiry o'f thinkers among the Brown
peoples of mankind. Doubtless the
highest degree of knowledge possessed
by any branch of this family is that to
which the Chinese have attained, and it
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 551
is certain that among them the natural
sciences are either utterly wanting or
families of men the Aryan race is al-
most equally distinguished by its scien-
IfODIFICATlOM OF ENVIRONMENT BY APPLICATION OF NATURAL FORCES. HYDRAULIC MINING.
else in so crude a condition as to merit
no attention from the Western nations.
Even from the Hamitic and Semitic
tific tendency and attainments. The
disposition of the Semitic peoples, and
of the Hamites in their best estate, as
558
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
among the Egyptians, has been, from
the first, to look at nature as a caused
phenomenon, and pass immediately to
reflection on the nature and character
of the Cause ; while the Aryan mind has
had almost a passiqn for scrutinizing the
phenomena themselves, for determining
the relations of physical facts, and dis-
covering the laws by which they are
governed.
This subjective difference, as will
readily be seen, has led to the scientific
The Aryans have ascendency of the Aryan
StlTitr 3 " ces and to their domina-
of phenomena, tion over the earth. That
is, the Aryan peoples have mastered the
laws of phenomena and subordinated the
forces of nature so successfully as to turn
them upon their environment, and to
compel nature to operate against her-
self for the benefit of her most intel-
ligent creature. The modification
which these peoples have effected iu
the general aspect of those parts of the
world where they have held their career
has been resultant from their instinctive
curiosity to know and handle the forces
of the natural world. If for a moment
we contemplate the hydraulic miners at
their gigantic task ' among the gorges of
the Sierras, with the uplifted brazen
nozzle of their hose throwing a volume
of more than a hundred square inches
of water, compressed into the destroy-
ing impact of a solid column, against
the granite mountain side, hurling and
hurtling the bowlders and debris as
mere sand flying before the blast, we
shall see the Aryan mind displayed at
its topmost bent and in its most charac-
teristic activity. This intellect delights
in attacking the environment and crush-
ing it into subjection. And in this re-
spect it is totally unlike the quiescent
and adjustable intellect of the Brown
or the Black races.
Still again we may note a second in-
stinct, or at -least a subjective quality,
in the Aryan peoples which has given
them their energy as a Extreme sensi-
modifying force on the sur-
face of the earth. This is
their sensitiveness to want, and the power-
ful reaction which such want produces
in arousing them to exertion. The
stomach was the prehistoric schoolmas-
ter, and hunger was the first professor
of natural science. Under the influence
of these austere but capable instructors
the Aryan responded more quickly than
the other pupils of the universal school.
The energy displayed by the Aryan
races under the influence of hunger, of
cold, of need in general, has been a
matter of astonishment in all ages.
Bodily and mental want has acted upon
this race like a passion upon the indi-
vidual man, and the tremendous exer-
tions growing out of this hunger of body
and spirit have told like a storm on all
the wild forests and hills and river banks
where the Indo-European tribes have
made their abodes.
The inquiry will at once arise whether
this curiosity to scrutinize the processes of
nature and to direct her en- Are Aryan m-
pro-iVc -w/hH-Tif^r fhi<; VPP-TI stincts and char-
ergies, wn > Keen acteristics effect
hunger, this anxiety to feed or cause ?
and clothe and build against inclemency
which the Aryan race has ever exhibit-
ed, is not in the nature of an effect rather
than a cause. Have we not here thus
may ask the reader a substitution of a
result for its antecedent force ? Has not
such instinct in the Aryan race been de-
veloped by the very antagonisms with
which it has had to contend ? Has not the
hunger arisen from the very exposure
and wasted energy which has come to
the half-barbarian wanderer in the wilds
of Northern Europe? Doubtless there
are many reasons that may be assigned,
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES, ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 559
many arguments that may be construct-
ed to answer these questions in the af-
firmative, thus making it appear that
the subjective conditions among the Ar-
yan peoples from which we have deduced
their modifying energy in the physical
world are not really subjective conditions
at all, but merely superinduced modes of
activity. But, on the contrary, if we
look profoundly into the problem, we
shall see still better grounds for admit-
ting the subjective ethnic distinctions
which we have here assigned to the peo-
ple of the Indo-European race.
For, in the first place, it was a matter
of choice and preference on the part of the
migrating tribes. In fact, all the pec-
Ethnic prefer- pies of the world, if we ex-
SaSSSSS ce Pt onl y the colonizations
veiopment. o f modern times, have
been distributed to their respective
quarters of the globe by the unreason-
ing and but half-conscious choice and
preference of the peoples themselves.
Why, otherwise, should a tribe of pri-
meval half-barbarians prefer to depart
toward the north and enter the bleak
regions of storm and snow and desola-
tion ? Why should others prefer to trav-
erse the desert? There was at the first
no compulsion, no contrivance. There
was preference only. The ethnic forces
were working out their own results.
The long lines of tribal migration, as
traced over the surface of the earth, were
determined in their course and extent
by the choice and instinctive dispositions
of the moving masses. True it is that
every race of living beings is acted upon
by the conditions of the environment,
and many second natures are produced
by these external causes. But the prefer-
ence which impels a given animal to adopt
a given habitat as his home, is an in-
stinctive choice, not determined, as a rule,
by the influences of the external world.
So in a larger degree the rational ani-
mal man. The Esquimaux cling to the
ice floes, struggle with the Races choose
walrus, live in their snow ^j- **
huts, and, indeed, suffer all on races,
the hardships of the polar circle because
they choose to do it. And the huge Pata-
gonians, bounding among the rocks at
the extreme of the continent, are there
from choice, and remain from a tribal
preference, for which no explanation
other than itself can be assigned. All
the selections of the intermediate terri-
tories of the world have been made
originally by the same unreasoning
preference of the original tribes that oc
cupied them. We thus see, after allow-
ing all due influence to the reactionary
effects of nature upon man, that there
were fundamental activities in himself
which led him to choose his environ-
ment and to fix himself in certain con-
ditions and in certain relations with the
physical world.
There are not wanting in recent times
a large class of profound thinkers who as-
cribe the march of civiliza- p rea * part of
human develop-
tion tO the disposition in ment based on
T -. - the knowledge
some advanced races of men O f nature.
to acquaint themselves with the laws of
phenomena, and to make those laws
available in the administration of life.
It would be, doubtless, too much to grant
the truth of this theory without restric-
tions and limitations ; but that it ex-
presses a great section of the whole truth
can hardly be denied. The last two
centuries have been conspicuous in the
whole history of the race by the rapid
development of scientific knowledge and
the consequent subordination of the
forces of the natural world to the will of
man. It is one of the great secrets of
progress, and it has belonged to the Ar-
yan race. It is they who have entered
into the arcana of the physical environ-
560
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
ment and extracted its principles of ac-
tion. They have preserved and record-
ed the invariable sequence in which one
natural fact succeeds another, and have
given to this sequence the name of law.
From this they have deduced the recur-
rence and the expectation of recurrence
among the phenomena of the outer
It would be trite to enlarge upon the
advantages which the highest races of
men have derived from concomitancy
their knowledge of physical gSSBS*
nature and the laws by life -
which it is governed. As between this
knowledge and the general fact called
civilization, defined as it is in our mod-
MASTERY OF MAN BY NATURE. A BOAT WRECK.
world, and have availed themselves of
all the advantages derivable from the
knowledge of what is to be. The man
who knows what will happen is wise and
strong. He who does not know what
will happen is foolish and weak. This
is said of man in his relations with the
natural world. What he understands,
he can control. What he can control, he
can use. What he can use, is beneficial.
Benefit is health and wealth and renown.
ern languages, it were hard to determine
which of the two more powerfully stim-
ulates the other. A certain kind of civ-
ilization may exist without the preva-
lence of scientific knowledge, and a
certain kind of scientific knowledge may
prevail without inducing a high grade
of civilization. But, on the whole, the
two are concomitant. The more the
man knows the more does he develop
and direct the civilizing forces. The
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 561
more he uses the forces of civilization
the more he knows of the principles by
which universal nature is controlled and
directed.
As compared with the other races, the
Aryan stock has been preeminent in
Scientific pre- these respects. The dis-
tinction between them and
the Hamitic and Semitic
families of men on the line of scientific
achievement is sufficiently broad, and
eminence of the
Indo-European
races.
Indo-European, families of mankind on
the other.
It is believed that the differences in
the intellectual habits and achievements
of the several races as Knowledge of
viewed from a general %
point of observation are perpetuity,
most distinct and striking with respect to
this great fact of natural law and the con-
nection of man with the material world.
In general, barbarians and half-civilized
MASTERY OF NATURE BY MAN. A SCREW STEAMER AT SEA.
when we look at the Brown races of
Asia and Polynesia and at the Black
races of Africa and Melanesia, we can but
be struck with the strong contrast be-
tween the indifference of the latter to
natural law, their inability to control
and direct for benefit the forces of the
material world on the one hand, and the
breadth and profundity of scientific
knowledge and the astonishing benefits
derived therefrom by the Aryan, or
peoples are utterly subject to the forces
of physical nature. It is not impossible
that the weakness of the old forms of
civilization, their want of perpetuity, was
chiefly attributable to the prevailing ig-
norance of the laws of phenomena ; and
it is probable that the strength and per-
manence of existing institutions are cor-
related with the prevalence or the non-
prevalence of scientific knowledge. This
is to say that at least one of the conditions
562
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
of perpetuity among the institutional
forms established by mankind is the
knowledge of the physical laws by which
the world is governed, and the sympathy
and concord of man with those laws in
the exercise of his activities.
out of Mesopotamia directly to the west
and were there developed into the He-
brew and Arabian nations, seem to have
dwelt in their mental activities upon the
nature and character of the intelligence
which preceded and formed and directed
'
\
--
SEMITE CONTEMPLATING NATURE. Drawn by Paul Hardy.
it was hinted on a preceding page that
the Semitic mind had shown itself more
concerned with what may
be called the Cause of na-
ture than with natural phe-
nomena themselves. From the earliest
ages of history the peoples who came
The Semitic
mind seeks per
sonality in na-
ture.
| not only the isolated facts and processes
of the material world, but the world it-
self and universal nature. It appears to
have been in the nature of the Semitic
mind to ascribe personality and intelligence
as the cause of phenomena and to pass
over the phenomena themselves, their
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 56S
relations and dependencies, to reflect
upon the character and will and work of
the personal agent behind the aspects of
the material world.
Following- out this fundamental con-
cept, the Semitic seer of the primitive
world would proceed to the
And makes man
to be related and immediate establishment
bound thereto. -, ,. -. , .
of relations between nim-
self and the personal intelligence beyond
the tangible forms of^ nature. That is,
human relationship, according to his
views, would spring up, not between
. man and physical laws and phenomena,
but between man and that agent who
stood above them. We can easily dis-
cern the strong religious tendency which
would at once arise from the existence
of such a disposition of mind, and we
may perceive with equal clearness the
absence of scientific knowledge from a
system of thought thus originated.
In these facts may be readily discov-
ered the bottom principles of what has
been called, in the philosophical and re-
Notion of spir- ligious discussions of the
itual causation -n rP o eT1 t oeritnrv SpmiHr
peculiarly Sem- P reben century, oerr
itic - monotheism. More prop-
erly, however, we should say that the
fact indicated is the theory of immaterial
causation, without respect to its single-
ness or multiplicity. If we examine the
Semitic nations, at our first acquaintance
with them, in Chaldaea and Assyria, we
shall find that they were polytheistic in
their religious development not poly-
theistic in the same sense with the Graeco-
Italic peoples of Europe, but in the same
sense with the Hamitic Egyptians. It
was the peculiarity of both the Hamitic
and Semitic races that they ascribed to
the phenomena of the material world
immaterial intelligent causes.
This view of the universe and its ad-
ministration is totally different from
polytheism as it was developed by the
Aryan nations. In course of time the
Aryan also arrived at the concept of im-
materialand intelligent cau- This notion dif-
Sfltion "Rut in thp parliVr f ers totally from
)n> r Aryan polythe-
ages of these peoples they ism -
looked simply at phenomena and gave
names thereto, and the names passed,
according as the phenomena were vast
and majestic, into the catalogue of dei-
ties. Aryan polytheism was the result
of the combined tendencies of primitive
natural philosophy and linguistic growth
and decay. It is not intended in this
place to elaborate, but only to point out
the difference between the fundamental
ideas of the Semitic and the Indo-Euro-
pean races. The former conceived of
the cause apart from the phenomena
and antecedent thereto. The system of
religion, therefore, as developed in Meso-
potamia, and even transmitted to the
West, was an immaterial kathenothe-
ism, as distinguished from the material
polytheism of Europe.
The primitive Hebrew fathers revolt-
ed against this system because it was
polytheistic. Their revolu- Misconception
of modern phi-
tion consisted in the substi- losophy respect-
tution of the monotheistic e n1:e. UC
idea as the bottom fact in the universe.
The Hamites never proceeded thus far
in the religious evolution. They there-
fore remained identified in their beliefs
with the Mesopotamia!! people ; and the
Egyptian system of religion differed
only from the Chaldaean in its more
elaborate development and its finer
philosophical expression. The attempt
of certain modern scholars to make it
appear that the Aryan Dyaus Pitar of
India, the Zeus of the Greeks, 'and the
Jove of Rome were fundamentally the
same concept with the Elohim of the
Hebrews, is to misconceive the whole
question, to confound phenomenon with
noumenon, and to obliterate the differ-
564
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
ence between a material and an imma-
terial causation of nature.
If we look among the Brown races for
the highest expression of their thought
The Brown on the subject we are here
mythology or* 16 considering, w r e shall find
religion. a totally different view of
both premises and conclusions. The
Chinese and Japanese as the oldest and
most thoughtful of the early Brown peo-
ples of Southern and Eastern Asia, gave
little heed to the aspects of nature or
to the interpretation of what we call
natural phenomena. Neither did they
concern themselves to seek for causes
behind these phenomena, either material
or immaterial. As a result, the Chinese
have never produced a highly inflected
mythology, or what we may properly
call a religion. They have risen in
their evolution as far as ethics and mo-
rality, and on these lines of development
have proceeded as far as any other
people.
From the first it appears that the
Chinese mind has been most concerned
Philosophical not with the facts of na-
jtTemo? 1111636 ture > but with the facts f
thought. iif e> Their native religions
have been simply elaborated systems of
ethics. Confucianism is not a religion
in the sense in which that word is em-
ployed by the Western nations. It is
simply a code of human morality as de-
duced from the life and teaching of the
most illustrious sage of the people. The
imported Buddhism has in great measure
lost its spiritual and subjective peculiar-
ities. In the concept of the Chinese mind
it has been transformed into harmony
with the older systems native to the na-
tion. If the Chinese can be said to
worship at all, it is the worship of life
and duty and obligation rather than the
adoration of any objective being, whether
the same be the highest expression of
some supreme thing, as the sky, or of a
great Spirit behind and above all aspects
of earth and heaven. It will readily be
seen that such a view is radically differ-
ent from the bottom notions upon which
the great religious systems of Western
Asia and Europe have been erected.
In their concept of nature and of the
author or authors of nature, the Black
races have been lowest of all in the scale
of rationality. In fact, it
The Black races
has been authentically dis- still lower in the
puted that some of these s
peoples have any concept of a moving
power among the objects of their sense
perceptions. As a general statement,
the Blacks in their native condition have
risen as high as fetichism and no higher
in the religious evolution. Hereafter
we shall note with more particularity
the peculiarities of their superstitions,
and mark out the divergence of their
thought from that of the Brown and
Ruddy races.
Turning from the subjective differ-
ences of mind and thought among the
races of antiquity to their Difference of
objective activities, we find a ^J^ft"**
corresponding divergence adventure.
and distinction of character. The di-
versity of men of different races in their
modes and purposes of action is among
the most striking features by which
they are discriminated. In what may
be called the spirit of adventure, for in-
stance, the various races have had each
its own distinctive character and method.
Some have taken to the w r ater, chosen
the maritime IL'e, sailed afar to distant
coasts and islands, and made the sea a
familiar spirit. To others, the ocean
has been a terror, while the continental
vastnesses have invited to exploration
and even to peril. To other branches of
the human family both sea and land have
appalled and paralyzed the adventurous
THE BLACKS FEAR NATURE. STORM IN AFRICAN FOREST. Drawn by Rlou.
566
GREAT RACES OF MANKIXD.
energies. Such peoples have shrank
back from the enticements of explora-
tion and the wild liberty which it af-
fords. They have settled into the safest
and most convenient nooks, and shielded
themselves from the opposing forces of
nature by what barriers soever they
could discover in a given environment.
In these respects, we find again that
the Ruddy races have been superior to
The Buddy the correlated branches of
S^eSur- the human family. It can
cms disposition. no t be said that their ad-
venture has carried them as far as in the
.case of the nomadic peoples of Asia
those great Turanians of the Brown race
who have drifted through all parts of the
greatest of the continents. But the ac-
tivities of the Aryans have been char-
acterized by greater energy and more
rational method. Their migrations have
been directed by a purpose, at least a
half-formed purpose, to seek for better
things and gain the mastery. The Ham-
ites have given a few conspicuous exam-
ples of adventure, as when, in times of
Pharaoh Neku II, they circumnavigated
Africa twenty-one centuries in advance
of Vasco da Gama.
The negative side of adventure is
timidity. Adventure is courage. It im-
Courageofthe plies the facing of danger,
vo r rcTd S fr d om ra- the willing exposure of the
tionai purpose, bodily life for the sake
of advantage, or even for the mere sake
of freedom from restraint. The latter
qualities have belonged preeminently to
the Ruddy races. It can not be said that
the Brown peoples of Northern Asia are
lacking in courage. On the contrary,
they have contributed some of the most
warlike and fiery spirits which the West-
ern nations have had to meet in combat.
But the bravery of the Brown races as it
was manifested in the barbarian era was
lacking in rationality and the conscious
purpose to achieve advantage by victory.
The conquests of the Turcomans, hur-
tling down from the Altais upon the ter-
rified and somewhat effeminated popula-
tion in Southwestern Asia and Eastern
Europe, succeeding as conquests and
then sinking into an inane and torpid
condition from want of rational purpose
and deliberation of method, are at once
the striking example and the epitome of
the spirit of courage as it has been man-
ifested by the Brown races of mankind.
A volume could not suffice to trace out
all the diversities of action among the
different families of men. undeniable and
The present chapter is de- S^tJT"^
voted merely to a general Aryans,
view of the most conspicuous traits in
which the people of one race have dif-
fered from those of another. On the
whole, the superiority of the Ruddy
peoples over the other varieties of man-
kind, in their masterful relations with the
physical world, in their concept of nat-
ural phenomena and the laws by which
they are governed, in adaptation of
means to ends in gaining and maintain-
ing a dominion over the earth, and in the
exercise of an adventurous and rational
spirit, giving them preeminence and
leadership, is undeniable and sufficient-
ly striking.
It may appear, at first glance, a long
departure from the subjects which we
are here considering to the
. Ethnic diversity
discussion of the bodily form in bodily form
... . . . . . f. and activity.
and physical activities or
the various peoples of earth. Men
have differed according to race not
only in their view of the world and in
their attitude toward the laws of matter,
not only in their concept of the primary
principle from which all things have
proceeded and by which all things are
governed, not only in their notion relative
to duty, obligation, and destiny, btit also
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 567
in the material organism in which for the
period of life all thought is resident and
from which all forms of activity proceed.
In fact, the bodily form and features of
the different races are the most con-
spicuous single circumstance as well as
the easiest criterion by which those
races are distinguished the one from the
other.
We are not able to penetrate through
the shadows of the prehistoric ages
to a time when these
Such diversity
dates back to very tangible evidences
the earliest ages. / ,-, . -,. -,.j
of ethnic divergence did
not exist as they exist to-day. Time
and again we have repeated what is
perfectly well known to historians and
antiquaries, that the very oldest mon-
uments which modern times have in-
herited from antiquity bear mute but
indubitable evidence to the fact that, in
the earliest ages to which we can in
any wise penetrate, the physical diver-
gence of the different branches of man-
kind was as conspicuously and deeply
cut in determinate outlines as at the
present time. It is worth while, then,
to note with some care the general pe-
culiarities in physical structure of man-
kind, and to point out the features by
which one race of men is most notably
and permanently discriminated from the
others.
In the first place, as to the bulk and
stature of the human body. It will be
found on an examination
of the facts within reach
of the inquirer that very
great diversity exists among men of dif-
ferent races in these respects. On the
whole, it does not appear that the people
of antiquity were specially different in
stature and weight from the peoples of
modern times. It might be difficult to
determine whether the race, considered
as a whole, tends, in its evolutionary
Great diversity
in the stature
and bulk of men.
processes, to the production of larger
or smaller individual members of 'the
species.
Tradition has preserved the shadowy
recollection of both giants and pygmies
in the ancient world, and from the mon-
umental delineation of figures we are
able to determine that the average peo-
ples were about of the same stature as
those of to-day. Among the -Assyrian
and Egyptian sculptures this fact is
abundantly illustrated. But while
this is true, it is clear that, on the
whole, the smaller peoples of antiq-
uity, as well as in modern ages, were
among the aborigines and barbarous
tribes, while those of great stature and
gigantic bulk were derived from the
progressive and well-developed families
of mankind.
This will appear at first glance as an
evidence of the truth of the evolution-
ary process. Casually, it may be ob-
served that the body of man has been
developed from a comparatively insig-
nificant race of ancestral
Correlations of
Savages. It IS known to mind and body
. 1 i_ 1 'j.j.1 11 j. to evolution.
the biologist that all exist-
ing species of horse have been derived
from a single prehistoric typical animal
known as Hipparion elegans ; and it is
also known that this primitive animal
was of very small stature, so small, in-
deed, that it would seem impossible that
the enormous Norman or Clydesdale stal-
lion of our day could have been derived
from so diminutive an ancestor. There
is one circumstance, however, which
breaks the analogy so far as the devel-
opment of the human body is concerned ;
that is, that the most intellectual and
powerful peoples, civilly, socially, and
politically considered, have not been
those of largest stature. This is to say
that if the evolutionary process is
to be accepted as an explanation of
568
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
the large size of some races as com-
pared with the diminutive stature of
others, there is a clear break in the
analogy of bodily and intellectual evo-
lution a thing that may be difficult of
explanation.
It is not intended in these pages to
enter into the abstruse and difficult
questions of biology. Such matters
absolute proof exists of a smaller race
of people than these. The native
Australians and some of the inhab-
itants of the Melanesian islands are
no more than four feet in stature,
and are slender in proportion. These
examples may be taken as a minimum
of size for prehistoric and existing races
of men.
THE TARPAN (FIRST REMOVE FROM THE PRIMITIVE HORSE).
may be remanded to specialists and to
the skill and scholarship of the future.
It is sufficient to note the
The lowest lim-
its of size in the great diversity in the size
of the members of different
races. In a preceding book it was noted
that the prehistoric folk who were buried
in the stone boxes along the banks of
the Cumberland, in North America,
were no more than three and a half feet
in stature. It is doubtful whether any
In considering the other extreme, we
come to the half-mythical and half-his-
torical giants of the heroic ages. Near-
ly all races have transmitted to posterity
some account of exceptionally enormous
specimens of the race, and in some tra-
ditions we have accounts of Maxima of
whole tribes conforming to %%?*
the gigantic pattern. It races,
is impossible to give an authentic aver-
age for the stature of the so-called
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 569
giants of antiquity. Goliath of Gath
was reputed to be nine feet nine inches
in height. We have hints in Homer of
towering warriors who might well be
called gigantic. Some of the largest
specimens of the human race have in
modern times been brought out of
Syria. The Teutones and Gauls were,
among barbarians, notoriously huge
ick William I. His regiment, known
as the Potsdam Guards, was made up
of men gathered from all parts of
Europe, the smallest of whom was over
seven feet in height. They reached
a maximum of nine feet, and it is
perhaps not beyond the truth to as-
sign an average of eight feet for the
whole regiment. We may accept this.
AN ARAB STEED (GREATEST REMOVE FROM PRIMITIVE TYPE). Drawn by T. F. Zimmennann.
in body. The paragraph in Csesar's
Gallic War, wherein he recites the
ridicule which the Gaulish warriors of
the Aduatuci bestowed on his Roman
legionaries on account of their diminu-
tive stature (brevitas nostra), will not be
forgotten.
The most conspicuous example of
an assemblage, or collection, of giants
within the historical era was that
resulting from the caprice of Freder-
M. Vol. i37
then, as the maximum stature of OUT
race, though possibly exceptional in-
stances may have shown greater height.
Whether the Blacks have contributed
any specimens worthy to be classified as
giants can not be stated Largest exam-
with certainty. Among the SetagsSSSJ?
Brown races, the most con- the Browns,
spicuous examples of greatness of size
are given by the Asiatic Mongoloids in
Patagonia. Many of these exceed
570
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
seven feet in stature, and it is known
that among- their far ethnic kinspeo-
ple, the Chinese, equally exaggerated
specimens of mankind have been found
this, too, among a people who are
conspicuously below the average in
stature.
To generalize these results, we find
very great departures from the common
standard of size among the ancient peo-
ples. The same phenomenon recurs in
Aryan peoples modern times. This vari-
SS?^ ation^ extends not only to
etature. individual members of the
human species, but to whole races. It
appears that, considered as races, there
were smaller peoples in the prehistoric
than in the modern world. It would
also seem that in ancient times the ex-
aggeration of size above the average
standard was as conspicuous as in recent
ages. On the whole, the White races
are larger in stature than any other
people. Among these, the Aryans
are conspicuously above the average;
and of the Aryans, the largest are
those who have been exposed to the
rigors of northern climates, but not in
the high latitudes.
" As between the barbarian and the civ-
ilized state of man, there is not much
Geographical difference as to size. On
SSSSSl the whole, the barbarian is
bod y- larger, on the average, than
his contemporary from the civilized
states. Geographically, the distribution
of the largest races has been in the tem-
perate zones. Beyond a certain degree
of cold the human family has been
somewhat dwarfed, rather than stimu-
lated into extraordinary growth. The
polar people are small in stature. The
insular populations of the world present
the same variations as those of the con-
tinents. The primitive Saxons of our
ancestral islands were huge in body and
highly muscular. The Japanese, simi-
larly situated, are small in stature and
delicate in development. On the whole,
there was not much difference in the
stature and muscular power of the three
great branches of the Ruddy race. The
advantage was in favor of the Aryans,
and the Hamites appear to have been
somewhat weaker and smaller than the
Semitic peoples ; but the distinction was
not great.
The races of men have generally pre-
served a given type and standard of
form and stature from our Form and stat-
earliest acquaintance ?
therewith to the present from antiquity,
time. The sarcophagi of Egypt, the
dish-covered tombs of Assyria, and the
burying grounds of Chaldsea have made
us acquainted with the stature and pro-
portions of at least three peoples of re-
mote antiquity. The Assyrians were
not taller than the average of modern
peoples, but were exceedingly stout
and muscular, like the Romans. The
Chaldasans were of the average height
and form. The mummies of Egypt are
below the average standard in height
and in general proportions.
If we descend from the general form
and stature of the different peoples of
ancient and modern times to consider
some of the special features by which
they have been characterized, the first
to attract our attention is the size, shape,
and capacity of the head. This organ,
indeed, is about the only one with which
the historian and ethnographer need to
concern himself. The established fact
that the intellect of man resides in his
brain, and is correlated in its manifesta-
tions with that organ, and the additional
fact that the mind is the agent of all
that has been accomplished by the hu-
man race, may warrant us in looking at
the cranial development of the different
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 571
peoples as an interesting study in ethnic
history.
There is a constant relation between
the size and formation of the brain and
constant reia- t ^ e ac ti v e energy of the
tioii between 0</
the size of the race. The facts connect-
brain and human , . . ., . ., . .
energy. ed with this important
study have been gathered from many
sources, and may now be studied on the
scientific basis. It is found that there
is an ascending ethnic scale of cranial
development, beginning with the Aus-
tralians and Papuans and proceeding
upwards, through the Black races of Af-
rica, to the Asiatic and Polynesian Mon-
goloids, and thence to the Ruddy peoples
of Europe and America. It will not be
considered a materializing digression to
note this fact, to dwell upon it, and to
point out the perfect correlation existing
between the average capacity of the brain
and the grade of civilization to which the
people of that average have attained.
The law is: small brain, little achieve-
ment; great brain, great achievement.
It is not necessary to refer the progress
of civilization to the mere physical fact
of cranial growth. A more rational
view is that the larger display of mental
power is correlated with the size and
activity of the organ by which that men-
tal power is expressed.
It has been found that a large varia-
bleness exists among the races with re-
spect to the volume and weight of that
organ upon which all thought depends.
The size and the capacity of the brain
in the different races of men have been
carefully examined, and the
Winchell's table
of cranial capac- results tabulated in a form
Ity of races. .-, M
that may be easily appre-
hended. The following table, present-
ing these results in a concise form, is
from Winchell's Preadamites, and may
be regarded as an accurate and indispu-
table summary of the best that is known
relative to the race gradation of men on
the line of cranial capacity :
TABLE OF CRANIAL CAPACITIES.
No. of
Speci-
mens.
RACKS.
CUBIC
CENTIMETERS.
Author-
ity.
Men.
Wom-
en.
Aver-
age.
572
38
293
901
33
1
18
13
I
101
126
61
"^
85
79
13
~^6
18
15
33
I. RUDDY RACES.
Aryans of S. W. Europe. .
J.576
1,395
M85
1.534
1,482
3 1,500
\ i, 4 86
1,450
MS 2
1,421
1,488
1,488
1,270
1,250
5 1,372
( 1,286
j 1.441
< 1,442
J '.403
i 1,338
,345
,364
1,452
J'.3j|7
(1,360
1,264
1,295
! j ' 27 ?
1 1,276
Broca.
Morton.
Davis.
Broca.
Davis.
Morton.
Broca.
Dall.
Ball.
Bessels,
Broca.
Mortov-
Davis.
Broca.
I) avis..
Britons, Anglo-Saxons,
Swedes, Irish, Nether-
Ruddy Races, mean ca- j.
1,518
1,383
11. BROWN RACES.
1*539
1,428
Asiatic Esquimaux.......
N. W. American Esqui-
Esquimaux, mean capacity
Chinese and Mongols, )
1,43
1,251
Mongoloids, mean ca- I
III. BLACK RACES.
Negroes, W. Africa.
Negroes, mean capacity..
1,347
1,181
Australians, mean ca- )
From the foregoing schedule it will
be seen that the native Australians are
the lowest type of men in Deductions from
cranial capacity, being in- %?*
ferior in this respect to the man-life.
Negroes by an average of eighty-four
cubic* centimeters. The table does not
include the Hottentots as a separate
study. These people, as a matter of
fact, have a cranial 'development inter-
mediate between the Australians and the
Negroes. Again, it will be noted that
the Mongoloids have an average capacity
of eighty-two cubic centimeters in excess
of the Negroes, while the average ca-
pacity of the Aryans is forty-four cubic
centimeters above the measure of the
Mongoloids. It will also be observed
that the preceding table does not exhibit
the relative size of the brain of the Papu-
572
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
ans, but from other sources this has been
found to be above that of the Australi-
ans, and nearly identical with that of
the Hottentots.
It may well be confessed that this
physical index discovered in the capacity
Relation of of the brain for the several
St^rphysfcai races P ints distinctly to a
features, certain grade of rational
activity and progressive power in each
people. Here, then, is the fundamental
fact of a certain quantity of brain forces
expended in the administration of life
among the various peoples of the earth.
The same is correlated with other pecul-
iarities of anatomical structure. It is
found that the cranial cavity is very vari-
able in its shape, conforming in its pro-
portions and relative distribution of parts
to the general configuration of the skull.
And this is typical in each of the primary
races. It is not the place to enter into
-any elaborate illustration of the definite
-angles and peculiarities of the human
-skull, or to describe by comparisons its
various approximations to the crania of
other animals. Such discussion belongs
to special scientific treatises, and the re-
sults derivable therefrom could play
but a small part in the ethnic history of
mankind.
The same is true of the other bodily
organs. It is well known that the lower
types of the human family
Selvage of man- Jr J
kind and the approximate in various de-
lower a-Tiirria.]^, . - ,
grees to the form and or-
ganism of certain quadrumana, and that
these close analogies, even identities,
have given rise to much speculation
about the connection between the bot-
tom selvage of the human race and the
upper margin of the animal kingdom.
How near together these two edges of
life may approximate, or how far apart
they may be found to lie, it is not the duty
of the historian, or even the ethnog-
rapher, to determine. Certain it is that
the highest types of men have a very
marked divergence from all species of
quadrupeds, and it will certainly be ad-
mitted that the lowest orders of man-
kind have in them at least the potential-
ity of a rational, and possibly an elevated,
life.
The nearest approach in anatomical
structure in the human species to the
lower orders of nature is
. Approximation
found in the Bushmen of of certain
South Africa, the native
Australians, and the Papuans of Mel-
anesia. Specimens of men have been
found among the native races of Central
America and in South America almost
equally near akin on the physical side
with the simians and other superior or-
ders of animals. The peculiarities which
constitute this physical affinity of man
with the brutes are well known. The
arms of the lower orders of men are
very long, reaching to the knees or be-
low the knees when the person is erect.
The hands also are spread out and set
on the wrists after the manner of fore-
feet in the quadrupeds. The feet are
strikingly animal in their structure,
having a long heel and so flat an instep
that the whole bottom of the foot is
pressed on the ground. Rising from
these expressionless parts of the body
to the features of the face, we find them
also strongly marked with animal char-
acteristics. The chin in many cases is
scarcely better developed than in the
chimpanzee, and the forehead slopes
back from the brow with scarcely greater
elevation than is found in the oranjr 01
ape.
From these low grades of development
in the human form, there is a gradual
ascent from the level of the Hottentot
and Australian, through the Negroes
and the barbarous aborigines of South
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 573
America and the Pacific islands to the
Esquimaux, thence to the nomadic races
of Asia, and thence to the
Hints in low . .
races of future highly-developed physical
development. form Qf the Europeans>
It should be noted, however, that occa-
sionally among the natives of Polynesia
and South America, and also among the
native races of North America, an excep-
tional example of high personal beauty
of form and feature will be discovered.
Such instances may be regarded as the
premonitory outgoings of nature relative
to what the race may become in its bet-
ter stages of development.
We have now arrived at that point
in the inquiry where the general view
The three prin. which takes in the higher
SSdSffig, relations of the races de-
and shelter. scends into particulars and
widens to infinity. Were we to pursue
the subject further in the present chap-
ter, it would be to consider what may be
called the tangible parts or evidences of
civilization as illustrative of race charac-
ter in different ages and countries. As
already said, the three great means of
supporting and developing human life
are food,clothing,and shelter. The man-
ner of man's activities in procuring these
essentials of his own existence and the
perpetuity of his kind would demand in
its exemplification a great amount of
space and variety of inquiry.
On the side of food, the problem
would begin with the appropriation of
the simplest vegetable products by the
Range of ethnic primitive races, and would
. end with the most highly
elaborated and carefully
prepared tissues of animals. This is to
say that food begins with the starchy
elements in vegetation, just as they
are distilled and manufactured by na-
ture, in vegetable cells, and ends with
the highest form of nitrogenous product
tiaisofiife.
in the animal kingdom. To procure the
latter requires all the refinements of
skill and contrivances of art. On the
side of clothing, the question is first
with the appropriation of the skins of
beasts, the mere transfer of the natural
covering of a dead animal to the body
of a living one. It ends with the finest
and most delicately wrought fabrics
which the ingenuity and caprice of civil-
ized races have been able to invent. On
the side of shelter, it begins with a
piece of bark set up at an angle between
a witless savage and the rain. It ends
with the villa and the palace, shining
down with marble front over boughs of
bending myrtle and avenues of ever
green and fountains of flashing water.
The activities of the different races of
mankind have been exerted primarily
in the three directions above indicated:
but the methods of exer-
Method of man
tion have been as variable in adapting him-
and multiform as the tribes self to nature '
of the human race. In the first place,
the earth herself has been capricious in
the distribution and character of her
natural gifts. Men have adapted them-
selves to this whimsicality of the natural
world. But with the progress and
development of the race, they have first
gone beyond and then ignored the hints
of nature relative to subsistence, and
have transplanted and wrought in a way
suggested by their instinctive appe-
tencies and ethnic preference.
It is in this way that the human race
has done so much in the way of diffusing
the natural products of the Adjustment va-
earth. In his adjustment
with the means of sub-
sistence, natural and artificial, man has
changed first himself and afterwards his
surroundings. At the beginning he
fitted and adjusted himself simply to
natural conditions; but these he soon
574
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
outgrew and overpassed in development.
It is in this respect again that the races
have shown remarkable diversity. The
life of some has become highly artifi-
cial, while in others the natural life pre-
dominates as from the first. The
Hamitic race in all of its development
remained close to the soil. The some-
what complex life of the ancient Egyp-
' tians was, nevertheless, of the earth,
earthy. No concept of Egyptian civiliza-
tion is at all adequate which has not the
mud of the Nile at the bottom. It was
founded on the ground, and its high-
est aspirations rose no higher than
a basket of lotus on the head of a
peasant.
Among the Semites, the evolution of
food took place more rapidly than that
Evolution of of either raiment or archi-
SSwS'SS 8 tecture. For some reason
clothing. these peoples bestowed
especial attention upon the materials
upon which they subsisted. Even on
their first emergence from the pre-
historic shadows we find them classify-
ing and, arranging their foods, especially
those deduced from the animal kingdom,
by the distinction of clean and unclean.
In common with the Hamites, they
refined upon this idea, and carried it
into their religious system. But unlike
the Hamites, they were not, especially
in the first stages of their development,
a people much interested in architecture.
The pastoral life which they adopted
was unfavorable to building, and even
when they settled into fixed communi-
ties and became husbandmen and keep-
ers of vineyards, they were still indiffer-
ent to building. The records of the
Semitic race would be searched in vain
for even the shadows of such architec-
tural grandeur as was displayed in the
valley of the Nile or in the opposite
peninsula of Hellas.
The Brown races, such as the Chinese
Mongolians, have always led a simple
and somewhat primitive The Chinese ex.
life Their means of sub em P lif y the re -
lie. ineir tardation of ar-
sistence have remained cwtecture.
primary. We may well be surprised,
when we reflect upon the antiquity of
the Chinese nation and upon the in-
tellectual astuteness of the race, to note
the really primitive condition of their
industrial and social life. Their building
is, at its best estate, a piece of Oriental
elegance, never rising to the grand or
sublime. Their raiment has perhaps
never been changed in its character or
material for a thousand years, and their
food is as simple as it was in the days
of Confucius. In the midst of much
intellectual acumen and a certain kind of
perpetual industry, they have signally
failed to advance into the higher forms
of physical culture and development.
The Black races have' scarcely at-
tained, in their industrial and social
state, to a higher level than The Blacks are
that of aboriginal tribes. ^h^nST *
In respect of food, cloth- tionsofiife.
ing, and shelter, they are savages, but
the peaceful character of the race has
forbidden the display on a large scale of
either the savage instincts or the savage
virtues. The Blacks have shown no
skill in their native places in the adap-
tation of means to ends, and have, there-
fore, made no progress in those primary
industries on which the civilized state of
man is founded.
It is the Aryan race again that has
shown itself preeminent in its adaptations
tO the natural resources of The Aryans pre-
the earth, and in improving ^nat^af
upon the conditions and resources,
methods suggested by nature. We have
already seen that the face of the earth
has, to a considerable degree, been
transformed by the energy and force of
DISTRIBUTION OF THE RACES. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS. 575
character of the Aryan peoples. In no
respect has their departure from the
primitive condition of mankind been
more marked than with regard to the
resources by which life is supported and
made strong. The Aryan peoples, at
least the Western Aryans, have all ad-
vanced from the primitive foods to the
these, great systems of industry and
commerce have been instituted, devel-
oping the energies and perfecting the
skill of the most active communities in
the world. The same refinement and
advance may be observed in regard to
the means by which the human body is
defended from the vicissitudes and rigors
LOW INDUSTRIAL ESTATE OF THE BROWN AND BLACK RACES. POST OF THE GRAND TALIBOUCHK.
Drawn by Y. Pranishnikoff.
higher and more complex form of or-
ganic tissue in which the elements of
subsistence are most highly condensed.
The race might be defined as " the peo-
ple who eat costly food." A second na-
ture has been produced in all Indo-Euro-
pean countries requiring sustenance from
the most costly elements of nature ; and
for the production and distribution of
of climate. This is said of the materials
which the civilized peoples of the West
employ in clothing, rather than of their
skill in fabrication.
As builders, the Aryans appear just
at the present age to be entering into
the era of splendid and substantial archi-
tecture. Strangely enough the race,
though marked by unusual skill and en-
576
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
ergy in the handling 1 of materials, has
not been conspicuous in recent ages for
Place of the its ability to build. Among
St the ancients, the only Ar-
evolution. van peoples noted for their
preeminence in architecture were the
Greeks and Romans, and the latter were
only imitators of the former. The belief
that even the skillful and artistic Greeks
derived their architectural forms and
methods from the Hamitic Egyptians
seems to be well supported by historical
evidence. From which it would appear
that the Hamites of the Nile valley were
the first great original builders the
first of the human race to create archi-
tectural monuments.
As already intimated, however, the
discussion of these topics leads us imme.
diately into the subject-matter which has
been reserved for the detailed account
of the industrial and social life of the
different races of mankind. We have
now reached the threshold of that dis-
cussion. In the former chapters we
have endeavored to delineate the primi
tive condition of the human race, and the
tribal departures and migrations by which
the race was originally distributed to the
various quarters of the globe. In the
current chapter we have endeavored to
look down, as from a high point of view,
upon the various families of men, and to
note a few of the leading features by
which they are distinguished. We shall
now take up for consideration the de-
tails of the methods and manner of life
among the principal families of man-
kind, and shall attempt to depict the es-
sential facts and some of the peculiar
incidents in the past and present condi-
tion of the leading divisions of our race.
T IT R K E
rjiei ^ "\ s /" *s Quetta"")
B I A N
RACE CHART is T O. 2
SHOWING THE GEOGRAPHIC\L DISTRIBUTION
OF THE EAST ARYANS.
Note. In the Race Maps of this worfr, the scheme
suggested by Winchell has been tollowed to
a considerable extent.
3ftOTHERS PUBLISHING CO.
C A S H MTE R E
.. A IVN
D A
RACE CHART No. 2.
EXPLANATION.
THIS Chart shows the geographical spread of the East Aryan family of
mankind. (For the connection of this stock with the whole race of man-
kind, see Race Chart No. i, at the proper point of departure, to the left,
above.) The point of departure for this division is indicated by the heavy
red line at the foot of the Caspian Sea, near Teheran.
The East Aryans, from this region, departed to the right hand ; while
tti^ West Aryans (see "Armenians," " Georgians," " Ossetes," etc.) departed
to the left. The movement extended eastward until the stricture between the
Caspian Sea and the Persian Gulf was passed, when the race branched out
in many directions.
The northern division, now represented in Turkestan, was the Usbeks.
To the south were the old races of the Medes and Persians. The ancient
Persians, as will be seen, developed into several modern families. Out of this
line sprang the Afghans, and further to the south the Beluchs. Far to the
north, from the original Iranian stem, arise the Bactrians, one of the oldest
families of this division.
The migratory stem of the East Indian races is indicated by the word
Indicans. From this stem arise the Punjabese ; and from this stock, in turn,
the old Brahmans, in the valley of the Indus; and the great Hindu family,
farther to the East. From the Punjabese stem, we have the modern Nepa-
lese. From the Hindu stem, we have the great races of the Mahrattas, the
Bengalese, etc. From the Bengalese division, at its easternmost extreme, we
have the Indo-Burmese family, which is the remotest Asiatic division of the
East Aryan races. The Chart covers about fifty degrees of longitude, and
twenty degrees of latitude.
THE RUDDY RACES,
I.-THE EAST ARYANS.
BOOK V.-THE IRANIANS.
CHAF>TER XXXIII . ELEMKNTARY CHARACTER AND
RELIGION.
|UR oldest kinspeople,
reckoning by antiquity
of descent, are discov-
erable along the far-
thest horizon of his-
tory on the plateau of
ancient Iran. The
country corresponds in general with
modern Persia. It must be borne in
mind that the political boundaries of
antiquity were not generally so defi-
nitely drawn as in the modern world.
The Semitic races in Western Asia and
the Greeks in Eastern Europe were the
first to set up termini, and thus to estab-
lish definitely the metes and bounds of
a political state.
The impulse which carried the Old
Iranians southward from the primitive
Aryan nidus in the coun-
The inquiry may
try about the lower Cas- begin -with the
1 iit i Iranians.
pian has already been de-
scribed. We are now to look with
some care at the people of the Iranic
family, and to note their ethnic peculiar-
ities. It will not be forgotten that at
the time of their first dispersion in Iran
they were still, as a race, fundamentally
identical in character with the other
eastern branch of our ancestral kindred,
577
THE IRANIANS. ELEMENTARY CHARACTER.
579
which was carried into the Punjab and
thence down the river valleys of India.
Ancient Iran invited to the nomadic
life. This was the first impress which
the environment made upon the primi-
Piateau of Iran tive tribes of our race. At
S t sMp t0 and rSe - the time of their coming
outdoor life. into these open highland
regions they had already domesticated
the horse and several other species of
animals. But the horse was the special
companion of
the Iranian on
his excursions,
and it is worthy
of note that
through all j
ages of history
the preemi-
nence of the
Persian steed
has been main-
tain e d . A
household had
been organized
ifter the man-
ner which has
ever since pre-
vailed among
the Aryan
races. The re-
lations of fa-
therhood and motherhood, of sonship
and daughtership, had been established,
and the home of the group was a tent
at first, and a more permanent abode
afterwards.
Not only were the common animals
known to the primitive Iranians, but
also the common cereals and vegetable
products. One point of divergence be-
tween this branch of the
human family and their in-
timate kinsfolk, the Aryans
of India, was with respect to the wild
animals, the capture of the same in the
chase, and their use for food. The
country of Iran was in its natural fea-
tures and resources promotive of the
chase. It was inhabited by all the com-
mon varieties of wild beasts peculiar to
the plains and mountains in the temper-
ate zone. To the pursuit of these the
Iranian tribes gave themselves with zest,
and soon became proficient in the cap-
ture of even lions and bears and tigers.
Another method of life opened to the East-
The desert ira-
mans become
hunters: the
gr
ANIMAL LIFE OF PERSIA. MOUNTAIN SHEEP OF KEROUT.
Drawn by Tofani, after a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
ern Aryans, who gave themselves up to
the quiet of the agricultural and domes-
tic life; and it is from this point that
one of the striking divergencies in the
languages of Iran and India may be no-
ticed. The domestic animals are named
in common by the two peoples, while
the wild beasts are generally designated
by distinct terms invented after the sep-
aration of the races.
The Iranian life thus presented some
diverse and peculiar aspects. It was in
one respect the half-barbarous life of the
chase, and in another respect the civil-
580
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
izing life of the field and the garden.
In proportion as the first prevailed, the
Both methods old nomadic and migratory
im P ulse of the race was
stimulated into activity ; in
proportion as the other became predom-
inant, the people were aggregated into
settled communities and began to build
cities and states. It is worthy of note
that the origin of several world-wide va-
rieties of fruits, such as apples, peaches,
and plums, has been assigned to Iran.
ANIMAL LIFE OF PERSIA. AN OX OF THE BISHOPRIC.
Drawn by A. L. Clement, after a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
It is quite likely that the primitive Medo-
Persian peoples were the first to cultivate
and improve these valuable products of
the vegetable kingdom. 1
The social evolution among this an-
1 The definition of " apple-eating animal " might
be given to the Old Iranian and to all of his Asiatic
and European descendants. The word apple, be-
ginning with the Zend and Sanskrit ap p'hala,
meaning "fruit of the water," or "juicy fruit," is
common in nearly every dialect of the Aryan lan-
guages ! It might be difficult to point out any other
term of like universality among the names of the
things eaten by men.
cient race took the course of a subsid-
ence from the nomadic into the agri-
cultural and pastoral life. The sedentary
The change was very grad- ^^
ual, and had been nearly nomadic,
accomplished at our earliest historical
acquaintance with the Medes. A more
permanent style of building had super-
vened, and many other evidences of a
rising nationality were seen as early as
the eighth century before our era.
Before proceeding to delineate the
manners and
customs, the re-
ij ligious and so-
cial state of the
Old Iranians, it
will be well to
describe the per-
sonal character
of the race.
Herodotus and
Xenophon have
given us full ac-
counts of the ap-
pearance of the
Medes in their
day, and we
may conclude
that the type
was the same
which had pre-
vailed from the
time of the original tribes. The sculp-
tures of Persepolis also have preserved
the person and features of
Ethnic and per-
the race, giving us perhaps sonai character
, -i , . j of the Iranians.
the most authentic and
permanent representation of the ances-
tors of the Indo-European family of
men.
The ancient Iranian was tall and well
formed. In personal grace and phys-
ical nobility he was almost the equal of
his kinsmen, the Hellenes of the West.
In strength and activity he was the peer
- Clement.
THE IRANIANS. ELEMENTARY CHARACTER.
581
not only of his contemporaries in Meso-
potamia and Hellas, but of any rival in
any age of the world. The features
were dignified and finely drawn. The
forehead was high and straight. The
nose was developed on a line with the
frontal bone, after the manner of the
Macedonian face, and was prominent
and well formed. Sometimes the organ
had that imperious and hawklike shape
which reappeared among the Romans of
a later age. The beard was manly and
stantly exposed to the reactions of na-
ture than were these progenitors of great
races. True, the climate was not au-
spicious for an out-of-door life. Storms
were frequent, and the winters of Par-
thia, Margiana, and Bactria were toler-
ably severe. But neither the rain blast
of summer nor the rigors of the winter
season were sufficient to extinguish or
repress the nomadic freedom of the
race. To scour the plains on horseback
became a second nature to the Iranian,
REMAINS OF IRANIAN BUILDING. RUINS OF THB PALACE OF DARIUS, AT PERSHPOLIS. Drawn by A. Deroy, after a photo-
graph by Madame Dieulafoy.
heavy, and the hair abundant to super-
fluity. The Iranian women were ad-
mired for their beauty and grace even
by the critical Greeks. In dignity of
personal carnage, they are represented
to have borne themselves after the man-
ner of the barbaric queens of the heroic
ages of history.
The environment of the early Iranian
The race con- tribes brought them into
SS^eS constant contact with the
of nature. open aspects of the natural
world. Their life was outdoors. Per-
haps no people have been more con-
and his preference for chasing wild
beasts took the form of a passion.
As late as the beginnings of authentic
history, not only the evidences, but the
actual example of this kind of life was
still to be observed. In Tribal divisions
the times of Herodotus the ^oyHeTod.
nations of Iran had not otus -
yet settled into permanence or affixed
themselves to given districts of terri-
tory. They were divided into tribes,
some of which had located their settle*
ments and fixed their institutions within
definite territories, while others roamed
582
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
at large. Among the Medes, the Father
of History mentions six tribal division :
the Busae, the Paretaceni, the Struchates,
the Arazanti, the Budii, and the Magi.
The Persians were, in like manner, di-
vided into the Pasargadae, the Mara-
phians, the Maspians, the Panthialaeans,
the Derusiseans, the Germanians, the
Daans, the Mardians, the Dropicans,
and the Sagartians. The last four
tribes were still nomadic in the times
of Herodotus, while the others had set-
tled on the soil and given themselves to
husbandry. The tribes were subdivided
into smaller clans, and these into gentes,
or households. In this condition of af-
fairs, which we may accept as correct
for the middle of the fifth century B. C.,
we may readily recognize another ex-
ample of that transforming process by
which the family is succeeded in regular
order by the gens, the tribe, and the
race.
At a very early period the intellect
of the Iranian nations reacted under the
influences of growth and
environment, and began
the Iranians. to display itself with con-
siderable vigor. It is to this circum-
stance, indeed, that the importance of
the race in after ages is to be attributed.
It was not, indeed, in the direction of
architecture and art that this primitive
race exhibited its best powers. On the
contrary, it may be truthfully alleged
that the Medes and Persians were ineffi-
cient as builders and artists. It appears
that the assthetic sense was weak, and
that even as late as the earlier stages of
Medo-Persian nationality the evidences
of architectural structure are few and
meager. In all Persia the foundations
of but two cities have remained to after
times, in illustration of the building and
decorative capacity of the people. In
Media not a single structure has left a
Feebleness of
trace. It is true that this paucity of
architectural monuments is to be ac-
counted for in part by the use of wood
rather than stone as the building ma-
terial of the Iranians. It is believed
that the ancient Medes employed neither
stone nor brick in their edifices, relying
wholly upon wood and the metals even
for the palaces of their kings.
It was on the side of the literary
evolution that the Iranian mind first dis-
played its energies. It fell Early motion of
to chanting the aspects of
the natural world and to race -
inventing metrical expression for the
mysteries above the material aspects of
nature. Already, before the partition of
the Indie and Iranic nations, the lan-
guage had been well developed. It had
an extensive and flexible grammar and
an abundant vocabulary. Its descriptive
elements admitted of inflection, and its
verbal structure indicated the niceties of
action in time and manner. With this
vehicle of language on his tongue and
the vision of supernal nature above
him, the Old Iranian began to elaborate
that system of religion and philosophy
which has transmitted to the modern
world an intellectual interest in the peo-
ple by whom the system was produced.
The language of the Iranic branch of
the human family, as preserved in its
most ancient books, is known as Zend,
and the great Bible of the Language and
race, out of which its sub- ^i e e c ^. ter
sequent religious and liter- Avesta.
ary development proceeded, is called the
Zend-Avesta. It is in eight books, which
embrace as their subject-matter the same
general topics as are presented in the
Old Testament. The themes are laws,
covenants, prayers, songs, and cere-
monials.
The Avesta may be called the Iranian
Bible. Its oldest portion is included in
THE IRANIANS. RELIGION.
583
the Gathas, or " Songs," many of which
are very nearly identical with the hymns
of the Indie Veda. This fact would in-
dicate that the Gathas had been chanted
by the primitive Aryan race before the
separation of the Iranic and Indie
families. If we 7 ook into the spirit
of the hymns, we shall find them
to be the exuberant expression, the
fervent utterances of the primitive
worshipers, awe-struck under the mys-
teries of nature, exclaiming in highly
figurative language, and pouring out
praise and prayer to the invisible powers
of nature. It is as though the primeval
singer had turned up his face in adora-
tion to airland and skyland on high,
praising the goodness and magnificence
of the majesties above, and making
petition for blessing and peace.
The hymns of the Avesta are polythe-
istic. The powers on high are many,
The beneficent not one, and seem to be de-
e^STn^ht void of personality. These
Gathas. powers were good, not
bad at least in the earliest concepts of
the race. The divine attributes of the
heavens deities, if we may call them
so bent auspiciously over the worship-
er, and he adored because of the benefits
received and expected. The supernal
powers were called Ahuras, and were
regarded as the life-giving influences of
the world. It may be noted here as a
fact beyond dispute that dualism, or the
recognition of evil powers in the uni-
verse set over against the good, is a later
concept of the human mind, and does
not belong to the really primitive sys-
tems of belief. Among no people of the
world was dualism more fully developed
or the evil powers raised to higher rank
than among the Iranians. But the evo-
lution of this system followed the real
body of the national worship as ex-
pressed in the earlier Gathas as the
shadow follows the substance. The evil
hierarchy was the invention of a later
age, and was set over against the benefi-
cent powers of earth and air and sky as
if to oppose them and to thwart their
benefits to men.
The Gathas are gathered from that
general division of the Avesta called the
Yagna. The more important part of the
sacred writings, however,
' _ Theme and
is known as the Vendidad, method of the
which corresponds in gen-
eral outline with the Pentateuch of the
Hebrew Bible. It contains in general
an account of the genesis of things and
the laws for the ethical government of
mankind. It embraces, besides, the
ceremonial code, in which the rites and
processes necessary for avoiding evil
and expiating sin and impurity are pre-
scribed. The whole is presented in the
general form of dialogue, or colloquy,
between the supreme Ahura, called
Ahura-Mazdao, and his favorite servant,
named Zarathustra, who is a prophet.
In his Iranic name we recognize at once
the Zoroaster of tradition. To him
Ahura-Mazdao reveals his will in an-
swer to questions and prayers; and by
him the purposes and laws of the su-
preme being are revealed to the people
of Iran.
The Yagna is of a widely different
character. In this are included expres-
sions of praise and adoration peculiar to
the Iranian worship. It is TheYacna
the devotional part of the g&
Zoroastrian Bible. As al- relations,
ready said, it contains the most ancient
element of the whole Avesta. There
can be no doubt that the primitive
hymns included in this collection were
sung by the Indian Aryans and the Ira-
nians while they were still a common peo-
ple. This aspect of the hymnody of
Zoroastrianism raises again the disputed
584
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
question as to whether the Iranians went
together with the Indie branch of the
race into the Punjab, and then, from
schism or other cause, parted company
with their kinspeople and turned into
Iran. This view has been stoutly main-
tained even by Professor Max Miiller.
But on the whole it appears more ration-
al, considering the geographical situation
and the much greater extent of the mi-
gratory movement into India, that the
two races divided on the plateau, leaving
PERSIAN KING WORSHIPING AHURA-MAZDAo.
the Iranic division behind, while the In-
die families made their way through the
Hindu-Kush or the Himalayas to their
destination. However this may be, the
common element in the old songs of the
Iranians and in the Veda can not "be de-
nied or ignored, and the fact points un-
mistakably to a common religious cere-
monial earlier in its origin than the
division of the races.
The hymns of the Yacna are devo-
tional. Sometimes the utterance of the
worshiper is merely praiseful The
attributes of goodness and love and
beneficence are ascribed, in exclamatory
language, to the powers on high. More
frequently the subject-mat-
* * Hymns of the
ter Of the GathaS IS in Yacna; M^ier
the form of prayer. Of c
these, the great German Orientalist, Dr.
Martin Haug, has made a translation
into German, from which a rendering
into English has been easily effected.
The general integrity of the translation
is attested by Miiller, who sums up the
results as follows: " Many of the pas-
sages as translated by
him [Dr. Haug] are as
clear as daylight, and
carry conviction by
their very clearness.
Others, however, are
obscure, hazy, mean-
ingless. We feel that
they must have beep
intended for some-
thing else, something
more definite and for-
cible, though we can
not tell what to do
with the words as
they stand. Sense,
after all, is the great
test of translation.
We must feel con-
vinced that there was
good sense in these ancient poems, other-
wise mankind would not have taken the
trouble to preserve them ; and if we can
not discover good sense in them, it must
be either our fault, or the words as we
now read them were not the words
uttered by the ancient prophets of the
world."
It can but be of interest to the gen-
eral reader to examine a
.
few specimens of some of
, ...
these primitive prayers,
representing as they do the most an-
cient invocations of mankind. The
Specimen trana-
Gathas.
THE IRANIANS. RELIGION.
585
following four sections are from the
Gathas :
1. "This thing will I ask Thee.
Tell Thou it to me aright, Thou living God.
How rose this world ?
By what means are the present things sup-
ported ?
That spirit, the holy Vohu-Mano, O true, wise
spirit,
Guardian of the beings who ward off evil,
He is the promoter of life."
2. " THs thing will I ask Thee.
Tell Thou it to me aright, Thou living God.
Who was in the beginning the father and
creator of truth ?
Who made the sun and stars ?
Who causes the moon to increase and wane, if
not Thou ?
This would I know, besides what I know
already."
3 This thing will I ask Thee.
Tell Thou it to me aright, Thou living God.
Who is holding the earth and the skies above it ?
Who made the waters and the trees of the field ?
Who is in the winds and storms that they so
quickly run ?
Who is the creator of the good-minded beings,
O Thou wise ?"
4. " This thing will I ask Thee.
Tell Thou it to me aright, Thou living God.
Will your friend Sraosha [Angel of Light] recite
his hymn to my friend Vistaspa, O Thou
Wise ?
Will he come to us with the good mind,
To perform for us true actions of friendship ? "
It has been mentioned that a consider-
able portion of the Zend-Avesta is in the
form of colloquy, or dialogue, in which
Example of Zarathustra appeals to
SSeTend- Ahura-Mazdao for wisdom
Avesta, an( l benefits, and the latter
replies with Tevelations of peace and
beneficence. The following specimen
from Dr. Haug's translation will suffi-
ciently illustrate the form in which the
subject is presented :
"Zarathustra asked Ahura-Mazdao
after the most effectual spell to guard
against the influence of evil spirits. He
was answered by the supreme spirit that
M. Vol. 138
the utterance of the different names of
Ahura-Mazdao protects best from evil.
Thereupon Zarathustra begged Ahura-
Mazdao to reveal to him these names.
Ahura-Mazdao then communicated to
him twenty of his names, of which the
following are examples: The first is
Ahmi, meaning 'I am;' the fourth is
Asha-Vahista, meaning ' the best puri-
ty,' or, perhaps, * purest and best;' the
sixth signifies * I am wisdom ;' the
eighth, *I am knowledge;' the twelfth,
Ahura, meaning 'the living one;' the
twentieth, ' I-am-who-I-am Mazdao.* "
After this revelation, Ahura-Mazdao
then continues:
" If you call me at day or at night by
these names I shall come to assist and
help yoti ; the angel Sraosha will then
come, the genii of the waters and the
trees." Mazdao then reveals to his serv-
ant another series of names by which
evil spirits, bad men, witches, Peris, and
other enemies of the human race may
be thwarted in their bad designs. Such
titles as protector, guardian, spirit, the
holy one, the best fire priest, etc., are
communicated as the talismanic symbols
by which men are to be saved from the
influence of the evil powers.
It is believed that at least all the ear-
Her parts of the Avesta proceeded from
Zoroaster himself ; that he ,
. . ... Relation of Zo-
was, in brief, the primitive roaster to ira-
. . j -, f nian. theology.
lawgiver and prophet of
the Iranian race. It is evident, more-
over, that he held his career while the
Indo-Iranic peoples were still a single
division of mankind. So that the scheme
of religious thought which we have here
presented belongs rather to the Old Bac-
trians than to either of the branches of
Eastern Aryans that proceeded there-
from. It will be of interest, therefore,
to consider briefly what may be called
the Bactrian deities, or those objects of
586
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
adoration which were deemed by the an-
cient people of the highest order among
the supernal powers.
In so far as one supreme being was
recognized above the rest, his name was
Ahura-Mazdao. The name
. .
Ahura is associated with
Mazdao. life and light. As the sun
is the supreme object of the visible uni-
verse and illuminates the whole, so
Place and of-
'
FIRE ALTARS OF THE OLD ZOROASTRIANS.
From Magazine of A rt.
Ahura-Mazdao was the highest and
brightest. The concept did not rise to
the level of monotheism. Mazdao was
the great god of the race, and was re-
garded as the living creator of all. In
general, he was the giver of blessings
both temporal and eternal. Such bless-
ings as earthly honor, preferment, and
such subjective good as wisdom and in-
telligence came from this immortal
source. Health and virtue, wealth and
good fortune were given by Ahura-Maz-
dao. These good gifts were withheld
from the evil-minded and the wicked.
He w r as a spirit, and approximated in
his attributes to the Hebrew Elohim, for
which reason there was always a reli-
gious affinity between the later Medes
and the Hebrews. The careful reader
of the Old Testament will note that the
two races were in sympathy, even in
matters where sympathy was
generally impossible.
Ahura-Mazdao had his ret-
inue of ministering angels.
They were about The retinue of
him in a dwell- att^lbuteSe?
ing Of light, and come personal.
carried out his will respecting
the race of men. One of
these hierarchs, greater and
brighter than the rest, was
called Sraosha. He was pre-
s eminently the Angel of the
Light, and, since light re-
veals all things, Sraosha was
the revealer of the will of
Mazdao. Primarily, he was
^T^~ merely an attribute of the
Most High, one of his shin-
ings forth. Another of these
attributes was called Vohu-
Mano, meaning ' ' the good
mind;" another was Mazda,
meaning "the wise;" and
the third was Asha, mean-
ing "the true." It was as if the at-
tributes of the primitive Godhead were
detached into personalities, under the
figure of angels, or messengers.
After Sraosha, the next of the divine
beings, as conceived by the primitive
Iranian, was Armati, mean-
/ j_i_ j_i_ '* i_ ^Ivtli 3,110. "wor*
the earth, who was ship of Arraati<
the same as the Gaia, or
Demeter, of the Greeks, and the Ceres
of the Romans. The earth was con-
THE IRANIANS. RELIGION.
587
ceived to be a beneficent power. From
the mere physical fact of giving food
and yielding increase, the mind of the
the contest with physical nature man
was helped by the invisible spirit of the
earth. When the adverse forces of the
PARSEE TEMPLE OF FIRE AT ATECH-GA. Drawn by M. Moynet.
Old Iranian passed to the general notion
of a good being who befriended man
and aided him in maintaining life. In
material world gave back under the
exertion of man, it was Armati that
aided him to get the victory. Armati
588
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
gave the seed of the plant and the fruit
of the orchard-bough. When the earth
was covered with green grass and
blossoms, Armati gave the blessing and
clothed her habitation with verdure.
FIRE TOWER OF ATECH-GA, AT FIROUZ-ABAD.
Drawn by, Taylor, after the restoration by Madame Dieulafoy
Whatever good thing had its root in the
bosom of the earth and yielded its bene-
fit to man, was the gift of this generous,
beautiful angel of the world.
The scheme of religious belief and
service here outlined was not the most
primitive form which the Iranian mind
produced. It was a development rather.
At the first there was a nature worship,
pure and simple. It was The personal
by refining upon this nat- ^^*
ural system of belief that shi P-
the hierarchy of Mazdao and his
subordinates was developed. In
the earlier ages, while the Iranians
and the Aryans of India still so-
journed together, the simple pow-
ers of the natural world were
adored and worshiped. These
powers came to be regarded as
living beings over and above the
visible aspects of nature. The
first was called Indra, meaning
"the storm;" Mithra was "the
sunlight;" Armati, as we have
seen, was "the earth;" Vayu was
" the wind ;" Agni, "the fire;" and
Soma, "intoxication." These
forces or facts of the natural world
were adored as the suitable objects
of worship, and the deities thus cre-
ated were common to the Hindus
and the Iranians.
In the beginning it was simply
a nature worship, under the garb
Of polytheism. The Separation of
concepts of the su- ^Egof^
perior beings arose dualism,
gradually to higher levels. The
materialistic element gave place
to the spiritual. The separation
between the visible aspect and the
invisible power became more dis-
tinct. At the same time dualism
began to appear. It was dis-
cerned that the powers of nature
are both good and bad. Some are bene-
ficial to men and others disastrous to his
interests. The former attracted human
affection, adoration, worship. The latter
excited human fear, dread, aversion.
To the beneficent powers the Iranians
gave the name of Ahuras, and to the evil
THE IRANIANS. RELIGION.
589
spirits the name of Devas. Such was !
the genesis of the gods and demons of
the primitive Aryan world.
Full of interest to every thoughtful
mind are these toilsome processes by
which our ancestral race,
Materialism ., .
yields to adora- in the prehistoric ages,
tion of spirit. gained at length a loftier
view of themselves and of the universe
in which they were appointed to live.
The struggle upward of the Old Iranian
mind in its endeavor to reach higher
concepts of the natural world and of the
powers by which it is governed may be
noted with constant admiration. The
ascent was spiritward. By degrees the
worship of these primitive peoples was
lifted from the contemplation of material
forms to the adoration of spirit and duty.
It was, in its very lowest aspect, an
advance from the consideration of mat-
ter to the consideration of force. The
mind, in its search for truth and stability,
ceased to dwell upon the visible form,
and passed to the invisible essence.
The form was wind, or thunder, or sun-
light, or fire, but the essence was truth,
or purity, or wisdom, or life. Through
all the emblems of this most ancient
form of faith it is possible for the mod-
ern student to discover a constant tend-
ency to refinement and to the substitution
of spirit for material form.
Philosophically considered, the march
of the human mind from matter to spirit
Symbolism in- passes through a stage of
tweenS-'and s y mbolism * Jt is doubtful
spirit- -worship, whether any stage in the
human evolution can be cited in which
the concept of spirit has been substituted
at once for the concept of matter without
the interposition of symbolical imagery.
There is always a period in the develop-
ment of mankind, passing out of uncon-
scious into conscious states, more par-
ticularly in the progress from a merely
material into the ideal life a period in
which emblem and allegory and myth
are built into the bridge which spans
the chasm between the things that are
seen and the things that are eternal.
In the instance before us we may se-
lect the myth of the Earth as an illus-
tration of the method by which the mind
rises to higher views and
The Earth and
fixes itself in contemplation the metaphor of
,. , . 1 the cow.
of. the supernal powers.
Armati, "the Earth," was represented
under the metaphor of a cow. At first
view such an image may appear gro-
tesque. But the most life-giving of all
substances with which the primitive
man was acquainted and, forsooth, the
modern man has found none better
was drawn from the udder of the cow.
Like her was the great earth. Out of
it came the streams of life. All the life-
producing elements were given from the
ground. So Armati was a cow. But
the cow was alive. She had a breast, a
spirit, a soul. Therefore the earth had
a soul. Armati was pervaded by the
directing principle of life a form of be-
lief which reappeared in after ages, in
the anima mundi of the Graeco - Italic
philosophers.
Now this soul of Armati was called
Geus Urva, "soul of the cow." And
here arises the myth of Elaboration of
Geus Urva. Man, inspired the myth of
j -u AI. Geus Urva.
and directed by Ahura-
Mazdao, when he came to plant seed in
the ground, cut the breast of Armati
with a plowshare. Then the Geus Urva,
or soul of ;the cow, cried out in anguish,
and appealed to the angels on high to
defend Armati against her brutal rav-
ishers. But the mighty angels, under-
standing the purpose and thought of
Ahura-Mazdao, would not interfere to
save Armati from the wound of the har-
row and the plowshare. She was left to
590
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
suffer and to moan without alleviation
of her anguish. But in recompense for
her sorrow, she was given the flowers
and fruits and waving harvests to hide
the wounds in her bosom.
Mention has already been made of the
Devas. There was a hierarchy of the
Bad as well as of the
Ahriman and
the hierarchy Good. Over against Ahura-
Mazdao was placed Ahri-
man, the Iranian Satan. He was the
foe not only of the good powers on high,
but also of man. The world was a bat-
tlefield between the benevolent and
malevolent spirits. Here again we may
see the evolution of a concept, proceed-
ing from material to immaterial images.
At the first it was the physical world that
was divided between the power of light
and darkness. In the world of matter
dualism is a fact, and perhaps a neces-
sity. While there is day, there is night.
While there is sunshine, there is storm.
While there is a balm of summer, there
is a blast of winter. While there is dew,
there are hailstones. While there is
blossoming mead, there is blasted har-
vest. While there is plenty, there is
starvation. While there is good, there
is bad. While there is life, there is
death. The ascent from the opposition
and antagonism of material things to the
antagonism of things ideal and spiritual
is inevitable while the aspects of phys-
ical nature are unchanged and the laws
of human thought retain their integrity.
Out of these conditions the Old Aryan
mind constructed its world of Devas, its
hierarchy of malignant spirits. Ahri-
man was at the head. The rest were
graduated in descending orders of ma-
lignity, to the small sprites that troubled
the dreams of childhood. Ahriman was
a demon. He was the Bad Mind of the
universe. Indra and Siva, taken from
the pantheon of the Brahmans, were his
counselors, who presided in the malign
parliament whence the black armies of
earth and heaven were ordered forth to
debase and destroy the children of men.
No tribe of men on the face of the earth
has been found without its intoxicant
Neither primitive barbarian nor modem
savage has failed to find
Intoxication
the substance and the proc- and the wor-
, 1-1,1 ship of Soma.
ess by which the nervous
system may be artificially excited and
the mind distraught with the flying fan-
cies of stimulation. Some of the oldest
hints of mortal tradition have transmit-
ted the story of drunkenness and the
knowledge of the means by which it
was produced. Among the Old Iranians
the plant of the East, called Asclcpias t
was discovered, the juices of its pith ex-
tracted, and turned by fermentation into
wine. He who swallowed it was lifted
with a sudden delight into the realm of
delirium. His heart throbbed and his
vision was exalted, while wild land-
scapes of fairies and phantoms flitted
before his eyes. Certainly, said he,
this is the gift of a god. It is divine.
It is the blessed secret of the immortals,
and its name is Soma. Let us drink
again and worship Soma. Of a cer-
tainty the gods drink and are drunken.
Soma is the only good thing which the
gods have given us. Such was the hi-
larious dream which
" Brought death into the world, and all our woe
With loss of Eden."
Under the influence of this system of
religion the Old Iranians rose to a high
level as it respects prac- _
r High morality
tical ethics and morality, of the primitive
T , 11 -r J-L.I/J Zoroastrians.
It may well be doubted
whether any other primitive race of
men were superior to the Bactrian an-
cestors of the Aryan peoples as it re-
spects the common virtues of life. The
THE IRANIANS. RELIGION.
591
laws of Ahura-Mazdao, as revealed by
Zarathustra to his people, demanded
.piety toward the gods and honest en-
deavor among men. Truth and purity
were regarded as the fountains of all
good. A life without virtue was worth-
less. True, the thing called virtue by
the best pagans of the ancient world
was very different in sense from the
narrow and technical meaning of the
word in modern times. It was the vir-
tue of strength and courage, the virtue
which defended the weak and shielded
innocence.
According to the Iranian system the
actions of men were judged by their
Motive made motives. Conduct was
of e etMnd 011 Poised or condemned ac-
religion. cording to the intent from
which it sprang. The simplest pursuits
of life were infected with morality. To
till the soil was a religious duty. The
destruction of weeds and brambles was
a thing pleasing to Ahura-Mazdao. The
people of Iran were exhorted to turn
from the barbarism of the nomadic
life and to seek their subsistence from
the bosom of the earth, the breast of
that generous Armati, from which came
the milk of life to her hungry children.
Tillage was, therefore, a duty of reli-
gion. Zarathustra enjoined it in his pre-
cepts, and piety demanded that men
should love and cultivate the earth.
As in the case of all other religions,
that of the ancient Iranians soon required
, a retinue of priests. Some
Evolution of
the order of the must be set apart to attend
especially to the worship
of the gods. In this system there were
three divisions in the priesthood. First,
the Kavi, or Prophets, were supposed,
by their discipline and communion with
the Ahuras, to be versed not only in the
lore of the present, but in the things of
the future. This office was a part of
that general scheme of benefit which
underlay the whole fact of early wor-
ship. The fundamental idea was that
of advantage to men ; and secondly, the
avoidance of evil. The primitive man
worshiped because he conceived it to be
of advantage to him to do so. He wished
to stand well with the powers of earth
and air, to be in alliance with them, to
conciliate their favor. Afterwards he
wished to avoid, even to propitiate, the
evil forces of "the world, and to thwart
the malevolence of the bad-minded dei-
ties.
One may well be astonished to see
how completely all ancient forms of
religion are permeated with
.- ' . Imperfection of
this narrow consideration primitive reit-
of personal advantage.
Those high and unselfish considerations
that are urged upon the minds of modern
peoples by religious teachers were un-
known in the primitive world. There
was, indeed, in the mind of antiquity no
perception or sense to which such ex-
hortations and inducements would have
appealed at all. The old tribes, still
struggling with the rank conditions of
unsubdued environment, thought only
of advantage, how they might for the
present be benefited, how gain might be
had and misfortune avoided.
Even among the Semitic nations the
same low concept of the relation of man
to the power on high ex- Even the Sem-
isted. As late as the time
of the composition of the and duty.
Pentateuch the Hebrew race had risen
no higher than this earthly view of the
profitableness of religion. In the twenty-
eighth chapter of Deuteronomy the sum-
mary of the whole argument in favor
of the expediency and rightfulness of
religious service to Jehovah Elohim is
set forth in an extended catalogue of
benefits to be gained and evils to be
592
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
avoided, not a single one of which rises
above the level of mere temporal advan-
tages on the one hand or physical afflic-
tions on the other. This is all the more
surprising when we reflect on the high
concept which the Hebrew race had of
the nature and attributes of Deity.
added the natural curiosity of the human
race to know mystery and to see the in-
visible. The Kavi were supposed to be
in communion, at least when exercising
their priestly office, with the Ahuras,
especially with Mazdao and Sraosha, and
from such intercourse with the powers
GUEBER CEREMONIES AT TEMPLE OF ATECH-GA, NEAR BAKAN. Drawn by M. Moynet.
This notion of advantage underlay
the prophetical office of the Iranian
._ , , Kavi. It was beneficial
Fundamental
ideas of the to foreknow what was to
office of Kavi. .-P., T
come. The Iranic people,
with such revelation of the hereafter,
might better adjust themselves to the
conditions of the physical world, and
thereby more easily gain its benefits and
avoid its evils. To this bottom motive
in the institution of prophecy must be
on high they gathered their revelations
for men.
The second class of Iranian priests
were known as Karopani; that is,
< 'Sacrifices." The notion Sacrificein-
tended to supply
of contributing something the deities -with,
, f . food and rai-
to the gods from the me nt.
abundance of the earth is one of the
most primitive of the religious concepts
of mankind. It implies mutual advan-
tage. Men, hoping to receive favors
THE IRANIANS. RELIGION.
593
from the powers of earth and heaven,
give something of their own goods in
return. The fruits of the field are
brought and laid upon the altar. Favor-
ite animals are led forth and presented
to the deities.
There are two correlations here which
may be noticed with interest. First,
that the deities in this case, the Ahuras
are supposed to require for food the
same things that are agreeable to the
appetites and wants of men. Very rarely
do the things sacrificed represent any
other element than that of food value.
Among some primitive peoples articles
of clothing, the hunter's gear and
weaponry, were given in sacrifice. But
generally there was a strict conformity
of the things offered to the articles of
food most desired by the sacrificers.
With the growth of aesthetic tastes
flowers were added, but generally those
articles of the vegetable and animal
kingdom which were used by the peo-
ple to sustain life were given as an
offering.
Among the Old Iranians, such articles
were fruits and grains and certain ani-
mals, particularly the horse. The latter
was a notable departure
The things sac-
tificed-, gift of from the usual order. The
the horse. , -r. -,
horse was sacrificed not as
an article of food, but as the most valu-
able of the possessions of the worshiper.
Without the horse his journey from
place to place could not be made.
Without him the hunt would be reduced
to a mere struggle of man with the wild
beast, and without him \var w r ould be
impossible. So the horse must be given
to the Ahuras as the most acceptable
gift.
The second notion above referred to
is that of the method of transferring the
gifts from the visible hands of the givers
to the invisible hands of the Ahuras.
Fire has been a possession of all the
races of men. Its general office is to
make the visible forms of
.-i 1 -, -, Fire employed
things invisible by COmbuS- as the agent of
tion. This transforming transformation -
force was therefore employed in all the
sacrifices of the primitive world. The
thing given was committed to the flames,
and disappeared. By this process of
divine commerce the fruit of the earth
or the slaughtered animal was trans-
ferred to the immortals. As a rule,
however, not all of the thing sacrificed
was committed to the flames. The
shrewd wit of the primitive worshiper
still dallied with the idea of advantage
to himself. A part of the offering was
reserved for the priest. As for him,
he could readily make a tradition that
by eating of the sacrificial offering he
sat at a common table with the gods.
This ingenious casuistry would be ac-
cepted as a verity, and the giver of the
sacrifice would be satisfied.
The third group of Iranian priests
were known as the Ricikhs, or the
"Sages." They were the The primitive
early philosophers of tfie SJ^g^"*
race. In the religious race -
evolution the Iranian mind conceived
it wise to draw along with the develop-
ment of ceremony the incipient learning
of the age. A class of hierarchs, known
as the Ricikhs, thus arose, as natural
philosophers, interpreters of earth and
air and heaven, not seers in the pro-
phetical sense, for that was the office of
the Kavi, but wise men in the inter-
pretation of all things secular and
material teachers of the commonplace
and natural.
Nature worshipers in the primitive
ages are little disposed to building tem-
ples. It is only in subsequent stages of
development that a system of religion,
founded on natural concepts, requires
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
the erection of houses for the deities. In
the beginning all worship is conducted
East Aryans in the open 'spaces, under
the arch of heaven.
Among the Old Iranians,
the hilltops were chosen as the most
preferred the
open air for
worship.
PRESENT STATE OF FIRE-TOWERS AT ATECH-GA.
Drawn by Taylor, after a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
suitable places on which to build their
altars and offer their sacrifices. It was
on these high places, from which a view
of a great horizon could be obtained,
where sun and earth and air were
revealed in all their grandeur and
beauty, that the earliest priests of the
Aryan race stood up and chanted their
Gathas and offered prayer. It was a
long time before the temple-building
epoch arrived in the history of the two
branches of the East Aryan race.
It is perhaps impossible for the
modern inquirer to transport him-
self into the consciousness of this
ancient people, and to feel the rea-
sons which were sufficient for per-
forming the services of religion
in the open air and which forbade
the localization of worship in a
temple. Even to comparatively
late epochs in the history of this
race the palace of the king always
outshone the temple of the gods.
To the present day the hilltops
back of Bombay smoke with the
fires of the Parsees, with no roof
above save the Indian sky.
Nature worship did not incul-
cate immortality. The doctrine
of the continuous
Notion of Im-
existence Of the SOUl mortality of
f . -, .-, 1 later date.
after death rose slow-
ly and through many tortuous proc-
esses of thought from the primi-
tive naturalism of the Iranian race.
It is surprising to view the indif-
ference of all the Aryan peoples
of antiquity to the question of a
life after death. When the pow-
ers of the natural world had been
separated from its physical aspects
and elevated into the character of
Ahuras, they were regarded as im-
mortal. But even this aspect of
the old natural theology was not
dwelt upon before the classical ages.
It came at length, however, to be per-
ceived that the gods, in order to be of
permanent benefit to their worshipers,
must be immortal. Otherwise, death
THE IRANIANS. SEX AND MARRIAGE.
595
might intervene and all advantages
cease forever.
From the immortality of the gods, it
was but a step to the concept of the im-
At first worship mortality of the soul. In
the later development of
Zoroastrianism such belief
became prevalent, and the teachings of
the Magi were largely based upon the
belief in an existence of the souls of
men after death. But in the earlier
ages duty and obligation were enforced
by the Kavi and the Sages of Mazdao
on the simple grounds of benefits to
be gained and evils to be averted.
The concept of an eternal existence
had not entered in; the horizon of re-
ligion, as it was believed and practiced
by the Old Iranians, was coincident
with the horizon of life, and the reli-
gious ceremonial was all prepared -and
performed with the expectation of
earthly benefits.
In the attempt to gather the outlines
of the prehistoric life of a people, and to
depict the same as one complete image
to be looked upon by living races of
men, the writer is many times embar-
rassed in selecting those features which
are most likely to make a
. . . Iranian religion
distinct and lasting image, foreran national
In the present case we devel P ment -
have dwelt at some length upon that Old
Iranian faith which had Ahura-Mazdao
for its supreme spirit and the Zoroas-
trian Bible for its apocalypse. We have
.done so for the reason that this system
of belief and practice was a fundamental
element, if not indeed the very life, of
Iranic development and nationality.
The rising institutions of the race took
form and fashion from the religious
system of Zarathustra. One of the
strongest forces by which the impulses
of the nomadic life were held back and
finally bound down to the pastoral and
agricultural career, by which the set-
tled tribes gradually became predomi-
nant over the hunters, and by which in-
stitutional forms took the place of mere
tribal chaos, was the unity of religious
beliefs and practices common not only
to the Iranians themselves, but also to
their kinsmen in India.
XXXIV. SEX AND MARRIAOE AMONQ THE:
T will now be of inter-
est to say something
of the relations of man
and woman among the
forefathers of the In-
do-European races.
The perpetuity and,
indeed, the very existence of the human
family depends upon the fact of sex in
the species. The complete mankind is
divided into two parts, the man and the
woman. By a beautiful coordination,
and perhaps what may be called a nat-
ural division of labor, the procreation
and the bearing of offspring are divided
as might be a piece of work importance of
in economics. The duty of ^ onl^ce
perpetuating the race is history,
separated into parts and given to two in-
stead of to one. In this respect man-
kind share in the general analogies of
nature. Nearly all animals and plants
reproduce by sex. In some cases the
whole procreative act is accomplished in
a single individual of the species, but,
as a rule, it is divided between two
596
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
The laws by which the two cooperate in
this vital effort to maintain the species of
which they are themselves the units are
all-important, and must ever constitute
one of the most interesting studies to
which the reflective mind may be devoted.
IRANIAN FAMILY TYPE.
Drawn by Tofani, after a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
In the human family four general
schemes of propagation have been em-
ployed by various tribes
Four methods f
of sexual union of men while still under
the dominion of the un-
conscious forces peculiar to the child-
hood of the race. It is almost cer-
tain that no one of these has been
used by all as the first, or primal, meth-
od of maintaining human existence. The
facts seem to warrant the belief that
some of the primitive races have in-
stinctively employed one plan for the
union of the
sexes, and oth-
ers another plan.
The four meth-
ods referred to
differ among
themselves ma-
terially. They
are unlike con-
sidered as plans
of procreation,
and are diverse
in the social re-
sults to which
they lead.
The first is the
scheme of sexual
union in which
men and women
are miscellane-
ously joined in
the procreation
of the race. It
implies little
more than the in-
stinctive and
temporary union
of the male and
the female in the
other races of an-
imals. It signi-
fies that after
this temporary
relation,, resultant in the birth of a new
member of the species, the relation
shall cease as it respects communal sys-
the parents, and that each
of them shall thereafter
enter into new unions with other
members of the species, and so on
THE IRANIANS. SEX AND MARRIAGE.
597
throughout the productive period of
life.
Impermanence is the feature of such
a connection of the sexes. It extends
even to uncertainty as to the male pa-
rentage of all offspring. It makes the
woman the mother of many children
by different men, and the man the
father of many children by differ-
ent women. The system is known as
communal marriage, and it may well
be regarded as the most barbarous, if
not the most primitive, of all the forms
of procreative union between the sexes.
The second scheme is that in which
one man selects two or more women as
his wives and by them multiplies his
kind. The relation once
Nature of the .
polygamous established is supposed to
scheme of union. be permanent during the
procreative period of life. This makes
the man the central fact in the propaga-
tion of the race. From him the lines of
life diverge through several members of
the opposite sex, and are spread wider
and wider as the process goes on, to the
second and third generation, until his
blood is almost infinitely diffused. After
some generations vast multitudes would
trace backward, through different moth-
ers, their descent from a common father.
To this scheme of multiple marriage is
given the name of polygamy a word
which the discerning tongue of the
Greeks has contributed to the vocabulary
of the world.
The third plan of union between the
sexes is like the last, except that the po-
sition of the parties is reversed exactly
reversed as to parentage, but not as to
Antecedents results in offspring. In this
third scheme several men
are married to one woman.
She, and not the man, becomes the cen-
tral fact in whom the lines of life con-
verge. In all other schemes the lines
and results of
polyandrous
marriage.
are divergent toward posterity, but in
this such is the nature of the union
the course of all the forces of procreation
is toward the woman. As to the off-
spring, the mother, as in all cases, is
known ; but the paternity is undiscover-
able. Each child has a single unit for
its mother and a multiple factor for its
father. In some tribes all the brothers
born of a single mother are married in
common to one woman. But when it is
said that all the brothers are so wedded
to one, it must be remembered that the
brothers in question have a multiple pa-
ternity ; that is, they are not brothers in
the sense that men are brothers in the
monogamic relation, or even in polygamy.
In other tribes not only the sons of a
single mother are wedded to one woman
as her husbands, but all of the members
of the tribe are in like relation with her.
Among many of the North American
aboriginal nations the woman is the wife
of the tribe. This system is called poly-
andry, a term which is self-definitive of
the relation.
The fourth plan of procreative union
is called monogamy. It is the joining
of one man to one woman Monogamy de-
~A ^f t,~- --~ I-,;,-,, T1-i^ termines both
and of her to him. The lines of parent .
relation thus established is a e e -
distinct from any of the three preceding.
It is especially different as it relates to
offspring. It signifies an ascertained
parentage in both maternity and paterni-
ty. It signifies that all the children born
of one woman have a single father, and
that all the children born of one father
have a common mother. The relation is
so easily apprehensible that it need not
be described, either in itself or its re-
sults.
It should be remarked that the sexual
usage in different nations adopting differ-
ent schemes of procreative relationship
is particularly tenacious, and is generally
598
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
maintained with scrupulous exactitude
by the sentiment of the given people.
Monogamy is by no means
All races have
and maintain a regarded as more essential
sexual code. , , -. / /- ,-,
to the welfare of the race
by those peoples who practice it than are
OLDEST TVPE OF THE MARRIED WOMAN A CHALDEAN.
Drawn by Mile, de Lancelot, after a sketch by Madame Dieulafoy.
the other schemes of union by the re-
spective races among whom they pre-
vail. There has never been found a
tribe of savages so low in the human
scale as not to have a certain sexual code,
any departure from which by the mem-
bers of the tribe would be regarded not
only as scandalous, but as destructive of
the welfare and happiness of all.
We can not pass from this analytic view
of the nature and methods employed by
different peoples in perpetuating the
race without notic-
ing the bearings of
the subject on cer-
tain controverted
questions. The
principal of these is
the historical prior-
ity of the several
plans of marriage
enumerated above.
The problem is not
so important in it-
self as in its rela-
t i o n s to another
question. It is easy
to perceive that if
monogamy be the
first great method
of mankind, then
the family, which is
the second unit in
ethnic development,
precedes the gens,
the gens the tribe,
and the tribe the
race, in the order
delineated in a for-
mer chapter. But,
on the other hand,
if the system of
polyandry should
be the primitive
method of union,
then, undoubtedly,
the tribe would be the Historical pri-
fj rs1 . f f 1p order of c\e- ority of marriage
or ae- systems con sid*
velopment, the gens sec- ered -
ond , and the family the last stage in the
human evolution.
If the ethnographer of to-day is com-
THE IRANIANS. SEX AND MARRIAGE.
599
pelled, with the data before him, to de-
cide this important question, he will be
Some tribes obliged, in view of all the
f n pvnress the belief !
l
adopt one meth-
od and some an-
other. that some of the primitive
races of mankind have adopted one of
these schemes, and others another. This
is to say that in certain families of men
the monogamic principle employed from
the beginning has led from the family to
the gens, from the gens to the tribe, and
from the tribe to the race, while in
other branches and under different con-
ditions instinctive ethnic preferences
have led to the adoption of communal
marriage, or more particularly to poly-
andry, by which the general course of
the race development has been exactly
reversed, beginning with the tribe and
passing by way of the gens to the final
establishment of the family.
It has been the custom to say that
monogamy originated, or was at least
Alleged begin- given its first authoritative
yamonTthe expression, among the Ro-
Romans. mans. It can not be de-
nied that from a very early age the
monogamic relation was formally recog-
nized by the Latin race as the one valid
law of sexual union. It is equally cer-
tain that the extension of Roman
power over all the countries around the
Mediterranean and far into the East
compelled the acceptance of this feature
of social organization. Monogamy be-
came thus intimately associated with the
bottom principles of Christianity, and
after the decline of the empire the law
of single marriage, the union of one man
and one woman for life, was carried
throughout the world, wherever that
system of religious belief found a foot-
ing. But it is doubtful if such is if
such was the actual beginning and es-
tablishment of the monogamic relation
among mankind.
The Greeks were monogamists. In
general, the Oriental nations were polyg-
amists, but in the West the opposite prin-
ciple prevailed. Among the Other Indo-Eu-
Gothic races, also, as far as STn^mar.
custom had been formu- riage.
lated into law, it appears that the prin-
ciple of single marriage was universally
recognized. The primitive institutions
of the Celtic tribes in Western Europe
have not been well ascertained, but we
have reason to believe that among them
also the law was monogamic. The
Greeks did not elevate woman to a high
rank or make her, in any sense, thet-so-
cial equal of man, but they were not
polygamists. Neither were the primi-
tive Aryans of India. We have already
seen that the Old Aryan Housefolk of
the Indian valleys were organized into
families on the monogamic basis. The
system of naming which they used to
express the family relations precludes
all idea of communal or polygamic prac-
tices among them.
The same is true in Iran. As far
back toward the bottom of the Aryan
nidus as we are able to Difficulty of
penetrate the relation was *f
one man for one woman against license,
and one woman for one man. While
men are in a tribal state, such a prin-
ciple can never be carried into full effect.
All modern nations have had cause to
appreciate the extreme difficulty of main-
taining in its integrity the system of
monogamy as against the natural license
and vagrant instincts of the race. If the
system has thus had to contend with
many diverse forces in the higher forms
of society, how much more may we ex-
pect it to have had an imperfect form
among prehistoric nations!
It is true, then, that the Romans were
the great authoritative promoters of sin-
gle marriage in the ancient world, and
600
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
that the Christian religion was at least
the vehicle of the diffusion of that plan
of union among the nations
Single marriage
peculiar to the of the earth. But it may
Aryan races.
asserted that the
system is peculiar to the Aryan race. For
some reason it accords with the instinc-
tive sentiments of nearly all people of
Indo-European descent. The attempt
to introduce and to maintain some other
law of sexual union among the Indo-
European races has been always com-
bated not only by the statutory princi-
ples and positive laws prevalent among
them, but also by the bottom instincts
of the race.
It remains, therefore, to look briefly
at the reasons that may be assigned for
the preference of one system of marriage
Factstending to over another. What are
"SSSSST tlie circumstances, the
considered. facts, which induced some
of the primitive tribes of mankind to
adopt monogamy, others polygamy, and
still others polyandry, or even communal
marriage? It might well be thought
that human beings in the unconscious
state, -placed under like conditions and
confronted with a problem so natural
and inevitable as that of procreation,
would all alike solve the question in a
given way, and adopt a common ethnic
code governing the manner and even
the details of this great central fact in
the perpetuation of the race. Such,
however, we shall not find to have been
the natural and necessary order in the
evolution of human society.
A close study of the conditions under
which the races of men were originally
Conditions ante- placed will show great di-
monTgamic 119 V6rsit y in theil> situations.
method. ft may be perceived that the
motives which, unconsciously to them-
selves, played upon the first men and
women in different parts of the earth
were very diverse and even antagonis-
tic. From the beginning the unconquer-
able instinct of the mother was for the
preservation of her child. The instinct
of the father also tended to its preserva-
tion, but not with so great force as on
the mother's side. Under certain con-
ditions the sustenance of the child was
so easy as to be almost natural. Under
other circumstances, it was a work of
difficulty and labor. In the latter case,
a repugnance to offspring would arise
among primitive people, and would pres-
ently become so strong as to suggest
destruction. As soon as barbarian fa-
thers should adopt this method of les-
sening the number of those whom they
must support and with whom their
households were encumbered, a natural
selection would lead to the destruction
of the girls and to the preservation of
the boys. By this means the tribal so-
ciety would soon have a preponderance
of males and a paucity of females. This
is a monogamic condition. Such a state
is the antecedent of single marriage.
Under such circumstances several men
would compete for a single woman. The
strongest would obtain her, Nature of the
partly by his strength and *
partly by her preference confirmed.
for him as the best. He who obtained
could generally defend. The man thus
married would become a party of the
first part, and those whom he had sur-
passed in competition a party of the sec-
ond part, both obliged to the mainte-
nance of the union thus established.
Each of the party of the second part
would hope in turn to obtain some other
woman as his own, and thus to become
a party of the first part, in a compact to
which his competitors were a party of
the second part. Here are the founda-
tions of a natural league on the part of
all to support and maintain monogamy.
FORM OF ROYAL TOMB IN POLYGAMOUS COUNTRY. Drawn by Taylor, from a ohotograph.
602
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Under other conditions a wholly dif-
ferent state of circumstances might
Certain other arise. In a warm and fer-
oonditionstend tile island or in a fecund
1x3 establish
polygamy. Oriental valley where na-
ture brings forth in abundance all things
soever which are desired by man, where
her resources seem exhaustless and the
eater has but to lift his hand to the bend-
ing bough to gather what fruits he will,
where the genial atmosphere and the
equability of the seasons requires no
clothing and suggests no permanent
shelter, where even the infant, before
it leaves its mother's breast, begins to
gather from its environment all manner
of natural foods adapted to its wants
the law of life and of the maintenance
of life is almost reversed from what it is
amid the hardships incident to adverse
regions. In such circumstances the
maintenance of offspring, however nu-
merous, could not be regarded as a task.
Neither father nor mother could be
much embarrassed even by a multitude.
The suggestion of reducing an overplus
by destroying it would not arise. The
unrestrained impulses and the unlimited
results of human instinct would take
their natural course, and no one would
feel the burden. In the choice of their
sexual mates men would not be limited
to one by a confederation against him of
the parties of the second part. The fe-
males of the tribe would be at least equal
in number to the males. The stronger
and more vigorous men would take two
women or more to wife, and there would
be no league against them by a disfran-
chised minority. The strong man would
thus originate two, three, or many
branches to his family. The weak man
would perhaps have none. In other
words, here is the antecedent state and
condition of polygamy; and, as a matter
of fact, the institution so called has gen-
erally prevailed under the circumstances
above enumerated.
As to communal marriage, it ap-
pears to be merely the sexual chaos of
tribes in whom the human
Communal mar-
SentimentS peculiar to this riage the result
1 . i of sexual chaos.
relation have not yet ap-
peared. It would be difficult to point
out any particular in which this system
differs from the method of union in-
stinctively chosen by the lower animals.
The existence of such a method, if
method it may be called, implies the
existence of tribes of men between whom
and the animals there is only a small
diversity of physical form and the pos-
session by the one of larger capacities
than by the other. It is a state of na-
ture, pure and simple, and has only been
found among peoples whose advance
from absolute savagery has not pro-
ceeded so far as the institution of any
definite social forms. We shall here-
after have occasion to speak further of
this state in connection with some of the
tribes by whom simple communal unions
are the only custom and law of mar-
riage.
The natural antecedents of polyandry
are hard to trace. This form of union
has prevailed in different paucity of fe-
nf the earth to ATI males must have
1 preceded poly-
extent not understood or
appreciated until recent investigations
have brought the matter to light. The
majority of all the Indian races of North
America employed polyandry as the
bottom fact in their social structure.
The same method of marriage prevails
largely in the Polynesian islands and in
other quarters of the globe populated
by races of Mongoloid descent. Some
suggestions may be offered, however,
relative to the obscure origin of this,
which to the enlightened understanding
seems the most repulsive of all forms of
THE IRANIANS. SEX AND MARRIAGE.
603
union between the sexes. In the first
place, there must have been antecedent
to the origin of the custom a paucity of
females, either from some perversion of
the laws of birth, or from the destruc-
tion of female infants. If the latter, it
may have occurred either by the will of
the parents or by natural causes. Suffi-
cient data are not accessible to indicate
which of these circumstances has led
among certain of the primitive tribes to
the excess of males. Such an excess
being granted, we can conceive that
mother. Among Aryan nations, how-
ever, the rivalry of brothers is not less
intense, even deadly, than between
strangers. But for some reason among
the polyandrous tribes, the rivalry of
the males has not taken the same
course. Perhaps this may be accounted
for on the ground of the smallness of
the divisions into which the Polynesians
and the American Indian tribes have
generally been parted. Where a given
totem has embraced but a few wigwams,
a few warriors, and still fewer women,
POLYGAMOUS FATHER AND HIS SONS. FATTALLY CHAH. Drawn by H. Chapuis, after a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
several males would compete for the
possession of one woman, and to this
extent the antecedent condition is
identical with that among monogamous
barbarians.
But from this point the analogy
breaks. For in polyandry, instead of
Smaiiness of the strongest competitor
SS taking and keeping the
drous system. prize to the exclusion of
the rest, the rivals make a league to
have the woman in common. The facts
show that the rivals are in the first place
the brothers born of some common
it might have been disadvantageous for
the warriors to go into deadly rivalry
over the question of marriage. It may
have been found among tribes thus weak
that it was advantageous to husband the
meager resources of force and tribal
vitality by assigning two or three war-
riors to a given woman in the bond of a
friendly husbandry. Whatever truth
there may be in these conjectures,
which are put forth as tentative explana-
tions of the institution in question,
polyandry exists as a large fact in the
primitive history of mankind. It has
604
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
doubtless been practiced by a greater
number of aboriginal tribes and races
than has polygamy or communal mar-
riage itself.
A question of great importance relat-
ing to vital statistics and to a still deeper
Bearing of mar- law of biology has been
^p e oS"f SOn raised with respect to the
the sexes. tendency of these several
forms of marriage on the proportion of
male and female births under each. It
is conceded that generally through the
kingdom of life the ratio is equally main-
tained, under equal conditions, between
the male and female members of a race.
There can be little doubt that mankind
in the monogamic relation obeys the
general law, and is perpetuated by near-
ly equal increments of the two sexes.
The same may be said of communal
marriages. Among the tribes where
this usage holds, infants are born in
equal proportions in either sex. The
great question is whether in the two in-
termediate systems of polygamy and
polyandry the opposing methods of
union tend to perpetuate themselves by
producing in one an excess of female
births and in the other an excess of
males.
That such is the result has been
stoutly maintained. It has been averred,
DO polygamy and many facts have been
pt r d p P e?Se dry cited in substantiation of
themselves? the principle, that in po-
lygamy a tendency to an excess of fe-
males is at once discoverable. This is
to say that nature provides for the con-
tinuance of the system by giving, as
the fruit of the multiple marriages of one
man , a considerable preponderance of fe-
male children. It is also alleged that in
polyandry the system perpetuates itself
by the production of an excess of males.
But both of these principles have been
strongly controverted, and facts have
been adduced which would seem in
given cases to establish the law of equal
birth under both the systems mentioned.
There are some physiological reasons
for believing that the first of the two ar-
guments is better maintained, and, on
the whole, the true one. But the ques
tion is still obscured with much doubt,
and must be remanded to future inves-
tigation for a final decision.
This digressive study relative to what
may be called the primary or bottom or-
ganization of society among the various
tribes and races of mankind has been
brought in in this connection once for
all, that the reader, at the beginning of
the delineation of tribal and national
life may have, as in a chart before him,
the diverse plans or methods of sexual
union, and the consequent perpetuation
of the human family in the various
quarters of the globe. The Old Iranians
were monogamists,, with only such de-
partures from the law which instinct
and custom had provided as are incident
to the general lawlessness of mankind.
With this monogamic principle the
religious elements which were developed
by Zarathustra and the Monogamy rein-
Kavi entered into combina- g^ by the
tion, and, as the nomadic prophets,
life gave place to a settled state, the old
provincial nationality of the Medes may
be said to have begun . We are here ex-
amining the very roots of human his-
tory. The opinion is confidently ad-
vanced that there was something in the
instinct and something in the environ-
ment of the primitive Aryan race, in its
old Bactrian nidus, before the Veda was
the Veda, before the A vesta was the
Avesta, which impelled to the union of
man and woman in the procreative re-
lationship on the monogamic, or single
marriage, principle. And from this re-
mote period, below the day dawn of hu-
THE IRANIANS. HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT.
605
man history, that principle has remained
instinctive in the race and in all its
branches. Doubtless, in some particu-
lar instances the old bottom law of Ar-
yan thought and preference on this sub-
ject has been subverted by environment
and association, and has been supplanted
by one of the other principles of sexual
relationship, but the exceptions will be
found, on the whole, rather to verify
and illustrate than to abrogate the gen-
eral law.
CHAPTER XXXV. HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT
THE IRANIANS.
HUS far in the course
of the present work
little attention has been
paid to chronology.
No effort has been
made to fix, with even
approximate certainty,
the time relations of events. This
course has been fully justified by the
fact that the events referred to have
been either absolutely prehistoric, or
else located along the farthest horizon of
formal history. Nothing
Question of
dates in old certain as to dates can be
Iranianhistory. offered for guch shadowy
parts of the annals of the human race.
Chronology is one of the special devices
of history. It is said to be one of the
historical eyes through which all things
are seen. Perhaps we are now, however,
arrived at a point when something may
well be said as to the approximate time
when the Old Iranians merged into the
dim morning light of antiquity.
On this subject we are fortunately in
possession of some distinct points of
observation. It is conceded that the
Medes were the oldest his-
Probable place
and epoch of torical expression for the
Zoroaster , T r\
ancient Iranian race. Con-
cerning the antiquity of the Medes, we
are able to draw at least a vague outline.
According to Polyhistor, following and
repeating Berosus, Zarathustra, or Zoro-
aster, was the first of a dynasty of eight
Median kings ruling in Chaldaea in the
very earliest ages of history. Indeed,
with the exception of the Egyptian
annals, this is the farthest point of light
which the historian is now able to touch,
as he looks into the mist-covered dawn
of human affairs. The Chaldsean dy-
nasty referred to was the second which
had ruled in the old empire at the mouth
of the two Mesopotamian rivers. It was
composed of eight kings, Zoroaster be-
ing the first ; and there are good reasons
for fixing the limits of this dynasty be-
tween the years 2286 and 2052 B. C. At
the close of this period it appears that
the foreign, that is the Median, domina-
tion in Chaldtea was broken and the
throne regained by native princes. It
has been customary to make the date of
Zoroaster about coincident with that of
Abraham, but the current chronology
would hardly admit of this construction.
It may be accepted as approximately
correct that the founder of the Old Ira-
nian faith flourished at about the time
indicated above.
One of the principal errors into which
the occasional student is likely to fall
relative to the relations of Historical stu-
dents do not
ancient events is to fix sufficiently con-
, ., n , sider perspec-
them, as it were, on a flat tive .
surface, without allowing for perspective.
In the present case, it must be remem-
THE IRANIANS. HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT.
607
bered that there was necessarily a long
Iranian history before the time of Zoro-
aster. There was already an organized
people, developed from the tribal state
and sufficiently high in the
scale of unity and self-con-
sciousness to receive the reve-
lations and accept the ideas
which he brought. The mi-
gratory period of the Old Ar-
yan departure, of the joint and
common progress of the Indie
and Iranic races, of their grad-
ual separation into two distinct
families, and the development
of institutional forms in each,
all preceded by ages of inde-
terminate, or at least undeter-
mined, duration the apparition
of the great teacher and prophet
of Ahura-Mazdao.
It must be borne in mind that
the Old Iranians,
of whom we are
here speaking, are
a prehistoric peo-
ple. That is to
say that their life
and history have
been developed by
what may be called
historical parallax.
The data in pos-
session of the eth-
nographer and his-
torian are sufficient
to construct an ac-
curate outline for
the career of many
peoples whose act-
ual annals nowhere
exist in the liter-
reached by this method of investigation.
The astronomer, acquainted with the laws
of physics and with his calculus before
him, feels into the depths of invisible
OLD MEDIAN TYPE CYRUS THE GREAT.
Drawn by Madame Dieulafoy after the sculpture.
ature or among the monu-
ments of mankind. Nor
is there any uncertainty
about the process of the results which are
Possibility of
developing his-
torical outlines
by parallax
space and grasps the unseen planet, de-
termining its mass and velocity with an
exactitude which in a less cultivated age
would be set down as miraculous. To
608
GREAT RACES OF MAXKTND.
the sight of the well-instructed ethnolo-
gist, or even well- versed historian, the
outline of prehistoric nations, their ca-
TYPE OF ANCIENT IRANIAN KING DARIUS AND THE LION.
Heliogravure, after a photograph from the sculptures, by Madame
Dieulafoy.
reer and character, are as plainly dis-
cernible as are the unseen worlds to the
vision of the astronomer.
We may, first of all, discover the Old
Iranian in the person of the Mede. The
Median nation is the earli- The oid Medes
estapparition intotheactual ^^SET
foreground of the ancient evolutions.
Bactrian Aryans whom the natural eye
has ever seen. For how long a period
the Iranian race continued to expand and
become fixed in institutional aspects be-
fore the actual historical emergence of
the nation it is impossible to determine.
So far as existing records are concerned,
our first acquaintance with this people
may be set at the latter half of the ninth
century before our era. It was at this
time, in the reign of Shalmaneser II of
Assyria, that an expedition was carried
out across the Zagros into Media, where
the Assyrian army succeeded in taking
several cities, slaying the inhabitants,
and carrying off the spoils of victory.
From this time forth a formal history of
the Median power, until its amalgama-
tion or absorption in the rising dominion
of Persia, may be authentically con-
structed. It is not here that we have
to do with historical narrative proper.
There is a difference to be observed
between an account of the social, civil,
and military movements of nations, and
an ethnic history of mankind. It is
here essayed to develop the latter, and
we have only to deal with the race as-
pects of the questions arising before us.
Monarchy came with tribal consolida-
tion in Iran. It is fairly well established
that the first authentic ruler of the king-
dom was Phraortes, who
Rise and prog-
reigned from about 66O to ress of Iranian
633 B. C. Long before this monarch ^
time are seen the shadows of the kings
walking. Herodotus accepted some of
them as real. Ctesias extended the list
backwards, arranging a fictitious dynasty
to the first quarter of the ninth centuiy
B. C. Names and dates are given. We
THE IRANIANS. HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT.
609
are introduced to Arbaces, Maudaces,
Sosarmus, Artycas, Arbianes, Artaeus,
and finally Dei'oces, which last stands in
the dawn of the reality. The rest are
fabulous, and are to be ranked with the
mythical kings of Greece and Rome.
From Phraortes, however, monarchy as
an institution may be regarded as estab-
lished among the Old Iranians. The
great reign of Cyaxares followed, and
the civil power was consolidated. Then
followed the reign of Astyages, 593-558
B. C., at which latter date the relations
fact much nearer to unity of character
than the term Graeco-Italic, applied to
the two branches of the Southern Ar-
yans in Europe. In Iran the language,
manners, customs, and growth of soci-
ety, civil and political, the religious be-
lief of the people, and, indeed, all the
elements of development were the same
for both Medes and Persians, with only
such slight differences as were incident
to territorial separation and environ-
ment.
These historical references are made
COURT OF PERSIAN MONARCH (ROYAL PALACE OF ISPAHAN).
previously existing between Media and
Persia were totally reversed by the gen-
ius and warlike daring of the young
prince Cyrus, who subverted the throne
of his grandfather Astyages, and re-
moved the .seat of government to his
own capital in Persia.
But the race was one, not two. Medo-
Persian stock was not materially differ-
ent in its two branches,
Order of the
Medo-Persian the chief diversity being
development. ^ ^ date Qf deyelop .
ment. The Persian sprang last and
grew highest. The term Medo-Persian
must be understood to express an ethnic
merely to impress the truth that mon-
archy was a fundamental
' ^ . Warlike form of
fact in the evolution Of Iranian instltu-
T-M tions.
the Iranian race. The cen-
tral principle was not only monarchic,
but absolute. It was a tyranny on a
large scale, and nothing more autocratic
or cruel has been seen in the way of
government among men. The genesis
of the system was military. It was a
warlike chieftainship, grown great and
established in a local autocracy, sur-
rounded with luxury and the imple-
ments of despotism. It is. not intended
in this connection to enlarge upon the
610
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
particular features of the old Medo-Per-
sian imperial government. It' is suffi-
cient to note its existence as one of the
striking aspects of ancient civil society.
The absolute and cruel character of
the institution had two roots of bitter-
ness. The first was in tribal warfare,
war passion and arising from leadership in
uTbuSs^tt ^ich the mythical kings
r ace - gradually arose to wider
and still wider dominion until all the Ira-
nian countries were consolidated in one.
The second source of the characteristics
tial foes, or to conciliate them, or to
beat them by subtlety became a necessity
of the national life. It was a perpetual
warfare with demons, and the actual
warfare with men soon gave the enemy
the character of devils.
The wild freedom of the race during
its tribal stages of development, the
bloody conflicts of the chase,
' Ferocity of the
the reactions of the dreary Medo-Persiau
, j / soldiery.
desert in summer and of
snowstorm in winter, all intensified the
instincts of the people, and added to the
MEDIAN SOLDIERS. Gravure by Bazin, after a photograph of the bas-relief of Chapour.
of the Medo-Persian power was deduced
from an inherent intellectual and moral
quality of the race. It had been a cruel
and vindictive race from the time of its
separation from the Indie family and
the establishment of the principle of
dualism in the national belief. As soon
as the Old Iranian priests had developed
the evil hierarchy of Ahriman and his
bad angels, the people came to regard
themselves as in a constant conflict with
the adverse powers of earth and heaven.
To put down these terrestrial and celes-
vindictive malevolence of their character.
The ferocity of the Median soldiers be-
came proverbial in all nations where their
name was known, and as late as the time
of Augustus, Horace, in his Secular Hymn,
could find no stronger historical reference
in illustration of the power of the empire
than to cite the subjection of Iran :
" Now by the sea, and on the land, the Mede
Fears the strong squadrons and the ax of Rome !**
While this civil evolution from the
primitive tribal condition of the Old Ira-
THE IRANIANS. HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT.
611
mans into a despotic monarchy had been
in progress, a counterchange was occur-
Deterioration of ring in the religion of the
Zoroastrianism j t wag a change to a
into fire wor-
ship, lower and idolatrous level.
It is easy to note the process by which
the high concept
of Ahura-Mazdao
and his court of
hierarchs was
brought down
again to a coinci-
dence with ma-
terial objects.
The first and
greatest of these
was the sun. It
may be frankly
confessed that sun
worship is the
highest and most
rational form of
idolatry. Even
modern science
has verified that
conception of the
ancients which
made the sun the
lord of day and
the origin of life.
As the dominant
object of the ma-
terial universe, he
has naturally at-
tracted the won-
der, the awe, and
the reverence
of all primitive
peoples.
In a country such
as Iran the as-
cendency of the orb of day would be
especially striking. The Zoroastrian
idea that Ahura-Mazdao was the living
one, and that his prime angel, Sraosha,
was the lord of light, brought both con-
cepts into close affinity with the sun as
the king of physical nature. His warmth
and radiance were qualities most sensi-
ble and grateful to the bodies of men,
and it was easy to ascribe to him the
attributes of a godhead. The Old Ira-
PERSO-MOHAMMRnAN TYPES ARAB CHIEF IN THE HOUSE OF A SHlilK.
Drawn by E. Ronjat, after a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
nian beliefs took this course, and the
next descent brought in the element of
fire. It was a symbol and analogue of
the sun. It was the sun localized on
the hearthstone and the altar. One
612
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
may easily perceive the whole course of
degeneration from Sraosha to the flame
of fire.
By the time of the Medo-Persian as-
cendency under the Achaemenian kings,
Wide preva- the transformation from
a?rfirtidoi! Un ~ original Zoroastrianism to
atl> y- fire worship was complete.
The great Persian armies which were
led by Darius and Xerxes to the West,
except in so far as they had gathered
out of the satrapies on the hither side
of Mesopotamia, were all worshipers of
fire. The religious ceremonial of the
Persians had taken that fixed form which
it has maintained to the present day.
The Parsee altars on the hilltops of Pars
and Yezd, and the smoking summits seen
here and there in Bombay, are at once
the remnants and illustrations of the
striking but idolatrous ceremonial which
was already established when the Medo-
Persian race was dominant throughout
Western Asia.
It is the purpose of the present book,
devoted to the subject of ethnic charac-
ter, to note not only the peculiarities and
race distinctions of the ancient peoples,
but also to delineate the Ancient Iranian
character and peculiarities %["'
of their descendants. The scendent races.
Old Iranians have their representatives
in the races distributed between the
Caspian and the Indus. If we glance
over the whole field we shall find that
the Western peoples of this group have
best preserved the lineaments of the
ancient stock, while those of the East,
next to India, are graded off into the
Oriental type. This is true not only of
physical, but also of mental and moral
characteristics. The Iranian peoples
next to Hindustan pass almost imper-
ceptibly into the character of the In-
dian races. The religious propagand-
ism of Islam has carried the faith of the
Prophet and the institutions of his fol-
lowers into these regions as well as into
India, and the result is manifest in the
establishment of common customs and
in a modification of the old national
character.
XXXVI. ETHNIC DIVISIONS AND CHARAC-
TERISTICS.
F we enter the west of
what was ancient Iran
and begin an examina-
tion of the present
representatives of the
primitive stock, we
shall find first of all
the Armenians. The central locus of this
race is now found in Astrakhan, that
The language portion of European Rus-
sia next the Caspian. Even
in this region the ancient
Iranian blood has been considerably
deteriorated with Semitic and Turani-
and literature
known as Hai-
kanic.
an admixture. The language, called the
Haikan'ic, from Haiks, the name of the
Armenians in the vernacular, has been
developed into an independent tongue,
strictly Iranic in its origin and in most
of its characteristics. A literature of
some merit has sprung up, even in the
absence of national unity. The ancient
writings have been edited and translated
into the vernacular, and a considerable
intellectual activity is otherwise shown
by the people.
In their complexion and person the
Armenians are not very different from
THE IRANIANS. ETHNIC DIVISIONS.
613
Ethnic features
and off-grading
of the Arme-
nians.
uiui
the peoples of Southern Europe. They
have fair features, and are regarded as a
handsome race. The hair
is abundant in quantity,
black in color, sometimes
straight and sometimes curled. The
forehead is low, but well shaped, the
face oval, the eyes full of expres-
sion and prominent, the lips thick, j m
resembling those of Afghans.
What is called the expression of
the Armenian face is divided be-
tween the features of Southern
Europe and those of India. In
stature, the people are rather
above than below the average of
mankind, are lithe in form and
agile in action. The Armenians
are taller than the Afghans and
the Beluchs. Here we have again
a grading down of the physical
forces toward the east, the people
of the Indian border being lower
and less active than they of the
west. The odd circumstance of
large and clumsy feet must not be
overlooked in noting the bodily
peculiarities of the Armenians.
This people are peculiarly te-
nacious of ancient customs. They
have preserved, even from remote
antiquity, a considerable part of
the social and religious life of the
Old Iranians. Their laws are like
the common law of the English-
speaking race, derived from prec-
edents of common life, reaching back to
the times of tribal dispersion. The pop-
Armenians pre- ular dress preserves many
of the features which were
peculiar to the age of
the Persian ascendency. As a general
fact, the Iranians have always been dis-
posed to wear a high dress for the head,
a sort of tiara, of which illustrations may
be seen in the everyday costume of the
Persians, both men and women, and of
nearly all the peoples as far east as
India. The outer garments of both men
and women are loosely worn, and de-
scend below the knee. The men have
trousers, and are belted at the waist.
On the whole, the effect of the costume
n n^
iu
Uiuu
L, Ij
nUtnnl.ini tu ,
\\'uiqiukir nn
tj.nn& fflt mu/u
hn
t. bu ,
LuiiT
LiutT uui^,
uiu
LL lull
it' 1TA'
*ukllil
fHr.p*
uui.
Uf[i
niulinh i/tunn nm.lt n.
ike.
u, fu
L
uji^uiqnt.p-jiLl^-
tn[i
in I, u lini u ,
np nt fj
IL.
Lti
ilji
linpuUgnL.fi
tu
n
[\uijij hit* ni.
inni'lui
f)i_
uiu
l l l l"i/ "{f""/'
serve the sem-
blance of Old
Iranian life.
SPECIMEN PAGE FROM ARMENIAN BOOK.
is rather Oriental than suggestive of the
apparel of Western peoples.
The Armenians are a shrewd and
rather intellectual race, intellectual
Were it not for the effects SEJS?
Of Old traditions, religious independence.
and social, they would have the capacity
of a good modern development. They are
brave and adventurous, good soldiers,
and especially noted for their ability in
THE IRANIANS. ETHNIC DIVISIONS.
615
the transaction of business. In general,
they present what many ethnographers
have chosen to call the Caucasian type of
mankind at its best estate.
In common with the other peoples of
Western Iran, the Armenians exhibit a
dividual in their character and as little
subject to restraint as were their pre-
historic ancestors.
For this reason it is somewhat diffi-
cult to generalize on the subject of man-
ners and customs where the same are
ARMENIAN ARCHBISHOP TYPE.-Drawn by Y. Pranishmkoff.
certain spirit of independence and love
of liberty. They regard valor as the
principal virtue of life. In the cities of
Armenia society is well organized, but
in the open regions, especially in those
parts where the country becomes moun-
tainous, the population consists of vigor-
ous shepherd tribes, who are almost as in-
so variable in different districts, One
thing may be noted with peculiar inter-
est, and that is the complete change in the
change in the method of ^ g d f t jf
disposing of the dead. dead -
Zarathustra required that the bodies of
the dead should be exposed on high, in
a kind of tower or building erected for
616
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
that purpose, so that birds of prey might
gradually devour them. It was con-
ceived that this, of all possible methods,
was least likely to contaminate the ele-
ments. It was held that earth burial
would pollute the ground. To submerge
the body in rivers would defile the
water, and to consume them by fire
ARMENIAN FAMILY TYPES.
Drawn by A. Sirouy, after a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
would poison the air, and even heaven.
The Zoroastrian plan, finding as it does
a strange reflection in the method adopt-
ed by some of the American Indians,
was thus produced as a means of pre-
serving the purity of the elements
against the noxious influence of dead
bodies.
The modern Iranians have given up
the old method as no longer practicable.
If they are Mohammedans, they employ
the plan in vogue among Mohammedan
the followers of the Proph-
et ; if Christians, they adopt
the Christian manner. In either case
the burial is in the earth. There is
generally something of Oriental fantasy
^ attending the circumstance of
|li| death, something of Semitic
clamor, and also traces of abo-
l riginal superstitions. In October
the Armenians have a festival,
which they call the Feast of thr
Dead. On such occasions the cem-
etery is lighted with fires, kindled
here and there. Tapers are set on
the graves, and the women aban-
don themselves to weeping and
wailing.
Over the Armenian graves tomb-
stones, on which are cut the effi-
gies of rams, horses,
Character and
Or lions, are Set lip, sense of grave-
, stone effigies.
a custom as ancient
in its origin as the tribal dispersion
of the Iranian race. It is evident
that such sepulchral imagery pre-
serves the primitive belief in sa-
cred animals and their guardian ship
over men. One of the earliest su-
perstitions of the human race was
that of the power of certain ani-
mals to intercede with the gods.
We shall see that in Egypt, and
even among the Greeks and Ro-
mans, there was a prevalent sus-
picion that the ram was an efficacious me-
diator between the deities and human
kind.
The ancient nomadic life of Iran is
best preserved by the Lures,
Certain Persic
another branch of the race, types represent
-i ., 1 - the ancient race.
having its central locus
in Luristan, but spreading therefrom
northward and northeastward, through
THE IRANIANS. ETHNIC DIVISIONS.
617
modern Persia as far as the Caspian,
and into the province of Mazanderan.
These people are in many respects
like the rude classes of the Armenians,
but are still more
nearly allied with the
inhabitants of Kurdi-
stan on the west. With
the latter people the
Lures have many
things in common, not
the least of which is
the thieving disposi-
tion for which the
Kurds are proverbial
among all peoples. It
is noticeable that
among the Lures many
ancient customs of the
Iranians are preserved,
and this in despite of
their conversion to Mo-
hammedanism. One
tribe, called the Gu-
ranes, are associated
with the Dushik Kurds
as a sort of peas-
ant caste distributed
among them. On the
western coast of the
Caspian sea another
group of the same peo-
ple, called the Tats, are
found. Indeed, the
Lures are scattered
through the whole of
Northwestern Persia,
as that empire is now
constituted, and far
out into Kurdistan, to
lake Van and the up-
per valley of the Tigris.
One might well suppose, glancing at
the fruitful and luxurious valleys of
Luristan, that any people long dwelling
there would abandon the nomadic life
M. Vol. i 40
and settle into fixed pursuits ; but such
is not the case. Wandering tribes still
possess the country, dwelling in tents,
owing allegiance only to their own
Dra
TOMB ON THE BORDER OF KAROUN.
n by Taylor, after a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
f chiefs, and engaged in almost constant
i warfare. Of these, the most conspicu-
i ous example is the ferocious Bakhti-
i yari, whose name is proverbial in West-
i ern Asia. The only town of any im-
618
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
portance within the limits of Luristan is
Khorramabad, which is said to contain
Prevalence of * thous ^d huts. The
the wandering place is rudely fortified,
Hfe inLuristan. -,
and possesses the palace
of the chieftain of the Lures.
The next great division of the Iranic
si van, or Persians. They are the most
widely distributed of any of the existing
Iranic families. They are even dis-
persed into districts far beyond the lim-
its of their own countries. Their Ian-
guage is Persic, and is the best repre-
sentative, or rather lineal descendant, of
MOURNERS WAILING.-Drawn by Y. Pranishnikoff, after a sketch of Madame Carla Serena.
race, distributed eastward of the Lures
Place and char- and the other western
Tajik^ f or h par- Persian tribes, includes the
ivan. Tajiks. These people are
spread from Kabul northward to Badakh-
fihan, to the table-land of Pameer, and
into Bokhara, in Central Turkistan. On
the east they lie against the Afghans and
Beluchs. Westward, they spread into
all Central Persia, and are called Par-
the ancient Iranian speech. By them
also was preserved, until the conquest
of the country by the Mohammedans,
the deteriorated or fire-worship aspect
of the old Zoroastrian faith. After the
conquest they became Mohammedans,
the old religion being preserved only by
the Guebers.
In stature, person, and complexion
the Tajiks are intermediate between the
THE IRANIANS. ETHNIC DIVISIONS.
619
Armenians and the Kurds on the one
hand, and the Afghans on the other,
stature and eth- They are not so tall or
tt7o h fThTsTeo s : a g ile as the one ' and not so
P le - dark-skinned and Oriental
as the other. They are comparatively
small in person, but heavy in build.
The limbs, and especially the feet, are
large, and the face broad. The features,
rior in appearance to the intermediate
race.
But the Tajiks, perhaps best of all,
preserve to modern times the general
character of the ancient
T r^-L. A They present
Iranic race. The Armeni- strongly the Old
ans compete with them in Iraman traits
this respect. The old customs and man-
ners of Iran have come down by way of
BAKHTIYARI TYPES. Drawn by G. Vuillier, from a photograph.
however, are good, if we except the
mouth, which is large and coarse. The
type is not by any means so favorable in
the judgment of Western peoples as that
of the nations of the Caucasus. Even
the Kurds are larger and handsomer than
the Tajiks, and some ethnographers pro-
nounce the Afghans, who are not in-
frequently of good stature, to be supe-
the Tajiks and Kurds of Persia, and rep-
resent to the modern inquirer a tolera-
bly authentic transcript of antiquity. It
is quite likely that many features of the
costume of the modern Persians, such
as the old tiara, or high cap, which was
worn by the subjects of Cyrus the Great,
are more faithfully preserved in the cur-
rent styles than is the Persian character
620
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
and person upon which they are exhib-
ited.
The cruelty and tyrannical disposition
of the Medo-Persians in the times of the
greatness of the race has
Cruelty and
fierceness of the already been referred to.
Even this bad nature has
suffered a terrible degeneration, and
is more repulsive in the coarseness,
to the trying exigencies through which
the Iranian peoples have passed. The
Mohammedan conquest was of itself a
sufficient shock to destroy nationality;
and the substitution of Islam for the Old
Iranian faith aggravated the calamity.
The modern Persians may be ranked
among the principal races of Asia. In
Western Asia they compete with the
USBKK AND TAJIK TYPES.-Drawn by A. Ferdinandus.
treachery, and immorality of the mod-
ern Persian character than in its ancient
aspect of fierce brutality. The race is
avaricious and untruthful. There is
little intellectual development; and if
corruption of heart and life were the
only term definitive of savagery, the
whole race might well be dismissed as
savages. Much of this degradation,
however, must undoubtedlv be attributed
Turks and Russians for the first place in
ethnic importance. The race, however,
lacks homogeneity. It is
more mixed than either of the modem
the Turkish or the Russian
stock. In Central Persia the ancient race
of Iranians is represented in tolerable
purity in the descendent people. But
all around the borders this is not true.
On the west, and particularly the south-
THE IRANIANS. ETHNIC DIVISIONS.
621
west, there is a strong admixture of
Turkish blood. On the north and
northeast the Mongol stock of man-
kind has made itself felt and given a
tinge to the race complexion ; while on
the side of Afghanistan and Beluchis-
tan, Indian or Hindu characteristics are
plainly discoverable.
The Persians at the present time num-
nomadic in habit. These number hardly
fewer than four million. They consti-
tute the great intermediate body of Per-
sians, and are the element upon which the
Shah's government most relies in the
matter of the Persian army. The national
forces, however, are recruited to an ex-
tent from the wilder tribesmen ; while
the official classes, commanders and the
KURD TYPES. Drawn by F. Courboin, from a photograph.
ditions of the
Persian pop-
ulation.
ber approximately eight million. Of
Classes and con- these nearly two million
are townspeople. About
an equal number are Iliyats,
or nomads, of whom. we shall presently
speak. Between these two extremes of
stationary citizens and wandering tribes-
men there is a large intermediate class
of villagers who are more sedentary than
like, are derived from the townspeople
or citizens who correspond to the aristoc-
racy of Western Europe.
No class of the Persian population is
of greater interest to the Ethnic place
traveler and ethnographer
than the Iliyats, or wander-
ing herdsmen. Of these, the manner
of life is pastoral rather than agricultural.
FALCONER OF THE SHEIK.-HiNDU-PERSiAN TYPES AMD COSTUMES. Drawn by A. Sirouy, from a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
THE IRANIANS. ARCHITECTURE.
623
They are organized into tribes, of which
the name is legion. Over each tribe is
set a hereditary chieftain, who commands
in war and peace. His authority is quite
absolute. The manner of life has respect
to a division of the country into pastoral
districts. Each tribe has its own dis-
trict, and the same may be saidW the
minor clans and families. Though all
wander about with their flocks, obeying
the suggestion of the season as to pas-
turage, the wandering is within the lim-
its of the clan lands. Each tribe has its
own section in the hill-country, and to
this region it betakes itself with the
coming of spring, and there the tents are
pitched until with the advance of the sea-
son a removal to better grounds is neces-
sary. But each tribe in its wanderings
must confine itself to its own section.
The social and domestic life of the Per-
sians has been derived from the^institu-
tional forms of Mohammedanism. Soon
Social and do- after the rise of islam in
et^om MO- Arabia and its spread into
hammedanism. Syria the Crescent was car-
ried victoriously into Persia. A religious
conquest of the race was soon effected,
and the faith of the Prophet was substi-
tuted for the former paganism. It was
the incoming of a Semitic religion, and
of the usages thereto belonging, into an
Iranian, that is, and Aryan, country.
The event was not unlike the previous
conquest of Europe by Christianity. In
either case we have an Aryan people ac-
cepting from Semitic prophets and their
followers a new religious system.
Islam brought with it polygamy. We
have hitherto remarked upon the fact
Polygamy sub- that Persia is the line of
ethnic breakage between
the Orient and the West.
By race the Persians were inclined to
the usages of the Indo-European family
of mankind. But by the religious con-
test they were led to adopt the theory of
Mohammedanism. This brought, with-
in certain limits, the system of multiple
marriage. There is thus a counter force
playing upon the domestic life of the
race. Polygamy, though prevalent, has
not been so universal as in Arabia,
Egypt, and Turkey. The Persian fam-
ily and household, however, are organ-
ized on much the same basis as in the
countries just named. The domestic
usages are largely of the Arabian and
Egyptian type ; but are in part deter-
mined by the ethnic instincts and Old
Iranian biases of the race.
The Persian family is better in most
of its features than that of the Turks.
With an equal degree of
Character of the
culture and refinement the Persian family;
u 1_ J.M1 the women.
comparison would be still
more favorable to the former people. In
the homes of the better class of Persians
there is elegance of manners, luxurious
surroundings, and many forms of com-
fort. The children are reared at first by
nurses, and are afterwards committed
to the schools under charge of Moham-
medan instructors. The women are in
great measure secluded, and are partially
veiled in public. Notwithstanding the
serious and rather sinister expression of
the Persian face, the countenance of the
woman is often regular and beautiful.
The artist in search of fine types of beauty
and elegance, even after he has studied
the faces of the women of Cashmere and
Georgia, may well pause to admire the
Sweetness and warm expression of the
Persian women.
Just as the social system of the Per-
sians has been derived from Islam, so
also the architecture of the Architecture of
country has been copied STSffiS?
from the Mohammedan medan styles,
countries. The original type of this
manner of building was arabesque ; but
MUSSULMAN NURSES AND CHILD-TYPES AND COSTUMES.
Drawn by Adrien Marie, from a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
THE IRANIANS. ARCHITECTURE.
625
this style has suffered considerable modi-
fication in the hands of Persian archi-
tects. In the building of mosques and
tombs the Arabian manner has been well
preserved. Indeed, the forms and cere-
monial of Islam made this necessary.
The minaret is everywhere a part
of the Mohammedan church and
religious establishment. If the cir-
cular domes are not also a necessary
part, they are at least a part estab- ^'-
lished by the usage of eleven cen- .
turies. These features of building
assert themselves strongly in the
major architecture of the Persians.
Some of the finest edifices of this
style are the tombs of the Persian |
great, seen in many cities and sacred
places.
One of the most remarkable of
these structures, typical of all,- but
preeminent by its vast-
Tomb-building
of the race ; the ness and elaboration,
burial tower. ,, -, f T
is the tomb of Iman
Mousa at Kazhemeine. This re-
markable edifice is surrounded with
buildings of stone or marble, but
rises above them with its four min-
arets and two domes in a manner
at once majestic and beautiful.
Others of the Persian tombs, like
that of Zobeide, are derived as to
their style from the building of the
ancient Iranians. That people, as
the reader knows, invented the
burial tower on the top of which
the dead were exposed to be de-
voured by birds. This pagan form
of disposing of dead bodies was Zo-
roastrian in its first intent, as it is Par-
see in its last evolution. The form
of the burial tower has been transmitted
to Persian architecture, and though
greatly modified in the hands of the
builders of the last eight centuries, it
still reappears in tombs. In such struc-
tures the ground plan is hexagonal.
This form is carried up sloping
slightly to a considerable height, and is
then surmounted with a sharp pyramidal
tower of stone shooting upwards much
in the form of the ancient burial towers
YOUNG LADY OF ISPAHAN TYPE.
Drawn by Adrien Marie, from a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
of the Zoroastrians. The materials of
such building are cut stone and bricks.
The smaller architecture of the Per-
sians has but little interest to the traveler.
The houses of the people Aspect of Per-
are square in ground plan ?SSS
and have flat roofs. This decorations,
gives to the structures the appearance of
cubes. The materials are wood, brick,
-'\
.
ARCHITECTURE OF THE PERSIANS.-To MB OF IMAN MOUSA, AT KAZHEMEiNK.-Drawn by Barclay, from a photograph.
THE IRANIANS. ARCHITECTURE.
627
and stone. White is preferred as the
color of the exterior. The plan is uni-
formly followed, and the appearance of
buildings is correspondingly monot-
onous. The Per-
sian town or city
is unattractive in
itself, though the
surroundings are
beautiful. It is
the custom to
plant gardens and
orchards around
the towns in close
setting against
them. The abun-
dance of rose
trees and other
flowering shrubs
in the gardens
and yards make
the towns to ap-
pear embowered.
Viewed from a
distance the pic-
ture thus afforded
is sometimes ex-
quisite. But with-
in the cities the
illusion is dis-
p e 1 1 e d . The
streets are never
improved. They
are merely nar-
row roads of clay,
and are always
either dusty or
muddy. They are
too narrow as a
rule to permit of
the passage of
wheeled vehicles,
and are uneven for want of paving.
The disposition and tastes of the Per-
sians, however, have compensated for
the lack of beauty without by elaborate
and luxurious furnishings within. There
is much that is Oriental in the interior
decorations and arrangement of the
houses. The tapestries are exquisite,
PERSIAN STRUCTURE. TOMB OF ZOBEIDE.
Drawn by D. Lancelot, from a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
with sofas and ottomans on every hand.
Especially on the women's side of the
court is such richness displayed. The
arrangement of the apartments betokens
628
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
ease, indolence, leisure, pride, and in-
dulgence. These are the qualities of the
race.
The character of the Persian language
has already been indicated in the account
of the parent Iranian speech from which
SPECIMEN PAGE OF PERSIAN BOOK.
it is descended. The order of linguistic
development has been from Sanskrit to
Zend, from Zend to Old
Linguistic evo-
Intion ; influence Persian, from Old Persian
to the current speech. The
common features and peculiarities of the
Aryan tongues are seen in the decay of
the ancient grammar and the substitu-
tion of prepositional forms. The new
style of speech began with the national
poet Firdusi, and has been perfected by
the poets and romancers of the present
century. The course of the language is
in strict analogy with the move-
ment by which Latin has become
Portuguese and Anglo-Saxon been
transformed into English. The
Arabic literature has meanwhile
performed for Persian almost the
same office of refinement and for-
eign ornamentation as that of
Norman French interfused with
our own tongue.
The governmental system of
the Persians is the result of an
evolution extending Governmental
hapVwprrlQ tn fh^ system reaches
- ne back to classic-
Classical ages. Per- ^ ae 68 -
sia has had a continuous civil his-
tory for at least twenty-three cen-
turies. The administration has
been many times transformed
with the successive revolutions
and changes of race in the coun-
try. Nearly always the govern-
ment has been a despotism with
few constitutional checks or limi-
tations. This was true as far
back as the ascendency of the
Achaemenian kings. The modern
system was virtually instituted
with the Mohammedan conquest
of Persia in the eighth century.
At the head of the government
stands the shah, who is at once
emperor and vicegerent of the
Prophet. He occupies much the same
relation to the people as does the sultan
of the Turks to his sub-
Place of the
jectS, but IS leSS restricted shah ; his ab-
-, 1 -, **A~A solutism.
by law and constitution.
He exercises the right of absolute gov-
ernment, and implicit obedience is ex-
THE IRANIANS. GO VERNMENT.
629
acted so long 1 as his rule and mandates
do not conflict with the Koran and its
interpretation.
Civilization has sufficiently advanced
in Persia to compel some conformity, of
the political system to the usages of
modern governments.
This has resulted in a
ministry as a means of
executive administration.
The ministry, however, is
almost wholly dependent
upon the will of the shah.
He removes and appoints
the members of his coun-
cil in a manner arbitrary
and capricious. Some min-
isters easily obtain the
royal favor and exercise
great power in the state.
Others have little influ-
ence, and are used by the
stronger in the promotion
of their own ends.
The departments of
government have been
organized with some
show of regularity. There
Departments of is a ministry
of war, and
others of in-
terior and finance, foreign
affairs, justice, worship,
and telegraphs. The
ministers are nobles of
high rank, and are set
around the throne in a
way to add to its reputa-
tion and glory. Persia, however, has in
her governmental system hardly entered
into the family of civilized nations. The
skill of the shah and his advisers in state-
craft is very limited ; and ignorance and
pass i '.un hold sway in high places.
Under the imperial administration the
army is organized and is fairly efficient.
It is recruited by conscription and poorly
paid. One of the means adopted by the
shah to obtain continuous and faithful
service is to withhold the pay of the sol-
diers and to keep them long in arrears.
The Persian army numbers over .one
admiij.istrati.on ;
organization of
tne army.
ED DIN SHAH ROYAL TYPE AND COSTUME.
Drawn by H. Thiriat, from a photograph.
hundred thousand men, of whom about
a half are infantry, one third cavalry,
and the remainder artillery, etc. The
system of revenue is tolerably well or-
ganized, and the credit of the govern-
ment is sufficient to enable the shah and
his ministers to make loans in the money
markets of the world.
TYPES AND COSTUMES OF THE ZAGROS HIGHLAXDS.-MurcHEiD OF TAI-RIS
bv Tofcul
THE IRA NIA NS.SOCIE TV.
631
The manners and customs of the Per-
sians have been derived in part from the
Derivation of ancient race character, and
manners and
customs ; vary- in part from the institutions
ing character- -, . n f T -,
istics. and influences of Islam.
From the latter source has been deduced
the easy-going habit of the Persian in
his intercourse and manner of life. In
this respect he departs greatly from the
habits of his kinsmen in Europe.
Contrary to common report the Per-
sians are affable and polite, at least
such as are refined by the influ-
ences of cities and the scholastic pur-
suits. The different races inhabit-
ing Persia present types quite di-
verse as it respects manners and
usages . Those of the north ern prov-
inces and in the northwest, where
the race spreads out to the Arme-
nian highlands, are rougher and
more uncouth in person and life,
while they of the south and of the
principal cities have been civilized
into forms of ethnic life much more
polite and attractive.
Slavery is a common form of Per-
sian society, though the institution
Slavery and the is not strictly based
on either color or race.
The slaves vary great-
ly in complexion and belong to sev-
eral races. Those imported from
Abyssinia are of greatest value.
Somaliland has contributed to the
slave population, as has also the
interior of Africa. The slave mar-
ket is always open and the institu-
tion is quite universal, but is less
barbarous than the corresponding forms
of servitude in other countries. The
slaves are regarded as a kind of pro-
tected class, and to this extent share
the common treatment which is extended
to children and domestic animals.
The costumes of the Persians are
picturesque and not unattractive ac-
cording to Eastern standards. Men wear
a cotton garment fastened Materials and
in front and falling- below styles of cos-
turns i TcWin m
the heels. It fits loosely dicated thereby.
about the person, having wide sleeves
and no collar. Several colors are used
in dyeing such garments. Trousers are
worn by the higher classes, especially by
slave market
among the
Persians.
FANATICAL TYPE AND COSTUME. DERVISH OF THE TIGER-
SKIN.
Drawn by A. Ferdinandus, from a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
the military orders, among whom West-
ern fashions begin to prevail. The out-
side garment is a shawl, generally of
some fine material like silk or satin.
The length and quality of the garments,
particularly of the cloak worn by nobles,
indicates the rank of the wearer. Priests.
632
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
merchants, townspeople, storekeepers,
and professional men are distinguished
by the long cloak which generally falls
to the heels. The costume of the shep-
herds and country people is more simple
in structure and of cheaper materials.
The custom of shaving the hair at the
crown is common though not universal.
The face, except in the case of ultra
fashionable men, is unshorn, the beard
being one of the distinguishing features
of the race.
The costumes of the women are pretty,
and are Oriental in their main features.
The ladies of high rank wear shoes of
Apparel of worn- colored leather, while the
a^-lTri^of men particularly the
the Persians. soldiers, are booted in the
manner of Eastern Europe. Arms are
permitted to the greater part of the pop-
ulation. The tribesmen of the open
country generally go armed. Most of
them carry what is called a kammah, or
dirk, dangerous to the enemy. These
knives the wearers are said to use in a
hacking manner, not stabbing or thrust-
ing as is the usage of those who kill in
the West.
Painting the face is customary only on
important occasions or with fashionable
ladies. The cheeks are painted and the
_ . . eyebrows improved accord -
Painting the . *
face and the ing to the taste or \vhim
iauty ' of fashion. The type of
beauty most admired is the circular
countenance and complexion. The Per-
sian women are much smaller than the
men, and are noted for their tiny hands
and feet.
Directly between Persia and India lie
the Afghans. They call themselves in
_ , . , the vernacular, Pukhtanch,
Ethnic place
and character from Pukhtu, the native
of the Afghans. -, .. f
designation of the lan-
guage. It is here that the Iranian race is
graded off into India. The most southern
division of the Afghans included the Lo-
hanis, who are distributed on the east of
the Suleiman range, where they main-
tain a nomadic life in tribal separation.
The Eastern Afghans are known by the
name of Berduranis. They also have
tribal divisions, and approximate the In-
dian character. Southward of Cabul
live the West Afghans, divided into the
two principal tribes of Ghilzai's and Du-
ranis, the latter occupying the south-
western angle of Afghanistan.
In person, the Afghans are described
as being of medium stature. They have
short necks, making the General fea-
head appear to rest upon ?2ju
the shoulders. Their com- admixture,
plexion is dark, and the skin has that
glossy, velvety character peculiar to the
Black races. In the flat nose there is
another hint of southern admixture.
The lips are thick, and the line of the
eyes horizontal.
Throughout the whole of Afghanistan
there is a considerable element of for-
eign population, and the intermixture of
this with tbe native blood has greatly
modified the personal character of the
race. The women have handsome fea-
tures, suggesting the faces of Jewesses.
They are much fairer than the men,
sometimes rosy, though more usually
pale. They wear the hair braided, plait-
ed in two long tresses, with silken tassels
at the ends. The influence of Moham-
medanism has driven the women into
seclusion, but intrigue and violence fre-
quently prevail over superstition, and in
parts of the country there is much license
between the sexes.
The whole population of the country
is divided into about a dozen tribal or-
ganizations. These COn- Tribal divisions
form to the clan in charac- $
ter. The Duranis and the ufe -
Ghilzai's have already been mentioned.
HUZAREH TYPES. AFRIDIS ATTACKING ENGLISH TROOPS. Drawn by Emile Bayard.
634
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
The Yusufzai's live in a hill tract north
of Peshawer, where they maintain a
semi-independence. They are regarded
by the Afghan chiefs as among the most
turbulent race with whom they have to
deal. The Kakars, also in Southeastern
PERSIAN SCHOLAR TYPE. HAJI MIRZA-UGHAZZI.
Afghanistan, are comparatively inde-
pendent. Their country is very difficult
to explore, and but little is known of
their manner of life.
In several parts of Afghanistan wan-
dering colonies of Persians known as
Kizilbashis have settled.
Distribution and
Ihey bear the character character of the
of Persianized Turks, and
speak the Persian language. They are
found chiefly in
I the towns, where
they maintain
themselves as
merchants, phy-
sicians, and
scribes. Many
of them are en-
rolled in the Af-
ghan cavalry and
in the Indian
regiments of the
English army.
The H u z a r e h
dwell in the
mountain coun-
try, in the north-
west of Afghan-
istan, among the
spurs of Hindu-
Kush. Their
dwellings are
frequently found
as much as ten
thousand feet
above the level
of the sea. It is
evident that the
tribe has been
infected with
Mongolian influ-
ence. It is
thought that
Mongoloid tribes
came from the
East with Gen-
ghis Khan and settled in this region.
The Huzareh are tributary to the
Afghan princes, but they rarely pay
their stipend except under compulsion
THE IRANIANS. BELUCHS.
635
of arms. They are an exceedingly im-
moral people, having many of the vices
of ancient paganism. Thev
Their immoral-
ity ; other tribes are, however, good sol-
of East Iranians. -, . -, -, i . i
diers when reduced to dis-
cipline, exhibiting the proverbial cour-
age of mountaineers. Many of their
manners remind the traveler of the ruder
class of Swiss peasants. There is a
Huzareh yodel sung by them, after the
manner of the Swiss. Other tribes are
called the Eimauk and the Hindkis. In
the latter term it is easy to see the word
Hindu concealed under a vernacular
form. They represent certain immi-
grants from the East, who are scattered
over Afghanistan, where they form in
many villages and towns quite an im-
portant element in the population . They
are bankers and traders in lands.
The language and literature of the
Afghans have both been infected by
many foreign influences. The Moham-
Language of the medan conquest of the
2Sk countl T greatly corrupted
development. the tides of the old national
life, turning them into new channels.
The admixture of alien elements among
the people and their institutions has in-
duced much uncertainty even as to the
ethnic classification of the race ; but the
language is unmistakably Aryan, of the
Indo-Persian branch. The vernacular
speech, or Pukhtu, prevails everywhere
except in Herat. There has been a con-
siderable literary development in mod-
ern times. A history was composed by
Shaikh Mali as early as the first quarter
of the fifteenth century. Poetry has
been cultivated by the Afghans. Khush-
al Khan, the chief of the Khattaks,
was recognized as a bard as early as
the reign of Arungzeebe. The foreign
infection above referred to, and traced to
the Mohammedans, is noticeable in the
vernacular Afghan history, in which the
people are said to be Bani-hrail, that is,
children of Israel. The tradition is so
elaborated as to give a race descent from
the Hebrew patriarchs. This fiction is
intertwined with the oldest books of the
Afghans, as far back as the sixteenth
century. In one of the histories Afghan-
istan is said to have been settled by
King Solomon himself, who gave his
name to the Suleiman mountain !
The manners and customs of the
Afghan race are in most respects in
close analogy with those of Western
Iran. They are the same with the Tajik
customs and traditions, with such excep-
tions and modifications only as have
been imported by foreign influence, par-
ticularly by the conquest of Islam and
the intercommunication with India.
The next great branch of the modern
Iranians includes the Beluchs, or native
peoples of Beluchistan. Here again the
language spoken, called in pi ace ofthe
the vernacular Baluchekee, f^^the
indicates unmistakably side of India,
the common ethnic descent of these
people with the Persians. Indeed, the
dialect is so much like New Persian as
to point to the fact of a very late sep-
aration of the Beluchs from the West
Iranians. Here, as in Afghanistan, the
people have been infected to a great
degree in language and institutions by
contact with India. Indeed, there is
a dialect spoken by the Brahoes which
is manifestly derived from the languages
of the Punjab, and not from an Iranian
source. All along the border there is
a great admixture of the two races, and
the prevalence of a common Moham-
medanism has tended to a community of
institutions and ethnic character.
In person, the Beluchs are of about
the same stature with the Tajiks. Many
of them are above the average height.
The prevailing bodily form is lithe, and
_^
NORTHERN ^BELUCHS TYPES.-MOUNTAINEEKS OF THB WESTERN HlMALAYAS.-Drawn by Fmile Bayard, from a photograph.
THE IRA NIA NS.BEL UCHS.
637
Personal fea-
tures and race
traits of the
Beluchs.
not suggestive of great physical strength.
The people are inured to great and rapid
changes of season and cli-
mate peculiar to the coun-
try, and are exposed by their
out-of-door life to many hardships. They
bear fatigue, and are
capable o.f long
marches and endur-
ance of hunger. They
are a brave and pred-
atory race, restless,
and addicted to war.
The physiognomy is
strongly marked, the
complexion is almost
as dark as that of the
Hindus, the nose is
broad and flat, the
forehead low. The
hair and beard are
abundant and coarse ;
the hands and feet,
large and heavy, in
which feature they
are strongly discrim-
inated from the Ar-
yans of India, whose
extremities are fine,
even to delicacy.
The Beluchs have
preserved in their
character, and even
cultivated, the ele-
ment of cruelty and
barbarous outrage
which we have noted
as peculiar to the Old
Iranians. Their so-
cial life is marked
with many strange customs. They re-
Sociai customs; gard hospitality as the
industrial pur- ^rimf* virtue A <;trano^r
suits and dissi- P r] ' virtue. A sirangei
pations. calling at their huts is sure
to be entertained as a guest, fed and
lodged with all the care which the family
are able to afford ; but no sooner has he
left the protection afforded by this tradi-
tional fiction of the East than he is
attacked and robbed, or even murdered.
In all industrial pursuits the Beluchs
are indolent and unenterprising, but no
WOMEN OF CHIRAZ TYPES AND COSTUMES.
Drawn by Adrien Marie, from a ph'otograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
sooner is war announced than all the
latent energies of the race are excited to
fierce action. In times of peace they are
dissipated, giving their whole time to
gambling, smoking tobacco or Indian
hemp-seed, and chewing opium. The in-
638
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
terdict of Islam keeps them from the use
of spirituous liquors. They are voracious
in appetite, devouring immense quanti-
ties of flesh, half raw, and filling them-
selves with other crude articles of food.
They season their victuals with capsi-
cum, onions, garlic, and other strong
and stimulating flavors, until one unac-
customed to such fiery condiments could
in no wise swallow the burning mass.
a method derived from the Levitical law,
as modified by the practice of Islam.
The old Hebrew usage which required
the widow to be taken to wife by the
surviving brother is repeated in the
Beluch custom. The funeral ceremony
demands a watch over the dead body for
three successive nights, during which
the kinsfolk and friends of the deceased
spend their time in revel and feasting.
DOMESTIC MANNERS OF THE BELUCHS. INTERIOR OF TENT. Drawn by Emile Bayard, after Vambery.
ceremonies.
Mohammedanism has gradually en-
croached upon the old instincts of the
slavery and the Iranian race. Slavery is
universal, each petty chief
having as large a retinue as
possible. Polygamy prevails. Even the
hill peasant will have as many as eight
or ten wives, and the number is in-
creased with the ascending rank of the
man. Young women are obtained by
paying cattle or sheep or goats to the
father. The marriage is performed after
The dress of the Beluchs is similar to
the Tajik costume already described.
They wear for under-gar-
* to Dress ot the
ment a shirt, generally of Beiuchs;the
blue or white calico, but- *
toned at the neck and reaching below
the knee. They have wide trousers,
which are open at the ankle. The head-
dress consists of a turban, which is
generally a high silk or cotton cap,
quilted and fitted to the head. The
chiefs and their relatives wear white
THE IRANIANS. MIXED PEOPLES.
639
tunics of chintz, which are lined and
padded with cotton. The peasants de-
pend for warmth upon a surtout, in
which they envelop themselves. The
cloth is manufactured coarsely from a
mixture of the hair of goats and the
wool of sheep. The dress of women is
little discriminated from that of men.
The trousers of the former are very
wide, almost like a skirt afound each
limb, and are made either of silk or of
a mixture of that substance with cotton.
The Brahoes, or Hindu Beluchs, have a
costume very similar to that of the Bel-
uchs, but of a poorer quality of material
and simpler in fabrication.
Within the broad region inhabited by
the modern Iranians many subordinate
races are found, each with its local
peculiarities of character
Character and
ethnic place of and development. In the
the Ossetes. ,. i 1 ^1
far west, high up in the
passes of the Caucasus, are found the
Ossetes, who call themselves Iron, that
is, Iranians. They are so strongly dis-
criminated in personal character from
their neighbors and from all other of
the peoples of the plateau as to suggest
a foreign race descent; but their lan-
guage is Iranian, and they are evidently
of the same stock with the other Arme-
nians, the Tajiks, and the Kurds. In
stature they are below the average, but
are very thickset and strong. The hair
is either blonde or red, and the com-
plexion is as fair as that of the Germans.
In religious faith and practice the Os-
setes are associated with the Armenians,
and their habits of life are similar to
those of the peasant class of that people.
They are mountaineers, and, like all
races in such situations, have a less com-
pact social development than do the
races of the lowlands and plains.
We may now glance for a moment at
the geographical region over which the
Iranic Aryans are distributed in their
modern estate. A line drawn from the
northwestern extremity of Geographical
the Persian gulf into Syr- gffJyiTS
ia, and thence to the Black Aryans,
sea, would mark the western limits of
the dispersion. On the north, the range
of the Caucasus, the Caspian, the north-
ern boundary of Turkistan, and a line
drawn from the Middle Oxus to lake
Balkash, are the boundary. On the east,
the general limit is the Indus, from its
head-waters to the mouth ; and on the
south, the Indian ocean and the Persian
gulf.
The great countries within these lim-
its are Persia, Turkistan, Afghanistan,
and Beluchistan. The races inhabiting
these are independent in Principal conn-
development and political %**
form, but are all primarily Islam,
peoples of a common origin. Around
the borders, especially on the east, the
admixture of foreign elements has been
so considerable as to modify, and in
some parts reverse, the original ethnic
character. The largest foreign force
which the Iranians of all these regions
have suffered and the greatest modifica-
tion in their national aspects have been
produced by the impact of Moham-
medanism. By this agency a great part
of the original traditions and ceremo-
nials of the Iranians, especially in Belu-
chistan, have been supplanted with
Semitic institutional forms of a totally
different nature.
Into some districts of ancient Iran
the lines of the primitive migration have
carried the Brown, even the Black and
Black, races of antiquity, g^SS?
as in the case of the Brahoes Iranians,
in Northeastern Seluchistan, around
Kelat, who are a people of Dravidian
descent. All of these elements have
left an ethnic detritus in the countries
640
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
over which they have passed, and these
elements have been absorbed by the
Iranians, with a consequent change in
personal character and tribal develop-
ment.
After the Tajiks, who are the most
widely distributed of the modern Irani-
ans, the Afghans are next in breadth of
dispersion and in numbers. They are
estimated at about four million nine
hundred thousand souls. This includes
the inhabitants of Turkistan and of sev-
eral adjacent provinces, who have a com-
mon ethnic character. The Beluchs
number about half a million. They,
most of all, have suffered from the in-
termixture of foreign races, and are
most conformed to the character of the
peoples of Hindustan.
Here, then, we shall conclude this cur-
sory outline of the race which contends
with the Indie Aryans for the rank of
eldest among our ancestral Asiatic house-
hold. We have endeavored in the cur-
rent chapter to revive, as far as possible,
an image of the Iranians in the garb of
their ancient life and in process of pre-
historic evolution. From this we have
proceeded to the consideration of those
modern peoples who best represent the
primitive stock. We shall now pass to
their kinsmen in the valley of the Indus.
EAST ARYAN ART WORK. Indican Designs.
BOOK VI-THE INDICANS.
. HOT^SE PEOPLE OF*
T is our purpose in the
current chapter to pre-
sent as much as may
be gathered relative to
one of the most inter-
esting types in primi-
tive civilization. This
is the method of life, the structure of the
household, the form of domestic and
social economy adopted by the primitive
Aryans of India. Since
Reason for the .,,..,,.
caption " House the building of a house for
an abode, and the dwelling
together therein of one man and one
woman with their children in the method
of that persistent and glorious fact called
the family, constitute the leading fea-
ture, the form and substance, of the life
of this far-off division of our own race,
the caption employed for the present
chapter will be the " House People of
Arya."
Before entering upon the formal elu-
cidation of the social life of this people,
it is desirable to note the features of the
country in which the great structure of
Indian civilization was planned and de-
veloped. We must not depreciate the
influence of physical nature
r . . Reactions of na-
Upon man and hlS instl- ture on man and
, />. ,-t his institutions.
tutions. On the contrary,
it is frankly conceded that the reaction-
ary effect of universal nature on the
senses and intellections, and even on the
emotions and passions of mankind, is one
of the greatest elements in determining
the course and character of human de-
velopment.
The country in which the house build-
ers of ancient Arya were destined, most
of all, to display their native dispositions
and acquired activities, may well serve as
an illustration of the potency, not to say
domination, of nature over man.
The name INDIA is of recent origin.
If we consult the native tongues of the
East, we shall find no sin- ,
Derivation and
gle word sufficiently com- sense of the
1 . -I r- ^1 name India,
prehensive to define the
country which we are now to consider.
The name which in Sanskrit would most
nearly describe the vast region whicb
641
642
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
the modern nations call India, would be
B/idrata-varsha, signifying the land, or
kingdom, of Bharata. The latter is the
name of a legendary monarch of the
Lunar dynasty, whose dominion, ac-
cording to the Indie mythology and tra-
dition, was perhaps as wide as the aggre-
of the Sanskrit Sindhu, or Hindu, mean-
ing rivers ; and this is the fundamental
sense of the nomenclature. "Rivers"
was the name which the primitive Ar-
yan folk, coming into the upper valley
from the table-lands of Iran and through
the gateways of the Hindu- Kush, first
VIEW IN SAPTA SINDHU. THE MOUNCHI-BAGH. Drawn by G. Vuillier, from a photograph.
gate of countries now called by the gen-
eral name of India.
The name Hindustan has been fre-
quently used by geographers to desig-
nate a resrion much broader
The Sapta Sind-
hu of the Old than the limited country
lying north of the Vind-
hya mountains; but such usage is no
longer warranted. The name India is
the smoothed and melodized Greek form
gave to the country now known by the
designation of Punjab, or Five Rivers.
It is thought, however, that the very
oldest designation given by the immi-
grating tribes to this region was Sapta
Sindhu, or Seven Rivers, the two streams
additional to the five of the Punjab being
the Indus on the one side and the Saras-
wati on the other. At any rate, it was
into this country of many rivers so
THE INDICANS. HOUSE PEOPLE OF ARYA.
643
many that they constituted the leading
geographical feature, and impressed
themselves first of all upon the imagi-
nation of the new folk from the north-
west that the Old Aryans came from
their native seats at a time far more re-
mote than we are able to measure by
any existing system of chronology.
These tribal immigrants came ulti-
mately, as we shall see in another part
Origin and -wan- of this Work, OUt of ancient
fnTica g nn! Bactria. ; For a long time
grants. after their departure from
their primitive seats they maintained
a nomadic, or rather a sort of pastoral,
life on the broad plateaus of Iran. Per-
haps the extent of their wanderings in this
region will never be ascertained ; but in
process of time, as they made their way
further and further to the east and
south, they descended into the valley
lands of the Upper Indus, and thence
made their way down the Sapta Sindhu
until the whole region between the Pun-
jab and the sea was dominated by their
influence.
Great were the climatic and other
changes which they experienced in this
Aryan mythoi- migration; and it is easy. to
tKwen e 4on- discover, by an examination
ment - of the ancient Indie and
Persic mythologies and by a comparison
of the one with the other, to how great
an extent the mythology and tradition
of the migratory Aryans was modified
by their debouchure into the valleys of
the east. The somewhat austere and
simple ideas of Zoroastrianism immedi-
ately broke out into an inflected mythol-
ogy, almost as variable in its forms and
development as that of Greece; and
this, no doubt, is traceable to the multi-
farious aspects and phenomena of nature
as she exhibited herself in India, in
contrast with her half-desert singularity'
on the Iranian table-lands and deserts.
India is a country very variable in its
climatic conditions. The sky is 'broad
and open, flecked with
Variability of
clouds, and invaded at in- climatic condi.
tervals by storms. The tions in Jndiu
heavens by night are, at least in the up-
lands, almost as blue and starry as those
of Mesopotamia. The rainfall varies
with the season and the district, being
less than thirty inches in some of the
drier parts, and much more than sixty
inches in the lowlands near the sea. But
first of all, something should be said of the
general relations and geographical fea-
tures of the vast region stretching from
the borders of Afghanistan to the de-
pendent mountain spurs which, divide
Assam from Burmah.
The extreme breadth of the country
called India is about twelve hundred
miles, and its extent from north to south
fully fifteen hundred miles. Extent and
India is the central of the =*"
three great peninsulas country,
which drop from the backbone of Asia
into the southern ocean. It is the Italy
of Asia, but an Italy on a vaster and
grander scale than that which depends
from the Central Alps into the Mediter-
ranean. The general shape of the In-
dian peninsula is a triangle, having its
base set firmly against the tremendous
buttresses of the Himalayas, and its apex
extending far into the warm waters of
the tropics. The southern point of the
country reaches to the eighth parallel of
north latitude; and its northern limit
lies under parallel thirty-five. Within
these vast boundaries there are three
distinct geographical areas. First, the
great uplifted mountain region, from the
double ridges of the Himalayan summits
to the hill-country at their foot. Second,
the great river plains, embracing the
larger part of the country, and bearing
through various channels the streams of
644
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
the Punjab, of the Brahmaputra valley,
and of the valley of the Ganges. Third, a
peculiar, triangular table-land, called the
Deccan, rising from the river plains just
mentioned, and held in place between
the Narbada and the Kistna rivers and
the range of the Vindhya on the north.
It is not needed in a history of man
to enter into the minute details of geog-
circumstances raphy ; but the general fea-
uSf inlSn tures of the country are of
race prime importance to the
understanding of human development.
It is necessary here to note, first of all,
the inaccessible barrier of the Himalayas,
shutting off India from connection with
the rest of Asia. The average height
of these mountains is at least nineteen
thousand feet, and they have few gate-
ways by which the country lying to the
south may be approached. It is believed
that the Indie Aryans came, in part at
least, through these mountain fastnesses
when they first reached the region of
their future abode and development. If
so, however, the migration must have
been- one of excessive toil and danger,
and, the river valleys having once been
reached, the mountain gates behind
would seem to close, never to be re-
opened.
Thus we find that the Old Aryans of the
East, having completed their migration,
found themselves isolated from the rest
of mankind and placed in a region well
suited for race development. It is not
needed, in this connection, to dwell upon
the fact that these people were the last
of the tribes to leave their old Bactrian
abode, and that they had less of the
migratory or roving disposition than
any of their kinsfolk who removed
from the same region, at earlier dates,
into the plateau of Iran or the far
European islands and peninsulas of the
West.
The instinct of remaining what the
philosophers would call the animus man-
endi was thus stronger The indicans
with the Indie Aryans than *L
with any other branch of others,
the great family to which they belonged.
They were more localized in their dis-
positions, and less adventurous than the
kinspeople with whom they had been
associated from the beginning. They
now found themselves in beautiful river
valleys and fertile uplands backed by
mountains, well suited to promote the
growth and expansion of those qualities
which race instinct and innate prefer-
ence had given them. They were alone
among the peoples at a date much more
than two thousand years before the
Christian era. All the circumstances of
their situation tended powerfully to de-
velop a type of life peculiar in ever} 7 fea-
ture.
It is not intended in this place to
sketch the character of the Indie mind
and philosophy, except in so far as the
same may have appeared in its most rudi-
mentary stages. The present chapter
is devoted to the primitive condition
of the race as it is revealed to us in
its earliest aspects and conditions. Let
us, then, proceed to note as much as
may be authentically gathered of the
primitive condition of these old peoples
of the Indian valleys.
On their reaching the regions which
they were to inhabit, the Aryan folk
from the northwest found already
in the country an aborig- The immigrant
inal people which they JgSSJf
had to crowd out of their country.
way. It is not known by how much ag-
gression and force these aborigines were
driven from their seats. Nor can it be
well ascertained to what extent the fu-
ture race was modified by the absorption
of the primitive tribes of the country.
646
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Those who have investigated the sub-
ject most closely differ in their estimates
of the extent to which the future people
of India were influenced in their blood
and character by contact with the old
tribes whom they overcame and dispos-
sessed of their native seats. Perhaps
the best judgment is that which assigns
but a small modification on account of
the absorption of characteristics from the
primitive races. The situation, doubt-
less, was not very different, in some re-
spects, from that which another Aryan
people, after nearly four thousand years,
discovered by their impact on the abo-
riginal races of the New World. The
great adventurers from Western Europe,
precipitating themselves upon the east-
ern coasts of North America, settling
there and planting a new civilization,
were not greatly modified, either at the
beginning or at any subsequent period,
by their contact with the Red men whom
they displaced from the country. In some
other regions conquest has given a dif-
ferent result. The Latin races, victori-
ous over the provincial peoples who
held Europe in the time of the Roman
ascendency, assimilated freely with
those whom they conquered and sub-
dued. As already indicated, it is not
now possible to determine with exacti-
tude how much of the original human
life of India was absorbed into the new
Aryan life which came by migration and
conquest.
The caption of the present chapter has
already hinted at what may be regarded
as the primary character-
House-building
instincts of the istic of the primitive Ar-
East Aryans. ,. T -, . /TV,
yans of India. They were
the builders of houses, the makers of
homes, the organizers of families. This
is the distinctive feature of that primi-
tive life which we see afar in the valleys
of the East, and also of the semitribal
life which we behold in process of evolu-
tion among the early Medes and Per-
sians, the Greeks, the Italic races, and
even the Teutonic tribes of the north.
They were all makers of houses houses
above ground, built from the material
furnished by nature, and constructed
with special reference to the permanent
abode and comfort of a single house-
hold.
It may well surprise us to reflect that
the primitive houses of the Indian valley,
built by a branch of our an- sympathy of
cestral races long before ^e^skiinn the
Sanskrit was Sanskrit or ^ ood structure.
Greek was Greek, had the same general
form and substance and design as the
houses built by the wanderers and pio-
neers of the New World in the seven-
teenth century of our era. There has
always been a close sympathy between
the man of Arya and the tree. He has
always looked upon the tree as his friend.
He has seen in it the possibility of pro-
tection and comfort and plenty. He has
used it as the auxiliary of his develop-
ment. Already, on his entrance into
the Indian valleys, he knew how to
create a house, to frame a structure out
of the trunks of trees. The Old Medes
had learned this lesson on the great
plateau, and it is not a little instructive
to note the fact that antiquarian research
has not until the present day discovered
a single Median structure left to us in
ruin or tradition which was not made of
wood.
Stone buildings and buildings of bricks
were things somewhat repugnant to the
first instincts of the East- Name of the
ern Aryan races. These *%S ideas
J JiSSOClcl t6d
forms of structure came therewith,
only by development and discipline, and
belong to the aesthetic periods of
national life. To fell the tree, to cut
and square the trunk, to put it in place in
THE 1NDICANS. HOUSE PEOPLE OF ARYA.
647
four solid walls, and put a roof over the
space for an abode, was the fundamental
idea with the Aryan peoples. He called
it his house, a word which is common to
every branch of the great Aryan speech,
from the oldest to the youngest. Nor
are we able to discover a period of tribal
life so remote that the house was not the
tangible evidence and bottom feet. Of
the exact forms which the structure
assumed, we have no precise informa-
tion ; but the
general nature
of the primitive
abodes of our
own race, as dis-
tinguished from
those of the
Semites and Tu-
ranians, was as
defined above,
and its purpose
was to consti-
tute a fixed
home for a man
and a woman,
with their off-
spring.
The man was
called pitar ; in
Greek, pater ; in
Anglo-Saxon, feeder; that is, father.
The father was the funda-
Nature of the
household; the mental fact of the hoUSe-
paternal name. * -. ,,
hold. The word means
the protector. And it is upon this idea
that the whole structure of Aryan society,
ancient and modern, is founded. The
father protects his house and household.
They are his. The idea is that of a nest.
He is the roof above it. He defends it.
His arm is bared for its protection,
and his faculties are all vigilant lest
harm come to his abode. He is the stem
around which the whole structure is
gathered and developed. He is the
singular core of the household to which
all the rest adheres and without which it
falls instantly into disintegratum and
ruin. His life is the constant barrier be-
tween it and all harm. His valor and
strength are the safeguards and guaranty
of his own place, which stands apart
from the rest and holds his treasures.
In all the tribes which have sprung from
that original Bactrian fountain, bubbling
up with human fecundity in remote pre-
PRIMITIVE BUILDING OF
Drawn
THE INDUS VALLEY. HOUSE IN THE KOULOU.
by G. Vuillier, from a photograph.
historic ages, fatherhood and protection
have been inseparable synonyms.
As a necessary adjunct to this central
fact called the father in the Aryan
household, was the institution of mo-
nogamy. Single marriage
& The fact and
was the rule from the be- sentiment of
,-TM . ,. single marriage.
ginning. The union of one
man with one woman, perpetually de-
voted the one to the other, was the fun-
damental concept of the creative relation
and of the outward fact called the home.
It appears, moreover, that this union
among the Aryan peoples has always
based on the sentiment of affection .
648
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
A preference, loving and tender, has
always existed, at least a preference of
the ma*n for the woman. It is doubtful,
indeed, if the preference of the woman
for the man has ever been wholly ig-
nored in any Aryan tribe. It is true
that the idea of ownership, the belief
and practice that the man was not only
strong contradistinction to the polyga-
mous practices of the Semitic races and the
polyandry of many of the The Aryan
barbarian families of man- ySSSSSSi.
kind, the single marriage ogamtc.
of the Aryan household stands preemi-
nent. Further on we shall see that this
principle of monogamy was so strong
MODERN HOUSES OF THE SAPTA SINDHU.-ViLLAGB IN THB KOULOU. Drawn by G. Vuillier, from * photograph.
the possessor but the owner of the woman,
has prevailed among many of even the
leading peoples of our race. But a
close study of primitive conditions will
show that even at the earliest emergence
from barbarism some even much def-
erence was given to the sentiments and
instincts of the woman.
However this may be, the monogamic
Delation is certain and definite. In
am^ng the Greeks and Romans as to be
by them communicated and forced upon
the prevalent social, political, and reli-
gious systems of the world.
In the valley of the Indus the primitive
Aryan household was or-
J . . Institution of
ganized on these principles, the family; office
. 1 , .,, . f of the mother.
A house was built. A fa-
ther declared himself. He took on
woman in marriage. He became her
THE INDICANS. HOUSE PEOPLE OF ARYA.
649
protector and the defender of the house
where she dwelt and where he dwelt
with her. When the child was born,
his fatherhood was emphasized. He
was the protector also of the child of
the children. They grew around him.
He was the center of the primitive
home, its defender from harm, and the
fundamental fact of its existence. And
this brings us to consider the mother in
her office and character as she is revealed
to us in the Aryan dawn.
The mother in Arya was the pro-
ducer, that is, the producer of life. She
was the genetrix, the wellspring. When
the name of mother (Sanskrit mdtd'] was
first given her, she was thought of as
the blessed origin of being, the bearer
of the new living form which the
father was to acknowledge and protect. 1
As to her own being, it was wedded to
that of the man. She lost her name
and her family relationship by her union
with the man. She was taken out of
the household to which she belonged in
girlhood and transferred to the man.
To this extent she became his. At
least, she was of him, and her identity
was henceforth merged with his in the
household which they had founded. But
the household took its origin in him,
bore his name, and was under his pro-
tection and sovereignty.
We are able, by means of linguistic
study, to penetrate the inner life of the
The son and primitive house of Arya,
*? and to discover its methods,
their names. The names given to the
son and the daughter indicate, as clearly
cs can be, the offices which they held in
1 The fundamental unity of the idea of mother
among all the Aryan peoples is shown by the identity
of the word in the different languages thus : San-
skrit, mdtd ; Old Persic, mdtd: Greek, mWZr; Latin,
mater; Old Slav, mati ; O. H. Ger., muotar ;
Gaelic, mathair, etc., etc.
M. Vol. i 42
the family. The ideas upon which the
organizations depended are clearly shown
by the words employed to define the
household relations. As for the son, he
was called sunu, meaning the begotten,
and the thought was that as the begotten
of his father he was to be his successor
and representative. He was named ac-
cordingly ; and we are thus able to see at
the very foundation of Aryan life the
notion which the primitive father had of
his male offspring.
The daughter was named on a differ-
ent principle. They called her at the
first duhitar, a term of endearment, sig-
nificant in its first intent of the tender-
ness with which the girl-child was re-
garded. Her place in the household was
affectional. She was the darling from,
her birth, and this relation of loving ten-
derness she continued to bear in the
family until her transplanting out of it
to the side of her husband. But while
she continued to be duhitar, the daughter,
she also, in maidenhood, took on another
name or names significant of her place
and duty. Instead of being called duhi-
tar, she was nicknamed milkmaid, and
by this simple fact we are let into a sec-
tion of the daily life of the household.
It was her duty, on arriving at mature
maidenhood, to milk the cows and goats,
and her duty in this respect was so clear-
ly defined as to warrant her nickname
milkmaid. By this title she was called
without disparagement, and her original
office has been carried with the frag-
ments of speech into several modern
languages.
If we scrutinize more closely the
method of life pursued
- 1 Predominance of
at the beginning by the the agricultural
T , . . 111 instinct.
Indie Aryans, we shall
find them to be a people of the soil.
They lived from the resources of the
earth produced by cultivation. In these
650
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
migrating tribes the agricultural impulse
was dominant from the first. They
were peculiarly a people of ground-
HOUSE PEOPLE OF ARYA THE DUHITAR.
itive life of the Aryans is so strongly
marked as to have left its own demon-
stration and history in the languages
spoken by the
different races of
this stock. Nor
can it fail of in-
terest, even to
the unlearned
reader, to note
the proof and il-
lustration of the
agricultural as-
pect of Aryan
life by an ex-
amination of
that group of
words which ex-
hibit the fact
most strikingly.
The word Ar-
yan is from the
Sanskrit Arya t
meaning "no-
ble." It signifies
the nobility of the
agricultural caste
in ancient India.
The plowmen
were the noble
people, and were
socalledby them-
selves from the
beginning. The
root AR means
to plow, and this
signification is
trac eable in
nearly every dia-
lect of Aryan
speech. In Latin
was to
Culture. They plowed the glebe. It
was their vocation to plant seeds and de-
velop the growing stalk to maturity and
fruitage. This peculiarity of the prim-
In Greek ar-oun had
Meaning and ap-
Even plication of the
_ , T* 1 1 i word Arya.
in Old English we have
the expression to ear the ground, mean-
plow.
the same meaning.
THE INDICANS. HOUSE PEOPLE OF ARYA.
651
ing to plow. In the forty-fifth chapter
of Genesis occurs the expression, ' ' There
shall neither be caring nor harvest."
This signifies, ' ' There shall be neither
plowing nor harvest time." Ancient
geographical names in all parts of the
Aryan world have preserved the traces
of this word. The old name of Thrace
was Ar-ia.. The ancient name of the
vocation of the Aryan race. The names
of men in various parts of the world
have carried forward the same noble
tradition ; and that great German leader
with whom Julius Caesar contended for
the mastery of Europe was called Ar-
iovistus. All these facts prove beyond
doubt that the vocation of this great
branch of the human family was agri-
HOUSE PEOPLE OF ARYA THE TILLERS OF THE SOIL.
Median and Persian plateau was fr-an,
meaning the land of the Aryans. The
name of Ire-land, formerly written Eire-
land, preserves the same root, and the
poetical name Er-in, sometimes sup-
posed to mean the land of the west, is
only the same word, and signifies the
land of the plow. Aye, the very word
ear-fh is doubtless the same, preserving
in its spelling and pronunciation the un-
mistakable evidence of the primitive
cultural, and this at a period before the
breakup of the ancient tribes in the orig-
inal seats of Bactria. They were the
people of the plow long before the Hel-
lenes were known to history or the an-
cient Medes had appeared as a power on
the Iranian plains.
The general character of the early life
of man is largely discoverable by his re-
lations with the other animals. From
his appearance on the earth, be the
652
GREAT RACES OF MANKIXi,
mode and the time of that appearance
whatever it may, he has been in close
Relations of the affiliation with the lower or-
2SKSi ders of being. The dis-
beasts. tinction between wild and
domestic animals is doubtless fictitious.
All animals at the first were wild. Some
species have, in process of time, been
tamed by the superior wit and contriv-
ance of man ; and the creatures thus do-
mesticated have acquired the instinct of
docility. The peculiarities of the Old
Aryan life of India are again revealed in
the character of the animals which they
succeeded in subduing. They are those
peculiar to the agricultural life. The
horse was their servant long before their
migration from the Bactrian uplands.
Tradition has preserved even into .the
dawn of authentic history the story of
the horses of the Medes and Persians.
The Indie Aryans were equally the mas-
ters of this noble animal, but with them
he was bred and reared rather for the
service of the field and the household
than for swiftness in flight or the charge
of battle. The horse in the Indian val-
leys partook in course of time of the
mild and docile qualities of the people,
and obeyed somewhat the influences of
his environment.
So also of the cattle and the sheep.
Both were domesticated and drawn
The agricultural around the Aryan house.
life indicated by -p rrm , *},- parlip^t HavQ
the domestic an- * Qays
imais. o f the migration wild cat-
tle still existed in the uplands of Persia
and perhaps in the mountain countries
of the north; but the kine of the valleys
were domesticated, and were used for
food and service more than fifteen hun-
dred years before the conquest of Alex-
ander. Likewise, the goat was among
the tamed animals of the primitive In-
dians. He was eaten as to his flesh, and
from the ewes was derived the principal
supply of milk, with its secondary prod-
ucts of butter and cheese. So also was
the dog but not the cat the constant
companion of these people. Indeed,
the whole life of the Aryan household
was of the strictly agricultural type ; and
it may well surprise us to find repre-
sented in the daily curriculum of the
oldest tribes of our race so many of the
features, the methods, and characteristics
of the modern family.
Strangely enough, it does not appear
that the ancient Aryans of India were
much acquainted with the Names of wild
wild beasts of the woods. S?
At' any rate, such acquaint- languages.
ance as they had seems to have been
gained after the departure from their
kinsfolk of the highlands and their com-
ing into the Indian valleys. These facts
we know again from the testimony of
language. The names of the wild beasts
are generally different in the different
Aryan languages. If the bear, for in-
stance, or the wolf had been familiar to
the tribes before the migration from their
original seats, they would have given
him a name, and that name would have
been common in the various dialects
arising from the common source. So
also of the other fierce beasts of the
woods. But we find that the wild crea-
tures have each a specific name in the
different Aryan tongues, from which the
nonacquaintance of the primitive folk
with such beasts is clearly inferred.
If we glance at the implements and
utensils of the Old Aryan household, we
shall find another illustra- Names of impie.
tion of the peaceful agri- $"
cultural life which they led. Ufe -
The various implements of tillage are
named in common by the different
Aryan folk who used them. The plow,
the rake, and the hoe, the iron ax and
sickle, and many other of the imple-
THE INDICANS. HOUSE PEOPLE OF ARYA.
653
merits of husbandry were manifestly in
use by the immigrants who peopled
ancient India. But here again we find
a different result when we look at the
names of the implements of the chase
and of war. The name of the bow and
arrow, the spear, the lance, and the
sword are different in the different dia-
lects which sprang from the common
source ; and we are able by such means
to discover that hunting and the still
at eventide. It is unmistakably true
that the leading features of the primitive
Aryan home of India had an outline of
identity with those of Greece and Italy,
and even of the Teutonic fastnesses of
the north and the oak woods of Britain.
Unto this day many words still live in
India and in England that had a common
birth and common meaning before the
separation of the ancient tribes from the
Bactrian homestead, and these words
HOUSE PEOPLE OF ARYA THE AGRICULTURAL LIFE.
more exciting vocations of war were
phases of life comparatively unknown to
the primitive Aryans, and only super-
imposed upon their ancient agricultural
life at a later date and under foreign
influences.
War and the chase were not the native
pursuits of these peaceable people ; and
indications of a the very nomenclature of
their household and garden
utensils is sufficient of it-
self to establish their character as men
of the field by day and the hearthstone
peaceable and
domestic race
character.
and forms of speech bear unmistakable
evidence of the common primitive life
which all these tribes inherited from a
common ancestry. The name for house
is the same in all. So also the names
for father and mother, for son and
daughter, for dog and cow, for heart and
tears, for ax and tree, for plow and
doorway all are common in their origin
and meaning in the whole group of
Indo-European languages. And thus
are we able, by linguistic research and
careful comparison, to draw from the
654
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
prehistoric shadows a tolerably accurate
outline of that primitive life which was
led by the Aryans of India before the
Veda was sung-, and even by their own
ancestral tribes long before the Zend-
Avesta had taken form in the minds
of the Iranian bards and philosophers.
Thus we see, in a very remote pre-
historic age, certainly as much as two
thousand years before our
Synopsis of the .
aspects of life era, the incoming of cer-
ln Old India. , - -
tain migratory tribes into
the great country which we call India.
We see them settling there and develop-
ing according to the laws of their own
instinct and the influences of their en-
vironment. We see them building
houses and organizing families on the
basis of monogamy. We see them
localized in their abodes and in close
relation with the soil, from which they
derived their subsistence by means of
regular cultivation. We see them de-
voting themselves to the pursuits of
peace ; employing the domestic animals
and using the implements of husbandry,
driving the oxen to the plow and bearing
the milk pail from the goatfold at even-
ing. We see them but little acquainted
with the chase and little disposed to the
dangers and excitements of war, a pecul-
iar people, given to peace and dreading
the hazards and alarms of conflict and
battle. We see them following from
generation to generation, even from
century to century, the same primitive
methods of life until, in the process of
time and with the rise of more aggres-
sive and adventurous peoples in other
parts of Asia, their national life is at last
thrust into the faint dawn of authentic
history. Then it is that the priest is
heard chanting the songs of the Veda,
and the old philosopher of Arya begins
to teach his mystic beliefs to dreaming
followers in the valleys of the East.
When we arrive at this juncture in the
history of the Indie races, it will be time
for us to pass from the purely primitive
aspect of Aryan life in India to consider
its tribal and historical relations as will
be done in the following chapters.
XXXVIII. RELIGION.
N the entrance of the
Old Aryans into the
Indian valleys all the
ethnic harmonies of
the race were softened
into a minor key.
There was a loss of
intellectual force, with a gain of imagi-
nation ; a loss of bodily energy, with a
General effect of gain of activity; a loss
o f adventure, with a gain
o f dreaming. Every ele-
ment of the originally robust Aryan
character, as it. had shown itself through
all the stages c: drifting from the Bac-
mto India.
trian homestead through the mountain
passes into the Punjab, was toned
down and soon forced, by a new disci-
pline, to vibrate to a softer chant.
Every force of nature conspired by its
reaction on the faculties of man to
abridge freedom, cool passion, assuage
tribal heat, and diffuse a calmer mood.
We come now to consider the old life
of India, always an obscure problem in
the history of mankind. We have al-
ready considered those ancient migra-
tory movements which carried down the
peoples of our ancestral race, by succes-
sive waves into the Punjab, and thence
656
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
southward and eastward to the ocean
and the mountains. We have even
noted some of the original conditions
which surrounded the immigrants and
conduced to the formation of a new race
character. The attentive reader is by
this time tolerably informed with re-
spect to the ethnic inheritance which the
Aryans brought with them into India ;
of their dispositions and peculiarities,
and the beginnings of the institutional
form which they carried along on their
way from the highlands of Iran into the
lowlands of Sapta Sindhu. It shall
now be our object to take up the trans-
planted life of the Old Aryans, and to
note its evolution into new forms pecul-
iar to the East.
We are here on the threshold of Brah-
manism. Perhaps it will be well first of
Indican religious all to note the peculiarities
Sedb y d t e h V e e1 ' of this ancient faith, and es-
Brahmans. pecially its divergence from
the system of Zoroaster. The term is
derived from the Brahmans, the sacer-
dotal caste of the Hindu family, who
have, from the most ancient times, been
the custodians of the national faith, pre-
serving its dogmas and directing its
ceremonial. In their hands such is
their antiquity and such their influence
over the destinies of Indian civilization
both the linguistic and the religious
development of the Indian race have
been determined, and it is interesting to
note the almost perfect parallelism of
the changes from the Old Aryan tongue
to the modern languages of Hindustan,
and the corresponding inflections of the
old religious beliefs into the forms and
ceremonials of the existing races of
India.
The doctrines of Brahmanism are
summed up and contained in a body of
sacred writings, under the collective
name of the Veda. The word signifies
"knowledge," or " revelation." Perhaps
the older portions thereof are the oldest
written compositions now
. Nature and
in possession Of the hu- extent of the
man race, unless we should
except certain parts of the Chinese liter-
ature, concerning the antiquity of which
the Western peoples are not well in-
formed.
The Veda consists of four parts, or
collections of sacred texts, called San-
hitas, or Mantras. The texts include
not only expositions of doctrine and
revelations of the gods, but also hymns
and incantations and prayers and sacri-
ficial forms peculiar to the national re-
ligion. The first major division of the
whole work is known as the ^?zV//-Veda,
commonly written Rig- Veda ; the second
is the Saman-Veda., or Sama-Veda ; the
third is the Yo/us/i-Veda, written Yajur-
Veda; and the fourth, the Atharvan-
Veda, or Atharva-Veda. Each of these
greater parts has its peculiarities, and
the whole covers a vast epoch as it re-
lates to the time of composition.
In addition to the sacred texts proper,
there is a large mass of prose writings
attached thereto called the Additional writ-
D t^ q TTiP mihiert- ings connected
isranmanas. ine . iDjeci- ^^^ the sacred
matter of these relates to text -
the ceremonial application of the sacred
texts, the proper method of conducting
the rites, and other practical and exposi-
tory matters. There are two other kinds
of commentaries or appendages to the
Vedas, called the Aranyakas and the
Upanishads, the former of which are
analogous in subject to the Brahmanas,
being in the nature of a comment and
explanation upon the sense and proper
usage of the sacred books. The Upani-
shads, however, are more philosophical
in their character. They contain the
great body of speculations on the prob-
lems of life and of destiny, particularly
THE INDICANS. RELIGION.
657
that part of philosophy which relates to
the universe and its religion. These
commentaries and expositional parts of
the Hindic Bible come down to a com-
paratively recent date, from which cir-
cumstance the sacred language of India
may be studied entirely from the reli-
gious texts. Nearly every inflection
and linguistic development which has
taken place from the most ancient San-
skrit to Hindustani may be gathered
and understood from an examination of
the Vedas, with their accompanying
gloss and commentaries.
It is the Rig- Veda which constitutes the
essence of the whole. It corresponds
with the Gathas of the Avesta, contain-
Essenceofthe ing the hymns and other
tTneTinth'e tyrical effusions of the earli-
Big- Veda. es t Aryan settlers in India.
It is clear, however, that these most an-
cient songs differ greatly among them-
selves in date of composition. Some of
them represent the language in its old-
est aspect, and others are of a later date ;
but all are ancient, and belong to that
primitive period of religious and linguis-
tic history in which the thought of the
ancestral race was still in native efflo-
rescence, freeing itself from the bosom of
man in ejaculatory expressions, apostro-
phes, and hymns of praise to the gods.
Quite unlike the Rig- Veda are the three
other divisions of the sacred books.
The Sama-Veda and Atharva-Veda are
ritualistic in character. They either
explain, illustrate, or apply the doctrines
of the older hymns, or repeat them in
more modern phraseology.
Much has already been said relative to
the bottom character of the Old Aryan
worship. It was based upon
Vedaism based .
on the adoration a reverential regard for
of nature. , 1 ,. /-TV,
the powers of nature. The
grand and striking phenomena of the
physical universe struck upon the con-
sciousness of this early race with peculiar
power, and the heart of the people burst
out in adoration and praise. Doubtless
in its very earliest aspect the religious
system thus produced was merely a na-
ture worship, having for its objective re-
alities the sublime aspects and processes
of the material world.
Generally, the vision of this early peo-
ple was lifted to the air and sky. At-
mospheric phenomena particularly af-
fected the senses and attracted the rev-
erence Of the Old Indians. Natural rever-
Higher still were the heav- ^*'^.
enly bodies. The efful- ly todies,
gence of the sun poured down upon a
sensitive race and warmed them into
gratitude and devotion. There was in a
very early age a division of the powers
of the universe similar to that discerned
and developed by the Greeks. There
were powers of the earth, powers of the
air, and powers of heaven. For a long
time the polytheistic aspect of the sys-
tem was maintained, and it is not until
we reach the tenth book of the Rig- Veda
that we find an effort on the part of the
worshiper to elevate one particular deity
to the rank of an omnipotent God.
We have already called attention to
the mode by which, in the worship of
the powers of nature, the
* . The mind seeks
mind, ever in process of ex- to separate mat-
1 i ter from spirit.
pansion, labors to separate
the force behind the phenomenon from
the phenomenon itself. This happened
in the case of the Indians. Their sys-
tem was elevated from the merely phys-
ical aspects of the universe to the invis-
ible powers which control and direct.
These were henceforth worshiped.
Names were given to them, and a hier-
archy was established, having a supreme
head in the sky god called Dyaus Pitar,
or Heaven Father. We thus see in the
extreme East a religious evolution which
658
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
reached the same result as that which
was subsequently attained, without his-
torical contact, by the kindred Aryans of
the Graeco-Italic race. Dyaus Pitar is
the same as the Greek Zeus and the Ro-
man Jove.
The system of worship adopted by the
Indie Aryans was noted for what may
be called its prayerful character. "Its es-
sence was invocation, and
The prayerful
element in the even the gloss and commen-
Lc worship. tarv> SQ abtmdantly elab .
orated in the books accompanying the
Veda, are nearly all devoted to the
proper exposition and form of prayer.
The whole system presents man in a
reverential attitude toward the gods,
pouring out his devotions, sometimes in
praise and what may be narrowly defined
as worship ; but generally the substance
of the devotional act was an appeal to
the powers above, a prayer for benefit,
for grace, for wisdom. The word Brah-
ma is said to signify "devotion," or
'* prayer."
It must not be understood that this
simple and essential element in the the-
ology of India was not sub-
Development of .
worship and use ject to development, in the
of sacrifices. -, /. ., . . .
hands of the priests, into
a vast and incomprehensible formulary.
On the contrary, the inflection of cere-
mony was never carried to a higher de-
gree than by the priests of the Old Indie
faith. Not only was the form of the
prayer, its subject, and its method to be
carefully defined, but the philosophical
concepts of the worshiper must be regu-
lated and mingled with his devotion, in
order that a true religion might be illus-
trated in his life.
The second idea w r as that of the effi-
cacy of sacrifices. The earnest prayer
properly expressed could hardly fail to
bring to the worshiper an answer from
the gods, but the pleasure of the latter
was enhanced and their purposes toward
men made more auspicious by the giving
of gifts on the altar. Thus a sacrificial
system was demanded to supplement
the system of prayers ; and for the con-
duct of the ceremonies and sacrifices
orders of priests became necessary, who,
by the multiplication of their own func-
tions and dignities, increased the num-
ber and reputation of their caste. Pro-
fessor Max M tiller has enumerated four
classes of priests required in the conduct
of solemn sacrifices :
1. The officiating priests, manual la-
borers, and acolytes, who have chiefly to
prepare the sacrificial ground, to dress
the altar, slay the victims, and pour out
the libations.
2. The choristers, who chant the sa-
cred hymns.
3. The reciters, or readers, who repeat
certain hymns.
4. The overseers, or bishops, who
watch and superintend the proceedings
of the other priests, and ought to be fa-
miliar with all the Vedas.
It is the purpose in the present work
to make as few excerpts as possible from
existing: writings. It has
Extracts from
been the plan rather to sum- the Veda ; hymn
i , -, , to Indra.
marize and to place in the
best light the substance of such docu-
ments as would most demand attention in
the course of an ethnic history. At this
point, however, it seems fitting to pre-
sent some examples of the Vedic hymns
in English. Only so much will be given
as may familiarize the reader with the
phraseology of these ancient songs and
with the worshipful spirit in which they
were chanted, in the faint dawn of his-
tory, by the old bards of India. The
selections are made from Miiller's trans-
lation of the Vedas. The first is from
the fifty-third chapter of the first book
of the Rig- Veda.
THE INDICANS. RELIGION.
659
I. HYMN TO INDRA.
i . Keep silence well ! We offer praises to the great
tndra in the house of the sacrificer. Does he find
treasure for those who are like sleepers? Mean
praise is not valued among 1 the munificent.
2. Thou art the
giver of horses, Indra,
thou art the giver of
cows, the giver of
corn, the strong lord
of wealth; the old
guide of man, disap-
pointing no desires, a
friend of friends ; to
him we address this
song.
3. O powerful In-
dra, achiever of many
works, most brilliant
god all this wealth
around here is known
to be thine alone : take
from it conqueror,
bring it hither ! do not stint the desire of the wor-
shiper who longs for thee I
4. On these days thou art gracious, and on these
nights, keeping off the enemy from our cows and from
our stud. Tearing the fiend night after night with the
help of Indra, let us rejoice in food, freed from haters.
5. Let us rejoice, Indra, in treasure and food, in
wealth of manifold delight and splendor. Let us
rejoice in the blessing of the gods, which gives us the
strength of offspring, gives us cows first, and horses.
6. These draughts inspired thee, O lord of the
brave! these were vigor, these libations in battles,
when for the sake of the poet, the sacrificer, thou
struckest down irresistibly ten thousands of enemies.
In the following hymn the invocation
is to Agni, the god of fire. As we have
seen, this deity was perhaps
\VorsWpof J J-
Agni; hymn the most lineal descend-
inhispraise.
SAKYA MUNI.
Mazdao, being the earthly representative
of the sun, shining on the hearthstone
and from the altar place. Agni was
regarded as the guardian of the house
and the messenger of intercourse be-
tween gods and men, having thus the
character of the Hermes of the Greeks.
Since flame was the devouring element
in the offering of sacrifices, Agni was
regarded as the divinity of the altar.
The following invocation is from the
sixth chapter of the second book of the
Rig- Veda.
II. HYMN TO AGNI.
1. Agni, accept this log which I offer to thee,
accept this my service ; listen well to these my
songs.
2. With this log, O Agni, may we worship thee,
thou son of strength, conqueror of horses ! and with
this hymn, thou highborn !
3. May we thy servants serve thee with songs, O
granter of riches, thou who lovest songs and delight-
est in riches.
4. Thou lord of wealth and giver of wealth, be
thou wise and powerful; drive away from us the
enemies!
5. He gives us rain from heaven, he gives us
inviolable strength, he gives us food a thousand-
fold.
6. Youngest of the gods, their messenger, their in-
voker, most deserving of worship, come, at our
praise, to him who worships thee and longs for thy
help.
7. For thou, O sage, goest wisely between these
two creations [heaven and earth, gods and men], like
a friendly messenger between two hamlets.
8. Thou art wise, and thou hast been pleased ;
perform thou, intelligent Agni, the sacrifice without
interruption ; sit down on this sacred grass I
The worship of storm was a peculiar
feature of the religion of Old Arya. It
can not be
said that
this phase
of the orig-
inal cult re-
appeared in
the mythol-
ogy of the
Greeks and
Romans, at
least in a
distinct
form , but
storm wor-
ship WaS a GOD OF FIRE.
conspicuous
element in the devotions of India, as it
had been, to a certain extent, among
the Iranians. The storm gods were
660
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
known as the Maruts, and the following
hymn, from the thirty-ninth chapter
of the first book of the
Cult of the
storm; hymn Rig- Veda, will sufficiently
to the Maruts. .,., ,, ,,
illustrate the nature of the
adoration which was paid to them :
III. HYMN TO THE MARUTS.
I. When you thus from afar cast forward your
measure, like a blast of fire, through whose wisdom
5. They make the rocks to tremble, they tear asun-
der the kings of the forest. Come on, Maruts ; like
madmen, ye gods, with your whole tribe.
10. Bounteous givers, ye possess whole strength,
whole power, ye shakers. Send, O Maruts, against
the proud enemy of the poets, an enemy, like an
arrow.
One of the tenderest aspects of the
natural world is the dawn of the day.
This phenomenon appears to have im-
SCULPTURES FROM A PORCH AT KARLI. Drawn by H. Catenacci, after Grandsire.
Is it, through whose design? To whom do ye go,
to whom, ye shakers?
2. May your weapons be firm to attack, strong
also to withstand ! May yours be the more glorious
strength, not that of the deceitful mortal I
3. When you overthrow what is firm, O ye men,
and whirl about what is heavy, ye pass through the
trees of the earth, through the clefts of the rocks.
4. No real foe of yours is known in heaven or in earth,
ye devourer of enemies ! May strength be yours, to-
gether with your race, O Rudras, to defy even now.
pressed itself upon the senses of all early-
races of men. In the Greek mythol-
ogy Daphne, the "dawn,"
Myth of the
Was Chased around dawn; hymn
the earth by her lover
Apollo. In the Indian system the-
myth reappeared under the name of
Ushas, first adored as a visible aspect of
nature, and afterwards elevated into a
THE INDICANS. RELIGION.
661
living being and impersonated as one of
the gods. From the seventy-seventh
chapter of the seventh book of the Rig-
Veda the following hymn to Ushas is
presented :
IV. HYMN TO USHAS.
1. She shines upon us, like a young wife, rousing
every living being to go to his work. When the fire
had to be kindled by men, she made the light by
striking down darkness.
2. She rose up, spreading far and wide, and mov-
ing everywhere. She grew in brightness, wearing
her brilliant garment. The mother of the cows [the
mornings], the leader of the days, she shone gold-
colored, lovely to behold.
3. She, the fortunate, who brings the eye of the
gods, who leads the white and lovely steed [of the
sun], the dawn was seen revealed by her rays, with
brilliant treasures, following everyone.
4. Thou art a blessing where thou art near; drive
far away the unfriendly ; make the pasture wide,
give us safety ! Scatter the enemy, bring riches !
Raise up wealth to the worshiper, thou mighty dawn.
5. Shine for us with thy best rays, thou bright
dawn, thou who lengthenest our life, thou the love of
all, who givest us food, who givest us wealth in
cows, horses, and chariots.
6. Thou daughter of the sky, thou highborn
dawn, whom the Vasishthas magnify with songs,
give us riches high and wide : all ye gods protect us
always with your blessing.
We will conclude these extracts from
the oldest division of the Indie scrip-
tures by presenting two hymns to Va-
runa, from the eighty-sixth
Theory of Va-
runa, and MS and eighty-ninth chapters
of the seventh book of
the Rig- Veda. This deity was the god
of the waters, or of the Western world,
as it was understood in the Hindu myth.
In the philosophical imagery of the
Brahmans, Varuna was represented as a
four-armed man, riding on a fabulous
sea monster, bearing in his right hand
a rope and in his left a bludgeon :
V. HYMN TO VARUNA.
1. Let me not yet, O Varuna, enter into the house
of clay ; have mercy, almighty, have mercy !
2. If I go along trembling, like a cloud driven by
the wind ; have mercy, almighty, have mercy !
3. Through want of strength, thou strong and
bright god, have I gone wrong; have mercy, al-
mighty, have mercy !
4. Thirst came upon the worshiper, though he
stood in the midst of the waters ; have mercy, al-
mighty, have mercy !
5. Whenever we men, O Varuna, commit an of-
fense before the heavenly host, whenever we break
the law through thoughtlessness, punish us not, O
god, for that offense.
Second hymn :
1. Wise and mighty are the works of him who
stemmed asunder the wide firmaments. He lifted
on high the bright and glorious heaven ; he stretched
out apart the starry sky and the earth.
2. Do I say this to my own self ? How can I get
unto Varuna? Will he accept my offering without
displeasure? When shall I, with a quiet mind, see
him propitiated ?
3. I ask, O Varuna, wishing to know this my sin.
I go to ask the wise. The sages all tell me the
same : Varuna it is who is angry with thee.
4. Was it an old sin, O Varuna, that thou wishest
to destroy thy friend, who always praises thee?
Tell me, thou unconquerable lord, and I will quickly
turn to thee with praise, freed from sin.
5. Absolve us from the sins of our fathers, and
from those which we committed with our own bod-
ies. Release Vasishtha, O king, like a thief who has
feasted on stolen oxen ; release him like a calf from
the rope.
6. It was not our own doing, O Varuna, it was
necessity, an intoxicating draught, passion, dice,
thoughtlessness. The old is there to mislead the
young; even sleep brings unrighteousness.
7. Let me without sin give satisfaction to the an-
gry god, like a slave to his bounteous lord. Th
lord god enlightened the foolish ; he, the wisest,
leads his worshiper to wealth.
8. O lord Varuna, may this song go well to thy
heart! May we prosper in keeping and acquiring!
Protect us, O gods, always with your blessings !
The foregoing examples will be suffi-
cient to illustrate the spirit in which
some of the earliest apostrophes of man-
kind to the immortal gods Muiier's vie-ws
were uttered. It is denied SJ^fSfeT 9 "
by the translator that the veaic hymns,
system of religion whose fundamental
ideas are expressed in these prayers is
polytheistic. He also would deny that
they are an expression of monotheism.
662
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
As a term definitive of their real nature,
he suggests Kathtnothtism, which would
imply that the deities of the Indie race
were the personified attributes of a single
godhead, that is, several under one.
This, however, is to enter into the nice-
ties and hair-splittings of that theological
and philosophical controversy, the re-
finements of which, even when most
carefully expressed, have proved of but
little advantage to the human race. It
will, however, be a fitting conclusion to
these extracts from the Indie Bible to
repeat some verses from another part of
the same translation. They correspond
to the Hebrew Book of Genesis rather
than to the Psalms, as do the Vedic
hymns already quoted :
RIG-VEDA, BOOK X, CHAPTER 121.
1. In the beginning there arose the golden Child
he was the one born lord of all that is. He estab-
lished the earth and this sky. Who is the God to
whom we shall offer our sacrifice ?
2. He who gives life, he who gives strength ;
whose command all the bright gods revere ; whose
shadow is immortality, whose shadow is death.
Who is the God to whom we shall offer our sac-
rifice ?
"3. He who through his power is the one king of
the breathing and awakening world ; he who gov-
erns all, man and beast. Who is the God to whom
we shall offer our sacrifice ?
4. He whose greatness these snowy mountains,
whose greatness the sea proclaims, with the distant
river ; he whose these regions are, as it were, his two
arms. Who is the God to whom we shall offer our
Sacrifice ?
5. He through whom the sky is bright and the
earth firm ; he through whom the heaven was estab-
lished, nay, the highest heaven ; he who measured
out the light in the air. Who is the God to whom we
shall offer our sacrifice ?
6. He to whom heaven and earth, standing firm
by his will, look up, trembling inwardly ; he over
whom the rising sun shines forth. Who is the God
to whom we shall offer our sacrifice ?
7. Wherever the mighty water clouds went, where
they placed the seed, and lit the fire, thence arose
he who is the sole life of the bright gods. Who is
the God to whom we shall offer our sacrifice ?
8. He who by his might looked even over the
water clouds, the clouds which gave strength and lit
the sacrifice; he who alone is God above all gods.
Who is the God to whom we shall offer our sac-
rifice ?
9. May he not destroy us, he the creator of the
earth, or He, the righteous, who created the heavens ;
he also created the bright and mighty waters.
Who is the God to whom we shall offer our sac-
rifice ?
Space would fail to extend these
quotations from the ancient religious
Writings of the Indie Ar- Brahmanism be-
yans. It can not be known l^^f e com '
to what extent the same mythology,
were originated after the incoming of
the immigrant peoples into India, or
to what extent they had already been
formulated at an earlier period. As
frequently happens in the case of reli-
gions, the old system of nature worship,
spiritualized and elevated in the hands
of the primitive seers of the East, soon
fell into degeneration in the hands of
the Brahmans. A volume could not
contain an account of the changed and
changing aspects through which Brah-
manism passed from its old form, as ex-
pressed in the Vedic hymns, to its later
inflections and incomprehensible refine-
ments, as elaborated by the Brahmani-
cal priesthood. It became a mythology
rather than a religion. The old spiritual
concepts gave place to vague and even
ridiculous myths, irrational in their sub-
ject-matter and preposterous in their
application. The old religion grew into
the most enormous body of ceremoni-
als and formalities which were ever,
perhaps, devised by the ingenuity of a
priestly order.
We have accepted Max Miiller's view
that the original faith of India was Kath-
enotheism, 1 that is, a system of many
1 The word kathenotheism is derived from the
Greek kata, "under," henos, "one," and theos,
" god ; " that is, a pantheon of many gods under one
supreme godhead.
THE INDICANS. RELIGION.
663
deities under one, the latter being the
supreme being of the universe, and the
Meaning of former his impersonated at-
SSeTf the sm; tributes. In the hands of
Trimurti. the Brahmans, this concept
finally took the form of a godhead, com-
posed of a triune person, or persons,
called the Trimurti, the first of whom
was Brahma, the creator ; the sec-
ond, Vishnu, the preserver ; and the
third, Siva, the destroyer of all things.
This trinity was represented, not as
a single person, as in the Christian
theology but as three deities, in in-
timate union of relationship. They
presided gloomily and in a fatalistic
sense over the destinies of human
life.
While the concept of Brahma as
the supreme deity of the Indian
pantheon was evolved, another no-
tion, of a philosoph-
What brahma
was and what ical rather than reli-
it became. . ., -,
gious nature, had ap-
peared. The word brahma, as a neu-
ter noun, became impersonal, and
was used by the philosophers to de-
note the sum of all nature, the
germ of everything that is, the one
thing that embraces everything.
The idea is especially difficult to
grasp. The incisive intellect of the
Western nations, requiring clear
definition in everything, does not
readily apprehend the meaning of this
brahma, and when we attempt to clear our
understandings by an examination of the
Vedic commentaries, such as the Upani-
shads, we are generally confused rather
than enlightened. The book known as
the Kena-Upanishad says of this imper-
sonal brahma: "Eye, tongue, mind
can -not reach it ; we comprehend it not,
we can not teach it to anyone ; it is other
than all that is known and all that is un-
known."
The speculations of the Brahmans rela-
tive to the meaning of the term would,
in their turn, demand volumes of expli-
cation. They have a mys- speculations
terious syllable, 6m, which
contains a peculiar trinity
of sounds, and by this they symbolize
the brahma. This inexplicable explana-
KAMI-RATI.
tion is in its turn made the subject of
commentary, and the Mandukya-Upan-
ishad is wholly devoted to explanations
of the sense of 6m. As illustrative of
the abstruse and involved ideas after
which the authors seem to struggle, the
following paragraph is quoted : ' ' Om is
immortal. Its unfolding is this universe ;
is all that was, is, and shall be. Indeed,
all is the word 6m ; and if there is any-
thing outside of these three manifesta-
tions, it is also 6m. For this all is
664
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Brahma; this soul is Brahma. This
soul has four existences."
Having once developed the notion of
this neuter brahma, as an expression for
the sum of all nature, the concept soon
became the end of the religious system.
This is to say that while the original
system was active in its character, the
BRAHMA AS THE FOUR-FACED BUDDHA.
Drawn by E. Tournois, after a sketch of Delaporte.
degenerate form was passive. The
mind, instead of resting upon Brahma,
as the creator of the universe, came to
rest upon brahma as the end of the uni-
verse, including man.
The early Aryans of India, in common
with all their related peoples in the
West, gave themselves to speculations
about the origin of things, how it was
that nature came into her present
forms, the agencies by which the world
was made, and man, and
. Later Brahman-
everythmg that is. It was ism puts the end
,-t i_ 1 f ,. for the cause.
the problem of active
creation, of the invisible effort by
which universal nature was reared into
its present form. But with the latter
Brahmanism, this
kind of speculation
was. supplanted by
another directly the
reverse. The ques-
tion now became,
not in what manner
and by what agency
nature was reared,
but to what end the
universe is tending,
into what state all
the material aspects
of animate and in-
animate nature will
fall at the conclu-
sion of the universal
career.
This species of in-
quiry at length pre-
dominated over the
other, and the Brah-
mans began to teach
the final condition
of the universe, in-
cluding man. They
called it brahma,
using the same term
that they had em-
ployed as the name of the creator of
all things, but in another The believer
sense. Henceforth the aim %%?*
and endeavor of the wor- to receive him.
shiper must be, not so much to acquaint
himself with this creator and his will, as
to know that other brahma which stands
in shadowy outline at the further verge of
nature, ready to receive and swallow v*
THE INDICANS. RELIGION.
665
all forms and aspects of the visible uni-
verse.
No contrast can be stronger than that
which is thus offered between the
into moods of meditative gloom and
sheer brooding over the desperation of
human life. A sort of astrology sprang
up in place of the vivid concepts which
CYCLE OF TRANSMIGRATIONS ACCORDING TO A THIBETAN IMAGE.
bright and happy Vedic religion as it
existed in the days of the
Contrast of the
oldandthene-w- old poets who Sang the
9r Brahmanism. ... . e \
primitive hymns of Arya,
and that fatalistic spell which has fallen
upon the mind of India, transforming it
M. Vol. i43
the old bards had had of the visible
powers of nature. The whole spirit and
genius of the Indie race were turned to
the darkest problems and most inscru-
table mysteries of destiny and fate.
As a natural consequence of this
666
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
brooding over the transmutation of one
form of visible nature into another, and
Source of the so on and on to the final
P lun g e into that brahma
of souls. which they regarded as the
end, even as the other Brahma was the
beginning of all creation, there arose
the notion of the transmigration of the
human soul. The concept of a grada-
tion up and down through all animate
nature took firm hold of the mind, al-
ready bound in fatalism. The human
race was divided into castes, and these
became a part of the system of the
world. All living creatures were the
progeny of Brahma, and they must pass
through the intermediate forms of life
in order to be resolved into brahma
again. Brahma is the origin, and
brahma is the destiny of all, but the
stages through which each living crea-
ture must pass are as various as the
forms of life.
Each living thing is born according to
the deeds of that from which it is
Theory of descended, and each living
metempsychosis thirip- fixes bv its deeds
and gradations tnin g nxeb, Dy IS,
of living forms, the state of that future liv-
ing thing which is to be born therefrom.
Animate nature has its orders through
which the souls of men must pass in
their ascending and descending stages of
transformation. The lowest order of
living things includes insects, fishes,
serpents, tortoises, dogs, and asses.
The next order has elephants, horses,
lions, boars, Sudras, and other races
not speaking the sacred language of
India. The third grade of creatures in-
cludes thieves, actors, Rakshasas and
Pi9achas. The fourth order comprises
athletes, dancers, armorers, drunkards,
and the Vaisyas. The fifth includes the
Kshatriyas, kings, great soldiers, speak-
ers, the Gandharvas and the Asparases.
The sixth class has the Brahmans, dev-
otees, gods, and the great Rishis. The
seventh has only Brahma himself. Such
are the several orders of living things.
Brahmanism recognizes the sinfulness
of man. For this sin there must be
expiation. No such thing as redemp-
tion is recognized. All
sin is balanced against so SS21
much punishment, and the
expiation must be by the sinner himself.
Man, however, may do something to
free himself from the consequences and
tendencies of his actions ; either put him-
self in the ascending scale of transmi-
gration, or in the descending scale which
leads to the condemnation of his life to
some of the lower orders of being in his
next existence. Thus the soul may
make its way upward until it is taken
back into brahma, or may descend into
insects, worms, and reptiles.
The Brahmanical theory of sin is very
different from that of the Western na-
tions. It is essentially un-
Notion that sin
Cleanness, as distinguished and uncleanness
f ., -, . < are one.
from cleanness, which is
righteousness. Pollution is the funda-
mental concept of offense against
Brahma. Things are holy or unholy in
proportion as they are clean and unclean,
but the definitions of that which is clean
or unclean sounds strangely to the
understanding of the West. The high-
est notion of defilement is that which
comes from the touch of the dead, the
excretions of the body, the circumstances
of birth, and of everything relating to
the sexual life. The cleanest of living
creatures is the cow. She is not only
clean, but holy, and is incapable .of
defilement. The remedy for sin is pen-
itence, fasting, mortification of the body,
prayer, and recitations of the Veda.
One of the greatest pollutions is drunk-
enness. He who so sins is compelled to
drink boiling rice water unto death.
THE INDICANS. RELIGION.
667
So far as earthly punishments are
concerned, they are adjusted to the prev-
Punishments alent false theories of
sin. Offenses done against
the holy things are pun-
ished in the highest degree. The mur-
der of a person belonging to a lower
caste may pass with slight retribution,
but the killing of a cow is a mortal
sin.
One of the concepts peculiar to Brah-
manism is that of the incarnation of the
deities. It is known by
^ Doctrine of the
the name of avatar. On incarnation, or
, -i , the avatars.
many occasions the great
gods of the Indie pantheon have passed
into the form, of animals or men.
Vishnu, the "preserver," has had te
avatars assigned to him, following each
THE SACRED COW OF INDIA.-Drawn by A. de Neuville.
crime. One who kills a Brahman with
intent must thrust his own head three
times into the fire, until he die. If the
killing is unintentional, he shall build a
hut in the woods and live alone for
twelve years, carrying the skull of the
slain man in his girdle. So throughout
the whole list of human misdeeds the
same irrational and ill-adjusted methods
of punishment are employed.
other in an ascending scale. In the
first three instances he was incarnated
in the form of animals, namely, as a
fish, as a tortoise, and as a boar. In
the fourth earthly revelation he was the
Manu lion. Then began the human
avatars. In the fifth estate Vishnu was
a dwarf; in the sixth, a hero; and in
the seventh, a Ramchandra and a Krish-
na. Buddha himself was an incarna-
668
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
tion. It is also believed that Vishnu
will ultimately appear on earth in his
own person. This will happen when
the highest age of man has been re-
duced to twenty-three years. When
Vishnu shall come he will be called
Kalki,and will possess eight supernatural
powers on the earth. This great avatar
equal with Brahma and Vishnu. Siva
was identified with Rudra, god of the
storm, just as Vishnu took
J Place of Siva
the place of Indra in the m the Indian
older mythology. The F
Brahtnanic system represents Siva as
dwelling at times with the human race,
but never as incorporated in earthly
VISHNU IN THE FORM OF A BOAR.
is to occur at the end of three hundred
and sixty thousand years, as time is
reckoned by men, or one thousand two
hundred years as it is reckoned by the
gods.
It appears that Siva, the third person
of the Brahmanical trinity, was an old
god of the Dravidian race before the in-
coming of the Aryans. By them this
divinity was raised to the rank of co-
form. His place in the mythological
system is that of destroyer, and hence
his genesis from the storm god of the
Old Dravidians. His power is symbol-
ized by the trident, while in his hands
he bears a lasso or sling, an antelope,
and sometimes a flame of fire.
Ethnic history does not demand more
than an outline of the religious beliefs
which the ancient kindreds of mankind
THE INDICANS. RELIGION.
669
adopted for themselves and their pos-
terity. It is only while religions are ex-
To what extent pressive of the subjective
religions are states f ^ m j n d t h at t h ey
part of ethnic *
history. are really an ethnic con-
dition. When they pass into objective
ceremonies and institutional forms, they
become a part of the subject-matter of
general history. In this connection, as
in the account of the Iranians, we offer
no more than a sketch of that primal
faith which was developed by the early
bards and rhapsodists who, with up-
turned faces, chanted the praises of the
gods in the valleys of India. In course
of time, both in Iran and in India, an
age of commentators and mere gram-
marians succeeded to the age of poets,
and lifeless ceremony took the place
of living inspiration. From this time
forth the ethnologist has but little con-
cern with the inflected forms, the mere
outer garb which the Brahmans flung
around the ancient religion of the
East.
One other topic remains to be consid-
ered before the Vedic system of religious
evolution is dismissed. The spirit of the
old faith had died out many centuries
before the Christian era. On the tongues
of the priests even the
Apparition of
Sakya Gautama apostrophes of the old rhap-
sodists and seers had be-
come an echo and a mockery. It was
under such circumstances, in the latter
part of the sixth century B. C., that the
great reform was instituted which was
destined to carry on its tide more than
thirty per cent of the human race. It
originated with Sakya Gautama, com-
monly called the Buddha, Prince of
Kapilavastu, in Northern India. But
the reform, like that of Luther in the
West, was already prepared, in its ele-
mentary conditions, by a reaction in the
mind of the upper classes against the
absolutism and uselessness of the Brah-
manic order.
The career of Gautama is now accessi-
SIVA AS MAN AND WOMAN.
ble in many forms to English readers,
and need not be repeated, career and evan-
It was, in general, that R^^,
of a sincere and elevated One."
mind, highly sensitive in its organiza-
tion and inspired by philanthropy, re-
670
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
belling against the current religious sys-
tem of his country and people. He re-
tires, as if into the desert. He muses
long on life and destiny. He communes
with himself and with the invisible
Spirit. He struggles and writhes in
anguish and despair. Light breaks into
his understanding. He becomes the
Buddha, the "Enlightened One." He
NEPAL BUDDHA IN BRONZE.
Drawn by P. Sellier, from the collection of Le Bon.
takes that name and returns to his
people as a teacher. He would substi-
tute for the intolerable mass of formali-
ties and philosophical dogmas of the
Brahmans a new code of thought and
morality. He would teach the living
way. First a few, and then multitudes,
follow him. He becomes, even in his
life, a great leader. His work is well
begun. The burden is upon him. He
leaves to others what he could not him-
self accomplish within the limits of a
mortal life. He goes again alone to the
woods and deserts. He journeys on,
and at last, wearied with the burden of
thought and oppressed perhaps with
the sorrows of the race, he sits down by
the root of a tree, and there, alone, gives
up his spirit and enters into Nirvana.
Such is the origin of that great system
called Buddhism, which is now professed
by 31.2 per cent of the human family.
The reform thus instituted was almost
identical in its nature with the Protes-
tant revolt which roused Parallel of Bud-
Europe from her stupor ^e^otes-
in the sixteenth century, tantism.
Buddhism is essentially the Protestant-
ism of the East. It is to the older Brah-
manism what Protestantism is to the
Catholic Church in Europe and Amer-
ica. If we look at India the parallel
may be carried still further. Baddhism
did not achieve, or at least maintain, a
great success in the country where the
older system of faith prevailed. Brah-
manism had taken too deep root in the
soil of India to be exterminated by a
counter revolt. Just as in Italy the as-
cendency of Rome has ever been main-
tained, so in its central seat the power
of Brahmanism remains to the present
day.
While Buddhism had temporary and
local success in the land of its origin,
its great triumph was achieved by its
dissemination in foreign lands. It swept
eastward and northward to the limits of
the furthest oceans, carrying with it a
great proportion of the Mongoloid races
of mankind, but the elder faith held its
own against the innovation in the valleys
of India, and continued to bear up its
vast system of inane speculation as the
better theory of life and destiny.
It is impossible to convey to one who
has not personally acquainted himself
THE INDICANS. RELIGION.
671
acter of the
Brahmanical
ceremonies.
with the degradation of the Brahmauical
faith and practice an adequate idea
Debasing char- of its debasing character.
Its ceremonies are not only
offensive to the human
understand-
ing, irrational
and foolish as
expressions of
religious faith,
but they are dis-
gusting to taste
and indecent to
the eyes of mo-
rality. The de-
generation of the
system is com-
plete, its ruin
overwhelm-
ing. Whatever
potency it may
have had in for-
mer centuries to
purify the theory
and practice of
human life, or
even to control
its violence or
moderate its ex-
cesses, has long
since passed
away, and inane
ceremonies and
ridiculous dog-
mas are all that
remain. These,
however, are suf-
ficient to uphold
the Brahmanical
ascendency in
India, and until this is broken, neither
Buddhism nor any other system of faith
can penetrate the gloom and despair of
the Indian mind.
A few instances of the external, visi-
ble aspect of Brahmanism may prove of
interest. The usage until recently much
in vogue was sutteeism, or the devotion
to death of the widow of a dead husband
on his funeral pyre. This was regarded
and is still regarded, as an act of the
INDICAN FUNERAL PYRE AND SUTTEE.
After a Persian miniature.
highest merit. The woman was taught
to believe that by immolat-
J . Practice of sut-
ing herself in this manner teeism ; the rite
., , , . ... . , not obligatory.
she should enjoy thirty-
five million of years with her husband
after they had both gone to Brahma.
672
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
For the credit of humanity, the system
was never obligatory. The sacrifice was
voluntary ; but the superstitious despot-
ism over the mind of the victim was
sufficient to enforce it with more energy
than might have been
expected even of civil
authority.
India is full of dev-
otees. In every popu-
lous district and even
in waste places the trav-
eler will find them . T1 1 e
from sin or impurity rests upon the soul
of India like a pall. The space of a
chapter would not be sufficient to enu-
merate all the forms of bodily degrada-
tion and mutilation which the depraved
ingenuity of the devotees has invented
wherewith to mortify themselves and
prepare for happiness hereafter. One
superstitious wretch will sit starv-
ing in the dirt, or will take only
so much food as barely to feed
the fire of life. Such emaciation
and wretchedness are not to be
otherwhere in the world.
Another stands and
repeats senseless
mutterings out of the
INDIAN DEVOTEES. JOGEES WOUNDING THEMSELVES. Drawn by Emile Bayard, from a photograph.
idea is similar to that which in the Mid-
dle Ages drove the monks
Usages and self-
inflicted torture and anchorites into isola-
of the devotees. , . -, ,
tion and poverty. The
notion that the mortification of- the body
is meritorious as a means of salvation
sacred books. A third goes about with
a living snake drawn through a slit in
his tongue. Another hangs a weight
to some bodily organ until it is drawn
out of all semblance to nature. Another
thrusts an arrow or a sword through his
THE LVD f CANS. RELIGION.
673
limbs, and still another holds up his
hands with nails and spikes driven
through them.
The distortion of the body into some
Belief that bod- horrible and repulsive form
iiy distortion j g thought to be most effi-
IS 6tnC3,ClOUS
against sin. cacious. Many devotees
take a strange
attitude and
hold it by force
of will until J
the freedom 3
of the given jj
organs is de- |
stroyed. Some 1
will hold up an I
arm straight I
above the head j
ford ays and!
weeks andl
months, until it 1
becomes wasted l
away and rigid
as bone. Others,
by contortion,
twist their mus-
cles out of shape
until they are no
more able to re-
turn to symme-
try or perform
their office. And
so on and on
through an end-
less variety of
tortures and tor-
ments self - in-
flicted by a su-
perstition which
admits of no limit
or palliation.
Not only has the Brahmanical system
fallen into this degraded aspect ; it has
sunk to absolute immorality and inde-
cency. Perhaps no single ceremony bet-
ter illustrates the debasing level to which
the national religion has descended than
does the ceremony of Juggernaut. This
is primarily the name of a
I. City and annual
town Of Bengal, On the ceremonial of
northwest coast of the bay Ju ^ ernaut -
of that name. The true word, however,
is Jagannatha, meaning " the lord of the
CAR OF JUGGERNAUT.
Drawn by A. de Neuville, from a photograph.
world," which was the descriptive epi-
thet of Vishnu when he was incarnated
as Krishna. This gave the name to the
Brahmanical temple, and finally to the
town.
674
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Juggernaut became a city of temples.
The principal street is for the most part
filled on both sides with religious es-
tablishments. At the further end of the
main avenue, where it widens out to
rather grand proportions, is situated the
famous temple, most holy, perhaps, of
all the shrines of Hindustan. More than
a million of pilgrims come annually to
say their prayers and make their offer-
ings at this spot. Around the temple is
a lofty inclosure of solid stone, six hun-
dred and fifty feet square, covering an
area of nearly ten acres. In the eastern
wall is a great gate, through which the
pilgrims ascend, by stone steps, to the
terrace. The latter is four hundred and
forty-five feet square, and on this the
great pagoda rises. It is thirty feet
square at the base, and the pinnacle is
two hundred feet above the ground level.
The structure tapers from bottom to top,
and is rounded off on the summit after
the Oriental manner.
Siva and Subhadra are next in emi-
nence among the deities who are wor-
shiped in this city. Of these gods there
are wooden images painted blue, which
are regarded with extreme veneration.
Each idol has a " chariot," so called,
consisting of a lofty platform on wheels,
upon which the effigies of the deities are
mounted. The chariot of Juggernaut is
thirty-four and a half feet square and
forty-three and a half feet high. It- is
supported on sixteen wheels, which are
six and a half feet in diameter. The
great festival of the deity occurs in
March of each year, and is governed in
the date of its return by the phase of
the moon, like the Christian feast of
Easter.
At this time the city is thronged with
pilgrims from all parts of India. The
cars of the different idols are drawn by
the multitude through the city and for a
short distance into the country, where
the idols have what may be called a sum-
mer home. In the case of
Scenes at the
Juggernaut, a long cable is procession of the
attached to the car, and tower chariot.
tens of thousands of pilgrims and wor-
shipers take hold with their hands and
draw the idol through the streets. On
the platform about the effigy are the
priests, who, while the procession is un-
der way, perform with great activity the
ceremony prescribed for the occasion.
This consists of what may be called the
abandonment of humanity. The priests
go through with a series of bodily atti-
tudes utterly disgusting and obscene,
during the performance of which vulgar
gymnastics the multitude witnessing
the same are in the highest glee of wor-
ship.
This shameless exhibition of depravity
is the essence of the ceremony, which is
here cited in proof of the
Question of im-
utter degradation to which moiation under
Brahmanism has descend-
ed. About the chariot the throng is so
great and the enthusiasm so high that
rarely does the procession reach its end
without some of the multitude being
crushed to death under the wheels of
the car. It is said though the evidence
is not definite that devotees sometimes
throw themselves under the wheels and
are purposely crushed to death. It is
believed, however, that at the present
time this does not occur. The popular
belief that mothers are in the habit of
throwing their children under Jugger-
naut, that they may thus be sacrificed to
the god, is proved to be entirely erro-
neous.
The ceremony above described is
illustrative of many peciiliar to modern
Brahmanism. One of the most wide-
spread superstitions of the present day
is that relating to the Ganges. This is
SACRIFICE TO THE GANGES. Drawn by Emile Bayard.
676
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
regarded as the sacred river of the coun-
try. The belief extends, indeed, to the
whole system of streams,
Worship of the
Ganges and sac- nineteen or twenty in num-
rificethereto.
the spurs of the Himalayas and combine
their waters in the principal river. Per-
haps the superstition is very ancient.
The Nile was worshiped in like manner.
A great and tractable river in a primi-
tive country thickly peopled must always
have been regarded as an incalculable
blessing.
In an epoch of the nature worship it
is natural that the adoring instincts of
men should turn to the visible source of
their blessings. It may be thus that as
early as the composition of the Veda the
Ganges was looked upon and adored.
At the present time, and for some cen-
turies in the past, the waters of the great
stream are regarded as holy. They are
dipped up and carried into all parts of
India that they may contribute a purify-
ing element in the sacrifices and ablu-
tions of the altar. He who possesses a
bottle of the sacred water carries with
him a talisman against impurity and
sin. At many places the river is made
accessible to pilgrims and other worship-
ers by flights of stone steps going down
to the water's edge, and on these the
Brahmans and devotees, and often the
common people, may be seen standing
,and worshiping the river as it flows. If
the ceremonies stopped with the dipping
up and bearing off of the waters for
purposes of purification, or even with the
idolatrous worship of the stream, there
might be less cause for repugnance to
the Brahmanical formula, but to be
drowned in the holy river is in the nature
of a blessing. From time immemorial
sacrifices of human life have thus been
made, especially by mothers, who bring
their children and commit them to the
oblivion of the floods. Civilization stands
against it, but the usage still exists.
XXXIX. CASTES AXD RACE DIVISIONS.
E come now to consider
the greatest single fact
which the Brahman-
ical system has trans-
mitted from ancient to
modern times. It is
the system of Caste.
The fact expressed by this term is not
well apprehended by the Western na-
Origin and evo- tions. It signifies the nat-
ural and fixed classification
into which the vast and
growing populations of India fell, under
the influences of the Aryan conquest, the
Vedic institutions, and the administra-
tion of the Brahmans. Caste as it ex-
ists in India extends downwards through
lution of caste
among the
Hindus.
all Brahmanism into the Vedic epoch,
and has its roots in the profoundest soil
of the prehistoric ages. Given the ex-
isting conditions in the time when the
Aryan race was flung upon the aborig-
inal peoples of India and began by
conquest to possess the land, and under
the influences of the Vedic poets to
organize their nature worship into in-
visible institutions, and the whole
system of caste ensues. It is our pur-
pose, then, at this point to trace the
course of events by which the great fact
of caste was built up into the social
structure of India.
In the first place, it must be remem-
bered that when the nature worship
THE INDICANS, CASTES.
677
expressed in the Vedas was given forth,
it was done in a preliterary age by a
Division of the class of poets. It was the
language of rhapsody,
poured forth in verse and
committed to memory. The poem, or
hymn, thus composed was taught by the
rhapsodist to his son and to other bards.
A body of Vedic psalms was thus
produced and transmitted orally
from generation to generation.
There were great singers who knew
many hymns and others who could
chant but a few. It was in this sit-
uation of affairs that the famous
quarrel, the shadow of which is seen
in the Vedic worship, arose between
the two rival sages Vashishtha and
Visvamitra. They disputed with
each other the poetical and religious
leadership of the Indie race.
Around Vashishtha, the success-
ful contestant, and his followers
Rise and as- others who learned the
hymns were gathered.
A clan of singers
sprang up. Some hymns were po-
tent to give victory in battle. The
singers of these were specially hon-
ored. The prevailing prayer, or
hymn, was called brahma, and the
singer of it was a Brahman. ' ' Who-
soever," says the Rig- Veda, " scoffs
at the Brahma which we have made,
may hot plagues come upon him;
may the sky burn up the hater of the
Brahmas." Such was the origin of the
Brahmanical caste, highest in rank of
the four in which Indian society is
divided.
In the age of conquest, when the
Aryan immigrants were making their
way by war from the valley of the Indus
to the valley of the Ganges, the success-
ful chieftain was next in honor to him
who chanted the praises of the gods and
prayed for victory. Around each chief-
tain would gather a certain number who
devoted themselves espe-
Development of
cially to war. Such leaders the Kshatriyas,
took the better portions of
the land and soon established themselves
apart from the body of the tribes as an
independent class. They were known
caste.
A SIVAITE BRAHMAN TYPE.
Drawn by F. Regamey.
as Kshatriyas, 1 or "companions of the
king," and they presently constituted the
second caste in the system of India.
The weaker portions of the immigrant
tribes settled on the soil and became hus-
bandmen. They received vaisyas, or
the name of Vaisyas, signi- st rt?ti!e ( SSd
f y ing simply ' ' the people . ' ' caste -
Without the adventurous spirit requi-
'The modern name of the Kshatriyas is Rajputs.
678
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
site for war, they chose to arrange them-
selves in secluded places and village
communities, where safety was the chief
consideration. Whoever in the chaos of
a half-barbarous age chooses safety,
chooses subordination. The class of
husbandmen became subordinate to the
Kshatriyas, as the latter were in some
sense inferior to the Brahmans.
Caste always implies a conquered as
A SECOND CASTE PANDIT TYPE.
well as a conquering race. The abo-
riginal peoples of India, especially the
_ . Dravidians, were brought
The Sudras ;
possibility of into complete subjection.
caste promotion, m* - ' -
Ihey were reduced to
servitude. They were called " once-
born " slaves, to distinguish them from
the noble " twice-born " Aryan con-
querors. These subjugated aborigines
were known, and are still known, by the
name of Sudras, between whom and the
three superior classes of Aryan descend-
ants there is nothing in common.
Among the other three castes there is
some degree of mutation. Sometimes
the Kshatriyas, by learning the hymns
and ceremonies of the national faith, may
pass into the rank of Brahmans. An
aspiring Vaisya, or husbandman, may
throw off his peaceful dispositions, go
to war, and possibly make his way to a
place among the Kshatriyas, or
warrior caste. But the Sudra is a
Sudra, a slave of slaves, fixed by
the fate of birth to unalterable sub-
jection and isolation.
In the course of this outline of
the religious system which has con-
stituted one of the essential ele-
ments of the Indian
Summary char-
character from the re- acterof the
1 j.1 present view.
motest epoch to the
present day, it has been necessary
to neglect all time-relations and to
bring together parts which are sep-
arated by centuries. The aim has
been to present distinct images by
gathering certain leading features
and setting them in relation the
one with the other. It has been
necessary, in so doing, to express
important facts in a single word or
reference, and to cover the chasm
of ages with a clause. It will now
be our purpose to look in upon the
India of modern times and, as in
the case of the Iranian nations, to de-
lineate the character of the multifarious
peoples classified as the descendants of
those ancient Indie Aryans who drifted
by migration through the passes of the
Hindu-Kush in an epoch below the
morning twilight of history.
Within the limits of India, as defined
in a former book, dwell about one sixth
of all the inhabitants of the globe. Un-
til within the last quarter of a century
THE INDICANS.RACE DIVISIONS.
679
Efforts of Great
the
but little was known of the multiplied
millions populating these vast and un-
traversed regions. The
ascendency of Great Britain
1871-72. i n the East suggested, and
the facilities of her government in India
encouraged, an effort to make an actual
enumeration of the almost limitless na-
tions under her sway. Not, however,
until 1871-72 was an effort actually
made. It was attended with unusual
success. The whole work was done in
its principal parts concurrently in a
single night. The officers of the gov-
ernment had arranged that every village
and district in British India should re-
turn its own numbers to the registrars,
and, with very few exceptions, this was
THIRD CASTE TYPE LANDOWNER OF KOUMAN.
Drawn by G. Vuillier, from a photograph.
done. The spectacle itself was worthy
of commemoration. Out of the British
islands in the West the strong arm of a
Teutonic race had reached back more
than ten thousand miles into the East,
had lifted up over one of the vastest and
LOW CASTE TYPE DANCING WOMAN, OR BAYADERE.
richest regions of the earth the rod of
authority, and had now, by a single
effort, accomplished what had never
been accomplished before, an enumera-
tion of 4;he peoples tinder English do-
minion. .
The result has been a better knowl-
edge of the extent and variety of the
Indian populations. The
Aggregate re-
enumeration showed that suits ; density
-r, . , . 1 T j 1 of population.
British India alone con-
tained a population of a little more than
a hundred and ninety-one million,
while the native states increased the ag-
gregate to two hundred and forty million
nine hundred and thirty-one thousand
five hundred and twenty-one. This gives
an average of one hundred and sixty-
three to the square mile throughout
India. The aggregate is twice as great
as that which Gibbon gives for the pop-
680
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
ulation of the Roman empire at its best
estate, under the Antonines, in the
second century of our era.
Not only do we have thus an astound-
ing total for the peoples of India. In
SONTALS OF BEHAR TYPES.
Drawn by Emile Bayard, from a photograph.
some districts the density of the popula-
tion is almost inconceivable, reaching
the limit of six hundred, or even more,
to the square mile. It has generalty
been agreed among Western statis-
ticians that any people who surpass
two hundred to the square mile must
sustain themselves by manufacturing
interests, by mines, and by the com-
mercial industries of great cities. In
India, however, this rule is turned to
^_^^, naught by the
ZHH_ existence of
purely agricul-
tural populations
three times as
dense as the pre-
scribed limit for
Western peoples.
The province of
Saran, in North
Behar, has an
area of two thou-
sand six hundred
and fifty -four
square miles, and
no city with a
population great-
erthan fifty
thousand, and
yet the average
is seven hundred
and seventy-
eight people to
the square mile,
and in one place
the maximum
rises to nine hun-
dred and eighty-
four. A careful
estimate places
the average for
the whole valley
of the Ganges,
from Saharunpur
to Calcutta, at five
hundred to the square mile, or nearly
double the rate for the population of
England, including her cities.
The general feature of modern India,
as it relates to population, is the absence
of great cities. There are in the whole
THE INDICANS.RACE DIVISIONS.
681
of the British Indian empire only eight-
een cities of the first class, that is,
Distribution of having over one hundred
senc P e e f P g e r ;a a t b " thousand inhabitants each,
cities, and of these only two,
Bombay and Calcutta, exceed half a mil-
lion respectively. This will appear an
astonishing fact when we reflect that in
the United States of America, after only
a century of national development, there
are twenty-six cities of the first class 1
in a popuation of only sixty million.
tion of fifty thousand. Nowhere on the
globe, with the possible exception of
China and Japan, is there so vast and
dense an agricultural, or country, people
as in the provinces of India.
If we look at the distribution of this
great mass of human beings according
to the religions which they proportion of
profess, we shall find first PP ulat ^ n
x among tne
of all the prevailing Hin- castes,
duism, or Brahmanism, which has its
basis ultimately in the Veda and in the
VIEW IN THE PUNJAB, SHOWING THE GOVERNOR'S RESIDENCE AT SIMLA. Drawn by G. Vuillier, from a photograph.
The disproportion thus expressed be-
tween the agricultural distribution of
the ancient peoples of India and the city
aggregations of Europe and America not
only surprises the statistician, but affords
the elements of a profound problem in
the progress of civilization. The census
of 1871-72 shows four hundred and
ninety-three thousand four hundred and
forty-four towns and villages in British
India, but of this number there are only
forty-four that have reached a popula-
1 Census of 1880.
M. Vol. i44
bards of the Aryan immigration. Of
these Hindus there are over one hun-
dred and thirty -nine million. They
are distributed in general throughout
Southern India and in the upper valley
of the Ganges. The student of history
will revert readily to the many Mo-
hammedan invasions and conquests that
have been made in different parts of the
countries now dominated by England in
the East. Next after Hinduism is Islam,
whose followers in Sindh, the Punjab,
Eastern Bengal, and the Northwest
provinces number over forty million.
682
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
In the Central provinces, in Bombay,
and sparsely scattered in other districts
is a large element derived
Ethnic and reli-
gious elements from the Old Dravidian
tn the census. population f which still pro .
fesses various forms of religion of the
Mongoloid character quite unlike, in
ceremonials and superstitions, to the
other faiths of India. These aborigi-
nals number about five and a half
million. Fourthly, the Buddhists and
Jains who are confined to British Bur-
mah number over two million eight
hundred thousand. The sect called the
Sikhs are found only in the Punjab,
and number a million one hundred and
seventy-five thousand. The Christians,
who are as yet confined to the coast
cities and a few isolated spots in the in-
terior, number eight hundred and ninety,
seven thousand, while certain unclassi-
fied clans, professing peculiar beliefs
here and there, are registered at over
half a million. It will thus be seen that
the Hindus proper, or Brahmans, if we
use the religious term by which they are
distinguished, are more than three times
as numerous as all the other religious
divisions of the Indian races.
Before proceeding to the ethnic classi-
fication of the peoples of modern India,
it will be of interest to no-
Excess of males
tn the Indian tice a peculiar general fea-
ture relative to the propor-
tion of the sexes. Of the hundred and
ninety-one million of people in British
India there is an excess of males over
females of nearly six million. The
proportion is about one hundred to
ninety-four. In the province of Oudh
the males are seven per cent in excess
of the females, and in Bombay eight
per cent. In the Northwestern prov-
inces the excess rises to twelve per
cent, and in the Punjab as high as six-
teen per cent. It has been currently
believed that the practice of female in-
fanticide so much in vogue among abo-
rigines and in the Oriental countries has
produced this result. There are places
in India, such as the Meerut district, in
which there have been found as many as
seven boys to one girl, and in other
provinces the disproportion is almost as
great.
We pass on to consider the true eth-
nical classification of the peoples of In-
dia. The grouping of Five principal
these races is most^ largely
effected on the basis of re- tions.
ligion and caste. Of these there are
five principal divisions, each of which is
widely distributed and numerous. In
noticing these, we will proceed accord-
ing to antiquity of occupancy in the
country ; that is, we will notice the old-
est Indian races first and the more re
cent afterwards. There is, of course,
some obscurity in determining the rela-
tive antiquity of ancient peoples, but
linguistic science is generally a sufficient
evidence of priority and order of devel-
opment. Glancing, then, at the ethnic
divisions of the Indian stocks, we find :
I . The Old Dravidians and their De-
scendants. The derivation of these from
the Mongoloid stem has
. . Distribution
already been noticed in a and tribes of the
,. * T Old Dravidians.
former chapter. In gener-
al, the peoples of this stock are found in
the southern part of the peninsula, but
branches of the family extend as far
north as Chuta-Nagpur. They are,
doubtless, the oldest race in India. Most
of the Dravidian tribes are associated
in tolerably compact settlements, but in
some parts of the country, especially to-
ward the north, they are sparsely scat-
tered among the other races. Twelve
distinct Dravidian languages have been
examined and classified. These are the
Tamil dialect, the Malayalim, the Telugu,
THE INDICANS.RACE DIVISIONS.
683
the Kanarese, the Tulu, the Kudugu,
the Toda, the Kota, the Gond, the
Khond, the Uraon, and the Rajmahal.
Each of these tongues has its peculiar
with the Bhiis of Bombay on the west,
and extending to the Sontals of Bengal
in the east. The race characteristics of
these peoples are thought by some eth-
OLD DRAVIDIAN TYPES KHOND CHIEFTAINS.
vocabulary and grammatical structure,
all different by a wide departure from
the other languages of India.
2. The Hill Tribes of Central India.
These are the upland races, beginning
nographers to be in affinity with the
Negroid family of man- T
* Kolarians, or
kind, but this is, perhaps, hm populations
rf,. ..... . 1 of the interior.
incorrect. They, like the
Dravidians, are of Mongolian extraction,
684
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
and belong to an original stock derived
from the same stem with the Dravidians
themselves. All these hill tribes are as-
sociated together by a linguistic classifi-
cation, and are known by the name of
Kolarians. They appear to have entered
SPECIMEN PAGE OF TAMIL BOOK.
India, especially Bengal, by the north-
east passes of the mountains. Their
habitation geographically is along the
northern and eastern edges of the trian-
gular table-land constituting the south-
ern half of India.
The difference between the Kolarians
and the Dravidians is the difference be-
tween a more ancient and a less ancient
Stock of people migrating Difference be-
into regions of the same Koiarianand
country by different routes. Dravidian races.
In Central India the two families have
had considerable contact and inter-
mixture, and in these provinces the
Dravidians have given character to
the race. The latter are much the
more numerous, and are massed to-
ward the south, extending as far
down as cape Comorin, while the
.' S*'i9Qe>t*/4jSj Kolarians are scattered through the
northern region in isolated tribes.
The Sontals, who are the eastern-
most representatives of the race, oc-
cupy the extreme eastern edge of the
table-land of Central India, next to
the valley of the Ganges. On the
west, at a distance of four hundred
miles, dwell the Kurkus, separated
from their kinsmen by mountain
ranges, great forests, and interven-
ing tribes of Dravidians and Aryan
descendants.
In Northern India, Madras, and
Orissa are found the remnants of the
Savars, a degenerate and
Place of the
mendicant people, re- Savars;Koia-
duced to the rank of serv-
ants, yet their name was known in
the earliest ages of history, and is
mentioned by Pliny and Ptolemy.
The Kolarian languages are divided
into nine principal groups: the San-
tali, the Mundari, the Ho, the Bhu-
mij, the Korwa, the Kharria, the
Juang, the Kurku, and the Savar.
There is a marked difference between
the vocabulary of the Kolarians and that
of their race kinsfolk, the Dravidians
on the south, and the grammars of the
two peoples are as distinct as those of
German and Greek.
3. The Indo-Chinese Races. These be-
Wmmk
c
JO
c
c
8
JHB&
.
* ?-T- "1**" || .,.._ .
686
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
long geographically to the slopes of the
Himalayas, to the valley of Assam, and
Tribal and lin- to Burmah. The latter
country is wholly occupied
by people of this stock. In
Northern Bengal there are certain low
castes, half Hindu and half Kolarian in
their characteristics, who are also thought
to be Indo-Chinese. It is evident that this
gnistic divi-
sions of the
Indo-Chinese.
HIGH-CASTE HINDU (ANANT RAM, PRIME MINISTER)-
Drawn by E. Ronjat, from a photograph by Burke.
race came into Burmah and Assam by the
northeast passes of the Himalayas. They
have clearly had an original common
home with the Chinese and other Mon-
golians of Central Asia. There is a
similarity of dialect, in some instances so
marked that particular expressions might
be understood alike in Bengal and Can-
ton. The linguistic designation of the
Indo-Chinese group of nations is Thibeto-
Burmese. Of this family of languages
there are more than twenty dialects : the
Cachari or Bodo, the Garo, the Tripuara
Mrung, the Thibetan or Bhutan, the Gu-
rung, the Murmi, the Newar, the Lepcha,
the Meri, the Aka, the Mishmi, the Dhi-
mal, the Kanawari, the Mikir, the Sing-
pho, the Naga dialects, the Kuki, the Bur-
mese, the Khyeng, and the Manipuri.
These twenty dialects are allied in their
grammatical formation and vocab-
ulary like the Romance languages
of Europe. The affinities of the
Italian, French, Spanish, and the
Portuguese may well illustrate the
analogies of Thibetan, Dhimal, and
Burmese. The names of numerals,
of common objects of sense, the
organs of the body, and common
actions are usually expressed by
root words which are essentially
the same in all. No accurate enu-
meration of the numbers speaking
the Thibeto-Burmese languages
has been made. It is estimated
that fully forty million of people
speak the Kolarian tongues in the
several dialects, and doubtless the
Indo-Chinese group is much in ex-
cess of the Kolarian.
The three principal Indian races
which we have here mentioned,
the Dravidians, the Kolarians,
and the Indo-Chinese, may all be
defined as non-Aryan peoples to
distinguish them from the domi-
nant race. They do not, therefore,
come distinctly within the
r^Tio-p. of fhe Tyres
CUSSlOn, which IS intended are non-Aryan.
to cover the Aryan peoples of India.
But the presence of the above races
among the Hindus proper, and the large
degree of ethnic admixture which has
occurred along all the lines of contact,
make it desirable to refer in this con-
nection to the aboriginal races, although
-TYPE.
rlis- Kolarians, and
Indo-Chinese
THE INDICANS.RACE DIVISIONS.
687
they have been deduced from a Mongo-
lian rather than an Aryan stock.
4. The High-Caste Hindiis. These are
the dominant nations of India. In num-
bers they probably surpass
Dominant Indi- .
cans are high- all the rest combined.
caste Hindus. T -, a 1
Likewise in influence they
are superior. Their intellectual, and
perhaps we should say their moral,
development greatly surpasses that
of any other Indie people, unless
we should except the Christian col-
onies, and doubtfully the Moham-
medans. Generally speaking, the
Hindus are the lineal descendants
of the Old Aryans who came, in
prehistoric times, into the Indian
valleys and conquered and over-
ran the aboriginal inhabitants. At
what date this occurred it is not
possible to determine. The Hin-
dus themselves believe that the
Vedic hymnal was composed at or
before the beginning of time. Some
of their philosophers, more moder-
ate in their estimates, place the
date at 3001 years before our era.
The best estimate which modern
scholars have been able to make
fixes the minimum of 1900 B. C.
as the date for the composition of
the older hymns of the Veda.
It is not possible to make the
ethnic line which defines or in-
cludes the Hindus proper corre-
spond with the caste lines which
we have already drawn. Of course,
the Brahmans are all included in the
ethnic class of Hindus.
Ethnic and
caste lines do The Kshatriyas likewise
not coincide. -, -. , , .
belong to this race; also
the Vaisyas, or at least the greater por-
tion of them. But at this point the in-
termingling of races begins to show its
effects, for the Vaisyas have in many
parts of India absorbed a considerable
amount of foreign blood from the Dra-
vidians and Kolarians. In some parts
the Kolarians have made their way into
the Vaisyas caste, so that at this point
the ethnic line can no longer be made
coincident with the caste line between
the Vaisyas and the Sudras.
5 . The Mohammedans. These came by
MUSSULMAN OF CASHMERE TYPE.
Drawn by E. Zier, from a photograph by Burke.
conquest. They were originally Arabs,
Afghans, Mughals, and piaceofthe
Persians. In successive in- ^ t T e dans
vasions, occurring at inter- Indian races,
vals sometimes of centuries, the followers
of the Prophet have thrown themselves
from the west into Sindh, the Punjab,
and all the Northwest provinces. On
some occasions the impact has carried
teft.
ii
%^'T *~~,
r&&f~- -^*-*
\n
THE INDICANS.RACE DIVISIONS.
689
bands of invaders as far east as Bengal.
These conquests have always been ac-
companied with religious propagandism.
Islam has borne the sword in one hand
and the Koran in the other. Indeed,
the impulse which has carried the armies
of the Prophet north, south, east, and
west from the original seat in Arabia
has always been rather the spread of
Islam than the mere conquest of
nations.
On the whole, the Mohammedan in-
vasions in India have by this criterion
been attended with success. More than
forty million of people have adopted
the Arab faith, and we thus have an-
other remarkable example of the inter-
fusion of a Semitic religion among the
Aryan races. Next to the Hindus them-
selves the Mohammedans are the most
populous division of the Indian nations.
The difference in numbers, however,
between them and the non-Aryan Kola-
rians and Dravidians is not great, but in
respect of spirit and power the Moham-
medans are infinitely above the aborigi-
nal peoples of the south. Indeed, if we
regard the Islamites as a caste in Indian
society, it would hardly be an exagger-
ation to say that in pride, arrogance, ex-
clusiveness, and bigotry they are fairly
the rivals of the Brahmans themselves.
The great mass of Mohammedan popu-
lation is distributed in Bengal, in West-
ern and Northwestern India, and along
the borders of those Iranian countries
where the faith of the Prophet has long
been in the ascendant.
We must now, however, omit the
non- Aryan populations of India as the
same belong to other parts of this work.
We Shall attempt tO fix OUr The Brahmans
represent the
attention more exclusively intellectual
,1 j i f forces of the
upon the descendants of Hindus,
the dominant race known by the eth-
nic name of Hindus, but classified reli-
giously as adherents of Brahmanism. It
is among the Hindus that the real power
and intellectual forces of the native races
of Hindustan are found. The Brah-
mans have in their possession not only
the sacred books in which the faith of
the Indians is recorded, but also the
philosophy, the science, and the juris-
prudence of the Hindu race. In like
manner they have been the creators and
the custodians of the secular literature,
such as it is, and of the educational
forces existent in Indian society. Their
exclusive claims in all of these partic-
ulars amount to a monopoly of the real
life of the Indian races.
The Brahmans are close alongside the
native Hindu princes, and are their
counselors and teachers. Locally, they
have the center of their power in the
great middle region of India, just as the
southern triangle has an excess of the Old
Dravidian populations, and as the slopes
of the Himalayas are occupied by the
Indo-Burmese. The Brahmans, as the
spokesmen of this dominant Hindu race,
represent not only the mind, the will,
the purpose, and the native power of
modern India, but also the continuity
of the Aryan race and the institutions
of that race from the earliest epoch of
human history to the present day.
690
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
AND VEGETABLE RESOURCES
OE INDIA.
HE Aryans began in In-
dia as poets and war-
riors, and have ended
as priests and peasants.
The primitive aspect
was one of aggres-
sion, conquest, ener-
getic activity ; the present aspect is one of
submission, quiescence, passivity. There
is only one point of view from which the
energies of the race may be said to be
unabated, and that is in the perpetual
but timid industry of the people. It is
now proper to review briefly the condi-
tions of environment under which the
transformation of the India of antiquity
into the India of modern times has been
effected.
This vast region, a peninsula in its
general form and relations to the sea,
Slight changes has perhaps been less af-
fected in its original condi-
tions of climate and phys-
ical character under the great and con-
tinuous burden of population than has
any other country of like extent on the
globe. The traveler, the ethnographer,
the historian, is to-day able, as in the
times of Alexander or in the times of
the Vedic bards, to scrutinize the move-
ments and products of physical nature
essentially unchanged and but slightly
varying from what they were in the
time of the prehistoric Mongolian abo-
rigines.
India has always been a land of vast
and varied resources. In
Vast and varied
resources of the the earlier ages of Aryan
domination the conquer-
ors were brought into relation rather
with the animal life of the peninsula
in the environ-
ment of the In-
-dicans.
than with the products of the soil. In
the beginning all people must be hunters,
warriors, adventurers of the hill and
jungle. Here in the valleys of the
rivers, in the wooded uplands, and on
the slopes of the Himalayas, steep-up to
the clouds, they found a variety and
abundance of animal life unequaled in
any other part of the earth. It is now
recognized as a fact by zoologists that a
majority of all the animals, great and
small, common to the north temper-
ate belts of the earth have their origin,
or at least a native place, in India.
Nearly every species of creature, from
the domestic fowl to the elephant, may
be found, with its pristine habits and in
its original abode in the vast wilds of the
Indian jungles.
To note particularly the principal ani-
mals of this great region would require
a separate treatise. Here
* Animal life of
from the earliest ages the India; tigers and
lion has flourished, and
from hence the striped tiger has carried
the name of Bengal to every spot on the
planet where a collection of wild beasts
has been established or a traveling men-
agerie has pitched its tents. To the
present day the people, even in thickly
settled districts, are in mortal dread of
this formidable beast, who from the
days of the beginning has been known
as a man-eater. Within the last quarter
of a century a single tiger has killed
hundreds of people before he could be
destroyed. In one instance a country
having an area of two hundred and fifty
square miles and thirteen villages was
thrown out of cultivation and abandoned
from the ravages of one tiger !
THE INDICANS. ANIMAL LIFE.
Leopards also are found in all parts of
India, and being much more numerous
than tigers, are on the whole more
destructive of life and property. One
variety, known as the Cheetah leopard,
has been domesticated and trained to
hunt. In the chase of the antelope this
creature is used, and by its speed and
considerably troubled, with wolves. Ot
old time the antelope, the wild goat, and
the hare were their prey, country in-
but with the increase of *3*SS
population and the spread jackals.
of the pastoral life they turned to the
sheepfold. Sometimes they attack man.
As late as 1827 a single neighborhood
VIEW IN THE HIMALAYAS. A MOUNTAIN VILLAGE. Drawn by G. Vuillier, from a photograph by Baker.
activity is a powerful auxiliary to the
hunter. It is said to surpass in swift-
ness of flight any other wild beasts in
India. Its peculiarity of habit is that if it
misses its prey at the first bound, it will
make no second attempt, but return ap-
parently mortified, to its master.
All the open country between the
Indus and the Ganges was originally in-
fested, and is to-day in wooded districts
lost thirty children by the ravages of
wolves. Next in order may be men-
tioned the Indian fox and the jackal,
whose hideous yell by night may be
heard in most of the country districts of
India. The latter animal is sought by
the European huntsmen who are settled
here and there in the country, for whom
the jackal takes the place of the fox in
the hunt of the Western nations.
692
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Dogs, wild and tame, are numerous.
The Cants dhola is an inhabitant of the
wildest jungles. These,
The Canis dhola, J .
the sloth and indeed, are his native lair,
the sun bear. -, -, , / , -,
and have been so from the
prehistoric ages. Of bears, there are
many varieties throughout all India.
The black, or sloth, bear is found in the
forests and on the mountains. This is
the other almost as large as the grizzly
of the Sierras.
The elephant is native to all parts of
the country except the Northwest prov-
inces. His native abode is
The elephant
the hill-country rather than immemorial in
, . T - India.
the plains. He does not
much descend into the river valleys, but
takes to the higher ridges. In the south-
ANIMAL LIFE OF INDIA. STAG SLAIN pv A TIGER. Drawn by A. de Xeuville, after Delaporte.
the creature so strangely marked with a
white horseshoe on his breast. The
Thibetan sun bear is found along the
mountain spurs, all the way from the
Punjab to Assam, but never at a lower
level than five thousand feet above the
sea. The Malayan sun bear inhabits
British Burmah, along with two other
species, one of which is quite small and
ern peninsula the elephant has been
nearly exterminated, but a few are still
found in the forests of Coorg and My-
sore, and in the states of Orissa. It was
out of India that the elephants were
drawn in the classical ages and trained
for the shock of battle. From this source
Hannibal drew his supply when Rome
trembled under the march of his armies.
THE INDICANS. ANIMAL LIFE.
693
Four varieties of rhinoceros are found
in India. Two of the species are uni-
corns, and two have double horns.
They most abound in the
valley of the Brahmaputra
and in the Sundarbans.
Its habitat is mostly in swampy places,
and its manner of life like that of swine,
The principal
pachyderms
and ruminants.
on the slopes of the Himalayas, where
some of them range as high as twelve
thousand feet above the level of the sea.
Here also is found the ibex, even on the
highest ranges of the mountains; also
the chamois, in the Himalayas, from
Assam to Burmah.
It would be vain to enumerate the an-
RHINOCEROS FIGHT AT BARODA. Drawn by Emile Bayard.
or even the hippopotamus. From the
earliest times the wild hog has abounded
in the Indian jungles. Its habit is to
hover along the edges of settlements
and to gratify its predatory habits by
plunging into fields and villages. In
the deserts of Sindh and Kachheh the
wild ass still exists, as in the times of
the Aryan migration. Many varieties
of wild sheep and wild goats are found
telope and the deer, with its many spe-
cies, the bison, from the
Habits and size
gaur of the Western Ghats of the Indian
to the gayal of the north-
eastern frontier. In the latter region
the bison has been domesticated, and is
used by the aboriginal tribes in their
sacrifices. In Burmah the buffalo is
found, large and fierce. The heads of
some bulls captured in modern times
694
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
have been as much as thirteen feet six
inches in circumference and fully six
feet and a half between the tips of the
horns. The animal reaches a height of
six feet, and compares favorably in mag-
nitude with the tremendous creatures
formerly inhabiting the great American
plains of the West.
Of birds, there are an endless variety.
generally innocuous. The inhabitant of
the safe countries of Europe has little
apprehension of the deadly work of those
Indian serpents, of which the cobra de
capello is the imperial and venomous
king. The fatality from snake-biting is
everywhere increased by the supersti-
tion of the people, who generally re-
gard the snake with veneration. The
INDIAN BUFFALOES.-Drawn by Mesvel.
The reptiles of India have ,been known
from the earliest ages for
Prevalence of
reptiles; loss of their tremendous size and
life thereby. . ., ., ,-,
poisonous bite. The most
deadly serpents to be found in any part
of the world lurk in the dank jungles,
along the river banks, and even in the
uplands of the Deccan. It is said that
all the salt water snakes of India are poi-
sonous, while those of fresh waters are
census of 1877 returned a total of six-
teen thousand seven hundred and sev-
enty-seven persons killed in a single
year by the bites of serpents.
It is against this great phalanx of an-
imal life, fierce and malign, that the In-
dian races have flung themselves for
thousands of years. It has been a war
at once offensive and defensive, and the
battle has not infrequently gone against
THE INDICANS. ANIMAL LIFE.
695
the man. In no other quarter of the
habitable globe does the wild animal,
life peculiar to the primeval world stand
forth against the human race, even to
the present day, in such fierce and de-
fiant antagonism as in this thickly popu-
lated India.
It is a strange reflection that after
fully four thousand years of conflict,
during which the great peninsula reach-
a stronger arm and better prospect of
victory than does his timid, light-limbed,
brown-bronze descendant.
In course of time, no doubt, every
species of savage creature will be 7 exter-
minated from the world, civilization ex-
The multiplication and ex-
pansion of the human fam- life '
ily will carry the abodes of man into the
reclaimed fenlands, to the river brink,
DEADLY SERPENTS OF INDIA. THE BUNJARIS FASCIATUS. Drawn by R. Kretschner.
ing into the Indian ocean and embraced
by the Indus and the Ganges has never
wanted for multitudes of inhabitants, the
The Indian man has not on the whole
raceshavenot
subdued the
wild teasts. beast. It is likely that the
primitive Aryan adventurer who pene-
trated the jungles while the earliest poet
of the Vedas was still chanting his hymns
in Sindh and the Punjab, met the fierce
creatures of the woods and marshes with
through the wild morass and woodland,
and up the mountain slopes beyond the
line of snow. The spread of civilization,
as exemplified in the cultivation of the
soil, in the improved means of defense,
in the scientific mastery over every ele-
ment in the environment, will demand
and accomplish the extinction of all the
hurtful races of lower animals. In some
parts of the earth poisonous reptiles and
savage beasts have already disappeared.
696
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Even in the New World the rattlesnake,
the viper, the panther, and the bear
have either totally vanished or maintain
maintain and perpetuate the wilder and
more dangerous varieties of animal ex-
istence, but this condition could soon be
THE TIGER HUNT. Drawn by Tanley Berkeley, from nature.
a precarious existence among the moun-
tains or inaccessible ledges of rock.
The same thing will happen in India.
Doubtless the country is well situated to
changed by a larger expenditure of gun
powder and a less supply of Brahman-
ism. Both of these modifications in the
existing status of India will occur in
THE INDICANS, ANIMAL LIFE.
697
time, but perhaps the day will never
come when the tradition, and even the
historical record of the fierce conflict
between human and mere animal life
in this region of the world will pass
away.
There is no more spectacular display
of man's activity than in the tiger and
elephant hunts of Hindustan. For how
many centuries such exhibitions of nat-
ural combat have occurred
Spectacular ...
character of the it IS impossible to Say.
The defensive fight for life
with the tremendous beasts of the Indian
jungle must have begun with the appari-
tion of the human race in the valley of
the Indus. Not only the battle to the
uttermost has been perpetually renewed
for thousands of years, but the fight for
capture has brought out the ingenuity
and daring of the native races, and even
taxed the skill and courage of foreigners
dwelling in the land. The census of
1877 showed the destruction of a thou-
sand five hundred and seventy-nine tigers
in a single year.
The character of the tiger hunt has
taxed the descriptive pen and the artist's
ose of the eie- brush. The favorite mode
phantinhunt- f rorn fU e haolc of the
Ing; the tiger's
habits. elephant. The scene has
been many times described. The hunt-
ers fix themselves with their spears
and javelins and guns on the back of
the huge beast and enter the jungle.
The tiger is roused from his lair, and
the battle begins. The elephant is
trained to perform his part of the con-
flict. With his tusks and huge trunk
made into a flail of destruction he lays
about him in what is many times a vain
endeavor to strike the terrible cat that
springs about him. The weaponry of
the Indian hunters is generally ineffi-
cient. Many lives are lost in the con-
flict, and the battle is usually long and
M. Vol. 145
evenly contested before the tiger is slain.
Another method is the construction of
elevated platforms, framed of the boughs
of trees in a jungle, from which height
the hunters fight, as from the elephant's
back. The tiger, until he is wounded
or has had a taste of human blood, will
escape from the presence of man ; but if
he is hungered, or has suffered pain at
his enemy's hand, or particularly if he
has wet his pink tongue with a drop of
human blood, he will never desist until
he has devoured his enemy, or is himself
slain or captured. In Assam the tiger
hunt is conducted in boats on the rivers.
The spearmen thus gain a great advan-
tage by being out of reach of the bound
of their enemy and having his move-
ments impeded in the water.
In all parts of India, except in the
Northwest provinces, the elephant either
abounds or may be discov- Native land of
ered for the seeking. That *?*,
part of India which fur- in s-
nishes the best supply is the hill-country
forming the northeastern boundary be-
tween Hindustan and Assam and Bur-
mah. Here the monster not infrequently
reaches the height of twelve feet, and
but for his clumsiness he would be the
most formidable natural foe that man
has found on the earth. The hunters
must approach him on foot. Horses are
generally an impediment. Several meth-
ods have been adopted of taking the
elephant alive. The hunt to the death is
not only dangerous in the last degree,
but difficult on account of the invulnera-
bility of the animal. Nearly all parts of
his anatomy are proof against the bullet
of even improved firearms. In a few
spots the well-directed ball may reach
the seat of life.
Generally the killing of an elephant is
a tedious and barbarous work. This is
now forbidden "By the government of
THE INDICANS. RESOURCES.
699
British India except in cases of neces-
sity, but the capture alive of elephants
is much practiced. The
Capture alive ;
methods of tak- taking, however, is under
ing and taming. ^^ regulation Q f law>
In 1887-88 two hundred and sixty-four
elephants were captured in the province
of Assam. The profit of this work
amounted to three thousand six hundred
pounds sterling. It is a government
monopoly. In 1873-74 Mr. Sanderson,
one of the officers of the government in
Mysore, studied the habit of the elephant,
and devised a plan by which he captured
fifty-three animals in a single hunt.
The former method of taking the crea-
ture was by driving him into a pit. In
this he was generally made to fall upon
a sharpened stake, which worked its
way into his vitals. The prevailing
method is to find a company of elephants
in the forest, to rouse them and drive
them into a strong stockade, where they
are shut up and reduced, by starvation
and by the agency of tame elephants, to
submission and docility. When tamed,
the animals are used in the government
transportation of timber and for other
heavy draught and powerful exertions.
They are also taught to fight, and their
combats are perhaps the most spectacular
and exciting contests to be witnessed in
the world. Among the natives the
princes and nabobs are, as they have
always been, ambitious of the distinction
of going about gorgeously mounted on
tame elephants.
It is not to be doubted that a good
deal of the timidity and fearfulness dis-
Race timidity played by the people of In-
SESSS?" dia is attributable to the
reptiles. dangers to which they are
exposed on account of poisonous reptiles
and other lurking foes. The methods
which they have adopted to defend them-
selves against such enemies are multi-
farious. In some districts where ven-
omous serpents abound a plan of build-
ing is common which is determined in
its main feature by the consideration of
safety from reptiles. The houses are
put on piles or large stakes at consider-
able elevation above the surface. By
this means a space is left between the
domicile and the earth, over which it is
difficult for the fanged enemies of man to
make their way. The edifice considered
apart from its situation is perhaps almost
identical in structure with the prehistoric
lake dwellings of Switzerland.
The maintenance of a food-supply
is the prime consideration with every
people of the world. In a
Physical setting
country like India there of India; the na
i -i 1 tive land of rice.
must needs be vast natural
resources. The whole peninsula may
be said to be inclined toward the sun.
On the north the great wall of the
Himalayas rises, and from the spurs of
this immovable buttress the land slopes
to the sea. In these majestic mountains
are the treasures of the snow. Here
scores of rivers take their rise, and south-
ward tending combine their waters in
the great streams which are one of the
fundamental physical features of India.
The Indian valleys are as rich as any
on the globe. Great, however, is the
difference between them and the low-
lying alluvium of the Nile and the Lower
Euphrates. The river banks in India
are marsh and jungle. Nature is rank
in the last degree. Among the sappy
and dense-growing products of the
valleys many grains and fruits grow
wild, which under the improving direc-
tion of man have become the great
cereals in the markets of the world. As
far back as the days of Pliny and the
oldest naturalists of the Graeco- Italic
peoples the grain known by the Greek
name of oryza, the modern rice, sprang
700
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
plentifully and wild in the lowlands of
Southern India. ' Thus it grows to the
present day ; now the old native grain
of the marshes is preferred by the na-
tive nabobs and princes to any of the
cultivated varieties.
India has been regarded as par ex-
cellence the native land of rice. The
belief is not warranted by
Extent of the
rice crop in dif- the facts. True, the rice
ferent districts. /. -n *. -L. T>
swamps of British Bur-
mah are among the most fruitful in the
world. In Rangpur eighty-eight per
the average crop is as high as two thou-
sand five hundred pounds per acre. In
1878 the exports of this cereal from
Calcutta amounted to one billion six
hundred million pounds.
The rival grain of rice in India is
wheat. Where the one prevails the
other does not thrive. The center of
the wheat-producing region
Extent and
IS the Punjab, and it IS character of the
not unlikely that here wheat productt
this principal food-grain of the human
family was first brought out of the
SCENE IN THE INDIAN VALLEYS. VILLAGE OF PERTCEMBOKKRN. Drawn by Riou, from a photograph.
cent of the cultivable land is sown in
this single crop. In Orissa also as is
indicated by the name of the province
and in the deltas of the Godavery,
Kistna, and Kaveri, as well as in the
lowlands of Malabar and Kanara, rice
culture is the one predominant industry
and means of support. In the Northwest
provinces the grain is grown success-
fully, but only in damp localities. But
if we look at India as a whole, rice is not
the prevailing crop. In the regions
adapted to its cultivation, however, the
yield is immense. In British Burmah
native state by cultivation to the per-
fected form which it has had for more
than three thousand years. The quality
of Indian wheat is satisfactory in the
best markets of the world. It is accept-
ed in the great mills of England as the
peer of the wheat imported from the
Danubian provinces and other favorite
localities. The yield, as far as the same
has been determined by census reports,
is fairly good, averaging about thirteen
bushels per acre for the whole area sown
in India, as against fifteen and a half
bushels for the whole of France.
THE INDICANS. RESOURCES.
701
Millet is next among- the field crops of
India. Viewed as a food of the people,
it is more employed than
Millet the re-
source of the either rice or wheat. It is
commonpeople.
most fruitful grain in the world as to
abundance, and on the whole the best
adapted to tropical climates. It is the
most widely disseminated of any grain
grown in the peninsula. Millet flourishes
from Madras in the south, as far north
as Rajputana. There are several varie-
ties adapted to the different districts, but
nearly all are known as " dry crops," or
such as are dependent only on the
natural rainfall, while rice and many
other products depend upon irrigation.
By one of the strange mutations of
history and of language, that fruitful
maize called Indian corn has become In-
dian in reality. It is culti-
Indian" corn,
barley, and oth- vated in nearly all parts of
er cereals. , -i -,
the country, and grows to
perfection. Along 1 the Upper Ganges
barley is a standard crop. In the Hima-
layan valleys and in the Punjab oats are
grown, but as yet the cultivation of this
grain is experimental in the hands of
Europeans. Throughout all India the
oil seeds are raised in abundance. The
demand for vegetable oil in India is very
great. It is used for anointing the per-
son, for illumination, and for food. The
discarding of animal fats by the people
has increased the consumption of the
oils produced from seeds. In recent
years an export trade with Europe has
sprung up, and since the oil seeds can
be produced as an after crop, when rice
and other grains have been cut away,
the production of the oils has become
a source of great profit. There are four
principal seeds from which oil is pro-
duced: the rape seed, linseed, sesamum,
and the castor bean. The regions in
which these products are most abundant
are the Northwest provinces, Bengal,
and for sesamurn the presidency of Ma-
dras.
No cursory description could do jus-
tice to the vast variety of vegetable
products springing native Extent and va-
or under cultivation in 2S^2
the different districts of In- of India -
dia ; and the same may be said of the
fruits. Among the latter may be enu-
merated the mango, the pineapple, the
guava, the tamarind, the custard apple,
the papaw, the shaddock, and an end-
less variety of figs, melons, oranges,
limes, and citrons. In nearly all of
these fruits traces of the original native
saps may be discovered by the cultivated
palate, and they are doubtless not com-
parable for delicacy of flavor with the
corresponding varieties produced by the
skillful grafting and cultivation in vogue
among the Western nations.
Already, when the traveler enters In-
dia, he finds himself in the land of
spices. True, the air is
Abundance and
not yet burdened, as in distribution of
Ceylon and the Celebes,
with the almost oppressive odors which
spring from the groves and native woods
of the tropical islands; but the Indian
spices are abundant and fragrant. The
principal of these products are the chili,
or cayenne pepper, the turmeric, ginger,
coriander, aniseed, and black cumin.
Pepper is mostly produced along the
western shores of Southern India, in the
region known as the Malabar Coast.
The spice called cardamon belongs to
the same locality, but is also produced
in Nepal. Betel nuts are grown in the
deltas of Lower Bengal and in other
parts of Southern India.
In all the more tropical parts of the
country the palm flourishes. Dates have
been plentiful from time immemorial.
Three varieties are found : the true date,
702
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
the palmyra, and the bastard. From the
last named is manufactured the Jaggery
sugar of commerce ; also an intoxicating
COOLIES AT THE COTTON MARKET IN BOMBAY.
liquor, which is doubtless identical with
Varieties of that described by Xenophon
in the Anabasis. The true
date flourishes in Sindh
and the lower districts of the Punjab.
Along the western coast of India the
dates ; sugar
and the sugar
manufacture .
cocoanut is not only plentiful, but abun-
dant, ranking as a product next in value
to rice. Sugar is produced not only
from the bastard
date palm, but
also from sugar
cane, which flour-
ishes in the
Northwest prov-
inces. It requires
irrigation, how-
ever, and is other-
wise expensive in
production. The
manufacture of
sugar has re-
mained in the un-
skillful hands of
the natives until
in recent times,
when facilities for
making it have
been produced in
the Madras presi-
dency and in My-
sore.
The cotto n
plant is also a na-
tive of India. It
has been found
from the earliest
times, and the
product has sup-
plied the local
wants of the coun-
try within the his-
torical era. Until
the last century
cotton was not ex-
ported as a prod-
Here we touch upon
- The Indian cot-
uct from India.
that remarkable
stance in the commercial
history of modern times, ests -
balancing and unbalancing the cotton
trade of the world during the American
THE INDICANS. RESOURCES.
703
Civil War. It will be remembered that
in Lancashire, England, seat of the great
cotton factories of the United Kingdom,
a crisis was reached in 1 86 1 by the clos-
ing of the ports of the confederated
Southern States. The American market
was thus hermetically sealed, and the
portation of cotton had been less than
three million of pounds a year, but the
cotton industry suddenly sprang up un-
der the tremendous stimulus, until 1866,
when the exportation amounted to thirty-
seven million. With this year, how-
ever, the stress was removed by the
INDIGO FACTORY AT ALLAHABAD. Drawn by E. Therond.
English factories suddenly stopped for
want of raw material.
At this juncture Great Britain turned
eagerly to the cotton fields of India.
Cotton produc- With an open market, the
StiStnScan quality of cotton produced
civil war. j n the East was not equal
to the American product, and could not
be, but in this time of extreme strin-
gency it sufficed to supply the demand.
Prior to 1860 the average Indian ex-
opening of the American market, and
the Indian exportation immediately fell
off to eight million a year. Perhaps no
other world market of a great product,
balancing at its two poles eight thou-
sand miles apart, has ever exhibited so
remarkable a fluctuation.
Next after cotton may be ranked the
jute of India. It is virtually a hemp,
though the fiber is somewhat coarser.
The region of its production is confined
704
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
to Bengal, on the north and east. The
chief seat of the product is in the valley
of the Brahmaputra, where
The jute Indus- .
try; extent of the jute nourishes in the
the product.
believed that no other product which
has- reached to the rank of an important
export has done so much in a reactionary
way for the comfort of the producers as
jute. It is one of those peculiar prod-
Of the purely European products
which have been introduced into In-
dia, indigo is entitled to the
Large place of
first rank ; but the interest indigo in Indian
, -i j 1- i ,1 commerce.
in it has declined in the
last quarter of a century. In North
Behar the industry is as important as
ever, and from this single district about
half the product of the entire country is
derived. The exports of the dye from
OPIUM MANUFACTORY. Drawn by A. Sirouy, from a photograph by Madame Dieulafoy.
ucts which does not perish when placed
in depot from season to season, and the
supply, therefore, may be regulated by
the producer according to the demands
of the market. In 1872 a million acres
were planted in jute, and it is estimated
that the area of country in which it may
be profitably produced extends to over
twenty million of acres. The export
from Calcutta has amounted in a single
year to more than four million pounds
sterling.
all India amounted in the years 1878-79
to nearly three million pounds sterling.
But the most profitable of the East
Indian industries, so far as exportation
is concerned, is that of opium. The
valley of the Ganges and the table -land of
Central India are as much Extent, impor-
a native place of the opium- %%*?*
producing poppy as is Per- auction,
sia herself. The production of opium in
India is under the control of the govern-
ment. In some districts the growth of
THE INDICANS. RESOURCES.
705
the drug is free, and the opium is sub-
jected to a duty in passing through
Bombay for exportation. In the valley
of the Ganges the product is under su-
pervision of government agencies estab-
lished at Ghazeepur and Patna, and at
these two places the opium is manufac-
tured for exportation. In Rajputana and
had risen to a value of nearly thirteen
million pounds, and from this a net rev-
enue was derived by the government
of seven million seven hundred pounds
sterling.
The tobacco plant grows everywhere
in India. It may be said to flourish ; all
the natural conditions for the product
TEA PLANTATION IN THE VALLEY OF KANGRA. Drawn by Paul Langlois, from a photograph.
the Punjab the drug is also produced,
but only for local consumption. In the
other provinces under the dominion of
Great Britain the production of opium is
prohibited. The census of 1872 showed
an area of five hundred and sixty thou-
sand acres in poppy cultivation. The
revenue derived by the government in
this year was over four million pounds
sterling. In 1878-79 the exportation
Indian tobacco ;
the inferiority of
are favorable; but the quality of the
leaf has never found favor
in the markets of
1 i T i .L i_ the product.
world. Indian tobacco is
unable to compete with the richly fla-
vored growth of the West Indies and the
United States. Tobacco is grown, how-
ever, in all parts of the country for native
consumption. In the Coimbatore and
Aladur? districts in Madras the variety
706
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
of the plant from which Trichinopoli che-
root is manufactured, flourishes, and this
is the only tobacco product which com-
petes with that of the West in the mar-
kets of Europe. There is, however, an
exportation of tobacco from Bengal into
British Burmah, where the plant does
not flourish. Notwithstanding the wide
distribution of the growth of tobacco in
India, the importation at Calcutta has
amounted to forty million pounds in a
single year.
Neither coffee nor tea may be regard-
ed as native products of India. The
former has been introduced within the
historical period by the na-
Coffee and tea
not properly na- tives, and the latter at a time
tive to India. ,.** , _,
still more recent, by Eu-
ropeans. The cultivation of coffee is
limited to a portion of the Western Ghats
and to certain districts in Mysore and
Madras. The export of coffee in 1 878-79
was valued at a million and a half pounds
sterling. The reports of early explorers
that the tea plant grew r \vild in the south-
ern valleys of the Himalayas were with-
out foundation in fact. It is only in
Assam that the true Thea viridis will
flourish without cultivation. In this re-
gion it attains the proportions of a real
tree, and it is believed by botanists that
here is the native place of the plant, and
that it was carried hence in early times
into China.
Many other products of great impor-
tance might be enumerated as belonging
Indian vegeta- peculiarly to India, but the
sSn\Srn e g d c b on- abov e are sufficient to in-
ditions. dicate the general charac-
ter of the grain and other animal and
vegetable resources of the country. In
general, everything is rank. The high
heat and abundant moisture in the val-
leys stimulate vegetation, and bring all
manner of fruits and grains to early ma-
turity. Three crops annually are not
unusual on the same fields. In the great-
er part of the country the winter is not
sufficiently rigorous seriously to impede
the work in fields and gardens.
The rainfall ranges from twenty-four
inches in the drier districts to nearly
one hundred and twenty-three inches in
the rice regions of the south. The rains
are periodic, being the re- precipitation
suit of the monsoon, or sea J n ***Z*% m8
wind, which blows steadily rate -
at certain seasons, bringing on and main-
taining a steady and copious rainfall. It
is from the occasional, though rare, fail-
ure of this monsoon that famine has at
intervals possessed the land. In the
years 1876-78 nearly the whole of In-
dia was afflicted by the partial or total
failure of crops. In 1877 the death
rr.te rose, on account of the famine,
from six hundred and eighty thousand
to a million five hundred thousand.
The most strenuous efforts of the gov-
ernment were not sufficient to prevent
widespread and dreadful starvation. For
two years the monsoons failed to return
at the appointed season, and the country
was helpless in the grip of drought.
We are now able, from a wide view
of the resources of India, of the charac-
ter of the race predominant therein, of
the effects which climatic Physical degen-
eration result-
and other physical condi- ant from condi-
, . , -1 tions present in
tions naturally entail on India,
man, and of the contact and intermix-
ture of different races, to estimate,
though imperfectly, the nature and di-
rection of the human evolution, and of
the aspects which mankind would be
likely to assume under such conditions
and environment. On the whole, we
should expect a certain degree of phys-
ical degeneration. That the climate of
India is effeminating in its effects on
man has been plainly demonstrated by
actual observation in modern times. It
THE INDICA NS. RE SO URGES.
707
Is a general law that the subsidence into
agricultural life from the nomadic pur-
suit, with its accompanying excitements
of the chase and tribal warfare, exercises
a deleterious effect on the physical con-
stitution of man. It is a change from a
wider and freer and less toilsome mode
of activity, from a life of hazard and
wild excitements, to the more localized
and more laborious methods of the hus-
tending the activity of human life.
What may be called the science of diet
is still in its infancy. To importance of
no class of students is the food-supply in
~ relation to race
subject of greater inter- character,
est than to those who are curious in his-
torical and ethnic inquiry. What is the
law of the maintenance of life by food?
What shall be eaten as most conducive
to strength, to longevity, to the support
ASPECTS OF INDIAN LIFE. REPOSE AT NOONDAY. Drawn by F. Regamey, from nature.
bandman. It is not meant that the ag-
ricultural life is without great value in
maintaining the physical vigor of those
who follow it, but the toil and tameness
which are inseparable therefrom are not
favorable to the highest development
and greatest vigor of the human frame.
We are here again on the very border
of that world-wide problem of the rela-
tive effect and value <3f the different
foods in sustaining the vigor and ex-
of all the virile energies of man ? What
may be known scientifically on this sub-
ject over and above that simple folklore
which the untutored experience and tra-
dition of human kind has transmitted to
our age?
Foods have been subjected to a scien-
tific classification. They are divided by
physiologists into hydrocarbons, carbohy-
drates, and nitrogenous foods ; and it is
now well ascertained that each of these
708
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
classes of aliments has its particular
value and relation to the physical consti-
tution of man. The char-
Classification of
foods; the hy- actenstic of the hydrocar-
drocarbonates. -1-0.1 j
bons is the presence and
excess of oil. This generally exists in
the form of animal fats, though oil is
also a large product of the vegetable
kingdom. But the most concentrated
and characteristic development of this
food substance is in the fatty tissue of
animals. From the earliest ages men
have used this substance for the support
of life. It is, however, in the more rig-
orous climates that the appetency of the
human being for animal food of this de-
scription is most intense. There is a
law of natural selection which indicates
a diminishing quantity of the hydrocar-
bons as the human race spreads toward
the tropics. There is little or no nat-
ural appetite for animal oils in the
warmer climates.
The second class of foods are the car-
bohydrates. In these there is an ex-
The carbohy- cess of starch or sugar,
SconS?-* J' ust as in the hydrocarbons
tnte this class, there is an excess of oil.
The cereals and certain ground products,
such as the potato, may be taken as the
standard examples of the carbohydrate
foods. Rice is of this kind par excel-
lence. It will be seen at a glance that
the great products of the earth gener-
ally yield a high per cent of starch, and
in so far as the productive regions of
the globe lie within the temperate zones
and become more intense in productive
energy in the tropics, to that extent the
starch-bearing foods are prevalent in the
same regions. In general, the line be-
tween the hydrocarbon and the carbo-
hydrate aliments, upon which for the
most part all animated forms of ex-
istence are sustained on the earth, is
practically coincident with the line which
divides the animal from the vegetable
kingdom ; that is, the fat-bearing ani-
mals from the field products and ground
crops, which are starch-bearing.
The third variety includes the ni-
trogenous foods. All highly organized
tissue, whether animal or The nitrogenous
vegetable, contains a per-
centage of nitrogen. This plates,
is generally the fourth element in the
quadruple compounds which constitute
so large a part of the organic substances
of the material world. Nitrogen occurs
in all leguminous plants and grains, and
particularly in the muscular fibers of all
animals. It is a principal constituent of
"lean meat," its presence being as con-
stant and conspicuous in such fiber as is
carbon in the fats and oils. Among veg-
etable products all pulse grains, such as
peas and beans, are rich in the same
element.
Besides the three general classes of
foods here enumerated, there is a fourth
class, though scarcely distinct from the
others, in which certain valuable salts
are the meritorious element. These
are principally the phosphates of lime,
of potash, of soda, and of iron, without
which as constituents of human food
the nervous energy of the body can not
be long sustained. These salts are dis-
tributed in both the animal and the veg-
etable kingdoms, perhaps more plenti-
fully in the latter (?), and it is now a
well-known fact that the nervous vigor of
animals turns largely upon the percent-
age of the phosphates in the substances
upon which they feed.
Now it is the adjustment of the human
race to these different classes of foods,
as well as tO the different Race character
climates of the earth, that ? a ^Tthe
determines the race tend- kind of food,
ency of every people. This is said, first
of all, of the physical constitution which
710
GREAT RACES OF JA-LYAY.VA
will be developed in a given environ-
ment, and afterwards of the modes of
activity and mental dispositions which
the given people will display. In a
country where muscular exertion is es-
sential to life and welfare, and where
man must brace himself stoutly against
the opposition of the elements must face
angry vicissitudes of climate and season,
the hardships of sterility, the obstacles
of heavy forests and oozy rivers with un-
determined channels there must needs
be a perpetual feeding upon those ele-
ments of nature which furnish the es-
sentials of human energy under such
conditions. Here it is that man must
fill himself with an abundance of solid
food. Under the action of an untutored
instinct at first and the discipline of
right reason afterwards, he slays the
living creatures and eats their tissues
and the fat.
It is in the nature of the hydrocarbon
foods to supply him with heat. That is
The office of the physiological office of
SuTandnl- a11 the oil-producing Sub-
trogenous foods, stances of the vegetable
kingdom, and particularly of the fat of
animals. By this means the superior
races feed the fires of life amid the
rigors of northern climates. There is
an aspect in which man may be viewed
as a living furnace. His stomach is a
firebox; and nothing that he can cast
therein flames like oil. Thus he warms
himself, and goes abroad unharmed
amid the terrors of the high latitudes,
where all forms of life not supported
like his own must inevitably perish.
But he not only feeds himself with oil.
If he is in a region where active exertion
is demanded, where the excitements of
the chase, the adventures of the wide
campaign, the struggle with the obdu-
racy of physical nature, and particularly
the flaming excitements of war call out
his energies, he must support his mus-
cular system with an abundant supply
of nitrogenous foods. Hence he falls
upon and devours the dry meats and the
fresh tissues of slain animals, and from
this source builds up anew the broken
structure of his own muscles, exhausted
by toil and strain.
The kind of activity contemplated
under the stimulus of foods like those
we have here described is in what relation
not the activity of mere ^?E*.
industry. There may be uraiiy used,
long continued assiduity of application
to industrial pursuits without that kind
of muscular destruction, without that
combustion of the hydrocarbons, which
is here delineated. The agricultural
life in its milder aspects does not demand
the high feeding that is an essential in
heroic endeavor. It requires rather a
certain steady force, such as is gener-
ated from the carbohydrate elements.
All agricultural countries fall to the use
of grains and vegetables, and to a cer-
tain extent abandon animal food. In
proportion as the country lies well to the
south, the relinquishment of the hydro-
carbons will be more complete, and food
will be almost exclusively drawn from
the field, the orchard, and the garden.
These carbohydrates are the producers
of force. The starch foods taken into
the human constitution Effects of such
pass by metamorphosis in- *%*
to sugar and from sugar tion -
into oil. In the last named form they
are consumed. He who demands simple
working energy without regard to the
w r aste of his muscular tissue will turn
instinctively to the cereals and fruits.
Ultimately this tendency lands on rice
and potatoes. In countries where nature
brings forth abundantly of the cereals,
where all ground crops are plentiful and
fruits abundant, there will be an inevi-
712
GREAT RACES OF MANKIXD.
table shrinkage of tJic muscular parts of
all animals. Man subsisting on such a
food will become assiduous in his ap-
plication, even persistent in his pursuits.
He may be lithe and active, supple-
jointed and quick in movement, but he
will be essentially weak in his skeleton
and muscular structure.
Here we have the fundamental condi-
tions which have divided the Aryan race
The Hindu i?ody in India from the Iranians
the result of the _ j from the oreat races
long discipline an(
of nature. o f the West. The Hindu
body is the result of a long discipline in
HINDU JEWELER AT WORK.
Drawn by A. de Neuville.
the hands of nature. It has been con-
stituted under the enervating influences
of a semitropical or wholly tropical cli-
mate, combined with the results of the
substitution of the carbohydrates for the
hydrocarbons and nitrogenous foods of
the great northern peoples. ,
As the man is individually, so is his
tribe, his nation, his race.
Same laws hold
of the race as of India is not wanting in the
the man. - . 1 f . _
display of active and per-
sistent industry, but the industry it-
self is as feeble as it is persistent. The
tremendous energies displayed by some
of the Western nations in their mas-
terful struggle with an adverse envi-
ronment in subordinating the forces of
nature, in organizing the astounding ap-
paratus of commerce, in planting political
dominion even at the distance of thou-
sands of miles from its central source,
are set in vivid and exalted contrast
with the timid and effeminate exer
tions peculiar to the same stock of
men as they have grown into mere
suppleness under the influences of the
Indian sun and the enfeebling tenden-
cy of the starch-
bearing foods.
."' /, ' ; One must needs
travel through the
Indian kingdoms
to be properly im-
pressed with the
physical character
of the people. The
high-caste Brah-
mans, especially
in the north, have
preserved to some
extent the fine
stature and man-
ly bearing of their
Aryan fore-
fathers ; but as a
rule, the people
are not only low, but slender. They are
weak-muscled, and have weakness of the
nothing left of that ag- ?
gressive physical force and climate,
which the old stock possessed in its an-
cestral home and which has been so
strongly developed in the Indo-Euro-
pean s of the West. It is claimed that
Hindu laborers are as industrious as any
in the world. Their assiduity can not
be denied, but assiduity is not strength.
The race is weak. It lacks in courage
and audacity. It has fallen into a
THE INDICANS. RESOURCES.
713
passive condition which has in it neither
power nor progress.
It is held by a certain class of think-
ers that no people can ever be pow-
Ethmc life the erful and progressive
Joint product of . ?
subjective and whose principal SllbsiSt-
objective condi- . . -, ,-,
ns. ence is on nee and other
starch-bearing- products. This is look-
ing at the problem of life as merely a
physical phenomenon. It does not take
into consideration those other elements
which we have previously discussed. It
is sufficient to repeat that a race of men
as it presents itself in modern times is the
Joint product of two principal forces, one
of which is subjective or instinctive in
the race itself, and the other an objective,
or reactionary physical force, including
the elements of climate, food, and shel-
ter. The Hindus have been thus evolved
from the old prehistoric condition in
which we beheld them in their Iranian
homestead and in their migrations to
the East. They have been carried for-
ward on the line of race development by
the force of instincts which have deter-
mined in large measure their mental
and moral characteristics, and by phys-
ical agencies which have given to the
race its visible aspect and character.
Among the other physical conditions
that have modified the race constitution
of the Hindus may be men-
Precious stones
in relation to tioned the peculiar min-
race character. 1 /? .. 1 T
erals of the country. In
ancient times, and to a limited extent at
the present day, India is the country of
precious stones. Besides the usual de-
posits of the metals which provoked at a
very early day a considerable degree of
skill in metallurgy, the diamond mines
and other deposits of those rare stones
which have been classified as precious
have attracted the cupidity and excited
the pride of the Hindu race. Without
diamonds and other gems of great value
M. Vol. 146
such a thing as Oriental magnificence
could hardly exist. Barbaric state, such
as Eastern monarchs in the Middle Ages
and even in modern times are wont to
maintain and which constitutes so large
an element in personal despotism, could
hardly continue without the blaze of
precious stones. Indeed, no civilized
society in the world has as yet freed it-
self from the illusion of diamonds. The
name of Golconda, the old capital of the
Deccan, has passed into the literature of
all nations as a synonym for that kind
of splendor which blazes from precious
stones.
True it is that recent investiga-
tions have destroyed a part of the tra-
ditional glory possessed by Golconda the
this city as the native place g^
of diamonds, " but it was stone-cutting,
nevertheless the greatest seat of gem-
cutting and precious stone work known
in the Middle Ages, and perhaps in the
history of the human race. Not without
its effect upon the character of the Hin-
dus as a people was the gathering, the
wearing, the exhibition, and the com.
merce in precious stones. All this im-
parted much of the Oriental character to
Indian civilization. The nabob of to-
day has many traits which depend, if
not for their existence, at least for their
manifestation, on the presence in his
country of precious mines, with the
treasures of which he maintains his
grandeur and pride. It was this form
of barbaric magnificence which contrib-
uted to Milton's pictured page one of his
gorgeous images:
" High on a throne of royal state which far
Outshone the wealth of Ormus and of Ind."
The attention of the reader has been
called to the fact that iron is the last of
the great metals now in use to be discov-
ered and extracted from the matrix.
714
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
The forbidding and refractory character
of the ore impeded the manufacture of
iron until long after the other metals
the most useful of the metals. Iron
mines abound in all parts of India.
There is scarcely a district between the
DIAMOND MINE OF PUNNAH. Drawn by Emile Bayard.
that exist in the native state had been
brought out and employed
The working of . . r *
iron originated in the arts. It was in this
ia -'j^ land of India that the Ar-
yan race first succeeded in mastering the
difficulties in the way and brought forth
mountains of Assam and the southern
parts of Madras in which mines are not
abundant. The ore is purer than that
of almost any other region in the earth.
It is this circumstance, together with the
antiquity and ingenuity of the race, that
THE INQICANS. RESOURCES.
715
has made India the first country of the
world in which iron has been manufac-
tured.
The indigenous method of smelting
the ore is still preserved. The very
Method of same processes which were
excScfof employed at the beginning
product. of the historical era are
still in vogue. The great drawback
upon the success of the method employed
is the wasteful consumption of
charcoal. Where iron is smelted
in the open air there must be high
heat, long preserved, with the
consequent large consump-
tion of fuel. From time im-
memorial the native races of
appear that this metal was in use before
this time. From India the knowledge
of the processes of smelting the ore, and
the superiority of the metal thus ob-
tained over every other employed in the
arts, was in course of time recognized
even to the extreme limits of Europe.
Copper mines are also frequent in In-
dia. The best of all are found in the
skirts of the Himalayas, in the hill-coun-
try lying eastward of
Kumaon. The manu-
facture of copper has
remained to the pres-
ent day in the hands
of the natives. The
region where the ore
is abundant is almost
COPPER VESSELS OF HINDU WORKMANSHIP.-Drawn by Schmidt, from the originals.
India have succeeded in producing one
of the purest and best articles of
wrought iron known to men. Since
the creation of the East Indian em-
pire, much foreign capital has been
expended in establishing works and col-
lieries in the country; and modern sci-
ence applied to the problem of extracting
the ore has greatly increased the quan-
tity, but not the quality, of the metal.
It was after the incoming of the Aryan
population into India that the manufac-
ture of iron was discovered. It does not
Mining of cop-
The per and method
., , of manufacture.
worked by
inaccessible, and the capital of the West
has not yet made its way
into the country,
deposits are
the miners of Nepal, according to
the methods which have become tra-
ditional through lapse of time. In
many districts old "abandoned copper
mines are found, indicating the antiquity
of the knowledge of copper in india.
The process of working is primitrffe and
simple. Holes are carried into the earth,
following the vagaries of the deposit,
716
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
until the region is burrowed as if gigan-
tic conies or rabbits had selected the place
for their cities. When the ore is taken
out it is pounded up with an iron sledge
and smelted on the spot of its delivery.
It is not needed that the lead mines of
the Himalayas and the Punjab should
be described. Tin is found
The Indian lead
mines; antimony in Burmah, where the ore
and petroleum.
per cent of pure metal. The mines are
worked by the Chinese, with whom all
improvement is innovation. Antimony is
found in the hill-countries of the Punjab,
and also in Mysore. In Burmah rich
deposits of petroleum have been discov-
ered, and the annual yield in the hands
of European enterprise has risen to eleven
thousand tons. In the Punjab the petro-
leum wells are managed as a branch of
the public works.
The river beds of India are generally
laid with a nodular form of limestone.
Distribution of This rock has subserved
fu?t n abie SO for n0t tne usual Proses from
pottery. the earliest ages. At the
present time it is taken up and em-
ployed in large quantities in macadamiz-
ing roadbeds. In the Khasia hills in
Assam there are limestone quarries from
which building material has been im-
memorially taken. In Bankura, also,
there are valuable ledges of the same
stone. The lower valley of the Ganges
has suffered the same inconvenience as
did that of the Euphrates and Tigris
after their descent to the alluvial plain.
In the Ganges valley there is no lime-
stone, nor indeed any adequate building
materials. The soil, moreover, is not
suitable for the manufacture of either
bricks or pottery. Since the domination
of Great Britain was established in
India, pottery works have been built in
Bardwan, but these are devoted only to
the manufacture of drainage pipes and
the coarser form of stoneware.
In all the vast upland region between
the two principal rivers of India, build-
ing stone is abundant. In Rajputana
that pink marble out of which the old
temple and palace of Agra were reared
is found. In Godavery
Quarries of mar-
and Narbada sandstone bie, slate, and
abounds, and Southern In-
dia is rich in granite. Since the incoming
of European capital the slate quarries
have been opened, also mines of mica
and talc. Finally, the hills of Orissa
and Chuta-Nagpur abound in a variety
of indurated potstone, out of which
vessels of utility and others of ornament
are manufactured with that skill for
which the art of India is famous.
XLI. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS.
HEN a race of men
has long occupied a
land so varied in its
resources and physical
character as India, it
is natural, inevitable,
that there shall be a
diverse ethnic development. The peo-
ple of one part of the country will be
formed upon conditions different from
those in another. In the Diverse develop.
ment follows
case of a stock so conserva- long occupancy
,. ., 1-1 11 inwidecoun-
tive as that which peopled tries .
India, the diversity of social forms and
of ethnic character would be strongly
marked. After the settled estate had
once prevailed among the tribes, each
would develop on its own lines and reach
THE INDICANS. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS.
717
a different result. The absorption of
the aboriginal population would greatly
contribute also to the divergent tend-
Tfft *nu*M ;
forifr ^i ^
SPECIMEN OF SANSKRIT
ency. In a preliterary age dialectic
tendencies would shoot out over the sur-
face like growing vines, and in course of
time the inhabitants of one district
would no longer understand the vernac-
ular of another.
In India these dialectic departures
were all made from the common linguis-
Sanskritthe tic form called Sanskrit.
original of the j t was that sacre( } primitive
Hindu Ian- *
guages. language which grew to
maturity of grammatical form and into
a fixed vocabulary on the tongues of the
Vedic poets. The speech once established
in structure and phraseology in the
sacred hymns would no longer suffer
inflection, no longer present the phe-
nomena of growth. The Old Aryan
tongue became crystalized in the Vedas.
It was Sanskrdta, the " perfect speech."
And to speak the truth, among languages
developed into literary form by the
genius of man, only the Greek is able to
compete in the perfection of its structure
and methods with the old Sanskrit as it
was uttered two thousand years before
our era by the Vedic bards.
This old Sanskrit literature has dis-
seminated through all the Aryan tongues
of India a common element to which we
may give the name of Hindi, the lan-
Hindicorre- guage of the Hindus. This
spends to the
Latin stage in Hindic element in the
Western devel- ,. TT . ,
cpment. tongues of Hindustan is
much like the Latin element in the Ro-
mance languages of Western Europe
and South America. As the scholar
wanders through France and Italy,
through Spain and Portugal, through
Wallachia and Brazil, he sees and hears
evermore the movement and rhythm of
the old Latin tongue out of which the
vernaculars of all these people have
grown into literary forms, diverse among
themselves, but common in a single ori-
gin. So also with the Hindic element in
the languages of India.
As are the languages, so are the peo-
ples. Perhaps the first and most dis-
tinct ethnic division of the Cashmerians
Indie race is the Cashmeri-
ans. They are the best
representatives of the early Indicans, and
through them the clearest retrospective
glance may be had at the race character
of the original Aryans who peopled the
Punjab. Only in one respect do the
Cashmerians fail best of all to represent
and reflect the ancient and essential
character of the Indie branch of the Ar-
yan family of men. In religion they
SACRED INSCRIPTION FROM THE VEDA.
have largely apostatized from Brahman-
ism and accepted the faith of the Arabian
prophet. They have thus become in-
718
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
fected on the religious and linguistic
side of their development by foreign in-
fluences deduced from the Arabian des-
ert, from Islam, from Shem.
The Cashmerians are the most north-
erly division of the Hindu race, being
above the inhabitants of the Punjab.
They have developed their own tongues,
their own manners, their own institu-
tions, having, of course, a common basis
with the other Hindu races. Many of
ft?
afar,
VT?
VARIANT FORMS OF SANSKRIT.
t . Hindi ; 2. Punjabi.
them have retained the old faith of the
Brahmans.
Perhaps the climate of Cashmere has
Climate and en- been more favorable to the
SSSSfST maintenance of the original
race integrity, character of the race than
in any other district of India. The range
of the thermometer does not reach above
eighty-five degrees F. at noon in sum-
mer time. The heat, however, is op-
pressive, owing to the stillness of the
summer air. In winter the temperature
sinks much below the freezing point, and
snow is abundant. The conditions are
such as to favor physical perfection. The
Cashmerians are not only the handsom-
est of the Indian races, but are fairly
esteemed among the peoples of the West.
The men are tall, sinewy, and robust.
It is conceded that the complexion of the
women is one of the best, if not the fair-
est, in the world, and the female features
possess many other elements of beauty.
The people of Cashmere are noted for
their gayety of demeanor. They are
fond of pleasures. Music
Intellectual and
and dancing are the preva- social life of the
lent amusements, but liter- Cashmerians -
ature, especially in the form of poetry,
is cultivated. The Cashmerians have
obtained, and perhaps retained, one of
the worst reputations as it respects mor-
al character that any modern people of
like development has possessed withal.
Not that they are sunk in debasing vices.
Quite on the contrary, their manners
and social criteria are so high as to be
accepted even in the civilized countries
of the West. In respect to manners, the
Cashmerians may be properly styled the
French of India ; but they are the most
cunning, and perhaps the most avari-
cious of modern peoples, and their fame
for lying is infamous. Cashmere has
suffered to an unusual degree within the
present century by natural disasters and
the half-natural visitations of pestilence
and famine. The country is visited with
earthquakes ; and it has been estimated
that since the establishment of the Brit-
ish East Indian empire the population
of certain districts has been reduced to
one fourth of the original number.
The people of the Punjab lie in eth-
nic character close to those of Cashmere.
Indeed, there is no nat- points of di-
ural line of demarkation
between the two countries
either in geography or ethnic develop,
ment. Mohammedanism, however, has
not gained the ascendency in the one coun-
try as it has in the other, and the dialec-
tical difference between the language of
the Punjab and that of the Cashmerians
is sufficient to classify the peoples as dis-
tinct. The population numbers nearly
twenty million. The country is suffi-
THE INDICANS. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS.
719
ciently irregular in outline to have pre-
served, as in Cashmere, many of the
original features of the Aryan race. In
both language and religion they lie
nearer to the primitive type than do the
Cashmerians. Not only have they re-
sisted the propagandism of Islam, but
they have a strong antipathy for the fol-
Next in order of the Indian popula-
tions may be mentioned the great race
of the Mahrattas. They are so called
from the Sanskrit name
Maharashtra, the ancient gS2SS
designation for the ' ' Great
Kingdom," or region. The country in-
habited by them extends from the Ara-
VIEW IN CASHMERE. VALLEY OF THE TIRTAN. Drawn by G. Vuillier, from a photograph by Bourne.
lowers of the Prophet, whom they despise
as aliens in faith and nationality. As the
original seat of the earliest Aryan in-
stitutions, the Punjab will ever remain
a field of interest for the ethnologist and
historian. It is, geographically speak-
ing, to the Aryan nations what Italy is
to Southern Europe the ancient seat
whence conquest spread and institution-
al forms were exported to foreign parts.
bian sea on the west to the Satpura moun-
tains in the north. It includes the
larger part of Western and Central
India. By this designation are covered
the provinces of Comean, Kandashesh,
Berar, the British Deccan, half of the
Nizam's Deccan, and a part of Nagpur.
Within- the limits here defined, the
Mahratta population numbers about
twelve million. Considered as an eth-
ASPECTS OF CASHMERIAN LIFE.-DANcmo GIRL OF SERINAGUR. Drawn W Kroilt BavaM
THE INDICANS. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS.
721
nic term, Mahratta is not definitive.
Neither is it the name for a particular
Extent of Mali- social caste or a given re-
SStSKS: % ion - Jt is rather one of
guage. those wide terms which
history demands in the definition of a
race somewhat composite in ethnic ele-
ments, and even diverse in religious and
social qualities. Still the diversity is not
sufficient to warrant a division into
separate tribes. The common tie which
binds the several peoples living within
the regions defined above is language.
They speak the Mahratti, one of the
most widespread of the modern Indian
tongues. In common with the other
Indie languages, it is a dialectical form
of Hindi, differing only from Hindu-
stani as French differs from Italian.
Though the tribes of Mahrattas are
somewhat distinct in the different prov-
inces, they are all true Indicans. We
have Mahratta Brahmans, Mahratta
Rajputs, and Mahratta Kumbis for the
names of the several castes, all Mah-
rattas, but having nonintercourse with
each other, from the same prejudices
which prevail in other parts of India.
In so far as the Mahratta race has
fallen under the dominion of Great Brit-
ain, as in the Deccan, it
Variation in
character from has preserved to a consider-
foreign impact. ^ ^^ ^ features Q j
the original stock from which it is
descended; but in the Nizam's Deccan
the people have yielded to the Moham-
medan pressure, and to that extent have
taken the character of the Islamites. In
other districts the race is comparatively
pure. Of these, Kolhpur, in the South-
ern Deccan, is perhaps the best example.
The states of. Sinde, Indore, and a
part of Gujerat are nominally native,
but have been considerably subjected to
foreign influences. The native Mahratta
princes and the attaches of their barbaric
courts are Mahrattas, but a large part
of the people are Hindus from other
regions.
The Mahratta Brahmans may be named
as the best exemplars of the qualities and
character of the Brahmanic Mahratta Brah-
caste in all India. In ^p^of 1 ^'
physical, intellectual, and Hindus,
moral development they are Brahmans at
the best estate. The traveler can but be
impressed with the serene countenance,
the majestic walk, the lithe, straight
figure, the high forehead, and features
regular almost Grecian in outlines of
these leading representatives of the an-
, rR
SPECIMEN OF MAHRATTI.
cient priestly order. The British gov-
ernment has found them the most able
and energetic of all the natives of the
empire ; and he who visits India curious
for instruction relative to the language,
literature, and tradition preserved in the
Sanskrit books, will find the Mahratta
Brahmans to be the best of all his sources
of information.
All of the castes are represented among
the Mahrattas. The Kshatriyas, or the
Rajputs, are not numer-
Jr . Thelo-west
ous, and seem to maintain a classes of in- .
. , dican society.
rather precarious existence
between the two preponderating castes
of Brahmans and Sudras. The latter,
lowest of the four great strata in which
Indian society is divided lowest with
the exception only of the Pariahs, or serf
caste, whose business it is to handle the
dead have preserved so many features
of the aborigines and of the Scythians,
who on several occasions have invaded
722
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
the country, as to constitute them almost
a distinct race. Indeed, an ethnic analy-
sis would show them to possess a com-
paratively slight admixture of Aryan
blood. But the Sudras of the Mahratta
region, as in other parts of India, have
conformed so much to the structure of
the dominant castes as to be classified
are said to be exceedingly boorisn
in manners, and to have the looks of
clowns. As compared with the inhab-
itants of the Punjab and the Cashmeri-
ans, the Sudra class of Mahrattas are
physically weak and mentally inferior.
They have vigor and tenacity without
strength. They are essentially a race of
GROUP OF MAHRATTAS TYPES.
with them as a branch of the common
family.
The contrast in features and person
between the Sudras and the Mahratta
contrasts and Brahmans is sufficiently
SB anT f striking. The Sudra coun-
Mahrattas. tenance is wanting in all
those features of elevation which are
possessed by the superior caste. They
are small in person, though in common
with most Indian races they are lithe,
active, wiry, and able to endure. They
mountaineers, and have in common with
that class of people in every country of
the world the qualities of courage and
independence. They have but a slight
social or political organization in their
native places ; but they have submitted
to the discipline of the empire, and under
the command of English officers have
become an excellent soldiery. In the
pursuits of life they are herdsmen, cattle
raisers, drivers of stock and vehicles,
rather than husbandmen or tillers of the
THE INDICANS. ETHNIC CHARACTERISTICS.
723
soil. They have some skill as weavers
and manufacturers of armor, but have
not otherwise distinguished themselves
in the practical arts.
Geographically
speaking, India and
Hindustan are coex-
tensive, identical.
In a certain popular
sense Hindus and
Indians are convert-
ible terms ; but if the
meaning of Hindus
be determined by
linguistic evidence,
we shall find that
not all Indians are
Hindus. Hindu-
stani, or Urdu, is a
dialect of that me-
diaeval Hindi which
is the term for the
second origin of all
the Indie languages,
as Sanskrit was the
original root. Hindi
is to Hindustani as
the old Langue d'Oil
is to French. Again,
Hindustani is only
one of the seven
Aryan languages
spoken in Northern
India. The other
six are the Punjabi,
the Sindhi, the Gu-
jarati, the Mahratti,
the Bangali, and the
Oriya. So if we reck-
on as Hindus only
those whose vernacular is Hindustani, we
Ethnic and lin- shall find them occupying a
If U ;S C H7ndu nS territory of about two hun-
peoples. dred and fifty thousand
square miles, reaching from the Gandak
on the east to the Sutlej on the west,
and from the Himalayas to the Vindhya
range.
It will already have become clear to
PEASANTS OF THE DOAB TYPES.
Drawn by Einile Bayard, from a photograph.
the mind of the reader that generaliza-
tions with regard to peo- Difficulty of gen.
pies so widely dispersed SSSKSf
and so differently developed populations,
as those of India are wellnigh impossible.
Beginning with differences of person
724
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
and running through the whole gamut
of human attributes, there is. so great
diversity that only a few general out-
lines of the Hindu character can be pre-
sented with anything like accuracy. In
f
if
ft *t
' %
$ ff .
f
i TC ftrg^ WRT f%
SPECIMEN PAGE OF HINDI BOOK.
mere physical characteristics the gener-
alization is especially difficult. Personal
descriptions of the Hindus are as old as
the first contact of the Greek race with
that remote region of the world. The
astute observers such as Nearchus
who followed the army of Alexander, or
rather constituted a part of it, in the
great campaign into the valley of the
Indus, were as shrewd in their kind and
hardly less fertile in descriptive ability
than were the savants who ac-
companied Napoleon on his
invasion of Egypt.
The results were similar in
both instances. Macedonia in
the one case and France in the
Other Was en- Brahmans and
Sudras repre-
riched with a sent extremes
- . of Hindu devel-
great store of in- O pment.
formation drawn from the old
and abandoned mines of the
East. The Hindus of to-day
are the same in personal ap-
pearance as they were in the
days when they were described
by the invading Greeks. This
view is more true of the Brah-
mans than of the lower castes.
The representations in the old
Indian sculpture preserve the
identical figure, the form, the
features, and much of the ap-
parel of the modern descend-
ant of the Old Aryans. The
Hindus, then, are of middle
size. From this stature the
Brahmans depart in one direc-
tion and the Sudras in an-
other. That is, the Brahmans
are fully up to or beyond the
average height, while the Su-
dras and other lower caste peo-
ples are below that standard
much below it. Ethnogra-
phers have estimated the aver-
age height of the Hindus, considered as
a race, at one hundred and sixty-three
centimeters, or sixty-four inches in
English measure. This, perhaps, is a
little above the average of the Japa-
nese.
726
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
Sus ; the**
color -
The bodily organs of the Hindu are
symmetrical, but light. The limbs are
Bodily charac- often delicate, so slender
^deed as to suggest weak-
ness according to the stal-
wart Western criterion. As the traveler
passes from the plains into the hill-
countries, however, he comes upon more
vigorous tribes. In Rajputana, and other
districts similarly situated, the average
height is greater and the bodily weight
and strength are augmented. The com-
plexion varies from almost white,
through dark yellow, to bronze, or even
to a sooty black. The last-named color
is always indicative of foreign admix-
ture, the absorption of that Old Dravid-
ian stock which contributed the abo-
rigines. There is a general intensifica-
tion of the skin pigment as we proceed
from the north to the south, from the
mountain spurs to the burning coasts of
Southern India. To the latter influence,
that of climate, some ethnologists have
been disposed to attribute the whole
variation of color. It is true that among
the Dravidians themselves, that is, the
old population, so far as it is preserved
in anything like ethnic purity, consider-
able diversities of color appear. Some
Dravidian women are said to be almost
white, but on the whole the race is
dark-hued, so much so as to have fur-
nished the larger part of the intenser
color to the southern divisions of the
Aryan population.
The Hindus have preserved the
straight or wavy and glossy black hair
which the Old Aryans
Special features
brought down from the of head and
highlands. The abundant count
beard is also well preserved in the
descendants of the ancient stock. The
habit of the country is to shave, except
as to the upper lip, and tonsure of the
head is common with the men, only a
few curls being preserved at the poll
and on the temples. Classified by the
shape of the skull, the Hindus are meso-
cephalic; that is, the head is medium
between the long-skull and the short-
skull type of cranial development. The
face is oval. The forehead is open, and
indicative of good perceptions. It is
rare to see in India a contracted and
corrugated brow. Hindu eyes are large,
dark colored, brown, or black. The
eyebrows are curved into two arches.
The nose is rather after the pattern
called Roman, having not infrequently
the aquiline contour which gives an im-
perious expression to the countenance.
But this haughty feature is developed
principally among the Brahmans.
XLII. ARCHITECTURE, MANNERS, Gov
ERNMENT.
F we look at the objec-
tive forms which are
the expression of the
ideal life of the Hin-
dus, we shall find much
of interest some
things to admire.
Doubtless the most conspicuous fact in
which the ideal life of man is expressed
is architecture. It stands, as we have
seen, in .the triple category of necessities,
the other two being food and clothing;
but inasmuch as man is more than an
animal, his shelter is more than a house.
From the mere physical fact of shelter,
the abode of the human race rises rap-
idly into higher forms ; and elegance is
added to necessary structure.
THE INDICANS. ARCHITECTURE.
727
The Hindus have been immemorially
noted for the extreme elaboration and ex-
travagant taste exhibited in their build-
India. The style in general is Oriental.
Flat roofs are the prevailing form, with
projecting balconies and verandas. The
INDIAN ARCHITECTURE FLAT-ROOF STRUCTURE. BAZAAR OF KHOJA SYND. Drawn by H. Clerget.
ings ; and the same is true of their plastic
arts. The traveler must needs feel him-
self in the western twilight of the Orient
as he begins to scan the architecture of
name of the latter is from the Hindu
vocabulary, and both the fact and the
word have been carried into all Western
nations. In connection with the Hindu
728
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
residence is nearly always found a gar-
den, and in this is displayed the same kind
Extreme eiabo- of elaborate taste which
find in the permanent
architecture of the coun-
try. The arbor, the trellis, the curious
mndu a f rcJi e tec.
ture -
INDIAN ARCHITECTURE ELABORATION OF ORNAMENT GOPURAM.
Drawn by F. Regamey, from the original.
grotto, and many other parts of the gar-
dener's art are only the details of the
larger architectural art which has been
developed by the Indian builders.
It is in the nature of warm climates to
put the people much out of doors. The
same fact gives lightness to all classes
of structure ; but in a coun- Lightness of
try subject to storms, $,
strength as well as light- outdoor life,
ness must be consulted. Of the common
and low - caste
Hindus, the
houses are plain
and simple in
design. In these
the idea of shel-
ter is predom-
inant over what
in the higher
grades of soci-
ety becomes or-
namentati o n
and elegance. It
should be said,
however, that
the style of liv-
ing among the
rich, even Brah-
mans of the
highest rank, is
more simple
than am o ng
Western peoples
of like wealth
and magnificent
tastes.
The ancient
architecture and
sculpture of In-
dia may almost
take rank with
that of Egypt,
if not for abun-
dance, at least
for majesty. It
is not the place to give an extended
account of the old temples
r . The isle and
of the country, but an il- cavern of
- - Elephanta.
lustration may be drawn,
once for all, from the famous isle and
THE INDICANS. ARCHITECTURE.
729
cavern of Elephanta. This island is
situated about seven miles from Bom-
bay. Within it are found the remains
of those celebrated Hindu sculptures
and excavations which have preserved
to us the best notion of the ancient
art of the race. Near the shore stands
a colossal statue of the elephant from
which the name Elephanta was given
.Unfortunately, many of the effigies of
Elephanta have been mutilated or de-
stroyed by the Portuguese vandals and
the Mohammedan zealots of later times.
Some of the statues, however, have been
tolerably well preserved.
f Effigies of th->
In the center of the cavern Hindu gods in
is the colossal bust of the
Trimurti, or Hindu Trinity: Brahma,
MARRIAGE OF SIVA AND PARV ATI. -From the cave of Elephanta.
to the island by the Portuguese navi-
gators. A short distance from the huge
effigy is the entrance to the cavern.
The same is about sixty feet in width
and eighteen feet high. The pillars of
support are cut out of the native rock.
In the sides of the cavern are hewn
many compartments which were dedi-
cated as shrines to the old Hindu gods.
M. Vol. i 47
Vishnu, and Siva. Some scholars, how-
ever, have in recent times decided that
the triune figure is not intended for
Brahma and Vishnu at all, but only to
express the threefold aspect of Siva, the
' ' Destroyer. " The heads of the effigy are
six feet in height, and the features have
much of the majesty and repose peculiar
to the sphinxes of Egypt. Critics, how-
THE INDICANS. ARCHITECTURE.
731
ever, have noted an unpleasing expres-
sion of the underlip, which seems to be
too animal or faun-like for the deity.
Egyptian analogies are also discoverable
in the headdresses, which are ornament-
ed. In the hand of one of the gods is a
cobra de capello, and on the cap are set
a human skull and an infant. Doubt-
less here we have an allegory of life and
death in the infant and the skull and of
the destroying agent by which the one
becomes the other, in the serpent. Siva
was the destroyer. Perhaps the cobra
was his principal abettor.
On either side of the Trimurti stands
the figure of a man leaning on a dwarf.
To the right is a cavity hollowed in the
wall, in which are a great number of
mythological figures, the principal one
being a double image of Siva and Par-
vati, an effigy half male and half female.
To the right also is the four-faced statue
of Brahma reclining on a lotus. It is
one of the rare images of the supreme
Hindu deity now preserved in India.
Perhaps there is no space of like dimen-
sions in the vaults, grottoes, or caverns
of the world of so great interest to the
antiquary as is the cave of Elephanta.
As a field for the study of Indian archi-
tecture in general, the district and city
Agra the best of Agra, in the Northwest
SilSTESi- provinces are, perhaps,
tecture. the best of all in the coun-
try. The remains of old-time splendor,
however, are not so ancient as the sculp-
tures just referred to. The city of Agra
is on the Jumna river, in latitude
27 n' north. It was the old native
capital of the province. Until 1803 it
was held by the Mahrattas, but at that
time was taken by the British army, un-
der Lord Lake.
Three structures within the city of
Agra are known for their architectural
beauty and grandeur. The first of these
is the old palace of the native princes.
It has a great court within, five hundred
feet by three hundred and
, . The old palace
seventy feet in dimensions, of the native
The approaches to the princes>
court are by arcades and gateways of the
greatest beauty and Oriental splendor.
The hall of the palace is two hundred
and eight feet by seventy-six feet in di-
mensions, and to this are adjoined two
smaller courts, one of which was former-
ly the private audience chamber of the
nabob and the other his harem. In Agra
also is the celebrated pearl mosque, the
most elegant specimen of Mohammedan
architecture in all India. The dimen-
sions of the ground plan are two hundred
and thirty-five by one hundred and nine-
ty feet. The court is a rectangle one
hundred and fifty-five feet square. The
courtyard is the center of interest. It is
wholly of white marble, from the pave-
ment to the dome. In design the pearl
mosque is similar to the mosque of Dehli.
The structure is noted for the absence of
elaboration. A single inscription from
the Koran, inlaid with black marble as a
frieze, is the principal piece of sculpture
in connection with the edifice.
But the most remarkable example of
the building skill of India is the great
Taj built in Agra by the character of the
Emperor Shah Jehan in
honor of his beautiful wife, Mahal.
Mumtaza Mahal. Here the empress and
himself are buried. The building is,
like the mosque, of white marble. It is
surmounted by four tall minarets. The
ground plan is a terrace, also of marble.
The whole parallelogram, including the
gardens and court, are eighteen hundred
and sixty feet by one thousand feet in di-
mensions. The approaches are by arcades
and magnificent gateways, the principal
of which measures one hundred and ten
feet in width by on hundred and forty
732
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
feet in height. Through this the trav-
eler passes from the court to the garden.
The tomb proper stands on an elevated
platform eighteen feet in height. It is
faced in every part with white marble,
and is three hundred and thirteen feet
square. At each corner stands a mina-
ret one hundred and thirty-three feet in
height. The mausoleum is in the cen-
DRESS OF THE HINDUS PRINCESS OF AGRA.
ter on a marble platform. It is one hun-
dred and eighty-six feet square, but the
corners are cut off by sections thirty-
three feet in extent. Over the mausoleum
rises a dome fifty-eight feet in diameter
and eighty feet in height. It is doubtful
whether any other emperor and empress
who have ruled barbaric millions have
had a more splendid tomb.
The dress and personal ornaments of
the Hindus are now well known to West-
ern peoples. Story and pictorial art
have conspired to make familiar the
bodily vesture and decoration of the In-
dian races. The materials
. Dress and per-
Of fabrication for apparel sonal ornament!
11 of the Hindus.
are generally linen, cotton,
silk. The style of garment is Oriental.
The costume of the men and the women
differs in degree rather than in kind.
The High Brahmans wear drapery rather
than clothes. The Kshatriyas gather
their garments about them with a belt.
Everything is loosely worn. The Su-
dras, especially in the south, are but
slightly clad, a large part of the person
being exposed. In the schools and other
assemblies the upper part of the body
of the pupil is naked ; and in the house-
hold and on the streets there is much
exposure, but without vulgarity.
The dyeing of the hair and the beard
is a common adjunct to effect in dress.
It is customary to color red the nails
of the fingers and toes. The eyelashes
and eyebrows are dyed black with anti-
mony. The fan is much used by both
men and women, but not so universally
as in Japan. Ornaments are profuse.
Necklaces, bracelets, and earrings are
universal. Flowers and pearls are worn
in the hair. The ears and the septum of
the nostrils are pierced to receive jewels
and other pendant ornaments. Tattoo-
ing is but slightly practiced, but the
features are frequently painted with
marks and stripes across the brows,
between the eyes, and on the neck.
These marks constitute a kind of totem,
distinguishing one caste from another.
In India there is great diversity in the
manner of marriage. Each religion or
Superstition gives its Own Ceremonies of
inflection to the ceremony. 5^,
In one respect the usage woman,
is common, and that is the early age at
which the woman is marriageable. At
twelve or thirteen she is regarded as fit for
MANNERS OF THE HINDUS. RECEPTION AT THE COURT OF THE BEGUM. Drawn by A. de Neuville.
734
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
the wedded relation and for maternity.
The oldest ceremonial required that the
man take the woman by the hand and
walk around an altar with her. Perhaps
this still remains the fundamental idea
in the nuptial union. The woman after
marriage remains as she was before, a
dependent of man. There is here a con-
flict between the Old Aryan recognition
of the nobility, if not the equality, of
woman and the Oriental view which
holds her as a slave, a chattel. The
Hindu woman has much more respect
and honor than she of China, but is by
no means the equal of the man. She is
not wholly secluded in the house, but
may go forth after marriage. In gen-
eral, she is treated with respect. The
almost universal aboriginal usage of
giving presents to the bride's parents by
the husband, as in purchase of her, is
still maintained. It is in evidence that
polyandry was much in vogue in ancient
times, and polygamy is now frequent,
particularly in those provinces where
Islam is in the ascendant. The entrance
of strangers into acquaintance and com-
pany with Indian women is strictly in-
hibited, and it has been with great
difficulty that a knowledge of the manner
of life of the Hindu household has been
obtained by any alien.
The reader will have already perceived
the general distribution of the Hindus
_ f over the larger part of
Extent of race . 3 *
interfusion in India and their interfusion
Hindustan. . , , - ,_.
with other peoples. The
race has extended north, south, east, and
west, to the limits of the mountains and
the sea. In Nepal, in the very shadow
of the Himalayas, they are found associ-
ated with the Gurungs, the Magars, the
Murmis, and many other races. In
this region, however, it is the low-caste
Hindus rather than the Brahmans that
are mixed among the Nepalese. Further
on in Assam the census shows nearly
two million of Hindus, but they are, as
in Nepal, of the lower order. It appears
that Hinduism in this region made its
way first among the kings and nobility.
That is, the higher Assamese cultivated
Hinduism as a faith, but the great mass
of Hindus in Assam have been imported
as laborers, to work in the tea gardens
and in other pursuits of serfdom.
This peasant class has, nevertheless,
attained to a fair degree of home life
and competency. The Hindu popula-
tion has improved under
Particular fea-
British rule, and the char- tures of certain
acter of the people has been
greatly elevated since the last century.
The Assamese are not very much dis-
tinguished from the Bergalese and
Hindus in appearance. The person of
the former is shorter and more robust,
but the native is not so lithe and active
as the Hindu. As already remarked,
the Chinese type, that is the Thibeto-
Chinese, has infected all the races of
farther India, and the flat face, high
cheek bones, and general physiognomy
of the Assamese tells unmistakably the
story of an influence from beyond the
Himalayas.
Also into Burmah the Hindus have
made their way, but not in so great
numbers as in Assam. Here the lan-
guage and the general character of the
people is properly Indo- Grading off of
Chinese; and the race der-
ivation from beyond still
more strongly than in Assam discrimi-
nates the ethnic type from that of Bengal.
The census of 1872 gives a population
for the whole of Burmah of two million
seven hundred and forty thousand, or an
average of thirty-one to the square mile.
Of these, the vast preponderance are
Buddhists. The Mohammedans num-
ber about a hundred thousand, and the
THE INDICANS. SUPERSTITIONS.
735
Hindus only thirty-six thousand. Of
the whole number, one hundred and ten
thousand are still classified as aborigines.
It is probable that India presents a
greater variety of superstitions in an in-
tenser form than any other country of
Extent and va- the world. Except in the
lower districts of heathen-
ism, such as South Africa
furnishes, the general fact called super-
stition has relaxed its hold somewhat
riety of the
Hindu super-
stitions.
declining, losing its dominion and power
over the mind of man. To this general
fact India is somewhat exceptional. The
peculiar tendencies of the Indian mind
under the influence and discipline of
Brahmanism have been unfavorable to
the reception and dissemination of sci-
entific knowledge. The Indian mind
furnishes an example of a comparatively
high development in abstract thought,
in the ability to generalize and deduce
conclusions from established concepts
and premises. The inferential power
of the human intellect as it is displayed
in these countries is not to be despised,
but the inductive method of inquiry has
never found footing among them. The
disposition to scrutinize and question
the processes of the material world and
to find out the laws which govern nature
has not appeared, and the old supersti-
tions of paganism continue to prevail.
These are manifest in almost every
department of life. There are a thou-
sand SUperstitioUS beliefs Amulets and
charms; super-
respecting food. Amulets stitious beliefs
, , ,. respecting the
and charms and talismans dead.
are worn to protect the person and life
from harm. The image of an ances-
SUPERSTITIONS OF THE HINDUS. AMULETS TAKEN FROM THE BODY OF TIPPU SAIB.
upon the human mind. It is now clearly
perceived that superstitious beliefs and
practices can not coexist with scientific
knowledge. We have already seen that
the peculiarity of the recent ages is the
rapid extension of the knowledge of the
laws by which the phenomena of the
material world are governed. This is
equivalent to saying that superstition is
tor is swung about the neck in confi-
dent trust that the paternal spirit will
follow his image and guard his descend-
ant who wears it. One of the most strik-
ing superstitions relates to the dead.
There is an abhorrent fear of all places
where dead bodies have been brought or
deposited. Even where cremation is
employed, the spot on which the cere-
736
GREAT -RACES OF MANKIND.
mony is performed becomes a terror to
all who approach it ; and the small build-
ings in which the ashes are stored are
avoided as children would avoid an old
ruin haunted by evil spirits. A like
f.
HINDU FAKIR, CARRYING CIRCLETS OF IRON ABOUT
HIS NECK.
Drawn by Emile Bayard, from a photograph.
fear possesses the Indian mind with re-
spect to darkness. The night is dreaded.
They who are willing to expose them-
selves like good soldiers in the hazards
of battle, and who stand up against the
enemy with a fair degree of courage,
tremble with the coming of night.
Doubtless it is the association in their
mind of the facts of darkness and death
that have made both appalling.
In common with the Oriental nations,
the Hindus have a veneration for the
dead. If they do not positively worship
their ancestors in the man-
. Shrines and ef-
ner of the Egyptians, they figies to the de-
at least erect small tern- partedt
pies to the fathers, and within these are
placed pieces of wood on which are drawn
images of the departed. The masses of
the people have perhaps never been able
to grasp the idea of the universal Brah-
ma as the supreme God of the world,
and as a result, they have fallen through
the intermediate stages of polytheism
into idolatry.
The superstitions of India, in part
religious and in part merely mytholog-
ical, are strikingly mani- superstition the
fested in all ranks of so- S^^f 1
ciety. Beliefs and Fakirs.
practices having their origin in super-
stition have prevailed to the extent of
creating whole classes of the Hindus
sufficiently numerous to populate a king-
dom. Thus, for example, the Moham-
medan mendicants, widely distributed
through all the Islamite countries, and
known as Fakirs, have been recruited
not on the basis of race, but on the lines
of their peculiar and degrading super-
stitions. Of this great order of devotee
vagabonds there are more than a mil-
lion in India. They wander from place
to place about the towns, villages, and
countryside, constituting a pauper class,
everywhere present and everywhere il-
lustrating in their beggary and usages
the combined results of race deteriora-
tion and superstitious fanaticism.
In some respects, however, the beliefs
and practices of the Hindus are merito-
rious. They believe in cleanliness, in
THE INDICANS.RISE OF ROYALTY.
737
washings of the body, in what may be
called personal purity. The Brahmans
Hinduism re- en join the conquest of sen-
soTe^eL^and a\ity as a part of that vir-
practices. tue by which the soul may
find eternal rest. The devotee is en-
couraged to master earthly thoughts and
mere human affections as obstacles in the
way of his perfection. All of this tends
of course to asceticism, with its accompa-
nying follies and vices ; but it is probably
true that the sages of India have reached
as high a degree of self-mastery as any
other devotees to the dogma of the mor-
tification of the body as a means of eter-
nal happiness.
Chieftainship was a part of the original
structure of the Aryan race. It may not
be known whether this fact in the or-
oid Indian ganization of the primitive
1. P e P le was developed in
petty royalty. the old household of the
race, or whether it came forth as a
concomitant circumstance of migration.
Certain it is that migrating tribes must
have their chiefs, their headmen, who
lead and direct and take the responsibil-
ity. This chief tainship would inevitably
take on the character of a military cap-
taincy. The migration would traverse
hostile grounds. There would be the
clash of moving people with the aborig-
ines and the conflict with other tribes in
motion. He who could best control the
action of barbaric battle would have great
reputation. He would be a hero while
the migration continued, and a prince as
soon as the tribe had settled into per-
manent abodes. Such is the genesis of
the half-military and half-royal petty
kinglets whose figures are seen rising
above the confusion and strife of the his-
torical dawn.
We have already seen that in the coun-
tries possessed by the Indian races the
Vedic bard, in the first place, and the
Brahman priest afterwards, accompanied
the chieftain who led the tribe, and
invoked the deities to his sympathy of the
aid in battle and conquest.
The spectacle in the In- caste -
dian valleys, as we discover it in the far
twilight of history, is somewhat similar
to that which reappeared in the feudal
ages in Western Europe, when the
priest of Rome kept himself at the side
of the barbarian chieftain until the latter
was transformed into a feudal baron.
So in India ; with this difference, how-
ever, that the Brahman and the military
chief were in that country of the same
race and kindred. The union, therefore,
of religious dogma with barbarian state-
craft would be more intimate and friend-
ly in India than in the West. The as-
cendency of the priest would also be
more fatal to the natural evolution of
political power and the establishment of
secular forms of government in a coun-
try where the chieftain sympathized by
kinship with the priest, than in lands
where they two were in antagonism.
This was one of the leading causes of
the miserable condition into which the
political institutions of India fell at an
early age, and in which they have ever
since continued.
After the military chieftain in a bar-
barous age, leader and defender of a
wandering tribe, has passed, by the set-
tled residence Of his people, Primogeniture
into a prince, having a court
and a retinue and even
the beginnings of an administrative sys-
tem, he must provide for the continu-
ance of his rank, his reputation, his
government. This is most easily and
naturally done by transmitting it to
his son. The priest would encourage
this tendency ; for the counselor of the
father would have a favorable situation
for influence with the descendant. He-
r- v-
"Y\-
1NDIAN T PRINCE TYPE. THE MAHARAJAH OF GWALIOR. Drawn by A. de Neuville.
THE 1NDICANS. GOVERNMENT.
739
redity would thus become a natural ele-
ment in the system, and primogeniture
would follow as a secondary suggestion.
All of these facts have appeared in the
political structure of India, and in the
order named.
The government of the Indian princes
has been an absolutism from the earliest
ages. Everything has conspired to make
Absolutism of the native prince a des-
SaJSSS 11 * P ot > and to Perpetuate the
princes. despotism in his family.
The right of the Indian nabob to tax his
subjects for the support of the govern-
ment and to supply the means of war
rests with himself. Any part of the
private property of the people, from one
twelfth to one fourth of the same he
may take as a revenue, without responsi-
bility. In the same way he may enlist
his subjects into the army. Custom has
prescribed that those who serve in war
-shall be recompensed by a gift of land.
In former times only the Kshatriyas
were summoned for military duty. The
other castes were permitted to pursue
.the vocations of peace without disturb-
ance.
As to the methods of warfare, they
were rude and traditional. The Indian
Rude methods weaponry was the same as
of f i r e t ;USe that employed by all half-
phants. barbarous peoples. Until
modern times bows and arrows, clubs,
discuses, spears, swords, shields, and
war chariots were the armor, offensive
and defensive, of the native soldiery.
These were never entirely supplanted
until the establishment of the British
East Indian empire. From time im-
memorial the elephant has been used in
war. It may be frankly confessed that
until the artillery of modern times was
leveled against him he was one of the
most formidable engines ever seen on a
battlefield. From the days of Porus to
the days of Nana Sahib the enemy had
cause to look with dread on the huge
monster as he raged in the conflict, bear-
ing, as in a tower, his company of sol-
diers, and bringing down his tremen-
dous trunk, like the fall of a Norway
pine, upon half a legion at a blow.
All the conditions, social, civil, and re-
ligious, in the Indian countries have con-
spired to engender a su- superstitious
perstitious veneration for prlncesand r
princes and rulers. As rulers,
among other ancient Oriental peoples,
the king, the nabob, is regarded as half-
divine. He is the representative of the
unseen powers, and is responsible to
them for his conduct. He is their equal
and companion, and his right to rule is
from on high. Against a prince thus
hedged about with that divinity which
accompanies kings, insurrection is re-
garded as most wicked and dangerous,
and the punishment of disloyalty is al-
ways to the uttermost.
It were exceedingly difficult, if not
impossible, to present a satisfactory ex-
hibit of the distribution of the various
races in India. We have now given a
sketch of some of the leading elements
of the political, social, and religious
structure of the country; but much
would remain if an accurate delineation
should be attempted of the relations and
tendencies of the various parts of Indian
society.
The Hindus, to whom the foregoing
pages have been devoted, constitute the
leading element, the most
General view of
widely distributed popula- race conditions
tion of India. Perhaps a
sketch of the condition of affairs in Ben-
gal may serve as an illustration of the
status existing in all the provinces and
governments. Within this country there
is an aggregation of peoples of diverse
ethnic origin, speaking different Ian-
SOLTHERS OF THE RAJAH OF BARODA TYPES. Drawn by E:
THE INDICANS. GOVERNMENT.
741
Aggregate of
subjects under
the provincial
government.
guages. They represent eras of devel-
opment as far apart as the earliest ages
of history and the present day. These
diversities exist in religious thought and
practices, in political ideas, in race pro-
clivities, and in
every aspect of na-
tionality.
According to the
census of 1872 Ben-
gal, which then in-
cluded the province
of As-
s a m ,
had a
population of sixty-
six million eight
hundred and fif-
ty-six thousand
eight hundred and
fifty-nine, being
fully equal to that
of the entire United
States at the present
time. We thus have
the remarkable spec-
tacle of a lieutenant
governor sent out
from London, a dis-
tance of six thou-
sand miles, to pre-
side over a conge-
ries of nations far
exceeding the entire
population of the
United Kingdom of
Great Britain and
Ireland! The ele-
ments under this government and Ben-
gal was only one of many provinces un-
der British dominion were so diversified
and contradictory as to make a govern-
mental problem which no nation other
than England would have had the polit-
ical courage to undertake or the skill to
solve.
The people thus aggregated presented
every type of the human evolution, from
sheer barbarism and the grossest forms
of superstition to a high degree of human
enlightenment. Educated native noble-
GROUP OF HINDU WEAPONS OF WAR.
men from Bengal, full of the skeptical
spirit of modern times, have The Hindus pre-
come to London as dip- of^hehuman^ 9
lomats, have sat in the evolution,
clubs of that metropolis, and delivered
speeches at public dinners among law-
yers, bishops, and statesmen as skillful
at fence, as witty, and almost as schol-
THE INDICANS. ISOLATED RACES.
743
arJy as they, while at the same time
barbarous chieftains of their own race,
in their own country, were sacrificing
idiots and paupers on hilltops in order
to make sure of the political advantages
which the noblemen had gone to Lon-
don to plead for ! So great is the diversity
of development among the Hindus.
These people, viewed as a whole, are
most largely descended from the Aryan
Linguistic affin- stock. Their languages
rlacciral anrl ^rano-p
are ciassicai > ana > Sirange
to say, are more nearly in
analogy with the current English tongue
than are the Highland dialects of Scot-
land or the broken speech of Wales!
Of the sixty-six million of Bengalese,
forty-two and a half million are classi-
ities; striking
features of the
British rule.
fied as Hindus ; and of the remainder,
about twenty and a half million are
Mohammedans. The British lieuten-
ant governor has thus under his sway
in the single province of Bengal a larger
Mohammedan population than that ruled
by the Sultan of Turkey ! Besides the
two great peoples, the Hindus and the
Islamites, a small percentage of other
Indian races is diffused throughout the
country, and to this must be added the
Europeans, notably the English, who
have sat down at Calcutta under a May
and June temperature of one hundred
and ten degrees F. to control and
direct a mass of nations numerically in
excess of all the other subjects of the
queen.
CHAPTER
. ISOLATED RACES
ASPECTS.
T remains to notice
briefly one or two addi-
tional Indian families
less widely known than
the great races already
described. In the west-
ern part of the country,
on the slopes of the Hindu- Kush, are
the Daradas, or Dards, and further to
the west another people called the Sijah-
Posh. The latter word signifies " black
coats," because the men are mostly clad,
as to their outer garments, in black
hides. To these people the Moham-
medans give the name of Kaffirs, or In-
fidels. It is believed that they migrated
into India from Kandahar in Afghan-
istan.
We have among these extreme races
the same dialectical differences, the same
peculiarities, which belong to the other
branches of the Indie family. These
mountaineers are larger in person and
of finer build than are the people of
the Punjab, or even their
Distribution and
old kinsfolk the Afghans, character of
r. 1 i . i the Kaffirs.
They have light .skin,
blue eyes, and blonde hair. They are
more warlike than the people in the
valleys of the. Indus and the Ganges.
They have an extreme aversion to the
Mohammedans; and it is one of the
tests of good citizenship to have slain
one of the followers of the Prophet.
Whenever this feat has been accom-
plished the slayer henceforth wears a
feather in commemoration of his deed,
and allows his hair to grow long.
In other respects the Kaffirs are like
the Hindus. They offer sacrifices of
cows and goats, and have ceremonies
and feasts in honor of the gods, who are
both male and female, according to the
Indian theory. Like the greater races.
744
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
they venerate the souls of their ances-
tors. Amusements are popular, and
music and dancing are cultivated to a
high degree.
Perhaps after dispersed Israel, the
Gypsies are the most remarkable people
Anomalous in the world in their dis-
rn a t C h e ee f thS SieS tribution into foreign lands,
scheme. Their name has been
given to them by other peoples, who
habit of life has carried them into all
quarters of the globe. Their dispersion
among the Western nations began with
the fourteenth century, and has extended
to the present time.
It is believed that the Gypsies were
originally of the Pariah, or Sudra, caste ,
that is, the lowest order of Indian soci-
ety. Their dialects have certainly been
derived from Hindustani, but each tribe
AGRICULTURAL LIFE IN INDIA. GHADDIS CULTIVATORS. Drawn by E. Zier, from a photograph by E. Bourne.
have supposed them to be of Egyptian
origin. They do not call themselves
Gypsies, but Rom, or Romany. The ver-
nacular Sinte is always employed by
them as their own ethnic epithet, and
in this it is easy to perceive the word
Sindh. Doubtless the original seat of
the Gypsies was in the valley of the
Lower Indus, whence their migratory
of Gypsies has adopted parts of the vo-
cabulary and even of the grammatical
structure of the languages The race orig-
spoken in the countries of S^
their sojourn. Perhaps no class of Hindus,
people in the world have to a like degree
incorporated into their own speech so
much of other languages ; and the incor-
porated parts remain without assimila-
THE INDICANS. ISOLATED RACES,
745
tion. Leland, in his work on the Eng-
lish Gypsies and Their Language, has
given examples of the mongrel speech
employed by these wanderers. The
following two proverbs will suffice to
illustrate the gross deterioration of the
Gypsy tongue :
" A cloudy sala often piirabens to a fino
" A cloudy morning often changes to a fine
diwus."
day."
" It's sitn to a choomer, ktishtt for kek till
" It's like a kiss, good for nothing until
it's pordered atween dui."
it is divided between two."
By some Gypsy tribes their own lan-
guage has been better preserved, and
few traces of the speech of the country
in which they chance to
Features of the
Gypsy language be sojourning can be found
illustrated. . ,-,
in their current expres-
sions. The following paragraph from a
Welsh Gypsy story will illustrate the
character of the speech when free from
English admixture:
'' Yeker a dot ses bearengaro ta waver store
" Once there were (a) sailor and other four
morsh ; yek ses peltanengaro, ta ow vaver ses
men; one was (a) blacksmith, and the other was
koramangaro, ta stvamangaro, to pallano ses
(a) soldier, and (a) tailor, and the last was
kirchtmackaro. Ow bearengaro potchedas e
(an) innkeeper. The sailor asked the
peltanengaro te vel apra ow doreav. Ow pelta-
blacksmith to come on the sea. The black-
nengaro pendas, ' Nau shorn te ja te kerra boottee.'
smith said, ' No (I) am to go to do work.'
' So se tero boottee ?' ' Te tasarra sastarn,'
1 What is thy work ? ' 'To heat iron,'
chotchy ow peltanengaro, ' ta te kerravles undra
quoth the blacksmith, 'and to make it into
chichaw grengey' "
shoes for horses.' "
The ethnic classification of the Gypsies
was long a puzzling question. The most
skillful scholars were at fault in attempt-
M. Vol. 148
ing to fix their place. Here again, how-
ever, language furnishes the clue. The
course of the Gypsies on Language fur-
their way to Europe and ***
the West can be accurately tion -
traced by the admixture of foreign words
which they have brought along with
them. The oldest element thus incor-
porated with the Gypsy language is Per-
sian ; after that, Armenian, and so on to
the West. Doubtless a few bands of this
vagrant people have come into Europe
from Egypt, but their sojourn in that
country must have been brief, for no
tribe has been found speaking a language
in which there were traces of Arabic, as
would have been the case if they had
tarried long in Egypt or other parts of
Northern Africa.
Much investigation has been given to
the Gypsies as a people. Traces of them
have been found west of the Bosphorus
as early as the ninth cen- Apparition of
tury, but their presence in g^Ind" in
Europe is uncertain until America,
the year 1 346, when Catharine of Valois
granted to the chiefs of Corfu the right
to reduce to serfdom certain Homines
Vageniti, or vagrants, who had come into
the country. This same people pitched
its tents along the Danube as early as
1417. In 1422 it was estimated that four-
teen thousand of them had reached Italy.
In August, 1427, a band numbering a
hundred and twenty came to Paris,
representing themselves as fugitives
from the Saracens in Egypt. It is
doubtless from this circumstance that
the name Gypsy has been applied to the
race. In 1530 they had become so numer-
ous in England that Henry VIII issued a
proclamation against them. In nearly
every country of Western Europe stat-
utes were enacted to prevent the incom-
ing of Gypsies and to expel those who
already arrived.
746
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
At the present time it is estimated
that Europe contains about seven hun-
Deveiopment of dred thousand of this race.
America. j n to the two Americas,
into the islands of the sea, into Austra-
lia. Everywhere their character is the
BENJARI GYPSIES TYPES.
Drawn by A. de Neuville, from a photograph.
same. The form, the features, the man-
ner of life and character of the Gypsies
are repeated in all places where their
tents or huts are found. The physiog-
nomy is plainly Asiatic. The Gypsy
face is the best representation to be seen
west of the Atlantic of the face of the
Hindu. The complexion is tawny:
eyes black, glancing quidkly to right and
left, black hair, cheek bones high and
prominent, lower jaw Slightly project-
ing, mouth small, and teeth white and
even. It is not uncommon to see among
Gypsy women and girls figures and fea-
tures that Would be consid-
ered beautiful by the most
critical judgment of West-
ern peoples.
The character of the
Gypsy race is bad in the
last degree. Mendicant and
Both men thievin e cl ' ar -
1 acterofthe
and women race -
are usually degraded. It
is not, however, charged
that they have licentious
habits. They are addicted
to every sharp practice by
which rogues and thieves
obtain property that is not
their own. They are con-
scienceless, and are un-
acquainted with religious
obligation. It has been de-
clared by some scholars in
language that there is no
Gypsy word for soul or im-
mortality or God. They
pretend to the fortune tell-
er's lore and to skill in
palmistry, and to every
other species of magic,
from card-playing to the
black art of the Middle
Ages.
Fixedness is the great cen-
tral fact in the constitution of India. All
of the races inhabiting that vast country
or emanating therefrom be-
Fixedness the
tray in their beliefs and central fact in
j Hindu life.
practices the unaltered con-
ditions of a former life. While the West-
ern Aryans, as we shall see hereafter,
748
GREAT RACES OF MANKIXD.
have been almost infinitely inflected in
their development, the Indie branch of
the race fell at an early age into estab-
lished forms, to amend or alter which
has been regarded as innovation and
sacrilege.
In this respect India may be ranked
with the Egypt that was and the China
that is. Doubtless the Hamites in an-
Comparisons cient Egyptian society were
SfaSTS"^ more fixed in a s iven s -
Chinese. c i a i structure, less subject
to fluctuation and evolution into new
forms, than are the Indie races of to-day.
The Chinese also, who change not at all
from generation to generation, who re-
gard all movement or progress from the
old and approved constitution of things
as a useless and dangerous departure
from the best attainable standard, are
doubtless an intenser form of social com-
pleteness and conservatism than are the
Hindus. But as compared with the
flexibility and progressive tendencies of
all the Western peoples the nations of
India are in the strongest contrast.
It is impossible now to tell for how
long a time even the details of every-
Preservation day life, the circumstances
of manners and dress, the
rules of caste, and the
laws of social propriety have remained
unaltered. The styles of personal adorn-
ment described in the oldest records of
the race are still patterned and repeated
by the Indian jewelers. The ornament
has been immemorially regulated by
rank. Even wealth and profusion have
not been able to pass the prescribed lim-
its of form. The law books of Manu
fixed the limits and the details of caste
and determined the paraphernalia of
each. All descendants of Aryans should
wear the sacred cord around the person.
The cord must pass over the left and
under the right shoulder, and be placed
there when the wearer was initiated into
his caste. The cord of the Brahman
should be composed of three cotton
threads. The Kshatriyas, or warrior
caste, had also a threefold cord, but the
strands were of hemp ; and that of the
Vaisyas w r as made of triple strands of
wool.
Custom having once determined the
symbol, it must remain unaltered age
after age. The Brahman's
Usage of the
belt must be made of sugar belt ; clothing
TT ,1 of the Sudras.
cane. He must wear the
skin of the gazelle. His staff must be
of bamboo and reach to the top of his
head from the ground. The soldier's
belt must be made of bowstrings. His
garment must be a deerskin, and his
bamboo staff must reach no higher than
the forehead. The belt of the Vaisya
must be made of hemp. His garment
must be a sheepskin, and his fig-tree
staff, cut from an impeded branch, must
{ reach only to his nose. Let none violate
these things, for they are a part of the
usage and the law of the land. Opin-
| ions must not change, neither must the
outer forms of society. True enough,
i the Sudras may clothe themselves as
they will, for they are no true caste, but
only a residuum, a melange, left on the
soil after the three major castes have
j been determined and defined. These
things are necessary that the purity of
the dominant races may be preserved.
j Change will lead to confusion, corrup-
i tion of blood, deterioration of manners,
! destruction of race character, national
shame.
Life is growth. It is as truly so of
the tribe as it is of the individual; of
the nation as of the tribe; Race life, once
of the race as of the nation. j; may
The part of the human atrophy,
body which is not used, which does not
expand and grow by the addition of new
THE INDICANS. GENERAL ASPECTS.
749
elements, the substitution of living- tis-
sue for that which is broken down and
expelled, will suffer atrophy. It will
cease to act. It may not possibly decay.
It may even retain a certain circulation
of the blood and a sort of nervous vital-
ity, but in other respects it is dead.
The same is true of national life, and
even of the institutional forms of so-
ciety. They must progress or fall into
a shriveled and useless condition, unfitted
for the altered relations under which they
pass by lapse of time and change of cir-
cumstance.
India thus presents to the modern in-
quirer a fixed surface. There is less
perspective in Indian society than in al-
most any other of the world. This is to
say that the existing form
Lack of perspec-
tive in Hindu has the same character that
society. ., -, -, T
it had ages ago. In any
Western state, if a cross section be made
of society as it now exists, such section
will present phenomena wholly different
from what we would have discovered in
the sixteenth century, and the latter in
turn would be eqtially distinct from the
aspects discovered in the sixth century.
The art of China is said to have no per-
spective. The Chinese drawings and
paintings are all made- as though the ob-
jects delineated had been viewed from
above instead of horizontally. The insti-
tutions of India have this fixed expres-
sion. They are as if sketched from
above, and the forms of things have no
converging lines behind them.
Since the beginning of European
ascendency in India, however, the im-
pact of Western influence
Western influ-
ence begins to upon the crystalized in-
prevail in India. ._.. ,- , -i
stitutions of the country
have scattered the germs of change.
There is a slight relaxation even of
caste. The Brahmans themselves have
separated somewhat into higher and
lower orders, and in some instances
have engaged in secular employments.
It is not unusual to find a Brahman in
the military service of the empire, and
THE PARIAH DJONGAL OF SARGUJA TYPE.
Drawn by Emile Bayard.
in some parts of the country what arc
known as " plow Brahmans," or agricul-
turists, are found. Though engaged in
the pursuits of the field and garden,
these members of the Brahmanical order
750
GREAT RACES OF MANKIND.
toward the
neglect of caste
distinction.
still hold fast to their old distinctions,
wear the Brahman's thread, and claim
and receive recognition as belonging to
the highest caste.
The subsidence of the Kshatriyas, or
at least the subsiding tendency among
them into industrial pursuits, is still more
Tendency marked. It can hardly be
said that the Pariahs are
now a caste separate from
the Sudras. They are rather a lower
class of Sudras than a distinct division.
These changes, noticeable by the close
observer in recent times, are exceedingly
slow, and are made against the whole
force of the existing order; but they
foretoken an ultimate regeneration of
the social order and institutions of the
East.
We have now completed the intended
sketch of the Eastern divisions of the
General view of Aryan race. In a former
3 book we followed the
the inquiry. migrations of these great
and populous nations from their old seats
east of the Caspian into the regions of
their subsequent occupancy and devel-
opment. In the present book we have
noted the past and current aspects
which the various nations springing
from the primitive stock have presented
in ancient and modern times. The
object has been to give to the reader an
accurate general notion of the ethnic
character of these peoples. Geograph-
ically, we have found them distributed
from the Iranian Ossetes along the
northern spurs of the Caucasus, in lati-
tude forty-five degrees north and longi-
tude forty-five degrees east from Green-
wich, to the inhabitants of British Bur-
mah, in latitude ten degrees north and
longitude one hundred and two degrees
east. Within these extremes are dis-
tributed some of the most populous
nations on the globe ; and if the civiliza-
tions of these peoples do not present to
the inquirer of to-day so promising and
inspiring a view as the more vigorous
and expanding developments in Western
nations, there is, nevertheless, a per-
petual fund of interest and a limitless
revenue of information to be found
among the races and institutions of the
old Iranian plateau and the teeming
valleys of India.
i
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