THE ABORIGINES OP AUSTRALIA. 13 



sacredness of the circle in those early ages is seen from the 

 Chaldaean name (Genesis xxxi. 47), " the circle of witness " 

 a name given to a solemn compact of friendship witnessed by 

 that celestial orb which looks down on and observes all the 

 deeds of men. In Persia, to this day, in the southern parts of 

 it, which were originally inhabited by a Hamite race of an 

 almost purely negroid type, there are to be seen on the road- 

 sides large circles of stones which the tradition of the country 

 regards as set there by the Caous, a race of giants, that is, of 

 aboriginals. Their name closely resembles the name Kush, 

 as does also Cutch at the north of the Indus, and other 

 geographical names along the Arabian seas. Then in the 

 classic nations, both in Greece and Italy, some of the most 

 famous temples were circular in form, especially the Pantheon 

 at Athens ; and, at Rome, the temple of Vesta, the goddess of 

 the sun-given, eternal fire. At Rome also, for 100 years from 

 the foundation of the city, the worship of the gods was cele- 

 brated in the open air (</. the Bora), often in sacred groves ; 

 and there also the temple of Janus, the oldest and most vene- 

 rated of the Roman gods, was merely a sacred enclosure upon 

 which no building stood till the time of the First Punic War. 

 The pomcerium, or circuit of the walls of Rome, was a sacred 

 ring, and the Circus was consecrated to the sun, and was open 

 to the sky. In Britain, too, the fire worship of the Druids led 

 them to construct ring temples in various places, and especially 

 at Stonehenge, where there are two rings as in the Bora, but 

 concentric. Even the rude Laplanders, who are sprung from 

 the same Turanian race which was one of the earliest elements 

 in the population of Babylonia, make two circles when they 

 sacrifice to the sun, and surround them with willows; they 

 also draw a white thread through the ear of the animal to be 

 sacrificed, and white, as we shall presently see, is the sun's 

 livery. 



(B.) In the Bora, the two rings, both of them sacred, 

 communicate with each other by means of a narrow passage, 

 in which are earthen representations of certain objects of 

 worship; the inner contains the images or symbols of the gods 

 carved on trees, and the novice is so placed in the outer ring 

 that he faces the passage and the shrine of the gods; he is 

 turned to the east (see note, the eighth page of this paper) . 



(b.) The inner shrine is an arrangement common to all 

 religions. At Babylon in the temple of Belus, which was 

 built in stages, the worshipper had to pass through these 

 seven stages of Sabaeism befbi'e he reached the shrine ; this 

 was the topmost of all, and contained a golden image of the 

 god ; each of these stages was devoted to the worship of one 



