THE ASTRONOMY OF PRIMITIVE PEOPLES, 621 



responding picture of that part of it which is within its vision. Isl- 

 anders regard their groups as their world, and finish out the picture 

 with fantastic conceptions of the ocean-regions beyond. Highlanders, 

 who, like the ancient Greeks, also see the sea-shore, figure their earth 

 as a cup or a hollowed surface into which the waters run together. 

 The Grecian view held its ground till the Crusades, unaltered even as 

 to its particulars, and is still entertained by the lazzaroni of Naples. 

 People who live in high mountain-regions, and never look upon exten- 

 sive plains, regard the earth as a sublime range, a massive dome in 

 which peak towers above peak, as the Caucasians do, or as a lofty cone, 

 like the Thibetans. On conceptions like these stand those religious 

 systems which place the seat of the gods, the first home of the human 

 race, or the abode of the dead, among lofty mountains. The Hindoos 

 called Meru, the Thracians Olympus, the residence of the gods. East 

 African tribes, such as the Masais, the Wakamba, the Wakwasi, and 

 the Gallas, say that their gods dwell in Kilimanjaro or Kenia, or a 

 third equally lofty mountain of their regions. And the Indians of the 

 American prairies believe that the happy hunting-grounds of their 

 departed are to be found in the Rocky Mountains. 



The conceptions that are formed of the regions of the earth lying 

 outside of vision are equally diversified. In classical antiquity, the 

 earth was imagined to be surrounded by the sea, Oceanus ; or the 

 heavenly vault to rest upon mountain-ranges or isolated peaks. The 

 Caroline-Islanders represent the region beyond the Marianne Archi- 

 pelago, and north of their home, as one in which the sky gradually ap- 

 proaches the earth, and finally rests upon it, but not so closely but 

 what a space is left that a man can creep through. To the Esqui- 

 maux of Greenland the sky seems to be a steep, high mountain in 

 the north, around which the stars revolve, while the earth rests upon 

 props that would have decayed, crumbled, and disappeared long ago, 

 if it had not been for the mummery of witches. 



From this we may pass to a wider view, which attempts to form 

 an idea of the back side of the earth. The Kamchatkadales conceive 

 that the earth is flat, and that its under side forms a lower world, un- 

 der which is another land ; or as, according to Steller, they expressed 

 it, the earth is the reverse of a sky under which is still another world ; 

 so that they consider the world as a vessel of three stories. The con- 

 ception of the earth as a flat surface lies at the foundation of most of 

 these myths ; but there are a few of them that rest on better ideas. 

 According to Newbold, some of the Malays regard the earth as round, 

 like an eg^. The Chippewas and Winnebagoes, according to Lawson, 

 and the Duphlas of Assam, regard the earth as a square, with four 

 corners ; but the imagination of that shape is exceptional. 



What holds the visible world together, and what supports the 

 earth in it, are also questions that have occurred to primitive men ; 

 and their attempts to solve these questions also carry with them efforts 



