January 20, 19 16] 



NATURE 



567 



ORIGIN OF GREEK TRAGEDY.^ 

 ^T^HE object of this. Prof. Ride^eway's latest 



JL contribution to the early history of the 

 Stage, is to expand and reinforce with additional 

 evidence the thesis which he formulated in his 

 "Origin of Tragedy," published in 1910. The 

 doctrine of this earlier work asserted that the 

 drama of the Greeks was not, as had hitherto been 

 supposed, derived from the cult 

 of Dionysus, but was based on 

 the worship of the dead, and 

 reflects the primal tragedy of 

 human life. In order to secure 

 this position it was necessary to 

 controvert the theories of two 

 allied schools of interpretation 

 of primitive religion, and, as 

 often happens, the constructi\e 

 part of the work is inferior in 

 interest to the polemical, when 

 the attack falls into the hands of 

 a critic so acute, learned, and 

 ■' itty as the writer. 



In dealing with the school 



presented by "The Golden 

 lM3ugh," Prof. Ridge way 

 begins by stating that " it is 

 with extreme reluctance and 

 with genuine sorrow that 1 

 have found myself compelled 

 to differ on this fundamental 

 question from one of my oldest 

 and best friends." The gulf 

 fixed between Sir James Frazer 

 and himself is, indeed, great. 

 The former holds that vege- 

 tation spirits and the pheno- 

 mena embraced under the term 

 Totemism are primary and 

 absolutely independent of the 

 belief in the existence of the 

 soul of man after the death 

 of the body. Prof. Ridgeway, 

 on the other hand, asserts that 

 vegetation spirits and Totemic 

 beliefs are merely secondary 

 phenomena, all depending on 

 the primary belief of mankind 

 in the continued existence of 

 the soul after the death of its 

 carnal covering. He rejects 

 the famous explanation of the 

 Nemi story, which he holds to 

 be largely based on supposi- 

 tions and suggestions. The 

 priest of the Arician grove 

 is not the personification of 

 the oak, which is not the 

 Olympia, the centre of the worship of Pan- 

 1 fellenic Zeus, but derives its sanctity from its 



^ociation with a death cult, the worship of 



_;eria suggesting that honour was paid to the 

 burial place of the Egerii. 



' " The Dramas and Dramatic Dances of Non-Furopean Races in 

 •=P«cial reference to the Origin of Greek Tragedy." By Prof. W. Ridgeway. 

 Pp. xv+448. (Cambridge: At the University Press, 1915.) Price i;j-. net. 



NO. 2412, VOL. 96] 



The attempt of Sir James Frazer to account for 

 dramatic performances by the dramatisation of 

 the seasons is also necessarily rejected ; magic is 

 not antecedent to religion ; and with the abandon- 

 ment of the vegetation hypothesis goes the doc- 

 trine of Dr. Farnell that dramatic performances 

 of this type are primitive, and antecedent to 

 dramas based on human life. The criticism of the 



sacred tree at 



play: Ram Chandra and Lakstimana. From ■■ The Drama, ami I )ramatic 

 Dances of Non- European Races." 



school represented by Miss J. E. Harrison and 

 her fellow-workers. Prof. G. G. Murray and Mr. 

 1". M. Cornford, who postulate the Eniautos 

 Daimon and heroes as a projection from certain 

 choses sucries, is even more drastic. An impor- 

 tant part of the material adduced to support the 

 supremacy of ancestor worship as the basis of 

 primitive cult and belief comes from India, and 



