A CURIOUS AINO TOY. 7 



An observant traveller in Northern Scandinavia will see 

 many things to remind him of Oriental people. If he be 

 fresh from Japan and China he will be impressed with the 

 many features common to both peoples, and realize the 

 survival to-day of many oriental facies. From a zoologi- 

 cal standpoint one might attribute these similarities to the 

 fact that the east and the west shores of the old world are 

 not separated by an almost impassable barrier ; the people 

 are connected by a continuous stretch of continent, and 

 a circumpolar distribution, seen in the case of animals and 

 plants, might also apply with equal force to man and his 

 products. If, however, one considers the ramifications of 

 early Eranians he will see how twigs of this stock penetrated 

 into Scandinavia and thus render explicable the occurrence 

 of this curious puzzle in the far north. Dr. Hans Hilde- 

 brand, the Royal Antiquary of Sweden, in his interesting 

 book on Scandinavian Arts (South Kensington Hand- 

 book) shows that "there once existed during a period of 

 some length a continued intercourse between Mahomedan 

 Asia and Scandinavia." Coins of the Mahomedan States 

 of Asia have been dug up by thousands in Sweden. In 

 an ancient tomb in Gottland was found a bronze fibula, as- 

 sociated with shells from the Indian Ocean, and Dr. Hil- 

 debrand says "to a Swede it is quite natural to direct his 

 attention in the first place towards the East." Of greater 

 interest is Dr. Hildebrand's efforts to establish a standard 

 of weight of the ancient ring money, the ornaments of a 

 certain weight and the weights themselves. He says "not 

 to speak of other things, even the weights found in Scan- 

 dinavia (as well as in Russia) and the manner in which the 

 multiples of the unit are indicated, show the most com- 

 plete analogy with some oriental weights found in Persia." 



