26o 



NA TURE 



[July 13, 1905 



PRIMITIVE RELIGIOUS ART^ 



\\I E have on several occasions directed attention to 

 works by American ethnologists dealing with in- 

 vestigations on the meanings of the designs and patterns of 

 aboriginal decorative art. This fruitful and interesting 

 field of inquiry is by no means exhausted, and two papers 

 on the subject have recently been published by the American 

 Museum of Natural History which merit the careful atten- 

 tion of students. Dr. Clark Wissler has made a valuable 

 study of the decorative art of the Sioux Indians which is 

 a model of clear and concise e.xpression and of adequate 

 illustration. As he truly states, the investigation becomes 

 psychological, because it is necessary to linow what ideas 

 the artists have of their designs, and what motives lead 

 to their e.xecution. The assumption that all primitive 

 decorative designs are executed with consciousness that 

 they symbolise some definite object or relation in nature 

 is fairly supported by the facts so far accessible, but does 

 it follow that these symbolic designs were produced by a 

 gradual transition from the realistic representation? That 

 some of them were so produced has been satisfactorily 

 demonstrated ; but is this the law of growth for decorative 

 art? It appears, among the American Indians, that the 

 more abstract the idea, the simpler and more geometric 

 the design. On the other hand, it is obvious that a 

 vigorous conventionalisation of representative forms must 

 tend to reduce them all to a few simple geometric designs. 

 In such an event, confusion as to the symbolic aspect of 

 similar designs must arise in the minds of the artists, 

 necessitating re-interpretation or creation of new symbols. 

 Thus any given interpretation need have no certain relation 

 to the origin of the design itself ; indeed, the association 

 of the symbol and the idea can be shown in some cases 

 to be quite secondary. Amongst the Sioux there are two 

 main kinds of decorative art — realistic painting and con- 

 ventional bead- or quill-work ; the former is done by the 

 men and the latter by the women, and there is every 

 reason for assuming that the pictographic mode is on the 

 whole the older. One sex has often appropriated the 

 designs used by the other to express divergent ideas, and 

 thus we see how even within the same tribe two or more 

 modes of expressing symbolic motives may make simul- 

 taneous use of the same graphic designs. 



In a short paper of fifty pages on the decorative art of 

 the Huichol Indians of Mexico, Dr. C. Lumholtz has 

 managed to crowd some 350 figures, so that we have 

 abundant material for study. .'\11 these designs, he 

 says, are expressions of religious ideas that pervade the 

 entire e.xistence of these people ; in other words, they are 

 permanent prayers. Girdles and ribbons, inasmuch as 

 they are considered as rain serpents, are in themselves 

 prayers for rain and for the results of rain, namely, good 

 crops, health, and life. All the designs on pouches, shirts, 

 skirts, and so forth e.\press prayers for some material 

 benefit, or for protection against evil, or adoration of 

 some deity. Thus the magic double water-gourd, even in 

 its most conventionalised form, means a prayer for water, 

 the source of all life and health. Animals like the puma, 

 jaguar, eagle, &c., express prayers for protection, as well 

 as adoration for the deity to which the creatures belong. 

 The little white flower, toto, which grows in the wet, 

 corn-producing season, is at once a symbol and a prayer 

 for corn, and in all sorts of forms it is to be found woven 

 in their costumes. Flowers play, and always have played, 

 an important part in the religion of these Indians; with 

 them flowers, like the plumes of birds, are prayers for 

 rain and life. Dr. Lumholtz doubts if there is such a thing 

 as ornamentation solely for decorative purposes among the 

 Huichol, or, for that matter, among any primitive people. 

 Prof. Boas points out that on the whole the style of 

 decoration of ceremonial objects differs considerably from 

 that of the ornamental parts of garments. The former are 

 crude and pictographic, with slight tendency to con- 

 ventionalism, while the latter are regular, well executed, 

 and strongly conventionalised, and the general character 



1 "Decorative An of the Sioux Indians." By Clark Wissler. Bull. Am. 

 Miis. Nat. Hist., vol. xviii., pp. 231-278. (New York, 1004.) 



" Decorative Art of the Huichol Indians." By Carl Lumholtz. Mini. 

 Am. .Mils. Nat. Hist. Whole series, vol. iii. Anthropology, vol. ii. partiii. 

 (New York, 1904.) 



of these designs much resembles that of similar designs 

 found in other parts of Me.xico and in Central and South 

 America. These textile designs, which are of great variety 

 and beauty, acquire much more interest from the suggestive 

 interpretation of their symbolism which Dr. Lumholtz has 

 afforded us. 



The American Museum of Natural History is to be con- 

 gratulated on possessing collections about which so much 

 valuable information has been obtained, and students are 

 to be congratulated on having these riches made accessible 

 to them by means of such beautifullv illustrated memoirs. 



A. C. H. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE. 



Oxford. — An examination for a geographical scholar- 

 ship will be held on October 12 next. Candidates, who 

 must have taken honours in one of the final schools of the 

 university, should send their names to the reader in geo- 

 graphy, Old Ashmolean Museum, by, at latest, October 2. 

 The value of the scholarship is 60!. 



Dr. J. Ritchie, reader in pathology, has been constituted 

 professor of pathology so long as he holds the readership 

 in question. 



At the recent congregation of the University of Leeds a 

 fellowship of the value of looi. was awarded to Mr. Joseph 

 Marshall, of the Victoria University School of Chemistry. 



Prof. Stephen M. Dixon, holder of the chair of civil 

 engineering in the Dalhousie University, Nova Scotia, has 

 been appointed to the new professorship of civil engineering 

 in the University of Birminghain. 



It was mentioned by the principal of King's College, 

 London, at the recent distribution of prizes and certificates 

 to the successful students that Prof. W. G. Adams, F.R.S., 

 is about to resign his chair after forty-two years' work in 

 the college. 



The Rogers prize of 100!. of the University of London 

 has this year been awarded to Dr. B. J. CoUingwood for 

 his essay on " AnEesthetics, their Physiological and 

 Clinical Action." The essay submitted by Dr. .\. G. 

 Levy was highly commended, and an honorarium of 50/. 

 was awarded him. 



A movement is now in progress for providing the North 

 Wales University College with new buildings at an 

 estimated cost of 175,000/., of which 30,000/. has been 

 already promised. The site has been given by the cor- 

 poration, which has presented the deed of gift to Lord 

 Kenyon, president of the college. The president has ex- 

 pressed the hope that the rest of Wales will follow the 

 liberality shown at Bangor, and that there will be no more 

 need for the best professors of the college to leave Bangor 

 for more lucrative positions in other parts of the United 

 Kingdom. 



According to the Electrician, a committee of the Liver- 

 pool City Council, instructed by the Finance Committee 

 to report as to how far the educational methods employed 

 at the Liverpool University were in the interests of the 

 city and met its requireinents, have reported that they 

 are satisfied that the University is doing its best to ensure 

 that its students shall enter into the business of life w-ith 

 their intellectual powers fully developed by providing the 

 students with a wide range of duty and sound methods 

 of instruction, and they have therefore recommended that 

 the sum of 10,000/. should be granted during the present 

 year upon the same conditions under which a similar 

 grant was made for the first time last year. The report 

 of the finance committee has come before the City 

 Council and has been approved. Of the amount in question, 

 1000/. is devoted to scholarships for Liverpool men. 



Copies have been received of the Johns Hopkins Uni- 

 versity Circular containing the prograinme of courses for 

 the session 1905-06, and of the Yearbook of the Armour 

 Institute of Technology, Chicago, for 1905-06. The 

 Johns Hopkins University will begin its thirtieth year 

 of instruction ne.xt October. The work will be carried on 



NO. 186.3, VOL. 72] 



