ON THE ETHNOGRAPHICAL SURVEY OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. 653 
strengthened. If the house-fire was in itself continuously kept up as 
a sacred duty, how is it that the time arrives for it to be put out and 
relighted from the tribal fire? Is this indeed a primitive characteristic, 
or is it a form of decay into which the survival has fallen? This is an 
important question, because if it has to be answered in the latter direction 
the answer would tell against the general evidence cf which it is a part ; 
but if it can be answered in the first sense, namely, that it is a primitive 
characteristic, it strengthens the position immeasurably. 
The reasons for renewing the house-fire once a year ata solemn tribal 
festival are indeed not far to seek. Its employment in daily life, more 
particularly by its application to industrial purposes, made fire unhallowed 
_ according to the notions of the ancient Iranians ; and hence it had to be 
purified from time to time, and to be brought back to the ‘ lawful place,’ 
the holy fire altar of the community, from whence a fresh brand was 
obtained wherewith to revive the fire of the home hearth.! This explanation 
is, in fact, drawn from the early Avesta religion, and it not only accounts 
for the fire cult belonging to that religion, but also for customs among 
Greeks and Germans. There can be no harm, therefore, in using it to 
explain some of the peasant customs in Britain. It suggests that the 
annual or periodical extinction and renewal of the house-fire and the 
continuity of it from the time of its renewal to the time of its extinction 
are primary forms of survivals of the sacred hearth-fire in modern peasant 
custom. One other detail I must mention. It will be remembered that 
T laid special emphasis upon the fact that animals and human beings being 
made to ‘pass through fire’ did not tell for evidence of sacrifice, but for 
evidence of contact with some sacred element in the fire. This, too, is con- 
firmed by the tribal fire cult of the Iranians : ‘From the smoke and the 
flame of fire it was believed that the will of the deity could be recognised. 
His crackling flame was the means whereby he spoke to men.’ ” 
T shall not elaborate further on this occasion the parallels between the 
fire customs of Britain, which I have here classified and analysed, and the 
fire customs of the primitive Aryan tribes. But I will refer to Mr. J. G. 
Frazer’s admirable paper on ‘The Prytaneum, the Temple of Vesta, 
the Vestals, Perpetual Fires,’ in the ‘Journal of Philology,’ vol. xiv. 
. 145-172, as the parallel evidence in Greek belief—evidence so mar- 
‘shalled and arranged as to make it nearly unnecessary to attempt an 
exhaustive comparison, especially on an occasion like the present, when 
detail is not so needed as general principles. Suffice it to say, then, that 
the scattered remnants of fire customs which appear in our folklore can 
be restored by the comparative method, only possible when we have duly 
classified and analysed the customs, as a part of the early tribal system of 
organisation—a system, be it remembered, which governed every detail of 
early life, political, religious, and social, and which has left its marks on 
the map of Britain and on the early constitutional history of our people. 
The importance of this conclusion to folklore is that it enables us to 
proceed from the identification of tribal custom and belief to the identifi- 
cation of tribes : from the identification of tribes to the identification of 
races ; and the importance of it to history is that it gives to historical 
data a large body of evidence not otherwise obtainable. 
1 Geiger, Civilisation of the Eastern Iranians, i, 78. 
2 Thid. i. 75. 
