TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION H. 293 



drawings of Nortliern bpaiii and tlie Dordogue; to the ornamented implements of 

 the Magdalenian Age; to Neolithic Art as shown in the Kivik rock in Sweden; 

 and at later stages to the art of prehistoric Egypt, and of Crete and Mycente. 

 Among the primitive races of modern times the drawings of the Esquimaux 

 and the JJushmen may be noted for comparison. 



The most lifelike and truly artistic examples of the work of primitive man 

 are those produced by the Cro-Magnon peoi)lo in the Aurignaclan Period, and 

 must have been the result of long previous attempts, though wo have no 

 specimens of these. 



The Prophet Ezekiel describes artistic representations of a similar nature 

 which he saw in a vision displayed upon the walls of an inner chamber in the 

 temple at Jerusalem as an outcome of popular superstition among the remnant 

 of the people left in the city after its conquest by the Chaldeans. 



Now primitive artistry varies from the highest perfection, as in the cave- 

 drawings of France and Spain, to examples that apjiear like the first efforts 

 of children, or to the petrifaction which is exhibited in the conventional art of 

 the historic period in Egypt. But none of the work was done for a purely 

 artistic furpose, or to gratify the iesthetic sense. 



It is all based on sympathetic magic. 



Thus, just as religion supplied a marvellous stimulus to art in Athens after 

 the Persian wars, and to Christendom in the Middle Ages, so magic, with a 

 more practical aim in view, supplied a similar stimulus to the artistic instinct 

 which IS an inseparable factor in the complex nature of man. 



It may be said, This will explain the drawings of animals and such-like, but 

 how explain such drawings, for example, as those of the Dancing Women in 

 the Cave of Cogul ? The identical principle applies here also : To priinitive man 

 the image or symbol is the same thing as tlie living actor, and what is repre- 

 sented as being done by the symbol is as though it were being actually performed 

 by the producer of it; compare the Ushabtis in Egyptian tombs and the magical 

 ceremonies of the Australian and other native tribes in the present day. 



It is possible that we may find evidences of Totemism, as the basis of social 

 arraiigonu'irts, either actual or decadent, throughout the peoples whose art we 

 are discussing. 



1919. , , 



