Part 14

Mr. Holmes also points out that the Chiriqui have arrived at the scroll and fret by way of the alligator. I can here illustrate only two of these (Figs. 98, 99); in these the body of the reptile is the element of the design. In other cases Mr. Holmes finds that parts of the creature, such as head, feet, eye, or scales, assume the role of radicles, and pass through a series of modification ending in purely geometrical devices.

The designs in Fig. 100 are painted upon low rounded prominences on vases, and hence are enclosed in circles. In Fig. 100, A, the alligator is coiled up, but still preserves some of the well-known characters of that reptile. In B, we have the double hook modification of the alligator’s body, but the triangles are placed separately against the encircling line. In the next figure the body-line is omitted, and three dotted scutes alone represent the animal. The four scutes of the next designs assume a symmetrical position, and the central crossed line may represent the alligator’s body. In the last figure of this series the cross has become the predominating feature, and the spots have migrated into it, so that the triangles have become mere interspaces.

Finally, Fig. 101 is a zone pattern, painted on an earthen drum, the central zigzag line represents the body of the alligator, and the notched hooks its extremities; these are here arranged with perfect regularity, but sometimes only the latter occur in patterns, and then they are often somewhat irregularly disposed.

From his prolonged study of ancient American art, Mr. Holmes formulates the following generalisation:—“The agencies of modification inherent in the art in its practice are such that any particular animal form extensively employed in decoration is capable of changing into or giving rise to any or to all of the highly conventional decorative devices upon which our leading ornaments, such as the meander, the scroll, the fret, the chevron, and the guilloche, are based” (p. 187). The importance of the following conclusion is obvious:—“We are absolutely certain that no race, no art, no motive or element in nature or in art can claim the exclusive origination of any one of the well-known or standard conventional devices, and that any race, art, or individual motive is capable of giving rise to any and to all such devices. Nothing can be more absurd than to suppose that the signification or symbolism attaching to a given form is uniform the world over, as the ideas associated with each must vary with the channels through which they were developed” (p. 183).

The investigations of Dr. P. Ehrenreich and Professor Karl von den Steinen on the decorative art of various tribes in Central Brazil have led to results which may, without exaggeration, be termed startling. The patterns employed by these people typically belong to the class which is popularly described as geometrical. On page 176 I have selected examples of these patterns which will give a fair idea of the style of design.

Dr. Ehrenreich[98] informs us that in the Bakaïri chiefs’ huts a frieze of blackened bark tablets run along the wall which are painted in white clay with very characteristic figures and patterns of fish. All the geometric figures are in reality diagrammatic representations of concrete objects, mostly animals. “Thus a wavy line with alternating spots denotes a large, dark-spotted colossal snake, the Anaconda (_Eunectes murinus_); a rhomboidal mark signifies a lagoon-fish, whereas a triangle does not by any means indicate that simple geometrical figure, but the small, three-cornered article of women’s clothing” (p. 98).

[98] “Mittheilungen über die zweite Xingu-Expedition in Brasilien,” _Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_, xxii., 1890, p. 89.

The following quotation is also translated from Dr. Ehrenreich[99]:—“The ornaments of the Karaya consist of patterns of zigzag lines, crosses, dots, lozenges, and peculiar interrupted meanders, whereas the quadrate and triangle occur only incidentally (that is, owing to the filling up of other figures), and circles are entirely absent. As in the ornamentation of the Xingus tribes, so also here occur those apparently entirely arbitrary geometrical combinations fundamentally of wholly defined concrete presentments, of which the most characteristic traits are therein reproduced. Unfortunately it is not always possible to correctly ascertain the respective natural objects. The frequently occurring cross (Fig. 102, A), which in America has so often given occasion for amusing hypotheses, is here nothing but a kind of lizard.... Also peculiarly characteristic are the extensive wings of a bat (Fig. 102, B), as well as the frequently occurring snake pattern, such as Fig. 102, C, which represents the rattlesnake, while another snake is represented in Fig. 102, D. Accurate representations of men and animals, as we know them to be done so excellently by the Bushmen and Eskimo, do not appear to be forthcoming among the Karaya.”

[99] “Beiträge zur Völkerkunde Brasiliens,” _Veröffentlichungen aus dem königlichen Museum für Völkerkunde_, Berlin, ii., 1891, pp. 24, 25.

Professor von den Steinen[100] describes the above-mentioned frieze more fully. The pieces of bark, which were from 15 cm. to 40 cm. (6 to 16 inches) broad, were blackened with soot, and the white or yellowish lime applied with the fingers. The frieze itself was over 56 m. (over 184 feet) in length.

[100] _Unter den Naturvölkern Zentral-Brasiliens: Reiseschilderung und Ergebnisse der Zweiten Schingú-Expedition_, 1887-88. Berlin, 1894.

I would ask the reader to refer back to Fig. 52, p. 97, although this motive is not a zoomorph, in order to show that triangular designs, or resulting zigzags, may have various origins.

Only one tablet represented a plant. (Fig. 69.) It indicates the leaves of a small “cabbage”-bearing wild palm.

The bulk of the motives for the decorative art of these people, the Schingú tribes (the Xingu tribes of Ehrenreich), are drawn from the animal world; Fig. 103 A, H, I, K, are Bakaïri patterns, and Figs. 103 B-F those of the Auetö.

The pattern to the right in Fig. 103, H, indicates a kind of ray, the characteristic rings and dots which ornament the skin of this fish are here represented.

Common to all the tribes of the Schingú stock is the employment of conventionalised representations of the _mereschu_. This is a small compressed lagoon-fish, about 19 cm. (7½ inches) long, and 9.5 cm. (3¾ inches) deep; its colour is silver-grey with brown spots. The _mereschu_ belongs to the genus Serrasalmo or Myletes; the figure on p. 260, given by Von den Steinen, looks as if it were drawn from a badly-preserved spirit specimen, and one fails to see how Fig. 103, C, for example, could by any stretch of the imagination be considered to suggest that fish. On p. 613 of Dr. Günther’s _Introduction to the Study of Fishes_ (Edinburgh, 1880) is an outline figure of _Serrasalmo scapularis_; the contour of this fish is approximately rhomboidal, the head, the dorsal fin, and the tail fin occupy three of its angles, and the anal fin practically runs up to the fourth angle. Von den Steinen points out that in most cases representations of these animal-forms are incisions, not paintings, and the diagrammatic rendering of curved lines by angles is due to this fact. The patterns which I am about to describe are common to numerous allied tribes, and everywhere these patterns bear the name by which this kind of fish is locally known.

Sometimes the _mereschu_ fish is employed singly, but most frequently a number of them are evenly distributed over the decorated surface, and between the fishes single, double, or even several lines may be drawn, as in Fig. 103, B, C, E; these latter represent the net by means of which these fish are caught. Thus we may have a fish-pattern or a fishes-in-net pattern. These patterns are delineated on masks, posts, spinning-whorls, and other objects. Fig. 103, B, is a pattern of the _mereschu_ fishes-in-net group, but the fishes themselves are entirely filled up with black, and not their angles only.

The Auetö pattern drawn in Fig. 103, F, is intended for a mailed- or armadillo-fish.

On a Bakaïri paddle (Fig. 103, A) are incised four circles, which are the ring-markings of a ray, _pinukái_, on the other side of a transverse line follow two _mereschu_ in the meshes of a net, then a _pakú_, and finally several _kuómi_ fish. Professor von den Steinen believes that the object of this decoration is simply to bring fish close to the paddle. “But it is extremely instructive to see,” he continues,[101] “that concerning these scribblings, though they certainly do not denote anything in their order of arrangement, consequently are not picture-writing; however, every single one is by no means a casual flourish, but the diagram of a well-defined object, and consequently, in fact, represents _the element of a picture-writing_.”

[101] _Loc. cit._, p. 269.

Zigzags and waved lines are snakes. Fig. 103, K, represents common land-snake, the _agau_, or cobra of Brazil; to the left is the tail, the head is simply rendered, and as the skin of the snake is marked the artist characterised it by adding spots. Very similar is the _sukuri_ water-snake or anaconda (_Boa scytale_), drawn to the left of Fig. 103, H. A boa-constrictor is indicated in Fig. 103, I; the row of diamonds left on the dark background, between the two rows of triangles, represents the marking of the snake’s skin. The larger terminal diamond to the left is probably the boa’s head. A snake is also painted on a Nahuquá bull-roarer (Fig. 103, G).

We have seen that rows of horizontal triangles are _uluris_, women’s triangles, but when they are margined above by a line, as in Fig. 104, B, they are bats; but rows of triangles vertically disposed, as in Fig. 104, C, are hanging bats; Fig. 104, A, is also a bat device.

Another triangular ornament (Fig. 105) represents small birds, called by the Bakaïri natives _yaritamáze_, that is, they are a particular kind of bird, not birds in general.

Finally, one would naturally consider that the ornament engraved on the post, Fig. 103, D, is simply the favourite _mereschu_ pattern; but Von den Steinen assures us that the central design is not composed of _mereschu_, in which the angles are only slightly filled up, but that it is a locust, the lines arising from the angles of the lozenge being the legs. This locust pattern is, however, associated with true _mereschus_, which may be seen between the legs of the locust.

In Europe and in our own country we can study analogous transformations.

More or less recognisable animals break out, as it were into scrolls and floral devices, as on Samian vases (Plate VI., Fig. 1), on Gaulish swords (Fig. 2), on Pompeian walls (Fig. 3), and on the gold ornaments of Tuscany (Fig. 5). In Fig. 4, Plate VI., we have on an ancient pot from New Mexico a decorative treatment of birds which recalls that of the mural paintings of Pompeii.

Often in Greece and Italy symmetrical scrolls are associated with a head. (Plate VI., Fig. 6.) The scrolls themselves may, in some cases, be an animal form which has ended in a flourish, as is taking place in Plate VI., Fig. 5; or in others they may be the remnants of plant motive.

Dr. Colley March calls attention to old bench-ends of English churches, notably those in Cornwall, which are frequently surmounted by a crouching quadruped; at a later period this appears to be converted into a single scroll like that which adorned the old pews in Ormskirk Church. (Plate VI., Fig. 7.)

An ancient silver plate (Plate VI., Fig. 8), found in a tumulus at Largo, Fifeshire, is decorated with the distorted fore-half of an animal. The transformation is advanced to flamboyant curves in the zoomorph of the Dunnichen Stone (Plate VI., Fig. 9); but the head and ear and legs can still be distinguished. It is not quite certain what animal this is intended to represent. Earl Southesk[102] believes it to be the horse, which was sacred to Frey, and is a special symbol of the sun. The second figure is very remarkable, but it seems to be an extreme and foliated form of the same zoomorph.

[102] _Origins of Pictish Symbolism_, 1893.

There are numerous examples of linear series of animals in the early art of Egypt, Assyria, Greece, and other artistic centres, but these do not appear to have developed into patterns, possibly because the units were readily recognisable, on the other hand, serially repeated conventionalised zoomorphs frequently metamorphose into patterns. These patterns by repeated copying tend to become simplified till finally not only is all trace of the original long lost, but the resultant pattern may so resemble other simple patterns as to be indistinguishable from them. This may easily lead to confusion and cause the designs to be classed as one. We thus come to the conclusion that before any pattern can be termed the same as another, its life-history must be studied, otherwise analogy may be confused with homology, and false relationships erected. Things which are similar are not necessarily the same.

At the extreme south-east end of New Guinea and in the adjacent archipelago the most frequent designs are beautiful scroll patterns, which are subject to many variations. I have already[103] described many of these, and so there is no need to again repeat what I have said, except to remind the reader that all these patterns are variations of serially repeated conventionalised heads of the frigate-bird. I shall again allude to this bird when I deal with the relation of religion to art.

[103] Pp. 49-56, and at greater length in my Memoir on the Decorative Art of British New Guinea.

In the same district one occasionally meets with a pattern (Fig. 106) which in some respects resembles the former and appears in some cases to have been confounded with it. This one clearly arises from the serial repetition of conventionalised heads of crocodiles. The illustration is part of the carved rim of a wooden bowl in my possession, which probably came from the Trobriands or the Woodlarks. The triangles above the crocodiles’ snouts are coloured black, those bounded by their jaws are painted red.

There is yet another method of representing animals which consists in grouping them so as to tell a story, or, in other words, to make a picture.

Grouped animals rarely occur by themselves in decorative art; men, houses, implements, and even vegetation are frequently associated with them. The Arctic peoples, such as the Lapps, Eskimo, etc., greatly affect this form of art. The bulk of these pictures are representations of hunting scenes, and many incidents in the lives of these hyperboreans are depicted on bone and ivory. There is reason for regarding these as records of particular events (cf. p. 207); but they are also very useful to us as illustrations of native life and industry. Animals are sometimes drawn foreshortened, and confused herds of reindeer are often figured; but the grouping is mainly linear, without effects of perspective being attempted.

This kind of art is extremely rare amongst savage peoples, in fact its presence may be regarded as one of the proofs that the people practising it have passed from a purely savage condition, and have made some advance towards civilisation. It has reached its highest point in the works of the great animal painters of the present day, and thus has been one of the last forms of graphic art to be perfected.

As a general rule the inferior representations of animals in groups, and of animal pictures generally, are not due to the process of decay. They are the bad workmanship of inferior craftsmen. It is the imperfection of immaturity, not the symptom of decadence.

The last stage of the life-cycle of this class of zoomorphs occurs when incompetent draughtsmen copy the work of a master; when, for example, we see on the walls of country inns cheap and badly-drawn copies of Landseer’s pictures.

Animals also play a large part in mythology, and it is often very difficult to determine the limits of totemism in this direction. There are, however, numberless instances of legendary communications and relationships, of friendliness and enmity between animals and men, which have no connection with totemism, and these often form the subject of decorative art. Sometimes the animal alone is represented, at other times both man and animal are depicted, and according to their artistic treatment we may have pictures, or should the zoomorph and anthropomorph be rendered schematically, heteromorphism may result. At present we have to deal with representations of animals which illustrate some belief, myth, or folk-tale. The sacred art of the Hebrews was almost free from zoomorphs, and that of Islam totally so; with these exceptions there has scarcely been a religion in which zoomorphs have not played a greater or less part.

I need only remind the reader of the numerous examples in which animals are depicted in illustration of, or as a kind of mnemonic of a folk-tale, a legend, or myth, and of some sacred tradition or belief. There are so many intermediate stages between these different phases that it is often impossible to draw the line between them. The religious belief, with its sacred tradition of one age, becomes the myth or the legend of a later period, subsequently it is perpetuated as a folk-tale; later it may serve to amuse children, and lastly it becomes the object of scientific study.

What I have termed the æsthetic life-history may occur to the zoomorph at any or all of these stages of religious decadence. There is no correlation between an extreme or medium phase in the æsthetic cycle and a corresponding stage in the religious series. To take a homely example, the illustrations of the most recently published fairy-tales are as a whole of greater artistic merit than has been the average illustration of sacred narratives during any period of the world’s history.

D. _Anthropomorphs._

As a general rule, savages are less skilful in the delineation of the human form than they are with representations of animals, nor is it usually employed so frequently as might be expected.

It is for religious purposes that the human form is most frequently represented, and I refer the reader to the section in which religion is dealt with for illustrations of this fact. I employ the term “human form” advisedly, as this includes the images of both gods and men. At one stage of its evolution in the human mind, deity, like the Spectre of Brocken, is the shadowy image of man projected on the clouds. So the gods are most naturally represented as men, but often with special attributes. Now, these attributes are worthy of special study as being the milestones which indicate the distance which any given religious conception has traversed.

In the distant vista of time we can dimly perceive the transformation of the totem animal into the god. In the highest period of Greek sculpture the evolution was, for example, perfected in “ox-eyed lady Hera,” consort of Olympian Zeus, and in the Cnidian statue of Demeter, “Mother-Earth,” whose archaic representation was a wooden image of a woman with a mare’s head and mane. For thousands of years the Egyptian pantheon was peopled by gods arrested in the process—gorgonised tadpoles of divinity. Still earlier stages may even now be noted among savage peoples.

I know of no example of the preponderating employment of the human face for decorative purposes to be compared with what I have established for the natives of the Papuan Gulf. Illustrations of this will be found in Figs. 10-19, and in my Memoir on Papuan Art, but only an examination of a large number of objects from this district of British New Guinea will bring home to the student the remarkable ubiquity of the motive. We have no information concerning the reason for copying human faces; my impression is that it is related to the initiation ceremonies, which we know from the accounts of the Rev. James Chalmers to be very prolonged and important. One would expect to find more animal representations among these people than appear on objects in our ethnographical collections. Possibly these people are passing from the totemistic into the anthropomorphic phase of religion, and the latter finds most expression in their art. However, such speculations are futile until we obtain far more detailed and extended information of their religion than we at present possess.

Human beings are comparatively rarely represented merely for decorative purposes. In pictographs they have no predominating position. But when we come to portraiture the matter is very different; here we have an adequate motive for the delineation of the human form and face; it is, however, very noteworthy that portraiture, as such, only occurs amongst civilised communities. Possibly the explanation of this may be found in the widespread savage philosophy of sympathetic magic. According to this system a portrait has a very vital connection with the subject, and any damage done to the counterfeit would be experienced by the original. Portraiture then would be too hazardous to health, or even life, to be lightly undertaken.

What we have seen happening to plants and animals is also the fate of men in decorative art. A few examples here will suffice.

New Zealand is one of the places where anthropomorphs abound, due in this case to ancestor cult. The short series of three clubs (Plate VI., Figs. 10-12) illustrates the metamorphosis of the limbs into curvilinear forms. In dealing with the religion of Polynesia I give examples (Figs. 124-128) of the degradation of the human form into “geometrical” patterns.

In the various illustrations which have been given representations of the human form may be isolated, as in Melanesia (Fig. 3, O), Mangaia (Fig. 124), and New Zealand (Plate VI., Figs. 10, 12), or they may be double; for example, one frequently finds in Polynesia two god-figures placed back to back, and these may strangely degenerate, as in the examples given by Stolpe[104] and Read.[105] Human forms placed in linear series are frequent in Mangaian wood-carving (Figs. 127 and 125, A). Fig. 126 illustrates the decoration of a broader area.

[104] H. Stolpe, _Evolution in the Ornamental Art of Savage Peoples_. Figs. 3, 34.