THE ORIGIN OF THE SWASTIKA
The Swastika is, we have seen, a very early device or symbol in
use among ancient races in Europe, Asia and America. Though it has
been found on an ingot of metal in Ashanti it was of late foreign
introduction there, and is not known in Africa, nor in Polynesia and
Australia, nor among the Eskimos. How did it as a mere matter of
shape and pattern come into existence? One might suppose that such
combinations of lines as the simple cross and this modified cross,
with the arms bent each half-way along its length to form a right
angle, would be very natural things for a primitive man–or a child–to
make when trying to produce some ornamental effect by tracing simple
rectilinear and symmetrical figures. No doubt such a "playing with
lines" is a common phase or stage of the human search for decorative
design. It leads by gradual steps to very complex line-decoration in
early pottery and woven work, which is sometimes called "geometrical
design."
It is, however, the fact, and a very interesting one, that the
tendency to make geometrical design is not so pronounced in the very
earliest examples of human drawing and ornament known to us, as is
the tendency to copy natural objects. And this would appear to be
especially the case where the drawing is to be a symbol or significant
badge. In the earliest art-work known to us–that of the cave-men of
the late Pleistocene period in Western Europe (see Chaps. I., II.
and III.)–the artists were busy with attempts (often wonderfully
successful ones) to present the outlines of familiar animals (and
sometimes plants) by incised carving on bone or painting on the rock
walls of caves–preceded, it is true, by a period in which "all-round"
sculpture in bone or stone or modelling in clay was the method
employed. The extensive use of lines–concentric or parallel, like
those on the finger-tips–as decoration of stone work is not known
until the later or Neolithic period.[7] On one at least of the incised
bone drawings of the Palæolithic cave-men two little diamond-shaped
lozenges are engraved. They are seen in the cave-men's drawing of a
stag figured on pp. 12, 13 of this book. These lozenges are supposed to
be the "signature" of the artist, and, if so, are not only the first
examples of a geometrical rectilinear figure as ornament, but the
earliest examples known of the use of a badge or symbol as a means of
identification.
When we compare the simpler decorative designs made use of by the
less cultivated races of men, we find that there are certain distinct
and opposed tendencies the predominance of which is of importance
in helping us to explain the origin of the design. The tendency to
make straight lines and rectilinear angles, which we may call the
"rectilinear habit," is found in work executed on hard stone by a
graving tool, and in work where square-cut stones are set together or
flat pieces of wood or straw are interlaced, and in coarser kinds of
weaving, bead-work, and basketwork. The opposite tendency is found in
work executed with a brush and fluid paint on pottery or cloth, or even
with a graver on soft clay or bone.
The contrast is well shown in the two renderings of one and the same
"pattern," shown in A and B of Fig. 49. A is the rectilinear angular
decorative design which is known as the "Greek key pattern," whilst the
scroll below it is the "curvilinear" treatment of the same subject.
The first takes its rectilinear character from a structure built up of
hard blocklike pieces; the other is the flowing, easily moving line of
a brush laying on paint, or of a style moving over clay or soft wax.
The contrast is the same as that of the capital letters of the Roman
alphabet, as used in print, with their equivalents in "copper-plate,"
cursive handwriting.
[Illustration: FIG. 49.–The Greek Key pattern in _A_ rectangular, and
_B_ curvilinear or "current" form.]
Another pair of tendencies opposed to each other which have much
significance in the explanation of decorative design is the tendency
to convert the simple lines of an original design into a drawing
representing some animal or plant shape. At the end of the last chapter
I distinguished this as the "naturalizing" tendency, contrasting it
with the grammatizing or simplifying tendency. A good example of it
is seen in Fig. 50. In A of that figure we see a circle divided into
three cones by curved lines; this is a known design. It is called a
"triskelion" (meaning a three-legged figure), or is more correctly
termed "a three-branched scroll." The curves are converted into angles
and straight lines in B, and then the stiff rectilinear "triskelion"
is subsequently developed into three human legs, as shown in C, Fig.
50. It is naturalized. Were the change to proceed in the other way from
the three human legs to the simple lines, we should have an example of
the opposed tendency, namely, that of converting drawings of natural
objects–by a degenerative or reducing process–to the simplest lines
representative of them. This tendency, which we call "grammatizing"
(from gramma, the Greek for a line), is far commoner in early art than
the naturalizing tendency which sets in when the artist is exuberant,
self-confident, and imaginative. We see a "naturalizing" tendency
in the flamboyant and arabesque decorative work of the renascence,
but it is also found among the happy Minoan, or Ægæan, island folk
who decorated great pots and basins in Cyprus and Crete with forms
suggested by birds, sea-creatures, and climbing plants, and worshipped
the great mother Nature as Aphrodite, the sea-born goddess.
[Illustration: FIG. 50.–Diagrams of the "triskelion" or figure formed
by the division of a circle into three equal bent cones as in _A_. _B_
is the rectangular form derived from it. _C_ is a "naturalized" form
derived from it, namely, the three conjoined legs used as the badge of
Sicily and of the Isle of Man.]
The triangular island of Sicily (called also Trinacria) had in ancient
times (even as far back as 300 B.C.) the conjoined three legs (shown
in Fig. 50, C) as its badge or armorial emblem. An ancient Greek vase
found at Girgenti has this badge painted on it. Ancient Lycia had a
triskelion formed by three conjoined cocks' heads stamped on its coins.
Though it has no direct connection with the Swastika, the introduction
of the "three legs" as the armorial emblem of the Isle of Man is worth
relating, as it is not known to most of those who are familiar with
the device, with its motto, "Quocunque jeceris stabit" on the copper
pence minted for that island up to as late a date as 1864, and current
in Great Britain. King Alexander III of Scotland expelled the Norse
Vikings from the Isle of Man in A.D. 1266, and substituted for their
armorial emblem in the island, which was a ship under full sail, the
three legs of Sicily. Frederick II, King of Sicily, married Isabella,
the daughter of Henry III of England. Alexander III of Scotland married
Margaret, another daughter of Henry, and Henry's son, Edmund the
Hunchback, became King of Sicily, in succession to his brother-in-law
Frederick. Alexander of Scotland was thus brother-in-law both of
Frederick II and of Edmund, successive kings of Sicily. It was in this
way that he was led, when he added the Isle of Man to his kingdom, to
replace the former Norse emblem of the island by the picturesque and
striking device of that other island–Sicily–with which he had so close
a family connection.
The tendency for drawings of men and animals when used as decorative
designs to degenerate, in the course of time and repetition, into
more and more simple lines, to become more and more "grammatized"
and simplified, till at last their origin is hardly recognizable,
is both a very remarkable and a very usual thing. The process of
degeneration, step by step, can often be traced, and curious remnants
of important parts of the original drawing are found surviving in the
final simplified design. The paddles and other carvings of some of the
South Sea Islanders show very curious "degenerations" of this kind.
A carved human head with open mouth becomes by repeated copying and
simplification a mere crescent or hook, which is the vastly enlarged
mouth of the original face. It alone survives, and is of enormous
size, when all other features and detail have been abandoned. In some
carvings of a face the tongue is shown projecting as an indication of
defiance. In course of simplification in successive reproductions the
face becomes a mere curved surface with a large pointed piece standing
out from it; it is the tongue. That one significant thing–suggesting
defiance–alone persists. The study of this process in human art
covers a very wide field, including all races and all times. An
excellent example is that given in Fig. 51. It shows the step by step
"grammatizing" of a favourite decorative drawing–that of an alligator,
as painted by the Chiriqui Indians of Panama on pottery. We start in
Fig. 51, A, with an alligator, already considerably "schematized"
or conventionalized. The Indians could do better than that, but it
served for pottery decoration. The figures B, C, D show three stages
of further "grammatizing" of the design (from different parts of
the surface of a pot) till, in D, we get the alligator reduced to a
yoke-like line and a dot!
[Illustration: FIG. 51.–Four stages in the simplification of a
decorative design–the Alligator–as painted on pottery by the Chiriqui
Indians. (Holmes.)]
Familiar modern examples of this reduction of an animal figure to one
or two lines, with mysterious-looking branches (representing limbs or
horns), are seen in the scattered devices on the Turkey carpets so
largely used at the present day. A comparison of various examples of
such carpets of different age and locality reveals the true nature of
these queer-looking patterns as representations of animals! Another
familiar instance of the grammatizing of an animal form is that
shown in Fig. 52, D, which is the common symbol in modern European
art for a flying bird. Fig. 52 shows, however, some more important
simplifications of animal form. The series marked E are a few examples
from hundreds painted on the walls of caves in Cantabria (Spain) by
prehistoric men. They start with a clearly recognizable figure of
a man–many such, an inch or two high, occur on some parts of the
cave-walls–and then we have all sorts of simplifications and deviations
from the more naturalistic initial design, as shown by the rest of the
series, ending in a T–a primitive symbol often arrived at by savage
decorative artists in various parts of the world by reducing and
grammatizing the human figure. The letters of many alphabets have been
simplified in this way from original picture-like signs or pictographs.
[Illustration: FIG. 52.–Simplification (grammatizing) of decorative
design. _A_, a stork walking. _B_, a stag. _C_, a stork with wings
spread for flying–resulting when fully "grammatized" in a curvilinear
swastika. _A_, _B_, and _C_, from spindle-whorls found at Hissarlik.
_D_, conventional representation of three flying birds. _E_,
grammatized human figure from the walls of caverns in Cantabria.]
[Illustration: FIG. 53.–Spindle-whorl from Troy (fourth city), with
three swastikas–two resembling "stylized" storks (see Fig. 52, C).
(Schliemann.)]
The drawings lettered A, B and C in Fig. 52 represent accurately
figures scratched on the clay "spindle-whorls" (before baking), so
abundant in the remains of the ancient cities on the hill of Hissarlik
(Troy), found by Schliemann (see Figs. 42 and 53). These heavy,
bun-like spindle-whorls have retained their use and shape since
Neolithic times (they are found in the Swiss lake-dwellings) to the
present day. Similar whorls were made of modern porcelain, variously
decorated, in France in the last century and sold to the peasants for
giving weight and rotatory stability to the spindle used in spinning,
and are still used wherever the spindle survives, as among the Indians
of Central America. A "grammatized" profile representation of a stork
(Fig. 52, A) is one of the designs on these Hissarlik spindle-whorls,
and so is the linear representation of a stag (Fig. 52, B). And now we
come back to the Swastika. The four figures in a row, marked C in Fig.
52, are a few of the representations of "flying" storks on these same
spindle-whorls; one so marked is drawn in Fig. 53. They are of various
degrees of simplification, and the last but one on the right hand side
is identical with a Swastika! It must be carefully remembered that
these clay spindle-whorls from Hissarlik are very commonly inscribed
with undoubted well-shaped Swastikas, as shown in Fig. 42. The Swastika
is quite a common and usual decorative lucky badge in the household art
of that locality and age. Hence it is not surprising that M. Solomon
Reinach, of Paris, has suggested that the Swastika may have originated
thus–by the "stylizing" or "grammatizing" of a favourite and sacred
bird–the stork. Once thus suggested and drawn in the simple Swastika
shape the emblem (it would be supposed) became fixed, and made as
rectilinear and simple as possible. Thenceforward it was accepted as an
emblem of good luck, which has been transmitted throughout the ancient
world of Europe, Asia and America. This theory has a plausible aspect,
but I understand from M. Reinach that he no longer attaches importance
to it. I do not know what theory, if any, of the origin of the Swastika
now commends itself to him, nor whether he thinks it has originated
independently in several times and places, or holds that it has one
common origin. I am inclined to favour the theory that the Swastika
has been started by the copying of the form of a natural object on the
part of a primitive race of men, and that this form has lent itself to
the invention of other badges and symbols besides that known as the
Swastika. I will explain this in the next chapter.
FOOTNOTE:
[7] But spiral and leaf-like decorative designs engraved on bone (see
Fig. 29, p. 54) are found in caves associated with other carvings made
by cave-men of the Reindeer or late Palæolithic period.