Archaic Forms Research Articles

The Position of Archaic Forms in the Verse of Plautus

O NE of the most widely accepted criteria for determining archaic forms in early Latin is the occurrence of a given form only at the ends of verses or cola.2 It is assumed that such limitation of position in the verse indicates that the form was retained because of its metrical convenience and that otherwise it would not have been used. This assumption, which seems entirely reasonable at first glance, has been fostered by several studies arbitrarily confined to certain words occurring exclusively or almost exclusively in such positions. At least one such study came to the conclusion that all words so limited in Plautus were either archaisms or new formations.3 This was a rash conclusion, especially since this study had considered only certain peculiar words occurring at ends of lines and not all words occurring here with equal regularity. Before undertaking an investigation of the position of words in Plautine verse, one should realize the difficulties which the poet faced in attempting to write Latin verse which should fulfil the requirements of Greek quantitative meter without doing too great violence to Latin regard for accent. That this was the task which the Roman poets set themselves seems obvious from a study of the differences between the Latin senarius and the Greek trimeter, and the data to

202. An Archaic Form of Chess Game in Chinese Peasant Embroidery

202. An Archaic Form of Chess Game in Chinese Peasant Embroidery

Chronology of Early Man and Cultural Associations

IN his recent presidential address to the British Speleological Association (see NATURE of August 1, p. 194) Sir Arthur Keith, when arguing for a parallel evolution in the development of modern races from primitive ancestral forms in their respective continental areas, demonstrated the connexion between the Australian and Pithecanthropus of Java, with the aid of mid-Pleistocene Solo man as the connecting link between the early Pleistocene Pithecanthropus and the late Pleistocene form of that region, Wadjak man. There would now appear to be a possibility that the chronological position of the undoubtedly archaic form discovered in the gravels of the Solo river at Ngandong, Java, in 1932, may be called in question. In another column of this issue of NATURE (see p. 293) reference is made to a communication from Dr. P. van Stein Callenfels, the distinguished Dutch authority on the archaeology of Indonesia, appearing in the current issue of UAnihropologie, in which he points out that the cultural associations of Solo man, harpoons and axes of stag horn, are such as in a European context would denote an antiquity of not more than nine or ten thousand years. While the early dating of Solo man has been generally accepted hitherto, if, as is stated, these artefacts are apparently beyond question contemporary with the human relics, this would appear to demand re-examination of the geological data. If further consideration supports Dr. Callenfels' argument, like the evidence of the Swanscombe skull in relation to the position of Piltdown man (see NATURE, August 1, p. 200), it would suggest that the current phylogenetic scheme, while valid as a logical classification, is an uncertain guide to chronology, and that the evolution and descent of man has been a far more complex process than has been demonstrated hitherto.

古代契約論の一片影 : 「黄泉戸喫」と婚姻の食事

古代契約論の一片影 : 「黄泉戸喫」と婚姻の食事

I.The primitive features of the cerebrum, with special reference to the brain of the bushwoman described byMarshall

In 1864 John Marshall, of University College Hospital, London, published in the ‘ Philosophical Transactions ’ an account of a brain of exceptional interest, that of a Bushwoman. The original documents and photographs relating to this brain were recently handed to Professor Elliot Smith by his daughter, Miss Marshall, On his advice these documents have been studied anew.* In making his drawings from these photographs the lithographer made some slight changes which convey an erroneous impression of the primitive features that confer exceptional importance on this Bushwoman’s brain. The progress of knowledge of this subject since 1864 enables us to interpret the photographs in another way and so make this interesting evidence available for the interpretation of such archaic forms of brain as are revealed in the endocranial casts ofPithecanthropus,Sinanthropus, andEoanthropus. The original photographs represent the dorsal, ventral, lateral, anterior and posterior aspects of both hemispheres and the medial aspect of the left hemisphere. There is no photograph of the medial aspect of the right hemisphere. In addition to the photographs of the brain there are photographs of the head before the removal of the brain, and fortunately a photograph of the left hemispherein situwithin the cranium. Marshall’s photographs are exactly the same size as the lithographic figures ; and he states that the figures agree in size with the preserved brain. He also gives measurements of the cerebrum taken from intracranial casts. There is a small discrepancy between the length of the cerebrum as measured on the photograph showing the brain in the cranium and the figures in his table. The amount of shrinkage is shown in fig. 25, Plate 3. In estimating the form and size of the outline of the endocranial cast of the Bushwoman figured in this paper, Marshall’s maximum figures are taken; allowing for this possible error, his illustrations enable us to reproduce the form fairly accurately. In Marshall' s table of measurements, in which he contrasts the European brain with the Bushwoman’s, the European brain is smaller in certain dimensions. This indicates that he specially selected an abnormally small European brain for comparison.

Research Items

Racial Affinities in Ontong Java. Ontong Java, which is situated to the north-east of the Solomon Islands, about 150 miles from Ysabel, has usually been regarded as one of the Polynesian outliers in Melanesia among others being Tikopia, Sikiana and Rennel Island. The significance attached to these outliers is that they are thought to represent colonies dropped by the Polynesians in the course of migration from south-eastern Asia to their final destination in the Pacific. Dr. H. L. Shapiro, having this theory in view, has recently examined a series of measurements of the inhabitants of Ontong Java made by Dr. lan Hogbin. The results of this examination are published in Oceania, 3, No. 4. The first comparison made was with the Polynesian series in the studies published by the Bernice P. Bishop Museum. This showed that on the physical side there is no support for the hypothesis of a Polynesian origin, nor did a comparison with the Fijians and the coastal New Hebrideans from Eromanga and Tanna, who represent Melanesian strains crossed with Polynesian, support the view that the original Polynesian strain of the Ontong Javanese had been blended with Melanesian characteristics. Comparison with other groups in turn led to the conclusion that the affinities of Ontong Java are with Micronesia. The Caroline Islanders in particular revealed considerable evidence of kinship. On the other hand, Dr. Hogbin's examination of social structure has revealed a number of Polynesian forms; but it has been pointed out that their language is not an archaic form of a Polynesian language, as might have been expected had they been an early colony. It seems rather to be modern Samoan or Maori. The indubitable evidence of physical characters suggests a revaluation of the cultural traits to which a Polynesian character has been attributed.

The French-English Margin in Canada

French-Canadian culture is local and personal; English culture is expansive and often impersonal. The two most cherished elements of the former are the French language and the Catholic religion. These two are inseparable and any other elements of the culture are dependet upon them. French culture in Quebec differs from that in France. Definite effort on the part of the clergy has reinforced the usual tendency of a colony to preserve obsolescent features of the mother culture Is is viewed as a heritage which must no be polluted even by the mother, France. The speech of the French Canadian preserves archaic forms because of isolation from the main body of French people and receives necessary additions to its vacabulary from another language. Bilingualism, generally speaking, is confined to the Frrnch Canadian, which means a spread of the English language rather than of French. Contacts between French and English are more often of a secondary character than within either group. There are few activities or institutions in which the participation of both races is identical in either number or kind. Prestige is a matter of personal achievement, but the successful French Canadian is likely to be less French and less devoted to his people. In the church and nationality organizations alone can success be attained without compromise.

A Kharosthī Inscription from Endere

Among the numerous Kharosthi documents recovered from Chinese Turkestan and transcribed and edited by A. M. Boyer, E. J. Rapson, and E. Senart, is one which is in many ways unique. This is the oblong wooden tablet which is numbered 661 in the second volume of these scholars' Kharosthī Inscriptions, where there is given on plate 12 a photographic reproduction of the document in question. It is one of the few documents discovered at Endere, which seems in ancient times to have been a sort of military fort situated about halfway between Charchan (Calmadāna of the inscriptions) and Nina or Niya (Cad'ota). Not only does it show some marked peculiarities of alphabet, dialect, and general style of composition, but as can be seen from the reproduction the form of writing also is quite unusual.It is written in a very stiff and archaic form of script, but the ink is fresh and the writing is very well preserved and clear and Konow is probably right when he says in his paper on “ The Names of the Kings in the Niya documents ”, published in Acta Orientalia, that “ it does not seem possible to ascribe a late date to E. vi, ii, i, which is probably not an original but a copy from an old tablet ”. Various indications supporting this view of a very early date for the original of this document will be noticed in the course of the following commentary. For the sake of convenience of reference, I repeat the text of the inscription here.

The Human Figure in Archaic Chinese Writing. Part II

In the Journal for 1923, pp. 386–90, in the Series of “Pictographic Reconnaissances”, Part V, a small set of ancient forms was discussed and illustrated which I gave reasons for considering the original scription of the word hsün, now written and meaning to question, examine with authority, and, in the phrase, chih hsün, standing for “bound captives”. It was there maintained that the archaic form represented a kneeling human figure having the arms pinioned behind with cords. Fig. 21 on p. 389 of that Paper, reproduced as Fig. 1 on Plate II of the present Number, shows best the conception of the early design.

Research Items

THE DIVINITY OF THE GUEST.—In the Ceylon Journal of Science, vol. 1, Pt. 3, Mr. A. M. Hocart discusses the position of the guest and his relation to his host in ancient Greece, in India, and in Fiji. In ancient Greece no distinction was made between a stranger, a host, and a guest, as they were not distinguishable. Further, not only was the god present with the stranger, and Zeus the patron of strangers, but also he was often regarded either as a god or actually was a god, as is shown in the manner in which Odysseus was addressed in Phaeacia. The exchange of gifts and the return of hospitality, potential or actual, created a bond of hereditary guest friendship out of which grew the consular system in historical times. The idea that the god accompanied strangers was evidently a check on an unhospitable age. In India, in the Atharvaveda the divine character of the guest is worked out in detail, every act of hospitality being identified with some phase of the sacrifice to a god. In the Anguttara Nikaya, the offerings to the Manes include a reception of guests, who are selected either as being learned or virtuous Brahmans, or as being relations through females. In Fiji, various ceremonial observances towards strangers, including the making of gifts, point to their sacred or heavenly character. In Fiji, however, intercourse takes place only through kinsmen, the kinship being either actual or, in case of necessity, fictitious. It is reckoned through the female. There was also a system of official guest friends. It is suggested that the Homeric system may have developed from some such archaic form as the Fijian, India being the common link in which the offerings to kinsmen and guests are distinguished, while in Fiji the recipients are identical; but in both countries divine honours were accorded to guests. The resulting hypothesis is that the divinity of the guest grows out of the divinity of the kinsman, who stands in cross relationship to the host, and this is extended fictitiously to any stranger.

Research Items

CU-CHULAINN AND ToTEMISM.—In Man for June, Dr. Géza Roheim, whose ingenious and suggestive psychoanalytic study of totemism in Australia has just been published in Great Britain, applies the same analytical method to the Cu-chulainn cycle of Irish legend with reference to its bearing upon the problem of totemic origins. Not only is the dog taboo of Cu-chulainn probably totemic, but also he becomes a dog by killing a dog. In other words, the legend contains more or less veiled references to the father- and-son conflict for the women of the Cyclopean family, from which, Freud holds, totemism and exogamy arose; of the animal symbol arising out of a feeling of guilt for the act of parricide; and of incest committed by the hero. Cu-chulainn slays the dog of Cu-lain the smith, and serves in its stead, as other Aryan heroes served a term of apprentice- ship with a smith, from whom they usually obtained their terrific weapon. But the smith and his dog are to be regarded as identical and the former repre sents the father. The slaying is therefore parricide. Cu-chulainn fights with and kills his own son; but Lugaid, who deals him his death-blow, is probably also his own son by an incestuous union, although ostensibly the son of Curoi. Curoi, the archaic form of the Oak King, is also to be regarded as the father of Cu-chulainn by whom he is killed. If then the smith is equated with his hound, the combat is between two heroes of the dog clan, and when Cu-chulainn breaks the taboo he is slain by his son Lugaid, a parallel being the case of the Baja King, who eats his totem animal when death at the hand of his son and heir draws near.

Mysteres et Moralites du Manuscrit 617 de Chantilly. Publies pour la premiere fois et precedes d'une etude linguistique et litteraire

None of the five poems published by Dr Cohen in this volume has hitherto seen the light in its present form, though the last of them (Le Pelerinage de la Vie Humaine) is known to students of Old French literature in a French version by Guillaume de Digulleville, edited for the Roxburghe Club by M. Stiirzinger in 1893. They are listed in the library catalogue simply as 'Cinq Jeux.' The first two are 'Jeux de la Nativite' (the second unfortunately fragmentary), the remaining three deal with more abstract subjects and are thus described: 'Li Jeux des vnI pechie morteil et des vni vertus'; 'Unc Jeux a vi personage (L'Alliance de Foy et Loyalte) 'Le Jeux de Pelerinage humaine.' All five are written in Walloon, or, more precisely, in Liegeois, of the fourteenth century, and it is chiefly to a study of their forms and vocabulary that Dr Cohen has devoted the 149 pages of his Introduction, thus making a further contribution to the growing body of literature dealing with the Walloon language. The literary value of these Mysteries and Moralities cannot be said to be very great, though they possess a certain distinction in having apparently been copied by a woman and written for 'un couvent de femmes.' But their linguistic interest is considerable, especially in the case of the last one, where the existence of the French source enables a detailed comparison of French and Walloon forms to be made. This comparison Dr Cohen has carried out at great length in his Introduction, but his work is rendered very diffuse and a little confusing at times by the fact that, in spite of the archaic form of the poems, he takes modern French and modern Liegeois as his point de depart. Hence many forms and developments are tabulated (sometimes several times over, as each poem receives individual attention), which are absolutely normal in Old French and do not seem to call for remark in a work of this kind. Such

Possible Babylonian Contributions to the So-Called Phoenician Alphabet

Although recent excavations in the Near East have compelled us to make almost daily readjustments in our views on the development of ancient history, nevertheless the tradition, mentioned by Herodotus (Book v. 58) and other classical writers, that the Greeks (lonians) adopted for their writing the letters of the Phoenicians, seems to maintain an unshaken hold on the credence of scholars. And rightly so: for the Semitic names of the Greek letters would in themselves be the strongest evidence of an Asiatic origin of the European alphabet, even if we did not have the proof positive in the archaic forms of the letters of the early Greek and Phoenician (North Semitic) inscriptions which have survived to our own day. But the moment we raise the question of the origin of the Phoenician alphabet we are confronted by the widest divergence of opinion. prevalent theory, universally accepted till a few years ago, was that of Viscomte Emmanuel de Roug6, first propounded to the Acad6mie des Inscriptions in 1859, but unnoticed by the world at large till republished, after de Roug6's death, by his son in 1874. According to this view the alphabet was borrowed by the Phoenicians from the cursive (hieratic) form of Egyptian hieroglyphics.' This theory was popularized and disseminated throughout the English-speaking world by two volumes, entitled The Alphabet, by Canon Isaac Taylor, published in 1883.2 It received even wider publicity through the same writer's presentation of it in Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible (art. Alphabet). But today even an Egyptologist is ready to admit that it enjoyed a wholly undeserved popularity.3 It is not the purpose of this article to pass in review the onslaughts which have been made on the theory of de Roug6, much less to defend

Some Notes on the So-Called Hieroglyphic-Tablet

The tablet is clearly a sign list. The characters at the right hand of each column correspond to those on the kudurrus of the Cassite and Pasbe dynasties, differing from those of Hammurabi's time on the one hand and from the archaic forms of Nebuchadnezzar II on the other.4 The signs on the left except a few obviously late ones, are seemingly older and show little more than a passing resemblance to Babylonian traditions of writing. Two problems are therefore to be solved: 1. The general plan and interpretation of the sign list. 2. The identification as to origin and date of the archaic characters at the left.

Societies and Academies

PARIS. Academy of Sciences, October 3.—:M. Mascart in the chair.—A comparison of the expenditure of the flexor and extensor muscles of the forearm, applied, each group separately, to the production of the same continuous external work: A. Chauveau. The energy expended was measured by means of the respiratory coefficient. It was found that the external work effected by the flexor muscles of the forearm was less than that of the extensors, the proportion being about 0.4 for the former and 0.6 for the latter. This difference appears to be due exclusively to the less favourable conditions under which the extensor muscles work.—On the loss of electricity in air in the neighbourhood of thermal springs: A. B. Chauveau. In the thermal springs at Cauterets, the radio-activity of the air near the spring was clearly marked, the loss observed in the neighbourhood of the reservoir being three times as fast as in the open air.—The colorations produced by the Becquerel rays; its application to crystallography and to the calorimetric determination of radio-activity: C. J. Salomonscn and G. Dreyer. The coloration produced by radium on certain crystals demonstrates the zonal structure of the crystal, and thus throws light upon the manner in which it has been built up. In the case of quartz, this zonal structure has not hitherto been demonstrated.—On a vacuum effect produced by a waterspout: Léon Pigeon.—On actinium: A Debierne. The substance previously described by the author under the name of actinium presents many similarities with the emanium of Giesel. The opportunity has recently arisen of directly comparing the two substances, and the observations of M. and Madame Curie, M. Giesel, and the author on the characteristic phenomena of phosphorescence provoked by the two products shows that they are identical. The name emanium should therefore be dropped in favour of the earlier actinium.—The properties and constitution of the molybdenum steels: Léon Guillet. The series of steels studied contained only 0.2 per cent, of carbon, with molybdenum increasing from o per cent, to 15 per cent. A second series contained about 0.85 per cent, of carbon. In small quantity, molybdenum increases the breaking load without causing extra fragility. The general properties of the molybdenum steels resemble those of tungsten steels, but four times as much molybdenum as tungsten is required to produce the same results.—A thermochemical comparison between rosanilines and leucanilines: Jules Schmidlin.—On the morphology of the Chetoptera: Ch. Gravier.—The archaic form of the Thecosome Pteropods: Paul Pelseneer.—On the structure of the muscles of Anomia ephippium: F. Marceau,—On acarophytism in Monocotyledons: E. de Wildman.—Semeiology of the prostatic secretion: A. Guépin.—On a new treatment of seeds: E. Bréal and E. Giustiniani.

3. Cup-Marks as an Archaic Form of Inscription

3. Cup-Marks as an Archaic Form of Inscription

Art. XX.—Cup-marks as an Archaic Form of Inscription

Many years ago, in a paper read before the Asiatic Society of Bengal, attention was drawn by me to the resemblance borne by the ‘cup-marks’ found in India to the archaic sculpturings of Europe, described by the late Sir James Simpson and other writers on the subject, and certain theories were advanced regarding the possible significance of these markings.

The Fable Referred to in Aliscans

Some years ago (in the academic year 1898-99), while reading Aliscans with a few students, I reached an explanation of v. 3053 in Guessard and Montaiglon's edition which still seems to me plausible, even after the recent remarks of M. Gaston Paris on the same subject (Romania, xxxI, 100ff.). I, therefore, make it public.l Paris, it will be remembered, proposes for the line the reading: "Est o9 la fable dou tor et dou nuiton?" He argues that nuiton might easily have been corrupted by scribes into mouton, but that mouton, had that been the original reading, would not have been so altered into nuiton, this latter being a rare word, "qui devait embarrasser les scribes." Moreover, one of the three MSS. (out of a total of thirteen whose readings he gives) which favor his reading is one which is often alone in preserving original readings and archaic forms. But it is doubtless the former of these arguments whicli was in his opinion decisive; the latter, if it had stood alone, would hardly have induced him to express the view presented in his article. I shall, therefore, now consider only the former argument. The question of the comparative difficulty of the readings mouton and nuiton Paris considers as offering no room for doubt. But two objections to his opinion on this point present themselves, and each of them seems to me to have weight. In the first place, is it quite certain that the word nuiton was really rare, or rare enough to embarrass scribes at all ? Even if the word occurred only three or four times in the Old French literature preserved, it might still have been fairly frequent in conversational use, so that everybody was

A New and Annectant Type of Chilopod

ABSTRACT The continent of Australia and its adjacent islands have hitherto proved singularly disappointing in the production of interesting types of Chilopoda. Setting aside Cermatobins, which was discovered some fifteen years back in the island of Adenara, none of the genera known up to the present time from the Australian region throw special light upon the phylogeny of the families of this class ; none can be regarded as archaic forms that have found refuge in this southern tract of land. Collections made in various districts of the country have yielded specimens of Scutigera, Henicops, Lithobius, Scolopendra, Cryptops, Geophilus—genera which may be met with on a single hillside in almost any part of Southern Europe; of Cormocephalus and Ethmostigmus, which in an almost equal degree are characteristic of tropical Africa or the Oriental region. The entire fauna, in short, bears the stamp of comparatively recent origin by immigration from South Eastern Asia, with perhaps an infusion from the Ethiopian region or Madagascar.

Observations and reflections on the appendages and on the nervous system of apus cancriformis

ABSTRACT Apus Cancriformis is in many respects one of the most important of the Crustacea. Not only is it of exceptionally large size for one of the Entomostraca, and therefore suited to anatomical investigation, but it possesses peculiarities of organisation which mark it out (together with its immediate congeners, the Phyllopoda) as an archaic form, probably standing nearer to the extinct ancestors of the Crustacea than any other living members of the group.