The Swastika
The Migration Of Symbols
The Swastika ornaments Danish baptismal fonts, and according to Mr. J. A. Hjaltalin it "was used [in Ireland] a few years since as a magic sign, but with an obscured or corrupted meaning." It arrived in that island in the ninth century A. D. (2)
The Swastika mark appears both in its normal and ogee form in the Persian
carpets
and rugs. (3) While writing
this memoir, I have found in the Persian rug in my own bedchamber sixteen
figures of the Swastika. In the large rug in the chief clerk's office
of the National Museum there are no less than twenty-seven figures of
the Swastika. On a piece of imitation Persian carpet, with a heavy pile,
made probably in London, I found also figures of the Swastika. All the
foregoing figures have been of the normal Swastika, the arms crossing
each other and the ends turning at right angles, the lines being of equal
thickness throughout. Some of them were bent to the right and some to
the left. At the entrance of the Grand Opera House in Washington I saw
a large India rug containing a number of ogee Swastikas; while the arms
crossed each other at right angles, they curved, some to the right and
some to the left, but all the lines increased in size, swelling in the
middle of the curve, but finishing in a point. The modern Japanese wisteria
workbaskets for ladies have one or more Swastikas woven in their sides
or covers.Thus, it appears that the use of the Swastika in modern times is confined principally to Oriental and Scandinavian countries, countries which hold close relations to antiquity; that, in western Europe, where in in ancient times the Swastika was most frequent, it has, during the last one or two thousand years, become extinct. And this in the countries which have led the world in culture.
If the Swastika was a symbol of a religion in India and migrated as such in times of antiquity to America, it was necessarily by human aid. The individuals who carried and taught it should have carried with it the religious idea it represented. To do this required a certain use of language, at least the name of the symbol. If the sign bore among the aborigines in America the name it bore in India, Swastika, the evidence of contact and communication would be greatly strengthened. If the religion it represented in India should be found in America, the chain of evidence might be considered complete. But in order to make it so it will be necessary to show the existence of these names and this religion in the same locality or among the same people or their descendants as is found the sign. To find traces of the Buddhist religion associated with the sign of the Swastika among the Eskimo in Alaska might be no evidence of its prehistoric migration, for it might have occurred in modern times, as we know has happened with the Russian religion and the Christian cross. While to find the Buddhist religion and the Swastika symbol together in America, at a locality beyond the possibility of modern European or Asiatic contact, would be evidence of prehistoric migration yet it would seem to fix it at a period when, and from a country where, the two had been used together. If the Swastika and Buddhism migrated to America together it must have been since the establishment of the Buddhist religion, which is approximately fixed in the sixth century B. C. But there has not been as yet in America, certainly not in the localities where the Swastika has been found, any trace discovered of the Buddhist religion, nor of its concomitants of language, art, or custom. Adopting the theory of migration of the Swastika, we may therefore conclude that if the Swastika came from India or Eastern Asia, it came earlier than the sixth century, B. C.
If a given religion with a given symbol, both belonging to the Old World, should both be found associated in the New World, it would be strong evidence in favor of Old World migration --- certainly of contact and communication. Is it not equally strong evidence of contact to find the same sign used in both countries as a charm, with the same significance in both countries?
The argument has been made, and it has proved satisfactory, at least to the author, that throughout Asia and Europe, with the exception of the Buddhists and early Christians, the Swastika was used habitually as a sign or mark or charm, implying good luck, good fortune, long life, much pleasure, great success, or something similar. The makers and users of the Swastika in South and Central America,and among the mound builders of the savages of North America, having all passed away before the advent of history, it is not now, and never has been, possible for us to obtain from them a description of the meaning, use, or purpose for which the Swastika was employed by them. But, by the same line of reasoning that the proposition has been treated in the prehistoric countries of Europe and Asia, and which brought us to the conclusion that the Swastika was there used as a charm or token of good luck, or good fortune, or against the evil eye, we may surmise that the Swastika sign was used in America for much the same purpose. It was placed upon the same style of object in America as in Europe and Asia. It is not found on any of the ancient gods of America, nor
ENDNOTES:
1. Finnische Ornamente. 1. Stehornamente. Heft 1-4. Soumalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura Helsingissä, 1894. [Back]
2. Karl Blind, "Discovery of Odinic songs in Shetland," Nineteenth Century, June, 1879. p. 1098, cited by Aldfred C. Haddon in "Evolution in Art." London, 1895, p. 285. Back
3. Miss Fanny D. Bergen, in Scribner's Magazine, September, 1894. Back
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