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The Swastika

The Migration Of Symbols

Page 127

sages and have been preserved from destruction by the vicissitudes of time and space. We have but to consider how money passes from hand to hand and is always preserved to be passed on to the next. Every collection of importance throughout the world possesses a greater or less number of Greek and roman coins antedating the Christian era. We have an excellent illustration of these possibilities in the word "halloo," commonly rendered as "hello." A few years ago this work was peculiar to the English language, yet an incident lately occurred in the city of Washington, within sight of my own residence, by which this word, "hello," has traveled the world around, has spread itself over land and sea, has attached itself to and become part of most every spoken language of civilization,a and without much consideration as to its meaning; but being on the procrustean bed of imitation, there are people, foreigners, who believe that the telephone can be only made to respond when the demand is made "hello!"

Migration Of Classic Symbols.
      Count Goblet d'Alviella, in "La Migration des Symboles," traces many ancient symbols from what he believes to be their place or origin to their modern habitat. The idea he elucidates in his book is indicated in its title.
      The sacred tree of the Assyrians. --- this he holds to be one of the oldest historic symbols; that it had its origin in Mesopotamia, one of the earliest civilized centers of the world. Beginning with its simplest form, the sacred tree grew into an ornate and highly complex pattern, invariably associated with religious subjects. Two living creatures always stand on either side, facing it and each other. First they were monsters, like winged bulls or griffins, and after became human or semihuman personages --- priests or kings, usually in the attitude of devotion. The Count says the migration of both these types can be readily traced. The tree between the two monsters or animals passed from Mesopotamia to India, where ti was employed by the Buddhists and Brahmins, and has continued in use in that country to the present time. It passed to the Phenicians, and from Asia Minor to Greece. From the Persians it was introduced to the Byzantines, and during the early ages, into Christian symbolism in Sicily and Italy, and even penetrated to the west of France. The other type --- that is, the tree between two semi-human personages --- followed the same route into India, China, and eastern Asia, and, being found in the ancient Mexican and Maya codices, it forms part of the evidence cited by the Count as a pre-Columbian communication between the Old World and the New. He argues this out by similarity of the details of attitude and expression of the human figure, the arrangement of the branches of the sacred tree, etc.
      The sacred cone of Mesopotamia. --- This was worshipped by the western Semites as their great goddess, under the image of a conical stone. Its figurative representation is found alike on monuments, amulets, and coins. On some Phenician monuments there is to be seen, superadded to the cone, a horizontal crossbar in the middle of which rests a handle. This shape bears a striking resemblance to the Crux ansata (fig. 4), and, like it, was a symbol of life in its fig. 4

widest and most abstract meaning. The resemblance between them is supposed to have caused them to have been mistaken and employed one for the other in the same character of symbol and talisman. It is alleged that the Ephesian Artemis was but the sacred cone of Mesopotamia anthropomorphized, although, with the halo added to Artemis, the allegation of relationship has been made in respect of the Crux ansata.
The Crux ansata, the key of life. This is probably more widely known in modern times than any other Egyptian symbol. Its hieroglyphic name is Ankh, and its signification is "to live." As an emblem of life, representing the male and female principle united, it is always borne in the hands of the gods, it is poured from a jar over the head of the king in a species of baptism, and it is laid symbolically on the lips of the mummy to revive it. From Egypt the Crux ansata spread first among the Phenicians, and then throughout the whole Semitic world, from Sardinia to Susiana.
The winged globe. --- This was widely spread and highly venerated Egyptian symbol. From Egypt it spread, under various modifications, throughout the Old World. It is formed by a combination of the representations of the sun that have prevailed in different localities in Egypt, the mythology of which ended by becoming a solar drama. Two uræus snakes or asps, with heads erect, are twisted round a globe-shaped disk, behind which are the outstretched wings of a hawk, and on its top the horns of a goat. It commemorates the victory of the principle of light and good over that of darkness and evil. It spread readily among the Phenicians, where it is found suspended over the sacred tree and the sacred cone, and was carried wheresover their art was introduced --- westward to Carthage, Sicily, Sardinia, and Cyprus, eastward to Western Asia. Very early it penetrated on the north to the Hittites, and when it reached Mesopotamia, in the time of Sargonidæm, the winged circle assumed the shape of the wheel or rosette, surmounted by a scroll with upcurled extremities and with a feathered tail opening out like a fan, or a human figure in an attitude sometimes of benediction, sometimes warlike, was inscribed within the disk. Then it was no longer exclusively a solar emblem, but served to express the general idea of divinity. From Mesopotamia it passed to Persia, principally in the anthropoid type. It was, however, never adopted by Greece, and it is nowhere met with in Europe, except, as before stated, in the Mediterranean islands. When Greece took over from Asia symbolic combinations in which it was originally represented, she replaced it by the thunderbolt. But the aureaole, or halo,

ENDNOTES:

H. Mis. 90, pt. 2----------61

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