is one of prime importance, and is capable of indefinite extension to other peoples.
Allied to this method of study is the demonstration of the migrations of early cultures elaborated and so energetically promulgated by Prof. G. Elliot Smith and his school.[1] A prolonged study (1902-14) of the process of mummification by the Ancient Egyptians led Elliot Smith not only to consider mummification in general, but also methods of burial and tomb buildings. Thence he passed on to megalithic monuments. These studies led him to the view that the practice of mummification has a geographical distribution corresponding to the area occupied by a curious assortment of other practices, such as the building of megalithic monuments and other stone structures, the cult of the sun and the serpent, ear-piercing, tattooing, circumcision, beliefs in the petrifaction of human beings, the divine right of kings, the complex story of the creation, the deluge, and many other associations. Elliot Smith claims that “the study of such a practice as mummification, the influence of which is deep-rooted in the innermost beliefs of the people who resort to it, affords data almost as reliable as Rivers’
- ↑ G. Elliot Smith, The Ancient Egyptians and their Influence upon the Civilization of Europe, London, 1911; “The Evolution of the Rockcut Tomb and the Dolmen,” Essays and Studies presented to William Ridgeway, Cambridge, 1913, p. 493; The Migrations of Early Culture, Manchester, 1915; “The Influence of Ancient Egyptian Civilization in the East and in America,” Bull. John Ryland’s Library, 1916; Science, Aug. 11, 1916; “Ships as Evidence of the Migrations of Early Culture,” Journ. Manchester Egyptian and Oriental Soc. 1915-16 (1917); “Ancient Mariners," Proc. Belfast Nat. Hist. and Phil. Soc. 1916-17, p. 44, and numerous other papers and notes.
J. Wilfred Jackson, Shells as Evidence of the Migrations of Early Culture, London, 1917 (a reprint with additions of papers previously published in Manchester).
W. J. Perry, “The Orientation of the Dead in Indonesia,” J.R.A.I. xliv. 1914, p. 281; “Myths of Origin and the Home of the Dead,” Folk-Lore, xxvi. 1915, and other papers; The Megalithic Culture of Indonesia, Manchester and London, 1918.
