An important indication of this has been given us recently. A philologist, H. Sperber (Upsala) who works independently of psychoanalysis, advanced the theory that sexual needs have played the largest part in the origin and development of languages. The first sounds served as means of communication, and called the sexual partner; the further development of the roots of speech accompanied the performance of the primitive man's work. This work was communal and progressed to the accompaniment of rhythmically repeated word sounds. In that way a sexual interest was transferred to the work. The primitive man made work acceptable at the same time that he used it as an equivalent and substitute for sex-activity. The word thus called forth by the common labor had two meanings, designating the sex-act as well as the equivalent labor-activity. In time the word became disassociated from its sexual significance and became fixed on this work. Generations later the same thing happened to a new word that once had sexual significance and came to be used for a new type of work. In this manner a number of word-roots were formed, all of sexual origin, and all of which had lost their sexual significance. If the description sketched here approximates the truth, it opens up the possibility for an understanding of the dream symbolism. We can understand how it is that in the dream, which preserves something of these most ancient conditions, there are so extraordinarily many symbols for the sexual, and why, in general, weapons and implements always stand for the male, materials and things manufactured, for the female. Symbolic relationships would be the remnants of the old word-identity; things which once were called by the same names as the genitals can now appear in the dream as symbols for them.