Both the theory of diffusion and the theory of parallel, independent invention arise from the same scientific fact. This fact is that different primitive peoples often make similar tools, build similar buildings, enjoy similar institutions, live by similar customs, or believe similar myths. And they do this although the tribes may be widely separated from one another. To pin the matter down to our own present concern, certain objects found in the New World and dated before Columbus are almost exactly like objects in the Old World. For instance, a spear-thrower from western Texas not only employs the same principle as one from Australia, but has practically the same physical shape. Curved throwing-sticks and bull-roarers come from both these localities (see illustration, page 226). Star-shaped mace heads of Melanesian type turn up in Peru. Looms that have the same eleven working parts are found in areas of the New World as well as the Old. Easter Island has polygonal stonework with locked joints which matches a form of masonry in Andean Peru, and a certain people of Easter Island stretched their ear lobes in the same fashion as the Incas. Panpipes of the Old World type appear in South America, Panama, and California; some from western Brazil are identical in tonal scale and absolute pitch with some from the Solomon Islands (see illustration, page 235). In Hawaii and in Peru, as in Egypt and ancient Japan, brothers married to sisters were of superior status. The digging stick of certain Polynesians has a step like that of the Indians of Peru. The quipu, or knotted-string record, spread from Polynesia to Peru, and the decimal system was found in both areas, though farther north, in Middle America, men employed the vigesimal system based on progression by twenties. The Hindu game of pachisi resembles the Mexican game of patolli. Lists have been published of as many as fifty such similarities between Oceania and the Americas.[1] [Illustration: DIFFUSION OR INDEPENDENT INVENTION? _Striking resemblances exist between Old World and New World artifacts. The stone clubs are about 14 inches long. (Upper left, after Gladwin, 1937; the Chinese bell, after Gladwin, 1937, the Arizona bell, after Elmore, 1945; upper right, the New Zealand club, after Wickersham, 1895, the California and Peruvian clubs, after Imbelloni, 1930. The mace heads, after Gladwin, 1937.)_] Effigy Flints Russia Illinois Bronze and Copper Bells China Arizona Two-Edged Stone Clubs New Zealand California Peru Star-Shaped Mace Head Melanesia Peru Bastian’s “Psychic Unity”