Our knowledge is very imperfect concerning the movements of mankind. Historical records give some information on the subject. A certain amount has been gleaned from traditional sources, but doubtless much more remains to be garnered. The spoils of the archæologist afford important data, but there are immense tracts of country which are yet totally unexplored, or very imperfectly investigated. All shiftings of peoples are mainly controlled by climatic and geographical conditions; but these are continually varying, and it is the business of the geographer and geologist to indicate what these have probably been at various periods since the appearance of man on this earth. It is not too much to say that, when maps have been prepared which indicate these various changes, great light will be thrown upon the early history of mankind. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER VII. ETHNOLOGY: ITS SCOPE AND SOURCES [Sidenote: =Definition.=] “ETHNOLOGY” is a term which is often loosely used as synonymous with “Anthropology,” to cover the whole field of the science of man. It was in this sense that it first came into prominence, being chosen by M. W. F. Edwards as the title for the _Société ethnologique de Paris_, in 1839. The society was concerned with what we should now call Anthropology; but it was more especially interested in the origins and relationships of the historical races of Europe, which was the etymological justification for its name. The English Ethnological Society, established in 1843, imitated the French title, and did much to fix the vague and general interpretation of the word. Unfortunately, Professor Tylor, first and foremost of English ethnologists, seems purposely to avoid the use of the word in his _Primitive Culture_, which he refers to as “rational ethnography.” But, with the development of the subject, its scope became gradually more defined, until it is now generally restricted to the comparative and genetic study of human culture and of man as a social animal. The materials for the study of ethnology have been always with us, but the study itself is of very recent development, and almost alone among the sciences can reckon its founders among the living. Professor J. L. Myres gives excellent reasons for this “late adolescence” in his opening address at the meeting of the British Association at Winnipeg, 1909:—