The Swastika, the Earliest Known Symbol, and Its Migration: With Observations on the Migration of Certain Industries in Prehistoric TimesWilson, Thomas
Religion
The Swastika, the Earliest Known Symbol, and Its Migration: With Observations on the Migration of Certain Industries in Prehistoric Times
Wilson, Thomas
Industries, Primitive; Swastikas; Symbolism
_Belgium._--The Museum of Namur, Belgium, possesses a small object of
bone, both points of which have been broken; its use is somewhat
indeterminable, but it is believed by the curator of that museum and
others to have been an arrowhead or spearhead. In form it belongs to Class
A of stemmed implements, is lozenge-shaped, without shoulder or barb. It
is a little more than two inches long, five-eighths of an inch wide, is
flat and thin. On one side it bears two oblique or St. Andrew's crosses
scratched in the bone; on the other, a figure resembling the Swastika. It
is not the normal Swastika, but a variation therefrom. It is a cross about
three-eighths of an inch square. The main stem lines cross each other at
right angles; the ends of each of these arms are joined by two incised
lines, which gives it the appearance of two turns to the right, but the
junction is not well made, for the lines of the cross extend in every case
slightly farther than the bent end. The variation from the normal Swastika
consists of the variation produced by this second line. This object was
lately found by M. Dupont, of Brussels, in the prehistoric cavern of
Sinsin, near Namur. Most, or many, of these caverns belong to Paleolithic
times, and one, the Grotte de Spy, has furnished the most celebrated
specimens of the skeletons of Paleolithic man. But the cavern of Sinsin
was determined, from the objects found therein, to belong to the Bronze
Age.
_Scandinavia._--The evidences of prehistoric culture have great
resemblance throughout Denmark, Sweden, and Norway; so it is believed that
during the prehistoric ages their peoples had the same culture, and the
countries have been classed together as Scandinavia.
[Illustration: Fig. 203. RUNIC INSCRIPTION CONTAINING A SWASTIKA. Inlaid
with silver on a bronze sword. Saebo, Norway.]
[Illustration: Du Chaillu, "Viking Age," I, fig. 335.
Fig. 204_a_. SWASTIKA WITH DOTS. Torcello, Italy.
Fig. 204_b_. RUNIC INSCRIPTION ON SPEARHEAD. Torcello, Italy.]
[Illustration: Fig. 205. REDDING COMB WITH SWASTIKA. Scandinavia.]
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