The mind of primitive man

by Franz Boas

Historical evidence is quite in accord with the results derived from the investigation of the distribution of modern types. In the earliest times we find on the peninsula of Italy groups of heterogeneous people, the linguistic relationships of many of which have remained obscure up to the present time. From the earliest prehistoric times on, we see wave after wave of people invading Italy from the north. Very early Greeks settled in the greater part of southern Italy, and Phœnician influence was well established on the west coast of the peninsula. A lively intercourse existed between Italy and northern Africa. Slaves of Berber blood were imported, and have left their traces. Slave trade continued to bring new blood into the country until quite recent times, and Livi believes that he can trace the type of Crimean slaves who were introduced late in the middle ages in the region of Venice. In the course of the centuries, the migrations of Celtic and Teutonic tribes, the conquests of the Normans, the contact with Africa, have added their share to the mixture of people on the Italian peninsula.

The fates of other parts of Europe were no less diversified. The Pyrenæan Peninsula, which at present seems to be one of the most isolated parts of Europe, had a most checkered history. The earliest inhabitants of whom we know were presumably related to the Basques of the Pyrenees. These were subjected to Oriental influences in the pre-Mycenæan period, to Punic influences, to Celtic invasions, Roman colonization, Teutonic invasions, the Moorish conquest, and later on to the peculiar selective process that accompanied the driving-out of the Moors and the Jews.

England was not exempt from vicissitudes of this kind. It seems plausible that at a very early period the type which is now found principally in Wales and in some parts of Ireland occupied the greater portion of the islands. It was swamped by successive waves of Celtic, Roman, and Anglo-Saxon migration. Thus we find change everywhere.

The history of the migrations of the Goths, the invasions of the Huns, who in the short interval of one century moved their habitations from the borders of China into the very centre of Europe, are proofs of the enormous changes in population that have taken place in early times.

Slow colonization has also brought about fundamental changes in blood as well as in diffusion of languages and cultures. Perhaps the most striking recent example of this change is presented by the gradual Germanization of the region east of the Elbe River, where, after the Teutonic migrations, people speaking Slavic languages had settled. The gradual absorption of Celtic communities, of the Basque, in ancient times the great Roman colonization, and later the Arab conquest of North Africa, are examples of similar processes.

Intermixture in early times was not by any means confined to peoples which, although diverse in language and culture, were of fairly uniform type. On the contrary, the most diverse types of southern Europe, northern Europe, eastern Europe, and western Europe, not to mention the elements which poured into Europe from Asia and Africa, have been participants in this long-continued intermixture.

There is, however, one fundamental difference in regard to the early European migrations and the modern transatlantic migration. On the whole, the former took place at a period when the density of population was, comparatively speaking, small. There is no doubt that the number of individuals concerned in the formation of the modern types of Great Britain were comparatively few as compared with the millions who come together to form a new nation in the United States; and it is obvious that the process of amalgamation which takes place in communities that must be counted by millions differs in character from the process of amalgamation that takes place in communities that may be counted by thousands. Setting aside social barriers, which in early times as well as now undoubtedly tended to keep intermingling peoples separate, it would seem that in the more populous communities of modern times a greater permanence of the single combining elements might occur, owing to their larger numbers, which make the opportunities for segregation more favorable.

Among the smaller communities the process of amalgamation must have been an exceedingly rapid one. After the social distinctions have once been obliterated, pure descendants of one of the component types decrease greatly in number, and the fourth generation of a people consisting originally of distinct elements will be almost homogeneous. I shall revert to this phenomenon later on.

It might be objected to this point of view, that the very diversity of local types in Europe proves the homogeneity of race types,—as, for instance, of the northwestern European type, the Mediterranean type, the East European type, or the Alpine type,—but it must be remembered that we have historical proof of the process of mixture, and that the relative number of component elements is sufficient to account for the present conditions.

I think we may dismiss the assumption of the existence of a pure type in any part of Europe, and of a process of mongrelization in America different from anything that has taken place for thousands of years in Europe. Neither are we right in assuming that the phenomenon is one of a more rapid intermixture than the one prevailing in olden times. The difference is based essentially in the masses of individuals concerned in the process.