FEBRUARY 8, 1912] NATURE 475

As the author admits, many of the so-called species logical results. The ancient portraits of the two races and even the subgenera of Calamites are of little or agree with the skulls. We may, with him, regard no scientific value; but the reader has placed before the "predynastic" Egyptian as the true )lilote, akin to him in a convenient and accessible form abundant the desert tribes of Beja and Bisharin, to the Galla information from a scattered literature, from which he and Somali, and perhaps to the , while the new can form his own opinion as to the value of supposed "dynastic " type of the north was probably akin to specific differences, and is enabled to obtain a com• the high-nosed, round-headed stock of western , prehensive view of the genus as a whole a nd of its which von Luschan calls "Armenoid," because the geographical distribution. A. C. SEWARD. Armenians are the best representatives of it. The high-nosed Semites of Asia may be a mixture of this stock with the true Arabians of the south, but EARLY AND ANCIENT if the Sumerians of are representatives of CIVILISATION. the southern race, which spread from the Upper The Ancient Egyptians and their Influence upon the to the delta of the Euphrates, and even to , as Civilisation of . By Prof. G. Elliot Smith, Dr. Smith seems to hold, how does he explain their F.R.S. (Harper's Library of Living Thought.) remarkably high noses? I would suggest that they Pp.xvi+ r88. (London and New YOI"k: Harper may have been "Armenoids," not southerners, who Brothers, rgrr.) Price 2s. 6d. net. conquered the original southerners (Semites), to be l T E think that "The Early Egyptians and their themselves in turn conquered by the Semites who had \ IV Influence on Ancient Civilisation" would have imbibed Sumerian civilisation. There are facts which been a better title for Dr. Elliot Smith's little book point to the existence of a pre-Sumerian Semitic popu• than that which he has actually chosen, "The Ancient lation in Babylonia. On this view the Semitic speech Egyptia ns and their Influence upon the Civilisation of will belong to the southerners, the true Arabia ns, Europe "; for Dr. Smith deals only with the most and, if so, the very ancient Semitic elements in the ancient, the earliest Egyptians, and he traces their and culture will belong to the pre• influence not only upon the civilisation of Europe, dynastic people, not to the northemers. But this but also, and in the first place, upon that of northern conclusion conflicts with the fact that the most Semitic and . We may say at once that cults of , as, for instance, that of Ra, the sun• Dr. Smith is less happy in his essay to trace this god of Heliopolis, belong to the north; the southern influence than when he is simply analysing the ethnic cults are the least Semitic, and the predynastic culture constituents of the race which exercised it. In deal• of the chalcolithic age is by no means "Semitic " in ing with the complicated question of possible early appearance. Egyptian influence upon the surrounding peoples, with This is a problem raised by Dr. Elliot Smith's regard to which our information is of the scantiest book, and it is one of great interest and importance. and most nebulous character, he is straying rather Less important seems his view that the impulse to off his own ground, whereas in dealing with the early megalithic building in northern Africa and western Egyptians themselves he is not only upon his own Europe was given by the influence of the great stone ground, but upon ground which he himself has made. buildings of early Egypt. Here it is difficult to follow To read him on this subject is indeed to be en• him, and he seems to exaggerate the extent of the lightened, and every historian must read with atten• early influence of Egypt on the development of the tion the remarkable conclusions to which he has been surrounding civilisations. One is by no means in• led by his experience in the dissection of mummies clined yet to attribute the whole development of early (gained in the course of his medical work at ) European culture to Egypt; there are many conflicting in connection with the severely scientific archreological facts which have to be taken into consideration. It work of Dr. Reisner and his assistants at Nag' ed• is by no means certain that Dr. Reisner's view that Deir and in . the early Egyptians were the inventors of copper• His discovery that a more northern race infiltrated working is correct. Dr. Smith thinks the fact proved; into Egypt, probably from , from the time of others may doubt it. We should like to hear the the earliest dynasties, and gradually modified the views of Prof. Petrie, Dr. Gowland, and Prof. J. L. Egyptian "dynastic " type from the beginning, is Myres on the point. Dr. Smith is dogmatic, of course; very illuminating, as it explains the occurrence in how is it possible to be otherwise in a little book of Egypt, and more especially in northern Egypt, of the less than two hundred small pages? Were one to "stumpy," stout, rounder-faced type which we see in give all one's arguments pro and con in respect to so the portrait-statues of the pyramid-builders, so nebulous a subject as this, one would write volumes. different from the lank-faced prehistoric Nilote of And in a review it is impossible to argue at all predynastic times. Dr. Elliot Smith's arguments are on the doubtful points. One can only say that these, based chiefly upon craniologica l considerations. Those while important, are by no means many, for Dr. who recall Prof. 's incisive criticism of Smith has told us much that seems incontrovertible, the argument from craniology in his essay, "Migra• and his book is one of the most important recent con• tions," some years ago, may perhaps be a little scep• tributions to Egyptian archreology. Again, one can tical of all Dr. Smith's conclusions, yet it must be only regret its title, which does not explain the book said that his arguments are reasoned, and his conclu• properly. sions consistent with themselves and with at-chreo- H. R. H .ILL. NO. 2206, VOL. 88]

© 1912 Nature Publishing Group