Haddon, again, has often pointed to a precisely similar determination of many of the characteristics of primitive art,[1] while it is clear that much of Elliot Smith's work on pictorial representation and on popular stories is based immediately upon the very same idea.[2]
Miss Fletcher's account of The Hako, a Pawnee Ceremony,[3] shows how existing customs and religious beliefs may shape the growth of a new ceremony. The Hako was a series of rites originally performed for the purpose of securing offspring. But a marriage between exogamic groups within a tribe helped to secure peace within that community. The ceremony persisted, and through the participation in it of different and perhaps competing tribes, it came to serve the wider social purpose of securing a general harmony. In the form of its symbolism, however, it still remained a definite copy of the original model. The ancient beliefs, combining with new social conditions, produced a ritual having largely new purposes but almost identical, as regards many of its details, with the old practices.
It is, however, needless to multiply illustrations. Research carried out into the nature of popular stories has proved over and over again that many of the details, and many of the plots of the tales come directly from social custom and institutions. In so far, however, as we connect such and such a custom with such and such an incident of a story we have clearly made no psychological statement whatever. The psychological interest is as to those factors which so determine the individual attitude to social institutions as to make the latter figure largely in popular tales. The purpose of this section is merely to point out that any
