Sir Grafton Elliot Smith,
FRSThe Royal Society of London for the Improvement of Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, or even the Royal, is a learned society for science that was founded in 1660 and is considered by most to be the oldest such society still in existence...
FRCPThe Royal College of Physicians of London was the first medical institution in England to receive a Royal Charter. It was founded in 1518 and is one of the most active of all medical professional organisations...
(15 August 1871 – 1 January 1937) was an
AustraliaAustralia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the continental mainland , the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans...
n
anatomistAnatomy is a branch of biology and medicine that is the consideration of the structure of living things. It is a general term that includes human anatomy, animal anatomy and plant anatomy...
and a famous proponent of the hyperdiffusionist view of prehistory.
Professional career
Smith was born in
Grafton, New South WalesGrafton is the commercial hub of the Clarence River Valley. Established in 1855, Grafton features many historic buildings and tree-lined streets. Located approximately 630 kilometres north of Sydney and 340 km south of Brisbane, Grafton and the Clarence Valley can be reached by road, rail or air...
. He was awarded a degree in medicine at the
University of SydneyThe University of Sydney is the oldest university in Australia. It was established in Sydney in 1850. It is a member of Australia's "Group of Eight" universities that are highly ranked in terms of their research performance...
(Doctor of Medicine in 1895, with a dissertation on the fore-brain of the monotremes) and developed an interest in the anatomy of the human brain. He held a travelling scholarship at Cambridge in 1896, then he catalogued the human
brainThe brain is the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate, and most invertebrate, animals. Some primitive animals such as jellyfish and starfish have a decentralized nervous system without a brain, while sponges lack any nervous system at all...
-collection of the
British MuseumThe British Museum is a museum of human history and culture situated in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from...
. From 1900-1909 he was the first chairholder of anatomy at the
Cairo School of Medicine- Introduction :The Kasr Alainy Medical School is part of Cairo University, and is located in Garden City, Cairo. Kasr Alainy Medical School is one of the largest, oldest, and most prestigious medical schools in Africa and the Middle East...
and investigated the
brainThe brain is the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate, and most invertebrate, animals. Some primitive animals such as jellyfish and starfish have a decentralized nervous system without a brain, while sponges lack any nervous system at all...
s of
EgyptEgypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Western Asia...
ian
mummiesA mummy is a corpse whose skin and organs have been preserved by either intentional or incidental exposure to chemicals, extreme coldness, very low humidity, or lack of air when bodies are submerged in bogs...
. He was the first scholar to
x-rayX-radiation is a form of electromagnetic radiation. X-rays have a wavelength in the range of 10 to 0.01 nanometers, corresponding to frequencies in the range 30 petahertz to 30 exahertz and energies in the range 120 eV to 120 keV. They are shorter in wavelength than UV rays...
a mummy.
In 1907 he became
archaeologicalArchaeology or archeology is the science that studies human cultures through the recovery, documentation, analysis, and interpretation of material culture and environmental data, including architecture, artifacts, biofacts, and landscapes...
advisor to the archaeological survey of Nubia. From 1909-1919 he was Professor for anatomy in
ManchesterManchester is a city and metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. In 2007, the population of the city was estimated to be 458,100...
, 1919-1937 he held the chair of Anatomy at the
University College LondonUniversity College London is a British university institution and a constituent college of the University of London, based primarily in Bloomsbury, London...
.
During World War I he attended military hospitals for
shell shockShell Shock, also known as 82nd Marines Attack was a 1964 film by B-movie director John Hayes. The film takes place in Italy during World War II, and tells the story of a sergeant with his group of soldiers....
and served on the British
General Medical CouncilThe General Medical Council registers and regulates doctors in the United Kingdom. It has the power to revoke the registration, or place restrictions on it, if they deem a doctor unfit to practise in the UK. The current president of the council is Professor Peter Rubin.-History:The GMC was...
.
Smith was the leading specialist on the evolution of the brain of his day, many of his ideas on the evolution of the primate brain still form the core of present scholarship. He proposed the following stages of development:
- a smell dominated insectivore stage of jumping shrew
A shrew or shrew mouse or true shrew is a small mammal classified in the order Soricomorpha.Although its external appearance is generally that of a long-nosed mouse, a shrew is not a rodent and not closely related to rodents. Shrew feet have five toes; rodent feet have four...
-type
- vision dominated animals with an expanded cortex of tree-shrew-type
- acutely visioned, manually dexterous mammals of tarsius-type
- monkeys
- anthropoids using their hands to use and produce tools
He was decorated by the
KhediveThe term Khedive is a title largely equivalent to the English word viceroy. It was first used, without official recognition, by Muhammad Ali Pasha , the Ottoman Wali of Egypt and Sudan...
of Egypt, Abbas Hilmy in 1909. He became Fellow of the
Royal SocietyThe Royal Society of London for the Improvement of Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, or even the Royal, is a learned society for science that was founded in 1660 and is considered by most to be the oldest such society still in existence...
, FRCP, cross of the French Legion of Honour, and was knighted in 1934. In 1912 he received the Royal Medal of the Royal Society, in 1930 the Honorary Gold Medal of the
Royal College of SurgeonsThe Royal College of Surgeons of England is an independent professional body and registered charity committed to promoting and advancing the highest standards of surgical care for patients, regulating surgery, including dentistry, in England and Wales...
, in 1936 the Huxley Medal.
Hyperdiffusionism
Smith believed that all megalithic phenomena, be it in Northwestern
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
,
IndiaIndia, officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the south, the Arabian Sea on the west, and the Bay of Bengal...
,
Japanis an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, People's Republic of China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
or
MesoamericaMesoamerica or Meso-America is a region and culture area in the Americas, extending approximately from central Mexico to Honduras and Nicaragua, within which a number of pre-Columbian societies flourished before the Spanish colonization of the Americas in the 15th and 16th centuries...
, originated in ancient Egypt. "Small groups of people, moving mainly by sea, settled at certain places and there made rude imitations of the Egyptian monuments of the
PyramidA pyramid is a building where the outer surfaces are triangular and converge at a point. The base of a pyramid can be trilateral, quadrilateral, or any polygon shape, meaning that a pyramid has at least four faces...
Age." (Smith 1911, ix). Smith believed in a direct diffusion to
SyriaSyria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south and Israel to the southwest....
,
CreteCrete is the largest of the Greek islands and the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea at 8,336 km²...
, East
AfricaAfrica is the world's second-largest and second most-populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area. With a billion people in 61 territories, it accounts for about 14.8% of the...
, Southern
ArabiaThe Arabian Peninsula , Arabia, Arabistan, and the Arabian subcontinent is a peninsula in Southwest Asia at the junction of Africa and Asia...
and
SumerSumer was a civilization and historical region in southern Iraq . It is the earliest known civilization in the world and is known as the Cradle of Civilization...
, while other areas were influenced by secondary diffusion. The
neolithicThe Neolithic Age, Era, or Period, or New Stone Age, was a period in the development of human technology, beginning about 9500 BCE in the Middle East that is traditionally considered the last part of the Stone Age...
culture of Europe was derived from Egypt as well, according to Smith.
The term 'hyperdiffusionism' seems to have been coined by the British archaeologist
Glyn DanielGlyn Edmund Daniel was a Welsh scientist who specialised in the European Neolithic and made some of the earliest efforts to popularise the subject on radio and television....
(The idea of prehistory, 1962) in a mainly derogatory intention.
The Role of Egypt
EgyptEgypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Western Asia...
held a fortunate geographical position that made contacts to western
AsiaAsia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.6% of the earth's total surface area and with approximately 4 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population.Asia is traditionally defined as part of the...
and the
MediterraneanThe Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean surrounded by the Mediterranean region and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Anatolia and Europe, on the south by Africa, and on the east by the Levant. The sea is technically a part of the Atlantic Ocean, although it...
possible, while being safe from
invasionAn invasion is a military offensive consisting of all, or large parts of the armed forces of one geopolitical entity aggressively entering territory controlled by another such entity, generally with the objective of either conquering, liberating or re-establishing control or authority over a...
s. The fertile soil led to ample leisure, in art and the crafts could be cultivated. Smith believed that agriculture did originate in Egypt, and only later spread to
MesopotamiaMesopotamia "land between the rivers" is a name for the Tigris–Euphrates region in the eastern Mediterranean, largely corresponding to Iraq, as well as northeastern Syria, some parts of southeastern Turkey, and some parts of the Khūzestān Province of southwestern...
. "The earliest cultivators of the soil in Egypt were in fact laying the foundations not merely of
agricultureAgriculture is the production of food and goods through farming and forestry. Agriculture was the key development that led to the rise of human civilization, with the husbandry of domesticated animals and plants creating food surpluses that enabled the development of more densely populated and...
and
irrigationIrrigation is an artificial application of water to the soil. It is usually used to assist in growing crops in dry areas and during periods of inadequate rainfall...
but of all the
artArt is the process or product of deliberately arranging elements in a way that appeals to the senses or emotions. It encompasses a diverse range of human activities, creations, and modes of expression, including music, literature, film, sculpture, and paintings...
s and craft, the
socialSociety or human society is the manner or condition in which the members of a community live together for their mutual benefit. By extension, society denotes the people of a region or country, sometimes even the world, taken as a whole....
organization and
religiousA religion is a system of human thought which usually includes a set of narratives, symbols, beliefs and practices that give meaning to the practitioner's experiences of life through reference to a higher power, deity or deities, or ultimate truth...
beliefs which became an integral part of the civilization that was being built up sixty centuries ago and in later ages was diffused throughout the world. (Smith 1911, 6)."
Artificial irrigation led to cooperation and the development of a central
governmentA government is the body within a community, political entity or organization which has the authority to make and enforce rules, laws and regulations.....
that was based on professional knowledge, a rule of hydraulic engineers. The prosperity of everybody depended on a successful administration and a strong central government (cf. Wittfogel's hydraulic hypothesis). Later on, the leading engineer became a
sacred kingFor the office under ancient Rome, see Rex Sacrorum. In many historical societies, the office of kingship carries a sacral meaning, that is, it is identical with that of a high priest and of judge.- History :...
(cf. Henry Frankfort) and a
godGod is a deity in theistic and deistic religions and other belief systems, representing either the sole deity in monotheism, or a principal deity in polytheism....
(
OsirisOsiris was an Egyptian god, usually called the god of the Afterlife, underworld or dead.Osiris is one of the oldest gods for whom records have been found; one of the oldest known attestations...
) after death.
RitualA ritual is a set of actions, performed mainly for their symbolic value, which is prescribed by a religion or by the traditions of a community. The term usually excludes actions which are arbitrarily chosen by the performers, or dictated purely by logic, chance, necessity, etc..A ritual may be...
and
magicA belief in magic as a means of influencing the world seems to have been common in all cultures. Some of these beliefs crossed over into nascent religions, influencing rites and religious celebrations. Over time, religiously-based supernatural events acquired their own flavor, separating...
formed the germs of the first
scienceScience is in its broadest sense to any systematic knowledge-base or prescriptive practice that is capable of resulting in a prediction or predictable type of outcome...
s, of
biologyBiology is the natural science concerned with the study of life and living organisms, including their structure, function, growth, origin, evolution, distribution, and taxonomy...
and
physicsPhysics is a natural science; it is the study of matter and its motion through spacetime and all that derives from these, such as energy and force...
. The building of tombs initiated the development of
architectureFor a topical guide to this subject, see Outline of architecture. Architecture is the art and science of designing and constructing buildings and other physical structures for human shelter or use....
.
Other inventions of the
EgyptiansEgyptians is the name of the nationality and Mediterranean North African ethnic group native to Egypt....
were:
- Weaving
- Metal working (gold and copper)
- A calendar
- Seagoing ships
- The "art of shaving"
- Wigs
- Hats
- Pillows
The invention of
metallurgyMetallurgy is a domain of materials science that studies the physical and chemical behavior of metallic elements, their intermetallic compounds, and their mixtures, which are called alloys. It is also the technology of metals: the way in which science is applied to their practical use...
was the most important, as it quickened the pace of invention, widened the scope of human endeavour, stimulated the advancement of arts and crafts and awakened courage and the spirit of great adventure. The search for copper was to become the most important factor in the universal spread of civilisation. Prospectors settled in foreign countries and introduced agriculture, burial customs and their religion as well.
At first, Smith remained vague on the reasons for the spread of Egyptian influence to places without mineral deposits like
PolynesiaPolynesia is a subregion of Oceania, comprising a large grouping of over 1,000 islands scattered over the central and southern Pacific Ocean.-Definition:...
. But in 1915
William James PerryWilliam James Perry , usually known as W. J. Perry, was a leader in cultural anthropology at University College, London.Megalith culture, according to him, was transmitted to the rest of the world from Egypt....
, professor of comparative religion at the university of
ManchesterManchester is a city and metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. In 2007, the population of the city was estimated to be 458,100...
advanced the view that the "megalith-builders" were looking for
pearlA pearl is a hard, generally spherical object produced within the soft tissue of a living shelled mollusk. Just like the shell of a mollusk, a pearl is made up of calcium carbonate in minute crystalline form, which has been deposited in concentric layers. The ideal pearl is perfectly round and...
s and
precious stonesA gemstone or gem is a piece of attractive mineral, which—when cut and polished—is used to make jewelry or other adornments...
, which Smith adopted as well.
Smith did not believe that this spread of
cultureCulture is a term that has different meanings. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions...
was necessarily connected to a certain race, in contrast to other diffusionists like the German prehistorian
Gustaf KossinnaGustaf Kossinna was a linguist and professor of German archaeology at the University of Berlin...
. While he saw a racial affinity between the Egyptians and the first agriculturalists of southern Europe, both being of the "brown race", the spread of civilisation was mainly a spread of
ideaIn the most narrow sense, an idea is just whatever is before the mind when one thinks. Very often, ideas are construed as representational images; i.e. images of some object. In other contexts, ideas are taken to be concepts, although abstract concepts do not necessarily appear as images...
s, not of
tribeA tribe, viewed historically or developmentally, consists of a social group existing before the development of, or outside of, states.Many anthropologists use the term to refer to societies organized largely on the basis of kinship, especially corporate descent groups .Some theorists hold that...
s or people.
The History of Hyperdiffusionism
In the age of
ColonialismColonialism is the building and maintaining of colonies in one territory by people from another territory. Sovereignty over the colony is claimed by the metropole...
, hyperdiffusionism proved attractive, as it showed how
missionariesA missionary is a member of a religion who works to convert those who do not share the missionary's faith; someone who proselytizes. The word "mission" is derived from the Latin missioninimus A missionary is a member of a religion who works to convert those who do not share the missionary's faith;...
, engineers and prospectors had spread civilisation all over the earth, as the colonial nations believed to do themselves.
Later on, hyperdiffusionism supplied a single, simple explanation of the complex process of neolithisation that made it attractive to amateur archaeologists and crackpots worldwide. It could be used to retain a Eurocentric view on history in the face of increasing evidence for impressive autochthonous development, for example in Zimbabwe (
Great ZimbabweThe Great Zimbabwe, or "stone buildings", is the name given to the stone ruins spread out over a 722 hectare area within the modern-day country of Zimbabwe, which itself is named after the ruins. It is near the town of Masvingo, which before majority rule was called Fort Victoria...
), Polynesia (
Easter IslandEaster Island ; is a Polynesian island in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, at the southeastern most point of the Polynesian triangle. A special territory of Chile annexed in 1888, Easter Island is widely famous for its 887 extant monumental statues, called moai , created by the early Rapanui people...
) and Micronesia (
Nan MadolNan Madol is a ruined city that lies off the eastern shore of the island of Pohnpei and used to be the capital of the Saudeleur dynasty until about AD 1500. The city consists of a series of small artificial islands linked by a network of canals and is often called the Venice of the Pacific...
on the island of
PohnpeiPohnpei "upon a stone altar " is the name of one of the four states in the Federated States of Micronesia , and among the Senyavin Islands . Palikir, the FSM's capital, is located on Pohnpei...
).
We believe today that the megalithic graves of
BritainThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a sovereign state located off the northwestern coast of continental Europe. It is an island country, spanning an archipelago including Great Britain, the northeastern part of Ireland, and many small islands...
,
IrelandIreland is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island in the world. It lies to the north-west of continental Europe and is surrounded by hundreds of islands and islets. To the east of Ireland, separated by the Irish Sea, is the island of Great Britain...
,
FranceFrance , officially the French Republic , is a country located in Western Europe, with several overseas islands and territories located on other continents. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean...
,
PortugalPortugal , officially the Portuguese Republic , is a country located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of mainland Europe and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the west and south and by Spain to the north and east...
, The Netherlands,
DenmarkDenmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe and the senior member of the Kingdom of Denmark. It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries; southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and it is bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark borders both the Baltic and the North Sea...
, northern
GermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium,...
, and
PolandPoland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe . Poland is bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
are much earlier than the Egyptian pyramids, while the Mesoamerican pyramids are much later and securely based in a local development.
Private Life
G. E. Smith's father had migrated to
New South WalesNew South Wales is Australia's most populous state, located in the south-east of the country, north of Victoria, south of Queensland and east of South Australia...
from London. He had attended a workingman's college under
John RuskinJohn Ruskin was an English art critic and social thinker, also remembered as an author, poet and artist. His essays on art and architecture were extremely influential in the Victorian and Edwardian eras....
and later became teacher and headmaster in
GraftonGrafton is the commercial hub of the Clarence River Valley. Established in 1855, Grafton features many historic buildings and tree-lined streets. Located approximately 630 kilometres north of Sydney and 340 km south of Brisbane, Grafton and the Clarence Valley can be reached by road, rail or air...
, New South Wales. His older brother (S. H. Smith) was Director of Education in New South Wales, his younger brother (S. A. Smith) acting professor for anatomy at the university of Sydney.
G. E. Smith married Kathleen Macredie in 1902. During his time in London, he lived in Hampstead, Gower Street, and at Regent's Park. During his London years, he became a friend of Dr.
W. H. R. RiversWilliam Halse Rivers Rivers,
FRCP,
FRS, was an English anthropologist, neurologist, ethnologist and psychiatrist, best known for his work with shell-shocked soldiers during World War I. Rivers' most famous patient was the poet Siegfried Sassoon...
.
Smith's youngest son, Stephen Smith, died in an accident in 1936 and G.E Smith spent his final year in a nursing home in London, where he died.