According to my observations in this field, now continued nearly 12 years, prehistoric man had: (1) His land or province survey; (2) his circle, district, and communal surveys, in reference to which (3) the Alpine surveys deserve special mention, in cantons which down to the present day know nothing of such surveys; (4) private and special surveys. Thus it seems that my observations lend full confirmation to the oldest historic or traditional statements concerning the tenure of land of the Kelto-Germans or Germano-Kelts.
Among the Ojibwa concentric circles, according to Schoolcraft (_d_), constituted the symbol of time. It would be dangerous to explain the many markings of this character by the suggested symbolism, which also recalls that of Egypt in relation to the circle-figure. Inquiries have often been made whether the North American Indians have any superstitious or religious practices connected with the markings under consideration, e. g., in relation to the desire for offspring, which undoubtedly is connected with the sculpturing of cup depressions and furrows in the eastern hemisphere. No evidence is yet produced of any such correspondence of practice or tradition relating to it. In the absence of any extrinsic explanation the prosaic and disappointing suggestion intrudes that circular concentric rings are easy to draw and that the act of drawing them suggests the accentuation of depressions or hollows within their curves. Much stress is laid upon the fact that the characters are found in so many parts of the earth, with the implication that all the sculptors used them with the same significance, thus affording ground for the hypothesis that anciently one race of people penetrated all the regions designated. But in such an implication the history of the character formed by two intersecting straight lines is forgotten. The cross is as common as the cup-stone, and has, or anciently had, a different signification among the different people who used it, beginning as a mark and ending as a symbol. Therefore, it may readily be imagined that the rings in question, which are drawn nearly as easily as the cross, were at one time favorite but probably meaningless designs, perhaps, in popular expression, “instinctive” commencements of the artistic practice, as was the earliest delineation of the cross-figure. Afterward the rings, if employed as symbols or emblems, would naturally have a different meaning applied to them in each region where they now appear.
