Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 10.djvu/557

* IMERITIA. 483 IMITATION. a million, are one of the tribes belonging to the southern or Georgian group of peoples of the Caucasus. They are considered by Pantiukhoff to be the purest representatives of the primitive Georgian type. See Geobgians. IMHOFF, em'hof, AiiAUE voN. See Helvig. IMHOFFEK, em'hif-er, Gustav Melciiiob ( 15U;M651 ). An Austrian Jesuit, famed as a South American explorer. He was born near Gratz, Styria, and went to Peru as a missionary in 1(524. Twelve years afterwards he crossed the Andes to the source of the Amazon, and was the first European to leave upon record his explora- tion of that stream to its mouth. His account was published in two volumes in Madrid (1640) and in London (1680), the latter edition called A Relation of a Jotirney Along the River Ama::on. Father ImholTer was head of the .Jesuit College at Bahia, and the author of several treatises upon tlic language, history, and customs of his adopted country that were published by the Society of Jesus twenty j'ears after his death. IMHOOF-BLUMER, em'hof bloiymer, Feied- Eicit (18.38 — ). A Geniian numismatist, known as an authority on Greek coins. He was bom at Wiiiterthur. became interested in numismatics when he was a boy, gave up the business career planned for him, received a classical education, and amassed a valuable collection of more than twenty thousand ancient Greek coins, bought in inOO by the Eoyal Numismatic Cabinet in Berlin. The great work of the Prussian Academy of Science, Die antiken Mii»~en Nordgriechenlands (ISilO sqq.), was undertaken at his instance; and in 1901 he gave to the Academy the sum of one liundred thousand francs for the promotion of the science. He wrote: Zur iliinzknnde nndPaliio- graphie Bootiens (1871): Die Miinzen Al-arna- niens (1878); Portriitkopfe auf romisclien Mtinzen (2d cd. 1893) ; Portriitkopfe auf antiken Miinzen hellenischer und hellenisierter Viilker (1885): Ziir Miinzkunde Grossijriechenlands (1886) ; Tier- und Pflanzenbilder auf Miinzen und Uemmcn, with Keller (1889); Lydische Htadt- mihncn (1897); and Kleinaaiatische Miinzen (1901 sqq.), as well as the great illustrated works. Monnaies r/reeques (1883) and Griechi- sche Miinzen (1890). IMHOTEP, emhn'tep. An Egyptian divin- ity, identified with ^Esculapius ; the son of Ptah and Sckhmet, who with Imhotep formed the triad chiefly honored at Memphis. IMITATION (Lat. imitatio. from imitari, to imitate). The repetition of any thought or act, or the' copying of any example or model. The example or model is a stimulus which sets up nervous reactions that result in more or less nearly perfect repetition or d<iplieation. The repetition may be by one's self of one's own tlioiiglits or acts, as when a child, having learned to pronounce a new word, says it over and over; or it may be repetition by one person of the example or copy set by any other person. Imita- tion may further be subconscious, and due largely to suggestion, as it sometimes is in the behavior of crowds, or it mav be clearly conscious, as it is in learning to write or to draw. The phenomena of imitation are of great importance in educa- tion, in the theorv of art. in ethnology, and in .sociology. Froebel and Preyer especially have treated of the educational aspects. The discus- sion of imitation in art dates from Aristotle. In etlinology imitation is the key to an under- standing of magic and primitive religion. The savage believes that he can reproduce or control desirable conditions by imitating them. In fish- ing he puts a bit of wood cut in imitation of a fish into the stream, to attract the fish that he would catch. In hunting he dresses in imitation of his prey. To his enemy he aims to bring death by sticking an image of him full of thorns, or by filling it with poison. The whole investigation and literature of this subject the reader will find opened to him in Skeat's Malay Magie and Frazer's The Golden Bough. Imitation as a social fact was shrewdly commented on by Bacon in the essays, but the first writer to deal with it in a systematic way was Bagehot in his most thoughtful and suggestive Physics and Politics. The 'crust of custom,' which characterizes primitive and unprogressive communities, was shown to be the product of imitation. The most profound study of imitation, however, is Gabriel Tarde's great work. Les lois de I'imitation. Tarde finds in imitation the elementary and fundamental social fact, and he makes it there- fore the basis of a system of soeiologj'. Imita- tions he classes as 'custom' imitations, in which the copy is ancient or even immemorial, and 'mode' or fashion imitations, in which the copy is new. Imitations extend from above (the high- er social or intellectual ranks) downward, and all imitations tend to spread in a geometrical progression. One imitation may, however, inter- fere with another. In the resulting duel, if one does not extinguish the other, they combine, each modifying the other, and so creating a new model to be imitated. All 'inventions' Tarde thus ex- plains as a product of the confiict of imitations. Thus by imitations and their product, inventions, he tries to account for all the phenomena of language, manners, costume, amusement, art, reliffion, science, economy, morals, law, and politics. All modern civilization, he avers, is but the continuing imitation of Greece and Rome. The chief criticism to be made of Tarde's theory is that it fails to take account of original similarities of activity in the universe. Xot all resembling phenomena are alike merely because they form a sequence. They may be simul- taneously alike, as a part of coexistence. There- fore, another system of sociology is possible, which builds upon the simultaneous like re- sponses of like organisms to the same stimulus. See Sociology. IMITATION. In the science of musical com- position, tlio repetition of the same passage, or the following of a passage with a similar one, in one or more of the other parts or voices. It may be either strict or free. When the imitated pas- sage is repeated note for note, and every interval is the same, it is called strict, and it may take ]ilace in the unison or octave, or in any other of the degrees of the scale, either above or below the original passage. The progression of a pas- sage may also he imitated by an inversion, or by reversing the movement of the original; also by notes of a greater or of a lesser value. (See Ca.n-on; Covn'terpoint; Fvgue.) Imitation in composition is one of the most important means of producing nnitv and animation in the pro- gression of the parts, and is used in a strict and also in a free manner, in the instrumental works of Havdn and Beethoven, and also by Mozart in his earlier operatic works. JIany composers,