Page:Transactions of the Second International Folk-Congress.djvu/382

344 pottery at a wedding to bring luck, and this custom not only prevails in Italy, but is common throughout Germany ("Polterabend"); and it would be natural to suppose the Esthonians borrowed it from the Teutons, but the supposition would not account for the fact that the custom is also known to the Ostiaks, who have never been under Teutonic influence. Here, then, I think we have a case in which we may reasonably claim that the custom goes back to pro-ethnic Finnish-Ugrian times, from which it has descended to the Esthonians on the one hand, and to the Ostiaks on the other. It would, however, be foolish to ignore the fact that this is not the only conceivable way in which it is possible to account for the joint possession of the custom by these two branches of the Finnish-Ugrian race. It may be said that if the custom of breaking pottery goes back to pro-ethnic Aryan times (as, of course, it must if it was lent by the primitive Aryans to the pro-ethnic Finnish-Ugrians, or vice versâ), are we not to believe that it descended to all the Aryan nations, and therefore to the Russians, with whom the Ostiaks have come in contact? This is too serious and sinister an attack to be ignored; for the various Finnisb- Ugrian peoples have all come under the influence of some Aryan people or another; and what any given branch of the Finnish-Ugrian family has not learnt from one, it certainly may have learnt from another Aryan people. It is no use arguing that the Esthonians did not borrow from the Teutons or the Lithuanians, on the ground that the Wotjaks or the Mordwins, who have the same custom, could not possibly have borrowed it from the Teutons or Lithuanians, if the Wotjaks could have borrowed it from the Russians. Take, for instance, the custom according to which unmarried women wear their hair unconfined, and married women wear a cap: it is useless to argue that the Esthonians and the Finns did not borrow the custom from the Teutons or the Lithuanians, on the ground that the Mordwins and the Wotjaks, who did not come in contact with the Teutons or Lithuanians, also possess it; for the Russians have the custom, and the Mordwins and the Wotjaks may have borrowed it from them.

Now, this objection would be absolutely fatal to all attempts to prove any custom to go back to pro-ethnic Finnish-Ugrian times which could conceivably have been borrowed from an Aryan people in ethnic times, provided it so happened that in every case