The migrations of early culture / A study of the significance of the geographical distribution of the practice of mummification as evidence of the migrations of peoples and the spread of certain customs and beliefs

The author argues that the geographical clustering of mummification alongside a set of associated customs—megalith-building, sun and serpent worship, tattooing, circumcision, cranial deformation, the swastika, and related traditions—constitutes a coherent culture-complex whose overlapping distributions point to past migrations and maritime diffusion rather than independent invention. Drawing on comparative ethnological and archaeological reports, maps, and selected extracts from other authorities, he assembles cumulative evidence to trace probable routes of cultural transmission along coastlines and urges reconsideration of prevailing anthropological explanations in light of these patterns.