1995: 123–5). Australia’s 4 supposedly megalithic stone circles were also inter-
preted in light of EuropeanWndings and regarded as pertaining to the
barbaric stage. As Westropp put it in 1872:
In Australia, the Penrhyn Islands, and other islands of the PaciWc Ocean, and also
among the Hovas of Madagascar, where stone circles and megalithic structures occur,
people are in the lowest state of barbarism. We may, therefore, come to this conclusion
in regard to these megalithic structures, that they are not peculiar to the Celtic,
Scythian, or any other people, but are the result of an endeavour to secure a lasting
place of sepulture among a people in a rude and primitive phase of civilization; and
that they were raised by men who were led by a natural instinct to build them in the
simplest, and consequently the almost identical form in all countries.
(in McNiven and Russell 2005: 105).Much later in time, in 1914, the knowledge of Breton megalithic monuments
was paramount in attracting the attention of the French archaeologist-poet,
Victor Segalen (1878–1919), to similar structures in China (Debaine-
Francfort 1999: 20).
Race in prehistoric AsiaErnst Haeckel (1834–1919), a German zoologist who will be mentioned
later in the chapter because of his application of Darwin’s ideas to human
evolution, had also a key importance to the study of prehistoric Asia. Mainly
after the late 1860s, he concerned himself with the ranking of races,
starting with those of Europe, and following with others elsewhere. He
believed that the various human races originated from diVerent ape species.
He thought that the Aryans represented the highest form of human
evolution, and not surprisingly perhaps as a German himself, he considered
German Aryans to be the highest echelon (Bunzl 1996; MacMaster 2001: 39).
This belief in the Aryans as the most advanced race was followed by many,
although alternatives were proposed not only in Germany but also in Britain
and France (Leoussi 1998). The concept of race had been important from
earlier in the century (Chapter 12), and its research had been fostered by its
connection with philological studies. One of the key discoveries which
fuelled nineteenth-century racism was the connection between Sanskrit
and the languages in Europe, a link established by the Sanskrit scholar, Sir
4 Also in Australia the explorer Lt George Grey argued in the 1840s that the Wandjina
paintings were associated with the worship of the Egyptian god Amun. Others saw them as a
result of racial mixture of peoples from Asia and Europe (McNiven and Russell 2005: 135–8).
298 Colonial Archaeology