The American art historian, Carl Schuster (1904-1969), discovered a set of patterns designed by ancient peoples to illustrate their ideas about kinship. They tattooed and painted such "statements" on their bodies and clothing, and carved them on tools, game boards, pots, ceremonial objects, coins and other items, and carried these with them wherever they went. Through broad comparative study, Schuster decoded this iconography, which lasted over 10,000 years, crossed continents, and outlived most of the cultures that sheltered it. Having spent more than three decades gathering evidence for his study, Schuster delayed publication while he searched for more. This book, by his colleague Edmund Carpenter, distils his research to a single volume.

Patterns That Connect: Social Symbolism in Ancient & Tribal Art

Arts & Photography

Carpenter, Edmund

Schuster, Carl

History & Criticism

Harry N. Abrams

Das Perspektivische Sehen: Beim Zeichnen Nach Der Natur (1898) (English and German Edition)

Kessinger Publishing

1. Vol. 1, Book 1 - Genealogical Patterns: Form &amp; Meaning
The first book of this three-volume, twelve-book series. Genealogical Patterns: Form &amp; Meaning introduces the work of anthropologist Carl Schuster and his comparative method, as edited and written by Edmund Carpenter. This first book looks into the arts of women, primarily weaving, as passed down from mother to daughter from the Paleolithic period to modern times, and examines the embedded iconographies of pattern-making through Schuster’s comparative method. The book outlines the premise of seeing decorative patterns in their multiple forms as descriptions of tribal genealogy. Includes a preface, general introduction and biographies of Schuster by Carpenter, and by art historian Schuyler Camman.

Social Symbolism in Ancient & Tribal Art: Genealogical Patterns: Form & Meaning (Volume 1, Book 1)

Rock Foundations Press

2.  Vol. 1, Book 2 - Genealogical Patterns: Meanders, Ramiforms & DisksIn Genealogical Patterns: Meanders, Ramiforms & Disks, Carpenter draws connections between horizontal meanders and vertical bands in visual pattern-making, and interprets them as patterns of genealogical descent. This book introduces the concepts of ramiforms, vertical and horizontal meanders, vertical and horizontal bands and compartmental patterns. It traces similarities of visual traditions in the making of genealogical motifs around the world and over centuries. It goes deeper into the symbolism of genealogical diagrams, including split figures, and introduces the concept of rebirth. 

Social Symbolism in Ancient & Tribal Art: Genealogical Patterns: Meanders, Ramiforms & Disks (Volume 1, Book 2)

3. Vol. 1, Book 3 - Genealogical Patterns: The Human Body as Metaphor of Society
Book three, Genealogical Patterns: The Human Body as Metaphor of Society, presents how genealogical patterns are drawn in clusters with a single head at the top to represent an entire tribe, and the human body is conceived as a metaphor for the society. Various examples of creation myths where the body of the first ancestor or god is quartered to create the tribe are raised, and a connection is made between representations of the society and “heavenly ladders.” Carpenter discusses the close correlation between body painting, dancing costumes, house posts and memorial columns. What distinguishes genealogical pattens from representations of human figures are continuous limbs, shared by multiple figures. Myths of birth from limbs are related. The human body is used as a metaphor for society and kinship, both visually and conceptually. Dismembering and sacrificing rituals are discussed in the last chapter. Legitimization of familial lines through the father is enacted by placing the child on the father’s knee.

Social Symbolism in Ancient & Tribal Art: Genealogical Patterns: The Human Body as Metaphor of Society (Volume 1, Book 3)

4. Vol. 1, Book 4 - Genealogical Patterns: Animal Style &amp; Joint-marks
Genealogical Patterns: Animal Style &amp; Joint-marks is the fourth and final book of Volume One. Carpenter opens the book with Appendix One: an analyses of detailed examples of circular joint-mark patterns in the art of Old Bering Sea arctic, ancient Siberian and Eurasian forms. Carpenter adds Appendix Two, an extensive chapter on the Carl Schuster archives in Basel, Switzerland, and his process for compiling and completing his edited volumes. The book includes an index of source references for all of the previous three books in the series, with notes, museums and libraries, illustration sources, and bibliography.

Social Symbolism in Ancient & Tribal Art: Genealogical Patterns: Animal Style & Joint-marks (Volume 1, Book 4)

5. Vol. 2, Book 1 - Family Tree: Stacked Ancestors, Y-Posts &amp; Heavenly Ladders
Family Tree: Stacked Ancestors,Y-Posts &amp; Heavenly Ladders is the first book of five in Volume Two. This series reorganizes, under new headings, the data outlined in Volume One. Carpenter’s presentation deals with the origin of the iconography, stressing design as a cultural document, and argues in favor of Schuster’s emphasis on ephemeral materials over archeological evidence. Carpenter introduces the concept of family trees, citing their manifestations in tree worship and sacrificial posts, as representative of genealogy. He examines Y-posts and Y-staffs, double-headed anthropomorphic figures and vessels, shaved sticks, stacked ancestors and heavenly ladders.

Social Symbolism in Ancient & Tribal Art: Family Tree: Stacked Ancestors, Y-Posts & Heavenly Ladders (Volume 2, Book 1)

7. Vol. 2, Book 3 - Family Tree: Robes, Megaliths &amp; Compartmented Designs
The seventh book in the series, Family Tree: Robes, Megaliths &amp; Compartmented Designs, continues the discussion on robes begun in the preceding volume, focusing largely upon compartmented designs.The primary source is an unpublished manuscript written by Carl Schuster in 1958, which Carpenter expands into other chapters, to include additional cultures and epochs. Examples offered in this book range from Paleolithic to modern times, from Wales to Patagonia, with emphasis on Australian, Chaco, and Northwest Coast robe motifs. Carpenter compares them to Megalith carvings as prototypes for robe designs, or in reverse, evidence of their recorded continuity.

Social Symbolism in Ancient & Tribal Art: Family Tree: Robes, Megaliths & Compartmented Designs (Volume 2, Book 3)

9. Vol. 2, Book 5 - Family Tree: Pebbles from Eurasia, Africa, Oceania &amp; Australia
Family Tree: Pebbles from Eurasia, Africa, Oceania &amp; Australia is the fifth and final book of Volume Two, and the ninth in the series. It completes the survey of incised pebbles begun in Book Four. It examines links between Old World and New World traditions, extending the survey into paleolithic evidence throughout Asia, Europe, North Africa and the Pacific islands. Includes concluding chapters on heraldic devices and the meaning and function of these forms. As with the final book of Volume One, this book contains the Notes, Sources and Bibliography for the prior books of Volume Two.

Social Symbolism in Ancient & Tribal Art: Family Tree: Pebbles from Eurasia, Africa, Oceania & Australia (Volume 2, Book 5)

11. Vol. 3, Book 2 - Rebirth: The Labyrinth &amp; Other Paths to Other Worlds
Continuing the thread explored in Cosmic Games, Book Two, Rebirth: The Labyrinth &amp; Other Paths to Other Worlds, is an overview Carl Schuster’s investigations of the labyrinth. Carpenter opens by providing instructions on how to draw a labyrinth, noting that the compositional devices are basically universal throughout the world. Distinctions and identifications of different kinds of labyrinths are made, particularly square vs. circular types, and the connection between mazes and labyrinths is explored. A chapter dedicated to incorrectly drawn labyrinths (Bungled Labyrinths &amp; Gapped-circles) exposes bastardized hybrids of the form reduced to geometric patterns. The labyrinth is demonstrated to be connected to three states of being, as pathways between life, death and rebirth.

Social Symbolism in Ancient & Tribal Art: Rebirth: The Labyrinth & Other Paths to Other Worlds (Volume 3, Book 2)

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