nd he thus presents the
basis on which the impulses belonging to a higher culture may naturally
take root and develop.

Reference may here be made to a form of primitive exhibitionism,
almost confined to women, which, although certainly symbolic, is
absolutely non-sexual, and must not, therefore, be confused with
the phenomena we are here occupied with. I refer to the
exhibition of the buttocks as a mark of contempt. In its most
primitive form, no doubt, this exhibitionism is a kind of
exorcism, a method of putting evil spirits, primarily, and
secondarily evil-disposed persons, to flight. It is the most
effective way for a woman to display sexual centers, and it
shares in the magical virtues which all unveiling of the sexual
centers is believed by primitive peoples to possess. It is
recorded that the women of some peoples in the Balkan peninsula
formerly used this gesture against enemies in battle. In the
sixteenth century so distinguished a theologian as Luther when
assailed by the Evil One at night was able to put the adversary
to flight by protruding his uncovered buttocks from the bed. But
the spiritual significance of this attitude is lost with the
decay of primitive beliefs. It survives, but merely as a gesture
of insult. The symbolism comes to have reference to the nates as
the excretory focus, the seat of the anus. In any case it ignores
any sexual attractiveness in this part of the body. Exhibitionism
of this kind, therefore, can scarcely arise in persons of any
sensitiveness or aesthetic perception, even putting aside the
question of modesty, and there seems to be little trace of it in
classic antiquity when the nates were regarded as objects of
beauty. Among the Egyptians, however, we gather from Herodotus
(Bk. II, Chapter LX) that at a certain popular religious festival
men and women would go in boats on the Nile, singing and playing,
and when they approached a town the women on the boats would
insult the women of the town by injurious language and by
exposing themselves. Among the Arabs, however, the specific
gesture we are concerned with is noted, and a man to whom
vengeance is forbidden would express his feelings by exposing his
posterior and strewing earth on his head (Wellhausen, _Rests
Arabischen Heidentums_, 1897, p. 195). It is in Europe and in
mediaeval an