ABSTRACT
Together with the worship of animals and plants, the worship of sticks and stones and other inanimate objects has always been regarded as a special characteristic of the religious state of the “heathen”. The stone is not only a natural weapon but, on account of its hardness, is believed to possess supernatural power. This too seems to be the real nature of the sacred heaps of stone which are the object of superstitious practices among the Bantu tribes, Bushmen, and Hottentots of South Africa. Caves were the objects of worship not only among such peoples as the Indians of South America and certain primitive tribes of India, but also among peoples of culture like the Greeks. The Indians enter subterranean caves only with hesitation and dread, because they imagine that these dark and mysterious places are haunted by the spirits of the dead.
