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The Aesthetic Animal
The Aesthetic Animal
Henrik Høgh-Olesen
1
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CONTENTS
Preface xiii
Introduction: The Aesthetic Impulse 1

1. An Animal in Search of Stimulation for Pleasure and Need: Two Stories on
the Forces that Drive Us Toward Art and Aesthetics 15
2. The First Humans and the First Art 23
3. What a Sexy Tale! Key Stimuli and Attraction: Aesthetics in the Animal
Kingdom 43
4. The Woman in Red and the Man with the Chrome-Plated
Wheels: Aesthetics and Key Stimuli in the Human World 53
5. The Human Peacock: Body Ornamentation and Artistic Behavior from
Tribal Society to Modern Primitives 77
6. Who Lives Here? Decoration, Design, and Ornamentation on Objects and
Surroundings 95
7. Art and the Brain’s Reward System: Brain Processes and
Neuroaesthetics 107
8. Fiction and Narrative: The Function of Symbolic Aesthetics 117
9. Summing Up the Aesthetic Impulse: Adaptation, Cheesecake,
or . . . ? 129
10. Opening the Doors of Aesthetics: Concluding Remarks 139
Notes 147
References 151
Index 159
PREFACE
I have chills running down my spine. My arms and legs tingle as if charged by
static electricity. The hairs on my arms and neck stand up and my skin breaks
out in gooseflesh as though hit by a bout of fever. Then I start to feel a lump
in my throat. My voice becomes thick and my eyes start to water. My entire
system is reacting as though I am having a powerful allergic reaction.
But I am not ill. I am in a state of peaceful bliss. I am looking at something
beautiful and it moves me. It is that simple and wonderful.
What has moved me is the Villa Majorelle in Marrakech, Morocco, the
former residence of the fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent—an art deco
building in intense cobalt blue, turquoise, and lemon yellow colors surrounded
by tall lime-green cacti, palm trees, and violet bougainvillea flowers in bloom.
I drove through the snow-clad landscape of Denmark. I waited all night
in a deserted airport. And now—around 36 hours since I last lay in a bed—I
am standing in the dry heat of 26°C under the glaring desert sun in the Jardin
Majorelle, feeling my sensory receptors firing at the sight of this color ex-
plosion. It is (almost) as pleasurable as great sex, and a number of questions
arise: What kind of peculiar animal decorates its surroundings with such aes-
thetic care? Plants, colors, architecture—everything organized according to an
inner aesthetic idea. Moreover, why are we moved to tears when these efforts
are successful?
We are all familiar with the puzzling phenomenon of being moved by cer-
tain shapes, colors, sounds, and tunes. This aesthetic sensibility is simply one
of the main ingredients in the many highlights of life. But why is that, and why
on Earth do we even have these delightful sensory experiences? These questions
preoccupy me. If they preoccupy you, too, then this book has fallen into the
right hands.
A preface is usually written at the end of the writing process and this case is
no exception. What is just about to begin for the reader has just ended for the
author, and now the two parties meet in the doorway, so to speak. Although
not a place fit for a long conversation, before we go our separate ways, I would
like to mention the people who have helped me along the way.
Jacob Wamberg, professor of Art History at the University of Aarhus, has
read the first drafts of the manuscript and contributed his inspiring comments.
So have Dr. Mathias Clasen and Dr. Alexandra Kratchmer of the School of
Communication and Culture at the University of Aarhus. It has been valu-
able to me to have professionals with a background in the humanities read and xiii
xiv { Preface
comment on my evolutionary and behavioral psychology analyses of the aes-

thetic impulse before introducing them to a bigger audience, and I owe them a
debt of gratitude.
Charlotte Bentsen, MA in English literature, has assisted in translating my
idiosyncratic sentences into grammatically correct English.
Then there are my friends.
My friend and colleague Dr. Thomas Dalsgaard has contributed immeasur-
able input. He has read the manuscript several times. He has returned it with
red lines and suggestions such as “explain,” “elaborate,” or “leave out,” and
I have generally taken his advice.
I want to thank my friend, director, and gallerist, Torsten Hansen, for a
great many discussions on aesthetics, art, and what “turns people on.” Torsten
has a practical relationship with aesthetics. He makes a living out of selling art
and beautiful artifacts that people simply need to own. And I have learned a lot
from this practical knowledge.
I also want to thank my partner, Anne-Charlotte Bo, for endless conversations
about art, aesthetics, and design and for always providing constructive criticism
and inspiration for my projects. Finally, I want to thank my children, William
and Hedvig. They have inherited my interest in art and music and they are thus
never afraid to make a quick contribution when I am musing on these subjects.
This, too, is educational for me.
It has been a pleasure to complete this study. I hope the result is an equally
pleasurable experience to read.
Marrakech
January 2018
Introduction
THE AESTHETIC IMPULSE
It is cold, dark, and damp.

The space is tight and small so you need to constantly bend over to avoid
hitting your head against the overhang. We are now more than two kilometers
inside the mountain, and something has been stirring above our heads.
Bats!
Black flapping shadows that, miraculously, never hit us, but startled by our
footsteps and the flickering light from our headlights, do what all scared ani-
mals do: empty their bowels and escape. It is very effective in films, but right
now I would rather be rid of it. I have spent the past few months writing to
the French culture authorities and now I am finally here. In Dordogne in the
southwest of France, where our ancestors settled more than 40,000 years ago.
The walls are covered in bear claw marks, and there are big round hollows in
the bedrock that have been dug out over millennia by bears tossing and turning
in their hibernation. And then I suddenly notice them! Completely different
markings. Made by our own species. And the reason I am here in the first place.
More than 2.5 kilometers into the cave, the ceiling is decorated with paintings
and engravings of horses, bison, mammoths, rhinoceros, and ibex. I feel hot
and cold at the same time. This ornamentation defies reason. Why on Earth
have humans taken the trouble to do this in such an unreachable place? What
pointless effort. What remarkable exertion. No other animal would ever do the
same. I am a psychologist and an expert on human behavior, but this is so over-
whelmingly peculiar that I am finding it hard to describe it in words.
Any new insight starts with curiosity, and mine is so great that I want to
share it with the reader. I have become aware of something that we humans do.
We adorn ourselves. We decorate our things. We embellish our homes. This is a
curious aesthetic behavioral pattern on which we spend vast amounts of time,
energy, and resources and which manifests itself in virtually everything we do
1
2 { The Aesthetic Animal
from mindless and meaningless ways of passing time to silliness, festivity, and
vanity and to what is central to being human.
It is something specifically human and biologically mysterious that no other
animals do, to this degree, and that does not even occur among our closest
great ape relatives. The aesthetic impulse to adorn ourselves and our surround-
ings comes so naturally to us that it is easily overlooked, and it leaves anyone
trying to describe it with the privileged problem of not knowing where to start
and where to end. In principle, we could start anywhere, so why not simply start
with what is right there in front of us.
Right now, I am sitting at my desk at work writing these lines. And what
does my workspace look like? Try to imagine it.
I need room to work and provide supervision to students, so there must
be a table, a computer, and a couple of chairs. I must also be able to see, so a
lightbulb above the table is also necessary. If these things are in place, I can
do my job. The walls do not need to be painted and the lightbulb does not
need a shade. I do not need carpets, textiles, patterns, and colors on the table
and chairs either, and plants, pictures, and all kinds of knick-knack are, of
course, completely unnecessary in a workspace. So, a barren room with a table,
a couple of chairs, and a lightbulb hanging from the ceiling. Was this how you
pictured my office?
Probably not. I would not be able to thrive in such a room, none of my
colleagues’ rooms are like that, and if my students were to come to an office
at the university that looked as described, they would find it conspicuous and
think that the professor occupying the office was probably rather weird.
My office has pictures. It has plants and carpets, and the furniture fabric is
color-coordinated in tones of red, ochre, and dusty orange. Even the note board,
which is supposed to be a practical thing that keeps track of my appointments,
has gradually been taken over by aesthetics. It now holds so many children’s
drawings and postcards that there is hardly any room for notes and messages.
Our homes and cities are likewise filled with items that go beyond practical
necessity. Our houses are full of colors, designs, patterns, and ornaments on
walls, ceilings, floors, furniture, linen, and kitchenware. The cup we drink from
has color and painted images on it, and the ceramics are structured in a way
that is pleasing to the eye and pleasing to the touch. Our walls are decorated
with pictures, patterned wallpaper, and shelves with vases, knick-knacks, and
things we like, which gives the room its atmosphere and which makes it feel like
home to us.
With the different shapes and colors of plants in our gardens and parks, we
shape a pleasing visual sensation for our eyes to rest upon. Even when we cook,
eat, and set the table, the look, and not just the flavor, is carefully considered.
Our body aesthetics alone could fill a whole book. We paint our bodies and
we dye and cut our hair and beards in elaborate styles. We pierce, brand, tattoo,
and ornament our skin. We decorate ourselves with jewelery, feathers, fur, and
Introduction: The Aesthetic Impulse } 3
leather; we put colors and patterns on the clothes we wear, and we rub oils and
heavy, sweet perfumes on our skin.
We make an extra effort out of ourselves and our surroundings when we party
and celebrate so that we are literally gorging on different sensory perceptions.
We fill the world with music, song, and dance, and we decorate the night sky
with fireworks. We work for months on perfecting this aesthetic extravagance.
How much time, money, and effort does the Olympics opening ceremony or a
carnival or a festival or a wedding cost? And yet we continuously find the time,
money, and resources for these beautiful, superfluous, and over-the-top events,
and we do so universally.
Man is an animal among other animals on Earth but also a very special an-
imal: an aesthetic animal. It is a being that embellishes itself and its surround-
ings; that creates art, music, and dance; and that spends vast amounts of time
and resources doing so, as if it had nothing better to do. Thus, the aesthetic
impulse is a characteristic of the human species that can be found throughout
all cultures regardless of time, place, and material status. However, the impulse
is obviously not unaffected by these matters.
At a time when our ancestors were barely clothed and had little food they
went deep into dark caves to decorate them from floor to ceiling—and these
were not even the caves in which they lived. Spears and bowls were barely been
finished before they are adorned with ornaments, symbols, and figures. It is as
if the aesthetic impulse is a primary impulse in its own right on a par with the
need to find shelter and food!
Why do we do this?
Shouldn’t a species that only just has the bare necessities spend its time and
effort on something other than artistic decorations that play no part in the
function of the object and that do not bring us any closer to the goal of sur-
vival? You would think so, but these priorities still exist today among tribes and
poor people all over the world.
The San people in the Kalahari Desert, Australian Aborigines, and the
Inuit people of the north all tempt fate with a harsh existence in some of
the world’s least hospitable environments, and yet they still find the time
and energy to decorate their tools, weapons, and kitchenware and to carve
beautiful images of the mythological creatures of their beliefs in bone, bark,
rock, and sand—for instance the Eland, the Lizard, the Rainbow Serpent,
the Mother of the Sea.
Taking a walk through the favelas of Rio or Sao Paolo, you will find des-
titution but also aesthetic energy. Houses, walls, and interiors are painted in
a multitude of colors (Figure I.1). Glossy magazine pictures of film stars are
intermingled with religious icons and blinking fairy lights. The decorations
from last year’s carnival are still up. From the moment you can afford a
washing-up brush you start to think of what color to choose—should it be red
or green? Why?
FIGURE I.1. Favela Rio de Janeiro.

Source: Skreidzeleu/Shutterstock.com
When asked directly, very few can actually give a satisfactory answer. It is
not like it is easy.
If you see me with a hammer, you can ask what I need it for and I can answer
that I need to hammer a nail. If you ask me why I want to hammer the nail,
I can answer that I want to hang a picture on the wall. And if you then ask me
why I want to hang a picture on the wall, I can answer: Because I think it looks
nice. But if you then proceed to ask me why I think it looks nice, then I will
be at a loss for words. We have now reached a point of reason that cannot be
explained further than because I do and because that is what we humans—of
the species Homo sapiens—have always done. In fact, we are dumbfounded and
lapse into silence when confronted with the ultimate whys behind our natural
inclinations and urges.
Nevertheless, it is this silence that I want to challenge because we must be
able to come closer to the answer than that. Nature simply would not allow a
species to waste so much time and effort on an activity completely unrelated to
the survival and well-being of that species. Consequently, the aesthetic impulse
cannot be meaningless and superficial.
This is likely also why the aesthetic impulse is present from the dawn of
both the history of the species and the history of each individual. This impulse
appears to be—like language and tool making—an innate disposition of human
nature; something we just do that does not require learning and develops spon-
taneously, but which is, of course, shaped by culture.1 Infants spontaneously
follow and respond to song, music, and rhythmic activities. They spontane-
ously produce doodles on paper, in sand, mud, and spilled liquids, and they
attentively follow the patterns that come out of this activity. This rhythmic, mo-
toric creation activity is simultaneously pleasurable for them, and this pleasure
sensation will stay with us through adulthood.2 Already at a very young age
children spontaneously begin to dress up and paint and adorn themselves.
Theses on the nature of art very rarely mention the quite significant fact that
artistic experiences, processes, and presentations give us sensual experiences
that are physically pleasurable, which makes us engaged, focused, stimulated,
moved, and aroused.3 The fact that the aesthetic impulse is connected to lust
indicates that this behavior may very well be of biological value, because one
of the ways in which nature makes us do the things that are essential to our
survival is by making these activities pleasurable and therefore attractive. This
is why we do not need to be rewarded for eating and for having sex. These activ-
ities are rewarding in and of themselves.
The Functions of Artistic Behavior
I am not the only one who has been wondering about the functions of artistic
behavior in human life, and over time there have been different perspectives on
this matter.
In most of the world’s prehistoric and present societies, art is expressed in
the context of religious and cultic ceremonies. According to the theological per-
spective, art in its original form cannot be separated from cult and thus cannot
be separated from the basic human search for meaning of life and existence.
Humans are predisposed to seek meaning, and art is one of the ways in which
this search for meaning is expressed.
But humans also live in groups based on a social hierarchy system and there-
fore seek status, build a pecking order, and compete with conspecifics for power.
According to the sociocultural perspective, the search for meaning through art is
therefore also a tool for power, which is used by those who set the agenda: What
is good, beautiful, and wonderful; what can and should be appreciated?
Thus, what persistent and revolutionary art products have in common is that
they are perceived—through the sociocultural perspective—as tools of power
that can be used for positioning, individually as well as in groups, in the fight
for status that is continuously fought in societies based on social hierarchy. Art
can have this function, and therefore the sociological perspective is not incor-
rect either.
Through the view of anthropology, the social identity functions of art are
considered as characteristics of a group or tribe’s culture, values, and history.
Groups need to have an in-group connection and to mark their boundaries to
outsiders. For this purpose, we make use of our signs and markings.4
Within my own field—psychology—the hows and whats of aesthetics are

brought into focus.
Particular emphasis has been placed on aesthetic effects (stimuli, color, de-
sign, and pattern), as well as what degree of order, complexity, and ambiguity
we are attracted to and that the brain considers pleasurable and engaging in a
work of art.5 Furthermore, people within the field of personality psychology
have dealt with whether this sensitivity and these aesthetic preferences corre-
late with certain personality features. Among other things, they have found
that people who score high on traits like Stimulation Seeking and Openness in
personality tests show greater interest in art than others and tend to like modern,
abstract art, whereas people who score high on traits like Conscientiousness
and Sociability are more inclined toward traditional, realistic art styles in which
it is clear what the image depicts.6
The more ultimate questions of why we even exhibit such behavior and
what functions the aesthetic impulse might serve have largely been left to
psychoanalysts like Freud and Jung and their successors and thus to the-
oretical and speculative rather than practical, empirical, and experimental
approaches.
Freud, on the one hand, perceives art as he does dreams, slips of the tongue,
fairy tales, and neurotic symptoms: as disguised and dissatisfactory instinctual
urges of the sexual kind, which the conscious mind and society do not want to
acknowledge and which therefore cannot be satisfied openly and directly, but
must find an outlet through more indirect and symbolic means. Put briefly, we
make art because we cannot satisfy our primary sexual and aggressive urges di-
rectly, within the given conditions of society. Art replaces the urge, and in this
way art becomes displaced or sublimated satisfaction.
Thus, art becomes a vent through which to let out steam when frustrations
become too severe. This is good for the artist as well as society, as the well-
executed artwork can, according to Freud, simultaneously function as surro-
gate wish fulfilment for others as well and thus be a kind of cultural pressure
relief valve.7
For Jung, on the other hand, art cannot be reduced to a kind of displaced sur-
rogate satisfaction or a symptom of the artist’s underlying frustrations. Rather,
the artistic impulse is, according to him, an innate (archetypal), inner urge and
a means to self-expression, self-realization, and self-knowledge (Jung 1966).
Art may certainly serve all of these functions, from pressure relief valve to
self-realization, as Freud and Jung claim and, as we shall see in Chapters 4 and
5, there is also a probable connection between sex and art, albeit a link different
from the one proposed by Freud. But is the primary function of art really to
serve as a pressure relief valve for our sexual and aggressive urges, or are there
other reasons for the development of this behavioral pattern? I think there are
other reasons, and that is what I will attempt to demonstrate in the following
chapters.
None of the aforementioned perspectives is wrong per se or mutually

exclusive. However, none of them is a sufficient explanation, alone or combined,
and there are several reasons for this.
First, they engage the question from the wrong starting point. Most often,
they start with Art and art with a capital “A” is accessible for exploration for
only a few. However, a far more basic behavioral impulse lies behind artistic
activity: The aesthetic impulse—or the human need to embellish itself and its
surroundings, and its desire to fill time and space with song, music, dance,
and stories. This impulse is universal and, once we understand what feeds and
motivates this behavior, we can understand why some people create art and
what functions this behavior serves in human life.
Second, the aforementioned perspectives fully or partially neglect the fact
that man is a biological creature with an evolved history. Moreover, even
though aesthetics and art normally fall under the category of culture, it is pos-
sible that creating culture is something natural for us humans and that we must
therefore explore the human species’ evolved history to find the reason(s) that
cannot otherwise be explained.
An impulse is a natural, internal behavioral incentive that does not need ex-
ternal reward to exist. As we will see, a number of observations indicate that the
aesthetic impulse is exactly such an inherent part of human nature and there-
fore a primary impulse in its own right:
• The aesthetic impulse is present in all known present and past human
cultures regardless of time, place, and material level.
• It occurs in our infants as an innate, pleasurable activity, which (like
playing) does not need to be learned or rewarded in order to exist.
• The brain’s reward circuit is activated when we are presented with
aesthetic experiences and objects.
• We voluntarily spend, as individuals and as a society, enormous
amounts of time, effort, and resources on satisfying this impulse.
• Useless behavior without value that takes costly resources away from
other useful activities is ruthlessly weeded out by selection during the
evolutionary history of a species.
In addition, the aesthetic sense has several important functions, as we will see:
• It may guide us toward what is biologically good for us, and help us
choose the right fitness-enhancing items in our surroundings.
• Aesthetic behavior is a valid individual fitness indicator as well as a
unifying social group marker.
• Aesthetically skilled individuals get more mating• possibilities, higher
status, and more collaborative offers.
Thus, as I see it, there is no way around it. If we want to understand the distinc-
tively human need to adorn ourselves and our surroundings—both the need
to personally and actively create, decorate, and embellish and the ability to
passively appreciate and enjoy these aesthetic works—we need to look into the
evolutionary biology of the human species. We need to enter the psychological
engine room and understand our basic programs, motives, and drives. As seen
from this level of analysis, there are three distinctive species characteristics that
stand out.
First, as a species, humans are highly stimulation-seeking animals. We are,
by nature, curious and exploring creatures who investigate our surroundings.
Once our basic needs are fulfilled, we do not just passively exist but convert our
calorie intake into new stimulation-seeking explorations in our environment
and surroundings.
Furthermore, humans live in groups based on a social hierarchy system,
as already mentioned. We are social-hierarchic creatures who compete with
conspecifics for resources and are allowed access to the basic necessities of
life, which we all crave, according to our social status in the group. Sometimes
this species characteristic is very pronounced, as with the Yanomami people
in the jungle of South America, and other times less so, as with the more
egalitarian San Bushmen of South Africa, but it is never absent. The need
for status is a deep-rooted human motive that is fundamental for humans all
over the world.8 Also in this respect, then, we resemble our primate relatives
as well as a vast number of other social species with a pecking order such as
dogs, horses, chickens, and all the other domesticated animals we surround
ourselves with.
Last but not least, humans are symbolic and “narrative” beings—animals
in search of meaning. It is as natural for humans to create stories about who
we are, why we are here, and how the world works as it is for a spider to create
webs. In this respect, we are unique.
Nothing about the aesthetic impulse makes any sense if these ultimate spe-
cies characteristics are disregarded and left out. It is therefore in this basic pro-
gramming that we begin our investigation.
The Structure of the Book
In Chapter 1 we start out with the most basic driving forces behind the aesthetic
impulse: the human animal’s ecological living conditions and our ultimate spe-
cies characteristics as neophile and stimulation-seeking carnivores and food
opportunists. Humans turn calorie intake into aesthetic activity, exploration,
and play, for instance, instead of sleeping up to 16 hours a day as the big cats do
after a successful hunt. Our stimulation-seeking nature and the concept of the
optimal stimulation level (OSN) are mandatory for understanding the aesthetic
impulse; that is, how and why the aesthetic forms change and develop, and why
we are motivated to art and aesthetics both as a species and as individuals.
So far, two main points of view have divided the research. One views relief,
energy, and celebration as the main feelings that arouse our need to decorate
ourselves and our surroundings, while the other views anxiety, insecurity, and
our need to control these feelings as the cause for this artistic activity. So is it
pleasure or need that drives us to this behavior?
On the whole, the aesthetic field is full of absolute and seemingly incom-
patible oppositions through which people have, over time, passionately di-
vided into positions that may only seem to be mutually exclusive. In Chapter 1,
I argue that the human need for stimulation is a decisive factor behind the aes-
thetic impulse and simultaneously show how we, by considering the need for
stimulation, can actually end the aforementioned opposition between pleasure
and need, celebration and anxiety.
In Chapter 2 we follow the aesthetic impulse back to human prehistory and
take a look at prehistoric art. In order to establish our aesthetic inclinations
as a primary impulse—and not just as a surplus phenomenon appearing in
high cultures in times of plenty, when people have no better things to do—it
is important to track this impulse back to its first expression and to the mate-
rial living conditions at the time. Here, it is interesting who these people are in
terms of psychology. Who were the creators of the prehistoric art and what
motivated this activity? Here, too, there are different theories and oppositions.
In Chapter 3 we go back even further in evolutionary history and examine
whether there are traces of the aesthetic impulse in other species. Do other
species have a sense of aesthetics? Do they make aesthetic choices, and do they
exhibit examples of aesthetic behavior? Among other things, we will look at
bird song and crane dance. We follow the fascinating bowerbirds as they create
their remarkable and colorful constructions. And we join in as experiments are
conducted with chimpanzees in the lab.
In Chapter 4 we look at how key stimuli and brain programming affect our
own species aesthetics and determine which shapes, colors, and landscapes we
are attracted to and consider beautiful. Like other animals, we are predisposed
to respond to certain key stimuli that have been associated with an expectation
of functionality, fitness, and increased well-being. In other words, the percep-
tion of beauty represents a strong internal indicator by which it pays to be
guided in order to gain various benefits.
In this investigation, we enter the micro-processes of artistic creation. We
look at the aesthetic effects that make up a work of art and why something
captivates and fascinates us.
Everything beautiful is aesthetic, but not everything aesthetic is beautiful in
the traditional sense of the word. We also decorate ourselves and our surround-
ings for the purpose of intimidation and threat and to signal strength, danger,
and power. Similarly, we have a pleasurable fascination with topics that signal
dominance and horror. Human and animal skulls can be beautiful and fasci-
nating in their own unique way (any tattoo artist can attest to that), and we will
also attempt to understand this compelling world of stimuli. The right embel-
lishment can transform a trivial everyday object into an overwhelming power
object—a kind of fetish that means the world to us and costs a fortune. How
does something like this happen? It is the psychological mechanisms rather
than the market mechanisms of the art world that we will concentrate on here.
In Chapter 5 we focus on the human need for embellishment and artistic ex-
pression through song, dance, and music. From the rituals of tribal societies to
the “modern primitives” of our time, who also paint, pierce, and tattoo them-
selves. Furthermore, we touch upon fashion and self-promotion.
Why do we do these things? Here, as well, there are different theories at play.
Is it due to sexually selected behavioral traits, whereby those who stand out and
flaunt their special qualities are selected as partners and therefore further their
genetic heritage? Is the artistic energy they exhibit reliable evidence of fitness,
which lets the world know that these are good, strong genes exactly like the
peacock’s tail? Or is it, rather, that we must understand these exertions through
their collective value as social markers that unite us and inform the world that
we are dealing with a close-knit group united by a shared mind-set? None of
these functions needs be mutually exclusive.
In Chapter 6 we follow the aesthetic impulse full circle and explore the
human need to decorate objects and surroundings, as well as the marking of
property and status in the public domain. Furthermore, we look at phenomena
such as folk art, street art, and graffiti. In the modern city, a battle is fought to
be seen and to make your mark. Graffiti may be considered vandalism by most
people and art only by a few, yet it is a fascinating expression of the aesthetic
impulse. Why spend time and money on adorning objects and walls that are
not your own when you face the risk of being fined and imprisoned if you are
caught?
The purpose of the Chapter 6 is to show that such extravaganzas, too, make
biological sense, thereby strengthening the argument that aesthetic behavior
is natural for humans. Decorations signal personal fitness, ability, care, effort,
resources—as well as power—because they ensure social status, for instance to
attract more sexual partners. Like our body ornamentation, decoration is im-
mediate communication transmitting key social and evolutionary information
to the surroundings.
Moreover, we get the opportunity to discuss whether the visual designs and
ornaments used by different ethnic groups to embellish their things sponta-
neously capture the essential aspects of the existential, material, and social
conditions of the life of individual groups.
The purpose of Chapter 7 is twofold. We take the investigation of the aes-
thetic impulse into the human brain to understand, first, why only we—and
not our closest relatives among the primates so alike to us in many other
ways—express ourselves aesthetically, and second, how the brain reacts when
presented with aesthetic material. The characteristics of the human species
(our search for stimulation, our social-hierarchic nature, and our symbolic sto-
rytelling nature) are connected to the brain’s evolutionary history and to the
development of the different parts of the brain from the ancient structures of
the reptilian brain to the old mammalian brain to the frontal lobe in the new ce-
rebral cortex. Somewhere along the road on the journey from animal to human
animal, the aesthetic impulse developed.
Neuroaesthetics is a booming new area of research that currently benefits
from great scientific attention and funding. This field has its opportunities and
limitations, and we will also look at the latter. Brain scans are less useful when
you are interested in the “why” of aesthetic behavior rather than the “how.”
Nevertheless, some brain studies have been ground breaking. Neuroaesthetics
offers us a pivotal argument for the key function of the aesthetic impulse in
human lives. It shows us that the brain’s reward circuit is activated when we
are presented with aesthetic objects and stimuli. And why reward a perception
or an activity that is evolutionarily useless and worthless in relation to human
existence?
But we humans do not just adorn ourselves and our surroundings with
shapes, colors, and patterns or create artistic and rhythmic compositions
such as song, music, and dance. We also create stories and dramatic settings
that deal with the theme of what it means to be human. This behavior is
certainly not the least mysterious aspect of the aesthetic impulse, and we
will take a close look at these symbolic and narrative ornamentations of our
existence in Chapter 8.
Why do we even spend that much time and resources on telling each other
stories and dramatizing common human experiences? Which themes do these
narratives revolve around? Are there universal themes? What function do these
symbolic universes have for our development and survival as individuals and
as a species?
In Chapter 9 the threads from the different investigations are gathered, and
the evolutionary functions and conditions behind the aesthetic impulse are
outlined in a synthesizing model.
One of the main discussions in the aesthetic field concerns whether artistic
behavior should be considered a biological adaptation in its own right, and thus
an innate behavioral repertoire with direct consequence to our survival and re-
production that has been passed down the genetic line through evolutionary
selection, or whether this behavior should rather be considered a random by-
product that may hold certain advantages for us but that is basically a side-
effect of other adaptive processes.
I argue for my stand in the adaptation/byproduct opposition and show
how the viewpoints presented throughout the book can best be contained
within the adaptation theory. Artistic expression and behavioral patterns
are, as shown, some of the means with which we cultivate, regulate, and
calibrate the brain, the cognitive apparatus, and the human motivational
systems. Moreover, a world without these elements would limit our ability to
relate to other people, put ourselves in each other’s place, and respond crea-
tively to the challenges in life.
Chapter 10 concludes with showing the strength and limitations of the ap-
proach presented in this book in a discussion that highlights the differences
between a classic humanistic approach and an evolutionary, behavioral ap-
proach. The aim is not to move aesthetics from the humanities and into be-
havioral psychology and other sciences. On the contrary, the aesthetic field is
a house with many doors, and you will need several keys to open them—more
and different keys than those used in this book. However, aesthetics and art
are also behavior—that is, something our species does—and that is why behav-
ioral sciences were prioritized. Furthermore, with behavioral and evolutionary
psychology as tools, we can shine an extensive and important light on the big
“why” of art and aesthetics.
What remains now is to clarify a few central choices I have made in my
approach to this topic. We will—as is evident—look at behavior. What we
will call aesthetics or art is primarily certain recurring behavioral patterns
that we consider to be pleasurable to do and observe and whose products we
appreciate.
According to behavioral psychology, every species has its own specific be-
havioral patterns and innate programs, dispositions, and tools, and it is there-
fore possible to study human behavior as you would that of any other species.
According to evolutionary psychology, we must also understand these behav-
ioral patterns and innate brain programs as solutions to the challenges and
difficulties of the environment that members of that species have faced through
evolutionary history. Thus, according to this assumption, when we humans
spend time and effort on decorating ourselves and our surroundings, this be-
havior must somehow have been useful to us and helped us to survive, thrive,
and reproduce with quality, otherwise we would not have been equipped with
this impulse.
What interests me is the aesthetic impulse itself, not the debate about what
great art is. Nor is it the identification of what is “just” decoration and embel-
lishment as opposed to what may at a given time and place be accepted as art
in a particular culture. Not that there is no difference between these categories.
Some art is certainly “greater” than other art, and some expressions of art are
more complex and well crafted than others, but all these forms of art stem
from the same basic human impulse, and that is why it is this impulse we must
understand first.
Because this study is an interdisciplinary examination that draws on knowl-
edge from various fields and is of interest to people other than specialists, I have
attempted to avoid esoteric jargon and to define the specific terms.
And now to the matter at hand.
1}
An Animal in Search of Stimulation

for Pleasure and Need
TWO STORIES ON THE FORCES THAT DRIVE
US TOWARD ART AND AESTHETICS
Why do we create art and aesthetics? What motivates us?

If we are to understand the driving forces behind the aesthetic impulse, we
must try to understand the human animal’s existential and ecological living
conditions.
The human species belongs to the group of neophile animals. Neophilic be-
havior in an animal appears as the need to approach and investigate unfamiliar
objects in the surroundings; neophobe behavior, on the other hand, is the need to
avoid unfamiliar subjects and situations. In most species, neophilia is a passing
characteristic of youth that is replaced with neophobia in the adult animal. But
this is not the case with humans. We do get less mobile and stimulation-seeking
with age, but we maintain a curiosity and fascination with new and unfamiliar
phenomena throughout our whole lives, and we likewise have a lifelong urge to
investigate foreign objects.
Species who are food specialists, who survive by specializing in one food
item for which there is little competition, are typically far more neophobic than
species who are generalists and have evolved to eat many different things.1
For example, a lettuce specialist lives in my garden. He is Kalle Blomkvist
the tortoise, whom we have had for years. Confront him with an object that is
foreign to him and he will retract his head and feet, and he will not move an inch
before he is sure that nothing unexpected will happen. After this he withdraws
in a nice and reserved manner and at a pace worthy of a tortoise: “Investigate
that? Never!”
If you are a koala or a panda, you basically just have to care about whether
or not there are eucalyptus leaves or bamboo shoots in your surroundings. But
if you, like humans, are a food opportunist who is basically omnivorous, then
15
it pays to be investigative and curious about “that thing over there that I do not
know what is.” Maybe it is edible. The members of a species who expand their
food repertoire have an advantage in terms of survival compared to those who
do not. And then you investigate and crack the nut, and then the oyster, the
clam, the crayfish, or the lobster even though these unfamiliar objects do not
immediately seem edible, because that is what neophilic opportunists do.
The way in which a species acquires food is crucial to its behavioral rep-
ertoire and general living conditions. Though our closest relatives among the
primates are first and foremost herbivores that supplement their diet with an-
imal protein in the form of eggs and insects, humans are first and foremost
omnivorous with a passion for meat. And while herbivores are forced to use
the majority of their waking hours on getting food, carnivores make a concen-
trated effort in hunting and then have time to spare for other purposes.
We acquired even more spare time at the point that we learned to cook the
food over fire, and we apparently did so as soon as 1.9 billion years ago, where
the first chef appears to have been found among the ancestors of the human
lineage which we call Homo erectus.2
While our other ape and monkey relatives must use up to 50% of the day
just on eating and digesting, humans only use 5% of the day for this because
we are capable of cooking our food. But there is more. With the ability to cook
food comes the controlled use of fire and with fire a whole new world is opened
as hours are now added to the day. Whereas the day is full of duties and tasks,
the night and the dark are spare time, and with the light from fire this time can
now be utilized.
And all these conditions—along with the time we carnivores save on
acquiring food—free several hours that the representatives of the human lin-
eage can now use for other things such as hanging out, socializing, playing,
telling stories about who “we” are, and above all creating art, culture, crafts,
technology, and decoration. Time that our herbivorous and in-the-dark
relatives simply do not have.
At the same time, we are a species that makes the most of our calorie intake
and spare time. While other carnivorous species such as the big cats sleep for
up to 16 hours a day after a successful hunt, we convert our calorie intake to
stimulation-seeking behavior and new adventures into our environment and
the things that surround us. The human nervous system is made for a high
activity level, and we are busy stimulation-seeking creatures while the cats are
lazy, vegetating creatures.
All species have an Optimal Stimulation Level (OSL) at which they thrive.3
At this level there is an optimal and pleasant balance between novelty and fa-
miliarity and between change and stability. Below the optimal stimulation level
animals such as humans exhibit stimulation-seeking and explorative behavior,
and with monkeys, apes, and humans we can talk of boredom and restlessness.
It is simply uncomfortable to be understimulated.
An Animal in Search of Stimulation } 17
If, on the other hand, the stimulation level is above optimal, the world
becomes too varied and confusing. We become stressed and anxious and
commence stimulation-reducing behavior: We withdraw, attempt to leave, or
freeze into a kind of behavioral paralysis, which is sometimes followed by an
unconscious, sense-blocking black-out as a way of riding out the storm (see
Figure 1.1).
In some species, like tortoises, snakes, and reptiles in general, the OSL is
low. In others, as in most hoofed animals and cats, it is small to moderate, and
in a few species, such as most types of corvids and parrots, dolphins, apes,
and humans, the optimal stimulation level is high or even extremely high.
No other mammal is as investigative and wandering as humans are. We cross
boundaries and explore new territory even when we have plenty of resources.
The Neanderthals lived for thousands of years without spreading out very far,
while we have spread throughout the entire globe and found our way to the far-
thest corners of the planet in just 50,000 years.
Humans are unique, not least in the fact that we still seek stimulation and
activity even when we relax and all our basic needs are satisfied.
In a study from 2014 by Wilson and colleagues, 83% of test subjects reported
that they never spend time sitting down with their own thoughts doing nothing.
When the researchers later instructed a group of test subjects to do just this in
a series of tests where they just had to sit with their own thoughts for six to fif-
teen minutes in an empty room without phones and internet access and without
sleeping or pacing, they found that the test subjects found even this brief period
of inactivity very uncomfortable.
If they were given the option of reading a book, listening to music, or surfing
the web, they would choose that option above inactivity and then describe the
time as pleasant.
Optimal stimulation level (OSL)
OSL
Pleasant stress
rising interest
Organized behaviour
anxiety
boredom panic
collapse
Unpleasant sleep
Disorganized behaviour
0 5 10
Low High stimulation
FIGURE 1.1. The Optimal Stimulation Level (OSL).
If they were given the option of administering uncomfortable electric jolts

to themselves instead of just sitting there passively for the fifteen minutes of
test time, as much as 67% of men and 25% of women paradoxically choose this
option. They would rather do something unpleasant than to simply be passive
and unoccupied. They choose painful stimuli over no stimuli at all.
Only extremely stimulation-seeking creatures react this way, and it is this
restless energy that fuels all the aesthetic activities with which we fill the free
hours of a day: I am full, but with the bones of the meat that I have just eaten
I can, with a scratch here and a cut there and a bit of grinding and drilling, create
a statue, a talisman, or an amulet, which I can hang about my neck and which will,
most importantly, keep me occupied while making it.
The neophilia, the need for stimulation, and the free hours make this behav-
ior both possible and meaningful, and so do other things regarding our ecolog-
ical and existential conditions.
Festivity, Delight, and Surplus Energy
For an herbivore the day is a long series of small homogenous, monotonous,

and repetitive food consumptions. For a carnivore and a hunter this monot-
onous chain of actions is replaced by moments of strong concentration and
excitement, by great effort and intense activity, and by huge disappointment or
relief as the hunt fails or succeeds. This is an entirely different way of living in
the world.
Furthermore, for a primate and a member of the human species with a very
high OSL the moment of triumph—where there is food enough for everyone
and everyone is safe—becomes a party where the surplus resources and the re-
lief trigger various activities characterized by surplus energy, such as playing,
dancing, singing, making music, decorating the body and hair, and presenting
dramatic re-enactments or oral retellings of the hunt and the killing. And thus
begins the art of song, music, dance, poetry, drama, story, and painting: as
activities of surplus energy in an active, playful and stimulation-seeking animal
that converts its calorie intake to new activities and festivities. The aesthetic
impulse is not rooted in play. It is, like play, rooted in our need for stimuli. And
play and art are both pleasurable ways of achieving stimulation.
This is one of the main theories of why and when humans create art. The
zoologist Desmond Morris4 is one of the advocates of this theory, the philos-
opher Nietzsche another. In his Will to Power, Nietzsche vividly describes how
a state of “animal well-being” is behind the aesthetic impulse. It is a state of
“intoxication, euphoria, youthfulness, festal joys and spring” that makes the
forces of life find artistic expression.5
The theory of festivity, surplus energy, free time, and animal well-being in
an active and stimulation-seeking animal is a good theory for understanding
the birth of art. It makes immediate sense. We can picture it and understand
the dynamics from within when we search ourselves, and it is also supported
scientifically by both anthropological studies and psychological experiments
such as the experiment carried out by Wilson and colleagues.6 But it is not the
only theory out there.
Anxiety, Need, and Existential Uncertainty
In a different theory there is, paradoxically, focus on the more unpleasant

emotions. Here, the fact that the primary context of art in traditional tribal
societies is always cult and religious ceremonies is emphasized. Art can thus
not be separated from our magical and religious ceremonies, which we resort
to exactly in situations of uncertainty and moments of anxiety and distress in
an attempt to regain control. Consequently, we create art to alleviate the exis-
tential anxiety and tension that all humans sometimes experience in relation
to the uncertainty of life. We come together in religious ceremonies, where the
different forms of art simultaneously come together (including song, music,
dance, body ornamentation, drama, storytelling), to inspire a sense of control
and a feeling of community within the members of the tribe.7
It is very simple. When we sing, dance, and drum together we feel calmer
and we experience the strength of community. We are in this together. And
even though the rain dance or the other magical actions we resort to in order
to ensure hunting success or atone for the transgressions of the tribe are all
useless in the eyes of reason, each and every one of them is a psychologically
meaningful strategy that gives the members of the tribe a sense of control. We
can do something. We are not just passive pieces in the puzzle of grand forces,
and this mental boost carries survival value. Furthermore, as mentioned previ-
ously, these collective ceremonies establish a sense of connection, cooperation,
and emotional intimacy between the individual members of the tribe, which
improves their odds in the battle for existence.
The American scholar, Ellen Dissanayake, who is affiliated with University
of Washington, is one of the driving forces behind this theory. Dissanayake
argues that the main forms of ceremonial art—music, song, and dance—are
essentially soothing for us because these rhythmic, repetitive, and dynamically
varied vocal and movement patterns are ritualized repetitions of the sounds
and movements that we use for comforting and soothing our children during
child care.
Infants who cry and are restless do not just produce stress and interruptions.
They are also potentially dangerous for the other members of the tribe, as their
cries can attract the attention of predators and enemies. Consequently, it was
necessary to develop soothing mechanisms to deal with this issue. And this is
where song—the calming notes of the mother’s modulated voice, the cooing
and sighing of infant-directed vocalizations, the repetition and the rhythmic

rocking back and forth—comes in as one of the methods that have proven ef-
fective. Perhaps because these sounds and movements assure the infant that the
parent actually is attentive to it, as the Harvard psychologists Mehr & Krasnow
have suggested8.
This theory also has a point. Art and cult are without a doubt connected
in the original societies of man, and cult is something that we practice in
order to achieve control and to calm the anxiety and unease that, for humans,
inevitably comes with existence. But I have one reservation. Do humans pri-
marily express themselves aesthetically through collective, cult, and ceremo-
nial contexts?
Present tribes and modern humans adorn their houses, weapons, tools,
and kitchenware. They decorate themselves with colors, feathers, rings, jew-
elry, piercings, tattoos, and scars and thus fill the otherwise trivial everyday life
with aesthetic content. And these aesthetics are likely to be art in the form of
pastime, surplus energy, and delight rather than for comfort and as a sign of
a shortage of energy. And what about prehistoric art? Is this form of art first
and foremost religious and ceremonial? We will look into these questions in the
following chapter.
However, I would like to make it clear that I do not see any reason to choose
sides in this discussion between seemingly opposing views, because why should
both explanations not be able to supplement each other? Yes, more than that
even. Why should they not be compatible?
As we know, we humans have an optimal stimulation level at which we
thrive, and we can therefore both be understimulated and overstimulated in
regards to this level, and both positions are strongly behavior motivated. When
we are understimulated, the aesthetic behavior can be one of the ways in which
we engage, amuse, and stimulate ourselves, because, unlike cats, we cannot just
be inactive. Similarly, when we are overstimulated and unrestful, the artistic
forms—for example, together in a collective ceremony—may be one of the
methods by which we calm ourselves and lower the tension in the group, as
well as individually, all for the purpose of bringing us closer to the optimal
stimulation level.
At this level we step into a strong pleasurable state of engagement, presence,
or what the humanistic psychologists call flow. Flow is a mental state of fully
focused motivation where you are completely present in the moment, and from
this point of surplus energy, well-being and intimacy we can, of course, also be
creative, artistic, and inventive.9
Thus, rather than choosing between the great theories of what awakens the
aesthetic impulse, you should understand that this impulse is closely connected
to the stimulation level of the organism, and can therefore be roused across
the human excitement spectrum whether we are under, over, or optimally
stimulated. (Figure. 1.2 illustrates this point of view.)
Optimal stimulation level (OSL)
art
OSL
Pleasant rising interest stress

Organized behaviour art
anxiety
art
panic
boredom collapse
Unpleasant sleep
Disorganized behaviour
0 5 10
Low High stimulation
FIGURE 1.2. Art and the Optimal Stimulation Level.
But what can now trigger the aesthetic impulse on the individual level is one
thing. Why we were equipped with such an impulse in the first place and what
important functions this impulse performs is another.
We will look at these questions in the following chapters, but first we must
go back to our ancestors and have a closer look at the first art and the humans
who created it. Who were they and what where they doing? Were they first and
foremost creatures of cult making “religious art” to use for the magical ceremo-
nies of the tribe? Or can you also find a more broad aesthetic impulse here that
makes them decorate themselves, their everyday utilities, and their surround-
ings? And who were the creators of these works? Were they particularly gifted
individuals, few in number, and uniquely specialized for these activities, or was
art and decoration something most members of the tribe took part in?
2}
The First Humans and the First Art
One day three million years ago one of our ancestors—a member of the species
Australopithecus africanus—moved along the river bank in the southern part
of Africa. At the water’s edge he found a curious object: a reddish brown stone,
heavy at 260 grams, a jasper quartz made smooth by the forces of the water
and in the shape of a face with a pair of staring eyes, a broad nose, mouth, and
chin, and a forehead marked by a visible hairline. This stone fascinated our
ancestor so much that he did not just pick it up, but carried it with him sev-
eral kilometers into the land and to the cave where he resided. This is where it
was found 3 million years later—together with his bones and the bones of his
conspecifics—in the Makapansgat cave of South Africa.
The Makapansgat stone is not art. It is a manuport (from Latin manus,
hand and portare, to carry): a naturally formed object that has been found,
appreciated, collected, and moved from its original geological finding place to
another location far from there by one of our ancestors. And when I mention
it here it is because we, in this appreciative action, find one of the first signs of
an aesthetic sense in our evolutionary lineage. A curious primate, at this point
still more ape than man with a brain not much bigger than that of present-day
chimpanzees, found an object with a special visual, somatosensory, and, let us
call it, “symbolic power”: the stone has a face that looks like the finder’s face
(Figure 2.1). And this object, which can neither be eaten nor used for other
purposes, fascinated and enthralled our ancestor so much that he had to take
it with him.
In the Wonderwerk cave of South Africa, one of our more recent ancestors
of the species Homo erectus left color pigment behind 800,000 years ago, which
he seemingly used to decorate himself and maybe also some of his belongings
and surroundings. In Java 450,000 years ago, the same species engraved ab-
stract zig-zag patterns on clam shells,1 and around the same time another of
our ancestors was making the world’s oldest figurine to date in Marocco, the
so-called Tan Tan Venus. This 6 cm large and 10 gram heavy stone figurine is
23
FIGURE 2.1. The Markapansgat pebble.
a manufactured object with chiselled-out and engraved lines, which make the
stone’s already human shape appear even clearer. Furthermore, pigments of
iron and manganese show that the figurine had also been painted red.2
Neanderthals also used color and made strings of pearls out of clam shells,
and they engraved simple patterns on cave walls and buried their dead on a
bed of up to 200 colors.3 So from the moment we can see traces of the first
humanlike creatures in our evolutionary line (the hominids, as we call them), we
can also see the first traces of the aesthetic impulse. With the emergence of our
own species, Homo sapiens, these traces become truly pronounced (Figure 2.2).
Prehistoric art spans the entire world. Decorated weapons and tools, as
well as rock and cave art, have been found in Mexico, Peru, Patagonia, Africa,
Arabia, India, China, Siberia, Japan, and Australia, and new findings con-
stantly appear. More recently, in 2014 in Indonesia on the island of Sulawesi,
rock paintings at least 40,000 years old picturing human hands and a piglike
animal have been found.4
However, there can be no doubt that Europe is still unique when it comes to
both the quantity and quality of preserved art. The first fossils of our species
were found in 1868 beneath the Cro-Magnon rock in the Vezere Valley near the
village of Les Eyzies de Tayac in the Dordogne province in the southwestern
part of France. The area is a prehistoric treasure chest quite literally teeming
with traces of our ancestors and their activities. Therefore, this is where we con-
tinue our investigation.
The First Humans and the First Art } 25
Prehistoric humans
– A time line showing the humans mentioned in this chapter
Homo sapiens sapiens The modern humans

200,000 BC until today
Cro Magnon humans Another word for the modern

humans. The name originates
from the first fossil-finding of our
species in the Cro Magnon cave in
Europe in 1868
Homo neanderthalensis Neanderthals

250,000 to 40,000 BC
Homo erectus The upright humans

1,9m to 70,000 BC
Australopithecus “Lucy” the monkey human

africanus 3,8 to 2m BC
Hominides
Collective name for primates such as humans, great apes and our
above-mentioned extinct relatives.
Primates
The mammal species that we and the monkeys belong to. The
history of the primates began about 60m years ago when the first
prosimians occur.
FIGURE 2.2. Timeline.
Cave Art and Prehistoric Humans
The Vezere Valley is a beautiful place, and the area has everything humans need.
The landscape is mountainous and hilly, but you will not find hard, sharp alps
of impenetrable granite here. Instead, you will find soft, curved and penetrable
limestone rocks, smoothed by water and glaciers and full of overhangs and
caves ideal for protection, as well as life-giving springs. The landscape holds all
the necessities of human life: water, shade, shelter, and hunting opportunities.
It also has rich opportunities for exploration: a mountain overhang, a river that
twists and turns, open grasslands with a few trees, and areas of dense forest.
New enticing scenarios that stimulate and invite you to come closer constantly
present themselves.
For at least 350,000 years, representatives of the human evolutionary
line have been living in the Vezere Valley. The Neanderthals arrived around
100,000 years ago, and our own ancestor, the Cro-Magnon human, settled
FIGURE 2.3. Reconstructed Cro Magnon settlement (about 30,000 BC).
there around 45,000 years ago, and you cannot blame them. Seen through
human eyes, the area truly is a great habitat.
They did not settle in the caves but lived in the mouth of them or underneath
the big overhangs, which they fitted with tent sides sown from skin to shelter
them from the environment (Figure 2.3). They hunted, fished, and gathered,
made weapons, tools, beautiful garments (Figure 2.4), jewelry, and figurines.
And they got together for annual and semi-annual gatherings in groups of up
to 300 people under the great overhangs at Le Grand Roc and Laugerie basse.
Being the curious and stimulation-seeking creatures that they were, the also
went exploring into the caves and pits they found in the mountains and hills.
In some places they crawled several kilometers down into dark and impass-
able pits, and they painted and engraved some of these from top to bottom
with geometric symbols, stylized vulvas, and powerful animal figures such as
those found in the Lascaux, Rouffignac, and Font de Gaume caves. They painted
horses, bison, mammoths, and rhinoceri, but only remarkably few and badly
sketched humans and no landscapes with earth, sky, trees, or vegetation.
These humans—themselves nomads—were interested first and foremost in
mobile subjects. Static nature, with its mountains, rivers, and vegetation, is en-
tirely absent. These types of images do not appear in art until much later, when
humans became settled farmers. The first landscape images were created by
humans who erected houses and enclosed themselves behind walls in towns.
These people viewed nature as “the other” that lay outside the city walls. The
The First Humans and the First Art } 27
FIGURE 2.4. Cro Magnon man attire (about 30,000 BC).
nomad was too in sync with the environment in which he walked, moved, and
lived for it to be a captivating image for him.5 However, there were other subjects
that captivated him, and these subjects are thought-provoking and mysterious.
The Meaning Behind the Images—Religious Spiritual Explanations
When cave art was explored scientifically for the first time at the end of the
1800s, the Cro-Magnon humans were considered simple creatures without the
ability to think abstract thoughts, and their art was considered to be random
creations without any underlying meaning. Art pour l’art—or art for the sake
of art, to put it briefly.
Then, in the beginning of the 1900s, anthropologists arrived, and with them
the idea of art as an art magique—a magical art. They compared prehistoric art
with the art and religious images produced by contemporary hunter-gatherers
and concurrently began to view the cave paintings as an expression of hunting
magic and totemism.6 The assumption is that the images were supposed to en-
sure the success of the hunt by way of magic by tempering the spirits of the an-
imals or paying homage to totem animals that the tribe associated themselves
with and considered themselves to be descended from.
During another phase of this magical, spiritual approach, the images were
perceived as mythograms: close-set images and symbols of these humans’
religious conceptions, and the caves were considered religious centers of cult
activity. The assumption that it was only simple hunting magic is concurrently
abandoned because this assumption is undermined by the fact that the kitchen
middens of these hunters did not match the images of the caves. Although
these ice age hunters had rock ptarmigans and reindeer in their stomachs they
seemed to primarily have horses and bison on their minds.7
Reindeer, especially, were pivotal for them. Reindeer constituted up to
90% of their prey, and they used everything from the animal. They ate the
meat, made clothing and shoes from the skin and lamp oil from the fat. Apart
from that they made jewelry, tools, weapons, and figurines out of the horns
and bones. But they did not paint them. These everyday animals—their daily
meat so to speak—fascinated them as little as the animals in our refrigerated
counters fascinate us. It may seem puzzling, but in this respect they were prob-
ably not too different from us. Even though our refrigerated counters are full
of pork and chicken, we do not fill our paintings with pigs and chickens. You
are not likely to come across a painting of a pig in your grandmother’s living
room. It is quite likely, however, that you will come across paintings of impres-
sive, dangerous, or fast animals such as stags, horses, bulls, bears, and predators
on the walls.
Next, a structuralist approach was taken. Anthropologists registered which
species were depicted, counted the number within each category, noted where in
the room they appeared, and what other species they were linked or confronted
with.8 The French anthropologist Leroi-Gourhan, especially, leads the way
with a gender dualistic theory in which masculine and feminine energies are
allegedly confronted with each other on the walls of the caves (Figure 2.5).
According to him, the animals in these cave paintings are not prey but cosmic
symbols of some fundamental dualistic opposites that these humans dealt with.
The horses are thus not horses but symbols of masculinity, along with animals
such as stags and ibex, and they are associated with so-called masculine geo-
metric symbols such as straight lines, arrows, dots, and branch and feather-like
symbols. Similarly, bison are not, according to Leroi-Gourhan, simply bison
but are symbols of femininity, along with animals such as oxen and mammoths
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CHAPTER XXXVIII.
ALY TRANSFERS HIS SEAT OF GOVERNMENT TO KUFA.
AFFAIRS IN EGYPT.
A.H. XXXVI. A.D. 656, 657.
When Aly rode forth from Medîna in

pursuit of the insurgent army, a Companion Medîna abandoned as seat
seized his bridle;—‘Stay!’ he cried with of Caliphate.
earnest voice;—‘if thou goest forth from this city, the government will
depart therefrom, never more to return.’ He was pushed aside as a
crackbrained meddler. But his words were long remembered, and
the prophecy was true. Medîna, hitherto queen of the Moslem world,
was to be the seat of empire no more.
About the middle of the thirty-sixth year
of the Hegira, seven months after the Aly’s entry into Kûfa. Rajab,
a.h. XXXVI. Jan. a.d. 657.
death of Othmân, Aly entered Kûfa. The
first four months of his Caliphate had been spent, as we have seen,
at Medîna; the other three in the camp at Rabadza, in the campaign
ending with the battle of the Camel, and a short stay at Bussorah. No
Caliph had as yet visited Kûfa. It was now to be the seat of Aly’s
government. We find no mention of the manner of his entry and
reception; simply the fact of his arrival. No doubt the people were
flattered by the honour now put upon them. The city also had some
advantages; for there were in it many leading men, able, and some
of them willing, to support the Caliph by their influence. Moreover,
Aly might calculate on the jealousy of the
inhabitants towards Syria, in the Factious spirit there.
approaching struggle with Muâvia. But all
this was more than counterbalanced by the fickle and factious
humour of the populace. It was the focus of Bedouin democracy; and
the spirit of the Bedouins was yet untamed. What had they gained,
the citizens asked one of another, by the rebellion against Othmân?
The cry of vengeance on the regicides was for the moment stifled;
but things were fast drifting back again into the old Coreishite
groove. This was, in fact, the same cry as the Arab tribes were
making all around. ‘Aly hath set up his cousins, the sons of Abbâs,
everywhere—in Medîna, in Mecca, and in Yemen; and now here
again at Bussorah; while he himself will rule at Kûfa. Of what avail
that we made away with Othmân; and that we have shed all this
blood, fighting with Zobeir and Talha?’ So spoke the arch-conspirator
Ashtar among his friends at Bussorah; and Aly, fearful of the effect of
such teaching, took him in his train to Kûfa, where, indeed, among
the excitable populace his influence was even more dangerous.
Another uneasy symptom of the times was that the baser sort and
the servile dregs of Bussorah, breaking loose from authority, went
forth in a body, and took possession of Sejestan on the Persian
frontier. They killed the leader sent by Aly to suppress the
insurrection, and were not put down till Ibn Abbâs himself attacked
them with a force from Bussorah.
It was in the West, however, that the
sky loured the most. That was but a shorn Struggle in prospect with
Syria.
and truncated Caliphate which Aly
enjoyed, so long as his authority was scorned in Syria. A mortal
combat with Muâvia loomed in that direction. But, before resuming
the thread of the Syrian story, it is necessary first to turn to Egypt
and relate what was being enacted there.
When the band of conspirators set out
from Egypt to attack Othmân, we have Mohammed ibn Abu
seen that Mohammed son of Abu Hodzeifa Hodzeifa usurps Egypt.
Shawwâl, a.h. XXXV. April,
thereupon ousted Abu Sarh, Othmân’s a.d. 656.
lieutenant, and usurped the government.
This man’s father had been killed at Yemâma, and Othmân, adopting
the orphan, had brought him up kindly. Mortified at the refusal of the
Caliph to give him a command until he should have proved his
capacity in the field, Mohammed joined the insurgent faction, and
gained great influence in Egypt by an affected piety and by the
vehement denunciation of his former guardian. On the murder of
Othmân he succeeded in holding the government of Egypt for
several months. But he quickly paid the penalty of his ingratitude. On
the approach of the new governor, sent by
Aly, he fled to Syria, and there lost his life. Flies to Syria and is killed.
[522]
The follower whom Aly selected for the

heavy task of governing Egypt was Cays, a Cays appointed governor of
Egypt. Safar, a.h. XXXVI.
citizen of Medîna, son of that Sád ibn August, a.d. 656.
Obâda who, it may be remembered, was
the rival of Abu Bekr for the Caliphate. Of approved sagacity,
strength, and judgment, he was a loyal follower of Aly. He declined to
take an army with him, saying that the Caliph had more need of
soldiers than he; and preferred instead to be supported by seven
‘Companions’ of the Prophet, whom he took along with him. He was
well received by the Egyptians at large, who swore allegiance to him
in behalf of Aly. But a strong faction, as before observed, found
shelter in the district of Kharanba, and loudly demanded satisfaction
for the death of Othmân. Cays wisely left these alone for the present,
waiving even the demand for tithe. In other respects he held Egypt
firmly in his grasp.
With the prospect of an early attack
from the banks of the Euphrates, Muâvia Is supplanted by Muâvia’s
became uneasy at the Egyptian border machinations.
being commanded by so firm and powerful a ruler as Cays; whom,
therefore, he made every effort to detach from his allegiance to Aly.
Upbraiding him with having joined a party whose hands were still red
with the blood of Othmân, he reminded Cays that there was yet time
to repent, and promised that, if even now he joined in avenging the
crime, he should not only be confirmed in the government of Egypt,
but his kinsmen would be promoted to such office in the Hejâz, or
elsewhere, as he might desire. Cays, unwilling to precipitate
hostilities, fenced his answer with well-balanced words. Of Aly’s
complicity in the foul deed he had no knowledge; he would wait.
Meanwhile it was not in his mind to make any attack on Syria. Again
pressed by Muâvia, Cays frankly declared that he was, and would
remain, a staunch supporter of the Caliph’s cause. Thereupon
Muâvia sought craftily to stir up jealousy between the Viceroy and
his Master. He gave out that Cays was temporising, and spoke of his
treatment of the Kharanba malcontents as proving that he was one
at heart with them.[523] The report, assiduously spread, reached (as
it was intended) the court of Aly, where it was taken up by those who
either doubted the fidelity of Cays or envied his prosperity. To test his
obedience, Aly ordered an advance against the schismatics of
Kharanba; and when Cays remonstrated against the policy, it was
taken as proof of his complicity. He was
deposed, and Mohammed the regicide, Mohammed son of Abu Bekr
son of Abu Bekr, appointed in his room. appointed to Egypt.
Cays retired in anger to Medîna, where, as on neutral ground,
adherents of either side were unmolested. Finding no peace there
from the taunts of Merwân and his party, Cays resolved at last to go
to Kûfa, and cast himself on Aly’s clemency; and Aly, on the
calumnies being cleared away, took him back at once into his
confidence, and thenceforward kept him at court as his chief adviser.
Muâvia was grieved that Merwân had driven Cays away from
Medîna: ‘If thou hadst aided Aly,’ he wrote upbraidingly, ‘with a
hundred thousand men, it had been a lesser evil than is the gain to
Aly of such a counsellor.’[524]
On his own side, however, Muâvia had
gained a powerful and astute adviser in the Muâvia is joined by Amru.
person of the conqueror of Egypt. During
the attack on Othmân, Amru had retired from Medîna with his two
sons to Palestine. The tidings of the tragedy, aggravated by his own
unkindly treatment of the Caliph, affected him so keenly that he wept
like a woman. ‘It is I,’ he said, ‘who, by deserting the aged man, am
responsible for his death.’ From his place of retirement he watched
the struggle of Zobeir and Talha at Bussorah; and when Aly
conquered, he repaired at once to Damascus, and with his two sons
presented himself before Muâvia. In consequence of the unfriendly
attitude he had held towards Othmân, Amru was at first received
coldly. But in the end, the past was all condoned; friendship was
restored between the two chiefs, and thenceforward Amru was the
trusted counsellor of Muâvia.[525]
This coalition, and the false step of Aly in recalling Cays from
Egypt, now materially strengthened Muâvia’s hands. The success of
Aly at Bussorah brought at least this
advantage even to Muâvia, that it removed Weakness of Aly’s position at
Talha and Zobeir, the only other Kûfa.
competitors, from the field. On the other hand, the position of Aly, as
one of concession to the Arab faction, was fraught with peril. While
refusing ostensibly to identify himself with the murderers of Othmân,
it was virtually in their cause that he had taken up arms; and
therefore equally in the cause of the Arabs, as against the Coreish
and aristocracy of Islam. And Aly should have foreseen that the
socialistic element in this unnatural compromise must sooner or later
come into collision with the Caliphate.
The authority of Muâvia rested on a
firmer basis; his attitude was bolder, and Advantages of Muâvia’s
his position more consistent. He had from position in Syria.
the first resisted the levelling demands of the faction which rose up
against Othmân. He was, therefore, justified now in a course of
action which, pursuing these to justice, asserted in the pursuit the
supremacy of the Coreish. The influence of the ‘Companions’ had
always been paramount in Syria; and the Arab element (partly
because very largely recruited from the aristocratic tribes of the
south) was thoroughly under control. The cry for vengeance,
inflamed by the gory emblems still hanging from the cathedral pulpit,
was taken up by high and low. The temporising attitude of the Caliph
was in every man’s mouth as a proof of complicity with the regicides.
And though many may have dreaded Aly’s vengeance in the event of
his ultimate success, the general feeling throughout Syria was a
burning desire to avenge the murder of his ill-fated predecessor.
Still, whatever other motives may have
been at work elsewhere, the contest, as Aly and Muâvia in personal
between Aly and Muâvia, had now become antagonism.
a purely personal one. The struggle was for the crown; and many
looked to ‘the grey mule of Syria’ as having the better chance. A
possible solution of the contest lay, no doubt, in the erection of Syria
into an independent kingdom side by side with that of Persia and
Egypt. But the disintegration of the empire
of Islam was an idea which as yet had Unity of Caliphate still the
ruling sentiment.
hardly entered into the minds of the
Faithful. The unity of the Caliphate, as established by the history and
the precedents of a quarter of a century, was still, and long
continued, the ruling sentiment of Islam.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
BATTLE OF SIFFIN.
A.H. XXXVI., XXXVII. A.D. 657.
After Aly had established himself at

Kûfa, there followed a short interval of rest. Aly’s envoy returns with
The lieutenants and commanders, from defiant message from
Muâvia. Shabân, a.h. XXXVI.
their various provinces, flocked into the January, a.d. 657.
new capital to do homage to the Caliph.
Towards one of these, named Jarîr, chief of the Beni Bajîla, Muâvia
was known to entertain friendly sentiments. Him, therefore, Aly
deputed to Damascus with a letter, wherein, after reciting the fact of
his election at Medîna to the Caliphate, and the discomfiture of his
enemies at Bussorah, he called on Muâvia to follow the example of
the empire, and, with the rest, to take also the oath of allegiance.
Like the former envoy, Jarîr was kept long in attendance. At last he
was dismissed with an oral message, that allegiance would be
tendered if punishment were meted out to the regicides, but on no
other possible condition. The envoy further reported to Aly, that
Othmân’s blood-stained garment still hung upon the pulpit of the
Great Mosque, and that a multitude of the Syrian warriors had sworn
that they would use no water to wash themselves withal, neither
sleep in their beds, till they had slain the murderers of the aged
Caliph, and those that sheltered them.[526] Ashtar accused Jarîr of
playing into the hands of Muâvia; and by having dallied for so long a
time at his court, of thus giving the Syrians leisure to mature their
plans and become hardened in their hostile attitude. Jarîr, disgusted
at the imputation, retired a neutral to Kirckesia, or, according to
others, went over to Muâvia.
Seeing that Muâvia was hopelessly
alienated, Aly resolved no longer to delay Aly invades Northern Syria.
Dzul Câda, a.h. XXXVI. April,
the attack upon Syria, and he proclaimed a.d. 657.
an expedition accordingly. At first the
people were slack in answering the call. But after a time, the Caliph
succeeded in gathering together from Bussorah, Medâin, and Kûfa,
an imposing force of 50,000 men. His plan was to march first by
Upper Mesopotamia, and so to invade Syria from the north. A
detachment was sent as an advance-guard up the western bank of
the Euphrates, but meeting with active opposition there, it was forced
to cross back again into Mesopotamia. Aly himself, with the main
body, marched across the plain of Dura to Medâin, and thence up
the Tigris. Then turning, short of Mosul, towards the west, he
crossed the great desert of Mesopotamia, and, outstripping his
advanced column, reached the Euphrates in its upper course at
Ricca.[527] An unfriendly population lined the banks of the river; and
it was not without sanguinary threats that Ashtar forced them to
construct a bridge. The army crossed near Ricca; and then marching
some little distance along the right bank, westward, in the direction of
Aleppo, they met the Syrian outposts at Sûr.[528]
On learning Aly’s preparations, Muâvia
lost no time in marshalling his forces, Muâvia, advancing, meets
which greatly outnumbered the enemy, Aly, on field of Siffîn.
and, having no desert to cross, were soon to the front. Amru was in
command, having his two sons, and his freedman Werdân, as
lieutenants.[529] Aly, desirous of averting bloodshed, had given
orders that, as soon as his troops came upon the enemy, they
should halt, and, confining themselves to the defensive, avoid
precipitating hostilities before opportunity had been given for friendly
overture. The vanguards of the two armies spent the first few days in
skirmishing. Ashtar challenged the Syrian officer to single combat;
but the challenge was declined, and Ashtar told that, having imbrued
his hands in the blood of the late Caliph, he could not claim the
privileges of honourable warfare. When the main armies came in
sight of each other, Aly found Muâvia so encamped as to cut him off
from the river, and reduce his army to straits for water. He therefore
brought on an engagement, in which Muâvia was forced to change
his ground, and occupy the ill-starred field of Siffîn.[530a] Some days
of inaction followed; after which Aly sent three of his chief men to
demand that, for the good of the commonwealth, Muâvia should
tender his allegiance. No mention is made of any offer (though
perhaps it may be presumed) on the part of Aly to confirm Muâvia, in
case of his submission, in the government of Syria. A scene ensued
of fruitless recrimination. On the one hand, Muâvia demanded that
the murderers of Othmân should be brought to justice; on the other,
the demand was stigmatised as a mere cat’s-paw covering ambitious
designs upon the Caliphate. This was resented as a base calumny
by Muâvia. ‘Begone, ye lying scoundrels!’ he cried; ‘the sword shall
decide between us;’ and, so saying, he drove them from his
presence. Finding all attempts at compromise to be useless, Aly
marshalled his army into seven or eight separate columns, each
under a Bedouin chieftain of note. As many separate columns were
similarly formed on the Syrian side. And every day one of these
columns, taking the field in turn, was drawn up against a
corresponding column of the other army.
Desultory fighting in this singular way was Desultory fighting, Dzul Hijj,
kept up throughout the month, there being a.h. XXXVI. May, a.d. 657.
sometimes as many as two engagements in a single day. But the
contest could not up to this time have been very earnest or severe,
since little mention is made of sanguinary results.[530] On both sides
they feared, we are told, to bring the whole forces out into a common
battle, ‘lest the Moslems should be destroyed, root and branch,’ in
the internecine struggle.
A new year, the 37th of the Hegira,
opened on the combatants, wearied by this Truce during final month of
endless and indecisive strife, and inclined a.h. XXXVII. June, a.d. 657.
to thoughts of peace. A truce was called, to last throughout
Moharram, the first month of the year. The interval was spent in
deputations; but these proved as fruitless as those which had gone
before. Aly, influenced by the anti-Omeyyad faction around him, was
not disposed even now to admit the injustice of Othmân’s having
been put to death. When pressed upon the point by the Syrian
envoys, he declined to commit himself. ‘I
will not say,’ was his evasive answer, ‘that Fruitless negotiations.
he was wrongfully attacked, nor will I say
that the attack was justified.’ ‘Then,’ answered the Syrians, ‘we shall
fight against thee, and fight likewise against everyone else who
refuseth to say that thy predecessor was not wrongfully put to death;’
and with these words they took their final leave. On his side, Muâvia
declared to the messengers of Aly that nothing short of the
punishment of the regicides would induce him to quit the field.
‘What?’ exclaimed some one; ‘wouldest thou put Ammâr to death?’
‘And why not?’ answered Muâvia; ‘wherefore should the son of the
bond-woman not suffer for having slain the freedman of
Othmân?’[531] ‘Impossible,’ they cried; ‘where will ye stop? It were
easier to bale out the floods of the Euphrates.’
[Renewal of hostilities, Safar, a.h. XXXVII. July, a.d. 657.]
So passed away the first month of the year. At the beginning of
the second, Aly, seeing things unchanged, commenced hostilities
afresh. He caused proclamation to be made along Muâvia’s front,
recalling the Syrians from rebellion to their proper allegiance. But it
only made them rally with the more enthusiasm around Muâvia; and
a great company took an oath, girding themselves in token with their
turbans, that they would defend him to the death. The warfare was,
however, carried on at the first in the same indecisive style as
before. Six leaders on Aly’s side took, in daily turn, the command
against as many captains on the other side.[532] But though still
desultory, the conflict was becoming severer and more embittered.
Many single combats were fought. One of Aly’s sons went forth on
the challenge of a son of Omar, but was recalled by his father.[533]
And so eight or nine days passed, one differing little from the other,
till the beginning of the second week, when Aly made up his mind to
bring on a general, and, as he hoped, decisive battle. The night was
spent by his followers in preparation, and (as the Abbasside
historians relate) in recitation from the Scripture, and in prayer. Thus,
ten days after the renewal of hostilities, both armies were drawn out
in their entire array. They fought the whole
day, but the shades of evening fell, and Battle of Siffîn. 11 and 12
none had got the better. The following Safar; July 29 and 30.
morning, the combat was renewed, and with greater vigour. Aly
posted himself in the centre with the flower of his troops from
Medîna; the wings were composed separately, one of the warriors
from Bussorah, the other of those from Kûfa. Muâvia had a pavilion
pitched upon the field; and there, surrounded by five compacted
lines of his sworn body-guard, watched the day. Amru, with a great
weight of horse, bore down upon the Kûfa wing. Before the shock it
gave way; and Aly, with his sons, was exposed to imminent peril, as
well from the thick shower of arrows, as from a close encounter.
Reproaching the men of Kûfa for their cowardice, the Caliph fought
sword in hand, and with his ancient bravery withstood the charge.
Ashtar, at the head of three hundred Readers[534]—the ‘Ghâzies’ of
the day—led forward the other wing, which fell with fury upon
Muâvia’s ‘turbaned’ body-guard. Four of its five ranks were already
cut to pieces, when Muâvia, alarmed, bethought himself of flight, and
had even called for his horse, when certain martial lines came to his
lips, and he held his ground. Amru stood by him, ‘Courage to-day,’
he cried; ‘to-morrow victory.’ The fifth rank repelled the danger, and
both sides again fought on equal terms. Feats of desperate bravery
were displayed by both armies. Many men of rank were slain. On
Aly’s side fell Hâshim, the hero of Câdesîya. Of even greater
moment was the death of Ammâr, now over ninety years, and one of
the leading regicides. As he saw Hâshim fall, he exclaimed to his
fellows: ‘O Paradise! how close thou couchest beneath the arrow’s
point and the falchion’s flash! O Hâshim! even now I see heaven
opened, and black-eyed maidens, all bridally attired, clasping thee in
their fond embrace!’[535] So, singing, and refreshing himself with his
favourite draught of milk and water, the aged warrior, fired again with
the ardour of youth, rushed into the enemy’s ranks, and met the
envied fate. It had long been in everyone’s mouth both in town and
camp, that Mahomet had once said to him: ‘By a godless and
rebellious race, O Ammâr, thou shalt one day be slain;’ in other
words (so the saying was interpreted), Ammâr would be killed
fighting on the side of right. Thus his death, as it were, condemned
the cause of the ranks against whom he fought; and so it spread
dismay in Muâvia’s host. When Amru heard of it, he answered
readily: ‘And who is it that hath killed Ammâr, but Aly the “rebellious,”
that brought him hither?’ The clever repartee ran through the Syrian
host, and did much at once to efface the evil omen.[536]
The fighting this day was in real
earnest, and the carnage on both sides Battle still rages on morning
great. Darkness failed to separate the of third day, 13 Safar, July
31.
combatants; and, like Câdesîya, that night
was called a second ‘Night of Clangour.’ The morning broke on the
two armies still in conflict. With emptied quivers they now fought
hand to hand. Ashtar, the regicide, resolved on victory at whatever
cost, continued to push the attack with unflinching bravery and
persistence. Muâvia, disheartened, began to speak to Amru of
proposing to Aly a judicial combat, Goliath-like, with a champion on
either side. ‘Then go forth thyself, and challenge Aly,’ said Amru. ‘Not
so,’ answered Muâvia; ‘I will not do that, for Aly ever slayeth his man,
and then thou shouldest succeed me.’ Amru, indeed, well knew that
this was not in Muâvia’s line; and it was no time for continuing grim
pleasantry like this. All at once Amru
bethought him of a stratagem. ‘Raise aloft Hostilities suspended for
the sacred leaves of the Corân,’ he cried; arbitration by Corân.
‘if any refuse to abide thereby, it will sow discord amongst them; if
they accept, it will be a reprieve from cruel slaughter.’ Muâvia caught
at the words. And so forthwith they fixed the sacred scrolls on the
points of their lances, and raising them aloft, called out along the line
of battle: ‘The law of the Lord! The law of the Lord! Let it decide
between us!’ No sooner heard, than the men of Kûfa leaped forward,
re-echoing the cry: ‘The law of the Lord, that shall decide between
us!’ As all were shouting thus with one accord, Aly stepped forth and
expostulated with them: ‘It was the device,’ he cried, ‘of evil men;
afraid of defeat, they sought their end by guile, and cloaked rebellion
under love of the Word.’ It was all in vain. To every argument they
answered (and the ‘Readers’ loudest of all): ‘We are called to the
Book, and we cannot decline it.’ At last, in open mutiny, they
threatened the unfortunate Caliph, that, unless he agreed, they
would all desert him, drive him over to the enemy, or serve him as
they had served Othmân. Seeing that further opposition would be
futile, Aly said: ‘Stay wild and treasonable words. Obey and fight. But
if ye will rebel, do as ye list.’ ‘We will not fight,’ they cried; ‘recall
Ashtar from the field.’ Ashtar, thus summoned, at the first refused.
‘We are gaining a great victory,’ he said, ‘I will not come;’ and he
turned to fight again. But the tumult increased, and Aly sent a
second time to say: ‘Of what avail is victory when treason rageth?
Wouldst thou have the Caliph murdered, or delivered over to the
enemy?’ Ashtar, on hearing this, unwillingly returned, and a fierce
altercation ensued between him and the angry soldiery. ‘Ye were
fighting,’ he said, ‘but yesterday for the Lord, and the choicest
among you lost their lives. What is it but that ye now acknowledge
yourselves in the wrong, and the Martyrs gone to hell?’ ‘Nay,’ they
answered; ‘it is not so. Yesterday we fought for the Lord; to-day, also
for the Lord, we stay the fight.’ On this, Ashtar upbraided them as
‘traitors, cowards, hypocrites, and villains.’ In return, they reviled him,
and struck his charger with their whips. Aly interposed. The tumult
was stayed. And Asháth, chief of the Beni Kinda, was sent to ask
Muâvia ‘what his precise meaning in raising the Corân aloft might
be.’ ‘It is this,’ he sent answer back, ‘that we should return, both you
and we, to the will of the Lord, as set forth in the Book. Each side
shall name an Umpire, and the verdict shall be binding.’ Aly’s army
shouted assent. The unfortunate Caliph was forced to the still deeper
humiliation of appointing as his arbiter a person who had deserted
him. The soldiery cried out for Abu Mûsa, the temporising Governor
of Kûfa who had been deposed for want of active loyalty. ‘This man,’
answered Aly, ‘did but lately leave us and flee; and not till after
several months I pardoned him. Neither hath he now been fighting
with us. Here is a worthy representative, the son of Abbâs, the
Prophet’s uncle; choose him as your Umpire.’ ‘As well name thyself,’
they answered rudely. ‘Then take Ashtar.’ ‘What!’ said the Bedouin
chiefs in the same rough imperious strain, ‘the man that hath set the
world on fire! None for us but Abu Mûsa.’ It was a bitter choice for
Aly, but he had no alternative. The Syrian arbiter was Amru, for
whose deep and crafty ways Abu Mûsa was no match.[537] He
presented himself in the Caliph’s camp, and the agreement was put
in writing. As dictated from Aly’s side, it ran
thus: ‘In the name of the Lord Most Deed of arbitration, 13 Safar,
Merciful! This is what hath been agreed a.h. 665.
XXXVII. July 31, a.d.
upon between the Commander of the

Faithful, and ——’ ‘Stay!’ cried Amru (like the Coreish to the Prophet
at Hodeibia); ‘Aly is your Commander, but he is not ours.’ Again the
helpless Caliph had to give way, and the names were written down
of the contracting parties as simply ‘Aly and Muâvia.’[538] The
document went on to say that both sides bound themselves by the
judgment of the Corân; and, where the Corân was silent, by the
acknowledged precedents of Islam. To the Umpires, the guarantee of
both Aly and Muâvia was given of safety for themselves and for their
families; and the promise of the people that their judgment should be
followed. On their part, the Umpires swore that they would judge
righteously, so as to stay hostilities and reconcile the Faithful. The
decision was to be delivered after six months, or later if the Umpires
saw cause for delay, and at some neutral spot midway between Kûfa
and Damascus. Meanwhile hostilities should be mutually suspended.
[539] The writing, having been duly executed and signed, was
numerously witnessed by leading chiefs on either side. Ashtar alone
refused: ‘Never again,’ he said, ‘should I acknowledge this to be
mine own right hand, were it to touch a deed the like of this.’
And so the armies, having buried their
dead, quitted this memorable but Aly returns to Kûfa, and
undecisive battle-field. Aly retired to Kûfa; Muâvia to Damascus.
and Muâvia, his point for the present gained, to Damascus. As Aly
entered Kûfa, he heard wailing on every side. A chief man, whom he
bade to pacify the mourners, answered: ‘O Caliph, it is not as if but
two or three had been slain; of this clan hard by, alone, an hundred
and fourscore lie buried at Siffîn. There is not a house but the
women are weeping in it for their dead.’
The slaughter, indeed, had been great
on both sides.[540] And what gave point to Discord at Kûfa.
Aly’s loss was that the truce was but a hollow thing, with no hope in it
of lasting peace or reconciliation. The Arab faction, to whose insolent
demands Aly had yielded, was more estranged than ever. When the
men of Kûfa murmured at the compromise, all that he could reply
was this: that the mutinous soldiery had extorted the agreement from
him; and that having pledged his faith, he could not now withdraw.
He had thrown in his lot with traitors and regicides, and was now
reaping the bitter fruit. Muâvia alone had gained.
CHAPTER XL.
THE KHAREJITES, OR THEOCRATIC FACTION, REBEL AGAINST
ALY.
A.H. XXXVII. A.D. 657.
The quick sagacity of Amru had never

been turned to better account than when The Arab faction taken in by
he proposed to the army of Kûfa that the appeal to Corân.
Corân should be the arbiter between them. To be judged by the Book
of the Lord had been their cry from the beginning. The sacred text
gave no countenance to the extravagant pretensions of the Coreish,
nor to their (so-called) empire of favouritism and tyranny. Its precepts
were based on the brotherhood of the Faithful; and the Prophet
himself had enjoined on his people the absolute equality of all.[541]
No sooner, therefore, was it proclaimed than, as Amru anticipated,
the Arab chiefs, caught in the snare, took up the cry, and pledged
themselves thereto.
Reflection soon tarnished the prospect.
They had forgotten how narrow was the Dissatisfaction of the Arab,
issue which the Umpires had to decide. or theocratic, faction.
The Bedouins were fighting not for one Caliph or the other, but
against the pretensions of the Coreish at large. It was this that
nerved them to the sanguinary conflict. ‘If the Syrians conquer,’ cried
Yezîd ibn Cays to his followers of Bussorah and Kûfa, ‘ye are
undone. Again ye will be ground down by tyrants like the minions of
Othmân. They will possess themselves as heretofore of the
conquests of Islam, as if, forsooth, these had descended to them by
inheritance, and not been won by our good swords. We shall lose
our grasp both of this world and of the next.’ Such were the evils
which they dreaded, for which they had slain Othmân, and from
which they had now been fighting for deliverance. By the
appointment of Abu Mûsa for their Umpire, what had they obtained?
It was theocratic rule they had been dreaming of, and now they were
drifting back to the old régime. The Umpires would decide simply as
between Muâvia and Aly; and, whatever their verdict, the despotism
of the past would be riveted more firmly than ever. Nothing of the
kind they really wanted had been gained, nor was there any prospect
of its being gained, by arbitration.
Burdened with these thoughts, a body
of 12,000 men fell out from Aly’s ranks on They draw off into hostile
their homeward journey; and, keeping the camp near Kûfa.
same direction towards Kûfa, marched side by side with the army, at
some little distance off in the desert. Loud and violent in their
speech, they beat about their neighbours in rude Bedouin fashion
with their whips, and reproached one another for having abandoned
the cause of Islam to the bands of godless arbitrators; while some
few amongst them were uneasy at having betrayed the Caliph on the
field of battle, and at having now separated themselves from the
body of the Faithful. In this frame of mind they avoided Kûfa, but
encamped in its vicinity, at the village of Harôra.[542] They chose for
themselves a temporary leader. But their resolve was, that when
they gained the ascendency, they would no longer have any prince
or Caliph, nor any oath of allegiance but to the Lord alone; and
would vest the administration of affairs in a Council of State. This
theocratic dream was not confined to the schismatics at Harôra, but
had widely leavened the factious and fanatical population of Kûfa.
Aly, aware of the danger, sent his cousin, Mohammed son of Abbâs,
to reason with the seceding body, but to no effect. He then
proceeded to their camp himself, and gained over their leader, Yezîd,
by the promise of the government of Ispahan. He urged, and with
good ground, that, so far from being responsible for ‘the godless
compromise,’ he had been driven to accept the Arbitration against
his better judgment by their own wayward and persistent obstinacy;
that the Umpires were bound by the terms of the truce to deliver their
decision in accordance with the sacred text, which equally with
himself the theocrats held to be the final guide; and that, if the
Umpires’ deliverance should after all turn out to be in disregard of it,
he would without a moment’s hesitation reject the same, and again
go forth at their head to fight against the enemies of the Faith.
There was a strange mingling of
innocence and simplicity in these They are pacified by Aly.
Seceders, with a fanatical indifference to
the distinctions of vice and virtue, and a readiness to perpetrate any
crime, whether against the person or the State, so that it forwarded
the cause they had at heart, namely, ‘the Rule of the Lord,’ and the
setting up of that which they conceived to be His kingdom.
For the present they were pacified by
the assurances of the Caliph. They broke And retire to their homes.
up their camp and returned to their homes,
there to await the decision of the Umpires.

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The Aesthetic Animal Henrik

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Introduction: The Aesthetic Impulse 1

comment on my evolutionary and behavioral psychology analyses of the aes-

It is cold, dark, and damp.

FIGURE I.1. Favela Rio de Janeiro.

The Functions of Artistic Behavior

Within my own field—psychology—the hows and whats of aesthetics are

None of the aforementioned perspectives is wrong per se or mutually

The Structure of the Book

An Animal in Search of Stimulation

Why do we create art and aesthetics? What motivates us?

Optimal stimulation level (OSL)

If they were given the option of administering uncomfortable electric jolts

Festivity, Delight, and Surplus Energy

For an herbivore the day is a long series of small homogenous, monotonous,

Anxiety, Need, and Existential Uncertainty

In a different theory there is, paradoxically, focus on the more unpleasant

and sighing of infant-directed vocalizations, the repetition and the rhythmic

Optimal stimulation level (OSL)

Pleasant rising interest stress

The First Humans and the First Art

FIGURE 2.1. The Markapansgat pebble.

Homo sapiens sapiens The modern humans

Cro Magnon humans Another word for the modern

Homo neanderthalensis Neanderthals

Homo erectus The upright humans

Australopithecus “Lucy” the monkey human

Cave Art and Prehistoric Humans

FIGURE 2.3. Reconstructed Cro Magnon settlement (about 30,000 BC).

FIGURE 2.4. Cro Magnon man attire (about 30,000 BC).

The Meaning Behind the Images—Religious Spiritual Explanations

A.H. XXXVI. A.D. 656, 657.

When Aly rode forth from Medîna in

The follower whom Aly selected for the

A.H. XXXVI., XXXVII. A.D. 657.

After Aly had established himself at

upon between the Commander of the

A.H. XXXVII. A.D. 657.

The quick sagacity of Amru had never

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