________________
APPENDIX TO CHAPTER IX
527
However, I still maintain that the problem has not yet been solved, and hardly will be solved. In my opinion, it is one of those instances of the process, many times referred to in this book, which Professor Kroeber has termed "idea-diffusion" or "stimulus-diffusion"; to use Kroeber's words, a new element fills some need in a culture which has not previously possessed it. It is the idea which is accepted, but it remains for the receiving
MAQVIRINI FANO NI
Fig. 237-1, Oghamic inscription. 2, Oghamic-Latin digraphic inscription (British Museum)
culture to develop a new expression. Obviously this process is one which will ordinarily leave a minimum of historical evidence; the specific items of cultural content, upon which historians ordinarily rely in proving connection, are likely to be few or even wholly absent. Positive proofs of such a process are, therefore, difficult to secure long after the act, or wherever the historical record is not quite so full.
