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52-526: The Swastika Stone is a stone adorned with a design that resembles a swastika , located on the Woodhouse Crag on the northern edge of Ilkley Moor in West Yorkshire , England. The design has a double outline with four curved arms and an attached S-shape, each enclosing a so-called 'cup' mark, the like of which can be found on other stones nearby. The stone is not verifiably dated; however

104-589: A 1992 paper, contends that the swastika-like comet on the Han-dynasty manuscript was labelled a "long tailed pheasant star" ( dixing ) because of its resemblance to a bird's foot or footprint. Similar comparisons had been made by J.   F. Hewitt in 1907, as well as a 1908 article in Good Housekeeping . Kobres goes on to suggest an association of mythological birds and comets also outside of China. In Native American culture , particularly among

156-450: A chiral irregular icosagon (20-sided polygon ) with fourfold (90°) rotational symmetry . Such a swastika proportioned on a 5   ×   5 square grid and with the broken portions of its legs shortened by one unit can tile the plane by translation alone. The main Nazi flag swastika used a 5   ×   5 diagonal grid, but with the legs unshortened. The swastika was adopted as

208-475: A late paleolithic figurine of a bird, carved from mammoth ivory, found in Mezine , Ukraine. However, the age of 10,000 BCE is a conservative estimate, and the true age may be as old as 17,000 BCE. It has been suggested that this swastika may be a stylised picture of a stork in flight. As the carving was found near phallic objects, this may also support the idea that the pattern was a fertility symbol. In

260-401: A letter from Max Müller that quotes Burnouf. The term sauwastika is used in the sense of 'backward swastika' by Eugène Goblet d'Alviella (1894): "In India it [the gammadion ] bears the name of swastika , when its arms are bent towards the right, and sauwastika when they are turned in the other direction." Other names for the symbol include: In various European languages, it

312-658: A mapping in the original Big5 character set, but the former does not (although it is in Big5+ ). In Unicode 5.2, two swastika symbols and two swastikas were added to the Tibetan block : swastika U+0FD5 ࿕ RIGHT-FACING SVASTI SIGN , U+0FD7 ࿗ RIGHT-FACING SVASTI SIGN WITH DOTS , and swastikas U+0FD6 ࿖ LEFT-FACING SVASTI SIGN , U+0FD8 ࿘ LEFT-FACING SVASTI SIGN WITH DOTS . European uses of swastikas are often treated in conjunction with cross symbols in general, such as

364-608: A standard character in Chinese , " 卍 " ( pinyin : wàn ) and as such entered various other East Asian languages , including Chinese script . In Japanese the symbol is called " 卍 " ( Hepburn : manji ) or " 卍字 " ( manji ) . The swastika is included in the Unicode character sets of two languages. In the Chinese block it is U+534D 卍 (left-facing) and U+5350 for the swastika 卐 (right-facing); The latter has

416-521: A symbol of good luck and prosperity in Hindu, Buddhist and Jain countries such as Nepal, India, Thailand, Mongolia, Sri Lanka, China and Japan, and carries various other meanings for peoples around the world, such as the Akan , Hopi , Navajo , and Tlingit peoples. It is also commonly used in Hindu marriage ceremonies and Dipavali celebrations. With well-being ( swasti ) we would follow along our path, like

468-518: A symbol of the German Nazi Party who appropriated it for their party insignia starting in the early 20th century. The appropriation continues with its use by neo-Nazis around the world. The swastika was and continues to be used as a symbol of divinity and spirituality in Indian religions , including Hinduism , Buddhism , and Jainism . It generally takes the form of a cross ,

520-627: Is a sacred symbol in the Bön religion, native to Tibet . The swastika is an important Hindu symbol. The swastika symbol is commonly used before entrances or on doorways of homes or temples, to mark the starting page of financial statements, and mandalas constructed for rituals such as weddings or welcoming a newborn. Samarra culture The Samarra culture is a Late Neolithic archaeological culture of northern Mesopotamia , roughly dated to between 5500 and 4800 BCE. It partially overlaps with Hassuna and early Ubaid . Samarran material culture

572-619: Is a swastika symbol used to decorate objects, traditional clothing and in archaeological excavations . According to painter Stanisław Jakubowski, the "little sun" (Polish: słoneczko ) is an Early Slavic pagan symbol of the Sun; he claimed it was engraved on wooden monuments built near the final resting places of fallen Slavs to represent eternal life. The symbol was first seen in his collection of Early Slavic symbols and architectural features, which he named Prasłowiańskie motywy architektoniczne (Polish: Early Slavic Architectural Motifs ). His work

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624-536: Is called yung drung . All swastikas are bent crosses based on a chiral symmetry, but they appear with different geometric details: as compact crosses with short legs, as crosses with large arms and as motifs in a pattern of unbroken lines. Chirality describes an absence of reflective symmetry , with the existence of two versions that are mirror images of each other. The mirror-image forms are typically described as left-facing or left-hand (卍) and right-facing or right-hand (卐). The compact swastika can be seen as

676-533: Is clearly marked on a hilt and sword belt found at Bifrons in Kent, in a grave of about the 6th century. Hilda Ellis Davidson theorised that the swastika symbol was associated with Thor , possibly representing his Mjolnir  – symbolic of thunder – and possibly being connected to the Bronze Age sun cross. Davidson cites "many examples" of swastika symbols from Anglo-Saxon graves of

728-582: Is depicted among the magical symbols on the drums of Sami noaidi , used in their religious ceremonies before Christianity was established. The name of the Sami thunder god was Horagalles , thought to derive from "Old Man Thor" ( Þórr karl ). Sometimes on the drums, a male figure with a hammer-like object in either hand is shown, and sometimes it is more like a cross with crooked ends, or a swastika. The icon has been of spiritual significance to Indian religions such as Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism. The swastika

780-791: Is known as the fylfot , gammadion , tetraskelion , or cross cramponnée (a term in Anglo-Norman heraldry ); German: Hakenkreuz ; French: croix gammée ; Italian: croce uncinata ; Latvian : ugunskrusts . In Mongolian it is called [хас] Error: {{Lang}}: Non-latn text/Latn script subtag mismatch ( help ) ( khas ) and mainly used in seals. In Chinese it is called 卍字 ( wànzì ), pronounced manji in Japanese, manja (만자) in Korean and vạn tự or chữ vạn in Vietnamese . In Balti / Tibetan language it

832-502: The Avar khans depicted a wolf with a standard with a double-spiral swastika. Petroglyphs with swastikas were depicted on medieval Vainakh tower architecture (see sketches by scholar Bruno Plaetschke from the 1920s). Thus, a rectangular swastika was made in engraved form on the entrance of a residential tower in the settlement Khimoy , Chechnya . Iron Age attestations of swastikas can be associated with Indo-European cultures such as

884-637: The Hisarlik mound near the Aegean Sea coast for the history of Troy. Schliemann linked his findings to the Sanskrit swastika . By the 19th century, the term swastika was adopted into the English lexicon, replacing the previous gammadion from Greek γαμμάδιον . In 1878, Irish scholar Charles Graves used swastika as the common English name for the symbol, after defining it as equivalent to

936-540: The Illyrians , Indo-Iranians , Celts , Greeks , Germanic peoples and Slavs . In Sintashta culture 's " Country of Towns ", ancient Indo-European settlements in southern Russia, it has been found a great concentration of some of the oldest swastika patterns. Swastika shapes have been found on numerous artefacts from Iron Age Europe. The swastika shape (also called a fylfot ) appears on various Germanic Migration Period and Viking Age artifacts, such as

988-652: The Pima people of Arizona , the swastika is a symbol of the four winds. Anthropologist Frank Hamilton Cushing noted that among the Pima the symbol of the four winds is made from a cross with the four curved arms (similar to a broken sun cross ) and concludes "the right-angle swastika is primarily a representation of the circle of the four wind gods standing at the head of their trails, or directions." The earliest known swastikas are from 10,000 BCE – part of "an intricate meander pattern of joined-up swastikas" found on

1040-1024: The Swastika Stone . Swastikas have also been found on pottery in archaeological digs in Africa, in the area of Kush and on pottery at the Jebel Barkal temples, in Iron Age designs of the northern Caucasus ( Koban culture ), and in Neolithic China in the Majiayao culture. Swastikas are also seen in Egypt during the Coptic period. Textile number T.231-1923 held at the V&;A Museum in London includes small swastikas in its design. This piece

1092-552: The sun cross of Bronze Age religion . Beyond its certain presence in the " proto-writing " symbol systems, such as the Vinča script , which appeared during the Neolithic . According to René Guénon , the swastika represents the north pole, and the rotational movement around a centre or immutable axis ( axis mundi ), and only secondly it represents the Sun as a reflected function of

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1144-518: The 19th and early 20th century, such as suastika . It was derived from the Sanskrit term ( Devanagari स्वस्तिक ), which transliterates to svastika under the commonly used IAST transliteration system , but is pronounced closer to swastika when letters are used with their English values. The earliest known use of the word swastika is in Pāṇini 's Aṣṭādhyāyī , which uses it to explain one of

1196-640: The 3rd-century Værløse Fibula from Zealand, Denmark, the Gothic spearhead from Brest-Litovsk , today in Belarus, the 9th-century Snoldelev Stone from Ramsø , Denmark, and numerous Migration Period bracteates drawn left-facing or right-facing. The pagan Anglo-Saxon ship burial at Sutton Hoo , England, contained numerous items bearing swastikas, now housed in the collection of the Cambridge Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology . A swastika

1248-616: The French term croix gammée  – a cross with arms shaped like the Greek letter gamma (Γ). Shortly thereafter, British antiquarians Edward Thomas and Robert Sewell separately published their studies about the symbol, using swastika as the common English term. The concept of a "reversed" swastika was probably first made among European scholars by Eugène Burnouf in 1852 and taken up by Schliemann in Ilios (1880), based on

1300-604: The Pacific and even North America (especially Moundville ). In Armenia the swastika is called the " arevakhach " and "kerkhach" ( Armenian : կեռխաչ ) and is the ancient symbol of eternity and eternal light (i.e. God). Swastikas in Armenia were found on petroglyphs from the copper age, predating the Bronze Age. During the Bronze Age it was depicted on cauldrons , belts, medallions and other items. Swastikas can also be seen on early Medieval churches and fortresses, including

1352-436: The Sanskrit grammar rules, in the context of a type of identifying mark on a cow's ear. Most scholarship suggests that Pāṇini lived in or before the 4th century BCE, possibly in 6th or 5th century BCE. An important early use of the word swastika in a European text was in 1871 with the publications of Heinrich Schliemann , who discovered more than 1,800 ancient samples of swastika symbols and variants thereof while digging

1404-538: The Sun and the Moon. May we meet up with one who gives in return, who does not smite (harm), with one who knows. — The Rigveda V.52.15 The word swastika is derived from the Sanskrit root swasti , which is composed of su 'good, well' and asti 'is; it is; there is'. The word swasti occurs frequently in the Vedas as well as in classical literature, meaning 'health, luck, success, prosperity', and it

1456-535: The United Kingdom is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . This article about a West Yorkshire building or structure is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Swastika The swastika ( 卐 or 卍 ) is a symbol used in various Eurasian religions and cultures, and it is also seen in some African and American ones. In the Western world, it is more widely recognized as

1508-646: The Western world until the 1930s, when the German Nazi Party adopted the swastika as an emblem of the Aryan race . As a result of World War II and the Holocaust , in the West it continues to be strongly associated with Nazism , antisemitism , white supremacism , or simply evil . As a consequence, its use in some countries, including Germany , is prohibited by law . However, the swastika remains

1560-671: The academic consensus suggests it to have been carved sometime around the Neolithic or early Bronze Age . Alternative views have claimed the design is rare in the British Isles , so its close similarity to Camunian rose designs in Lombardy/Italy have led some to theorise that the two are connected. In fact, the troops stationed in Ilkley during Roman occupation were recruited from the Celtic Lingones . This tribe

1612-710: The archaeological record around 3000 BCE in the Indus Valley Civilisation. It also appears in the Bronze and Iron Age cultures around the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea . In all these cultures, swastika symbols do not appear to occupy any marked position or significance, appearing as just one form of a series of similar symbols of varying complexity. In the Zoroastrian religion of Persia ,

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1664-400: The arms of which are of equal length and perpendicular to the adjacent arms, each bent midway at a right angle. The word swastika comes from Sanskrit : स्वस्तिक , romanized :  svastika , meaning 'conducive to well-being'. In Hinduism , the right-facing symbol (clockwise) ( 卐 ) is called swastika , symbolizing surya ('sun'), prosperity and good luck, while

1716-651: The first widespread, relatively uniform pottery styles in the Ancient Near East , was first recognized at Samarra. The Samarran Culture was the precursor to the Mesopotamian culture of the Ubaid period . At Tell Sabi Abyad and other Late Neolithic sites in Syria, scholars adopt increasingly vague terms such as Samarra "influenced", Samarra-"related" or even Samarra "impulses", largely because we do not understand

1768-516: The left-facing symbol (counter-clockwise) ( 卍 ) is called sauvastika , symbolising night or tantric aspects of Kali . In Jain symbolism , it represents Suparshvanatha  – the seventh of 24 Tirthankaras ( spiritual teachers and saviours ), while in Buddhist symbolism it represents the auspicious footprints of the Buddha . In the different Indo-European traditions,

1820-524: The mountains of Iran , there are swastikas or spinning wheels inscribed on stone walls, which are estimated to be more than 7,000 years old. One instance is in Khorashad, Birjand , on the holy wall Lakh Mazar. Mirror-image swastikas (clockwise and counter-clockwise) have been found on ceramic pottery in the Devetashka cave , Bulgaria, dated to 6,000 BCE. In Asia, swastika symbols first appear in

1872-584: The north pole. As such it is a symbol of life, of the vivifying role of the supreme principle of the universe, the absolute God, in relation to the cosmic order. It represents the activity (the Hellenic Logos , the Hindu Om , the Chinese Taiyi , 'Great One') of the principle of the universe in the formation of the world. According to Guénon, the swastika in its polar value has

1924-604: The oldest examples of the symbol in Sintashta culture , the swastika symbolises the universe, representing the spinning constellations of the celestial north pole centred in α Ursae Minoris , specifically the Little and Big Dipper (or Chariots), or Ursa Minor and Ursa Major. Likewise, according to René Guénon-the swastika is drawn by visualising the Big Dipper/Great Bear in the four phases of revolution around

1976-490: The pagan period, with particular prominence on cremation urns from the cemeteries of East Anglia. Some of the swastikas on the items, on display at the Cambridge Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, are depicted with such care and art that, according to Davidson, it must have possessed special significance as a funerary symbol . The runic inscription on the 8th-century Sæbø sword has been taken as evidence of

2028-471: The pole star. In their 1985 book Comet , Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan argue that the appearance of a rotating comet with a four-pronged tail as early as 2,000 years BCE could explain why the swastika is found in the cultures of both the Old World and the pre-Columbian Americas . The Han dynasty Book of Silk (2nd century BCE) depicts such a comet with a swastika-like symbol. Bob Kobres, in

2080-514: The principal tower in Armenia's historical capital city of Ani . The same symbol can be found on Armenian carpets , cross-stones ( khachkar ) and in medieval manuscripts, as well as on modern monuments as a symbol of eternity . Old petroglyphs of four-beam and other swastikas were recorded in Dagestan , in particular, among the Avars . According to Vakhushti of Kartli , the tribal banner of

2132-570: The same meaning of the yin and yang symbol of the Chinese tradition, and of other traditional symbols of the working of the universe, including the letters Γ ( gamma ) and G, symbolising the Great Architect of the Universe of Masonic thought. According to the scholar Reza Assasi, the swastika represents the north ecliptic north pole centred in ζ Draconis , with the constellation Draco as one of its beams. He argues that this symbol

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2184-566: The swastika as a symbol of Thor in Norse paganism . The bronze frontispiece of a ritual pre-Christian ( c.  350–50 BCE ) shield found in the River Thames near Battersea Bridge (hence " Battersea Shield ") is embossed with 27 swastikas in bronze and red enamel. An Ogham stone found in Aglish, County Kerry , Ireland ( CIIC 141) was modified into an early Christian gravestone, and

2236-465: The swastika include veterok ("breeze"), ognevtsi ("little flames"), "geese", "hares" (a towel with a swastika was called a towel with "hares"), or "little horses". The similar word " koleso " ("wheel") was used for rosette-shaped amulets, such as a hexafoil -thunder wheel [REDACTED] ) in folklore, particularly in the Russian North . An object very much like a hammer or a double axe

2288-497: The swastika symbolises fire , lightning bolts, and the sun . The symbol is found in the archaeological remains of the Indus Valley civilisation and Samarra , as well as in early Byzantine and Christian artwork . Although used for the first time as a symbol of international antisemitism by far-right Romanian politician A. C. Cuza prior to World War I , it was a symbol of auspiciousness and good luck for most of

2340-559: The swastika was a symbol of the revolving sun, infinity, or continuing creation. It is one of the most common symbols on Mesopotamian coins. Some researchers put forth the hypothesis that the swastika moved westward from the Indian subcontinent to Finland, Scandinavia , the Scottish Highlands and other parts of Europe. In England, neolithic or Bronze Age stone carvings of the symbol have been found on Ilkley Moor , such as

2392-408: Was commonly used as a greeting. The final ka is a common suffix that could have multiple meanings. According to Monier-Williams , a majority of scholars consider the swastika to originally be a solar symbol . The sign implies well-being, something fortunate, lucky, or auspicious. It is alternatively spelled in contemporary texts as svastika , and other spellings were occasionally used in

2444-863: Was decorated with a cross pattée and two swastikas. The Book of Kells ( c.  800 CE ) contains swastika-shaped ornamentation. At the Northern edge of Ilkley Moor in West Yorkshire, there is a swastika-shaped pattern engraved in a stone known as the Swastika Stone . A number of swastikas have been found embossed in Galician metal pieces and carved in stones, mostly from the Castro culture period, although there also are contemporary examples (imitating old patterns for decorative purposes). The ancient Baltic thunder cross symbol ( pērkona krusts (cross of Perkons ); also fire cross, ugunskrusts )

2496-579: Was first recognized during excavations by German Archaeologist Ernst Herzfeld at the site of Samarra . Other sites where Samarran material has been found include Tell Shemshara , Tell es-Sawwan , and Yarim Tepe . At Tell es-Sawwan, evidence of irrigation —including flax —establishes the presence of a prosperous settled culture with a highly organized social structure. The culture is primarily known for its finely made pottery decorated with stylized animals, including birds, and geometric designs on dark backgrounds. This widely exported type of pottery, one of

2548-472: Was found at Qau-el-Kebir, near Asyut , and is dated between 300 and 600 CE. The Tierwirbel (the German for "animal whorl" or "whirl of animals" ) is a characteristic motif in Bronze Age Central Asia, the Eurasian Steppe , and later also in Iron Age Scythian and European ( Baltic and Germanic ) culture, showing rotational symmetric arrangement of an animal motif , often four birds' heads. Even wider diffusion of this "Asiatic" theme has been proposed to

2600-436: Was later attested as the four-horse chariot of Mithra in ancient Iranian culture. They believed the cosmos was pulled by four heavenly horses who revolved around a fixed centre in a clockwise direction. He suggests that this notion later flourished in Roman Mithraism , as the symbol appears in Mithraic iconography and astronomical representations. According to the Russian archaeologist Gennady Zdanovich , who studied some of

2652-458: Was native to Gaul , but in around 400 BC, some migrated across the Alps to the Adriatic coast. Some believe the Ilkley Lingones were recruited from here rather than from Gaul. It is possible that the Italian Lingones passed through the Valcamonica region at some point, took on the swastika designs they found as part of their tribal symbolism, and carved it on the nearby moor when stationed in Ilkley. This article relating to archaeology in

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2704-451: Was published in 1923. The Boreyko coat of arms with a red swastika was used by several noble families in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth . According to Boris Kuftin , the Russians often used swastikas as a decorative element and as the basis of the ornament on traditional weaving products. Many can be seen on a women's folk costume from the Meshchera Lowlands . According to some authors, Russian names popularly associated with

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