The Spirit in Human Evolution - Waldorf Research Institute

Fig 6.7 Acheulean and developed Olduwan
artifacts (after Bils-borough). The Acheulean
tradition proved remarkably consistent. Similar
artifacts have been found from England to China,
from Pakistan to South Africa.
An Analogy with Children’s Archetypal Drawings
At this early stage in the development of human consciousness it is not surprising
that cultural expressions are so consistent. In the development of the child we have
an analogous situation. All young children the world over and regardless of cultural
environment make the same sequence of drawings. Only later do children begin to
draw what they actually see around them and then they do so very individually. The
phenomenon is well known. Such drawings are not the expression of artistic intention
on the part of the child but rather represent the unfolding of developmental processes
that reflect a close symbiosis between physical and cognitive development. In the young
child the forces at work in the formation and maturation of the physical organism are
the same forces that later form the basis for memory and the ability to learn and form
concepts, namely the etheric forces. This emancipation of etheric forces from the organic
realm into the soul realm is marked by a transition around the age of six or seven. During
the period of maximum physical development in these first years, these etheric forces
reveal themselves in the soul life of the child, in archetypal forms. These are reflected in
the drawings and movements that young children make. These drawings, particularly
the earliest which portray no obvious correlation to specific mental pictures, reflect the
inner dynamic of the forces at work within the organism. It is this aspect which makes
them a useful diagnostic tool for the doctor to identify weaknesses or blockages in one
or another area of the child’s organism.
At an equally early stage in the development of mankind, I can imagine a similar
broadly common level of cognitive development. In erectus people, the etheric forces had
not yet been penetrated by the “I” sufficiently for them to be emancipated into the soul
realm. Erectus people were not yet consciously or intentionally able to form independent
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