
The “whirling” dervishes, disciples of the Islamic brotherhood of the Mevlevi (Konia, Turkey). In the course of their ancient whirling dance whose steps, taken backwards, take the Cosmos back to the moment of its creation, keep the arms outwards with the right hand turned towards the sky to receive the energy from God and the left one turned downwards to send it to the earth.
With the paper “La prèèminence de la main droite. Étude sur la polaritè religieuse” (1909) Robert Hertz was the first anthropologist to assert that in western tradition the right hand (and the right side of the body) enjoys a superiority compared to the left, which is strongly supported and guaranteed by sanctions. On the contrary, the left hand suffers a sort of interdiction that makes it virtually unusable. For Hertz “the preference of the right hand with respect to the left does not depend on anatomical or physiological factors, but it is a cultural trait that is achieved through learning “.

The main gestural postures found in Prehistoric Iconography: 1- the gesture of the cosmic man (worshipping), with the arms turned to the sky; 2- the gesture of the whirling dervish, with the right hand turned upwards and the left downwards; 3- The cross-shaped body of the universal man, with horizontal arms and palms facing forward; 4- the gesture of the chthonic man with the arms turned to the earth.
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