The Master thesis by E. G. Kagarov was defended at the Moscow University in 1912; it is a bright example of enrichment of old historical and philological instruments with new anthropological approaches.
The book consists of three parts according the title: ‘The cult of fetish’, ‘The cult of plants’, and ‘The cult of animals’. The first part shapes a concept of fetish as a ‘universal form of primitive religious thinking’. It is started with an anthropological introduction, where the author offers a typological classification of objects; then, there is a survey and classification of the most important Ancient Greek fetish mentioned in the sources (stones, sacred columns, pyramids, omphalos, herms, etc.); there are also basic cult forms of their veneration. The parts on the cults of plants and animals are built in the same way: an anthropological introduction, a review of various plants (oak, poplar, willow, ash, sycamore, etc.) or animals (mammals, birds, reptiles, etc.), a survey of testimonies on the forms of their cult veneration.
The book is still actual as a reference of the forms of cults of fetish, plants, and animals, and also as a successful combination of anthropological theory and fundamental historical and philological research of an ancient civilization.