Cave Hunting: Researches on the evidence of caves respecting the early inhabitants of EuropeDawkins, William Boyd
History
Cave Hunting: Researches on the evidence of caves respecting the early inhabitants of Europe
Dawkins, William Boyd
Antiquities, Prehistoric -- Europe; Caves -- Europe; Europe -- Antiquities; Prehistoric peoples -- Europe
Besides these broad crania, M. Lagneaux[162] calls attention to a
fragment, sufficiently perfect to indicate a skull of the long type
(très dolicho-céphale), and that differed from them in many other
particulars. In the Trou du Frontal, therefore, there is proof that
a long and a short-headed race lived in Belgium side by side, just
as a similar association in the cave of Orrouy establishes the same
conclusion as to the neolithic dwellers in France. And since skulls
of both these types have been discovered in the neolithic caves of
Sclaigneaux and Chauvaux, the interment in the Trou du Frontal may
probably be referred to that date.
_The Cave of Gendron._
The sepulchral cave of Gendron[163] on the Lesse, in which fourteen
skeletons were discovered lying at full length, and in regular order,
along with one flake and some fragments of pottery, is of uncertain
age, since those articles were found at the entrance, and have no
necessary connection with the interments. And if they were deposited
at the same time, M. Dupont’s view that they stamp the neolithic age
is rendered untenable by the fact that flakes and rude pottery were
in use as late as the date of the Roman conquest of Britain, and are
frequently met with in association with articles of bronze and of iron.
And for the same reasons the neolithic age of the human bones in the
Trou de Sureau and of the Trou de Pont-à-Lesse is open to considerable
doubt. The contents, however, prove these caves to be post-pleistocene.
_Cave of Gailenreuth._
The same uncertainty overhangs the age of the interments in the cave
of Gailenreuth, in Franconia, from which Dr. Buckland[164] obtained
a human skull of the same broad type as that from Sclaigneaux, along
with fragments of black coarse pottery, one of which is ornamented with
a line of finger-impressions. The skull is remarkable for the great
width of the parietal protuberances, and the flattening of the upper
and posterior region of the parietal bone. Its measurements are given
in the Table, p. 236, from which it will be seen that it belongs to the
same class of skulls as those from the neolithic caves and tumuli of
France.
_Cave of Neanderthal._
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