Fig. 2.Fig. 2.Stream issuing from a Glacier.
Evidences of the Existence of Man.—The traces of man in the deposits made during the glacial epoch are numerous. Out of the many, the most noted will be given, with a view to their chronological order.
In all probability the very oldest implements of the post-tertiary, and consequently the beginning of the glacial epoch, if not of the pliocene, are those found in the south of Hampshire, between Gosport and Southampton. They came from a tabular mass of drift which caps the tertiary strata. "The great bed of gravel resting on eocene tertiary strata, in which these implements have been found, consists in most places of half-rolled or semi-angular chalk flints, mixed with rounded pebbles washed out of the tertiary strata.... Many of them exhibit the same colors and ochreous stain as do the flints in the gravel in which they lay."
West of the Southampton estuary, "on both sides of the opening at Bournemouth, flint tools of the ancient type have been met with in the gravel capping the cliffs. The gravel from which the flint tool was taken at Bournemouth is about one hundred feet above the level of the sea.... The gravel consists in great part of pebbles derived from tertiary strata."
The oval flint implement discovered in gravel at the top of the Foreland cliff "is of the true palæolithic type, and the gravel in which it is imbedded at the height of about eighty feet above the level of the sea, may have once extended to the cliffs near Gosport; in which case we should have to infer that the channel called the Solent had not yet been scooped out when this region was inhabited by palæolithic man."[13]
It may be safely inferred that the implements in the above three enumerations were imbedded at about the same time.
The flint implements from the valley of the Somme, which have been of so much interest, and convinced so many sceptical geologists, belong to the early part of this epoch. This valley may be represented by Fig. 3.
Fig. 3.Fig. 3.Section Across the Somme in Picardy.1. Peat, twenty to thirty feet thick, resting on gravel,a.2. Lower level gravel, with elephants' bones and flint tools covered with fluviatile loam, twenty to forty feet thick.3. Upper level gravel, with similar fossils, and overlying loam. In all thirty feet thick.4. Upland loam without shells, five or six feet thick.5. Eocene tertiary strata, resting on the chalk in patches.
1. Peat, twenty to thirty feet thick, resting on gravel,a.2. Lower level gravel, with elephants' bones and flint tools covered with fluviatile loam, twenty to forty feet thick.3. Upper level gravel, with similar fossils, and overlying loam. In all thirty feet thick.4. Upland loam without shells, five or six feet thick.5. Eocene tertiary strata, resting on the chalk in patches.
In explanation of the above it may be well to remark that No. 2 indicates the lower level gravels, and No. 3 the higher ones, which are from eighty to one hundred feet above the river. Of a later date than these is the peat, No. 1, which is from ten to thirty feet in thickness. Underneath the peat is a bed of gravel,a, from three to fourteen feet thick, resting on undisturbed chalk. But between the gravel and the peat is a thin layer of impervious clay. This section of the valley of the Somme is a pretty fair representation of the arrangements of the different beds at Abbeville, Amiens, and and St. Acheul.
In these beds are the records of two drift periods, marked by 2 and 3. The two are separated by a layer of fresh-water deposits, which contains river shells and is sometimes as much as sixteen feet thick. The lower, or gray diluvium, (No. 2), marks the glacial epoch, as distinct from the glaciers of the reindeer epoch. In the lower gravel, lying immediately upon the tertiary formation, were found the flint hatchets, together with the bones of the mammoth and fossil rhinoceros.
In order to understand the deposits still more clearly, the following figure is given.
4Fig. 4.Section of a Gravel-pit at St. Acheul.1. Vegetable and made soil from two to three feet thick.2. Brown loam from four to five feet thick, containing a few angular flints.3. Bed of sandy marl from five to six feet thick, with land and fresh-water shells, covered with a thin layer of angular gravel from one to two feet thick.4. A bed of partially rounded gravel containing well-rolled tertiary pebbles. In this bed the flint implements are chiefly found—ten to fourteen feet thick.5. Formation of chalk.a.Part of elephant's molar, eleven feet from surface.b.Entire molar of mammoth (E primigenius), seventeen feet from surface.c.Position of flint hatchet, eighteen feet from surface.d.Gravel projecting five feet.
1. Vegetable and made soil from two to three feet thick.
2. Brown loam from four to five feet thick, containing a few angular flints.
3. Bed of sandy marl from five to six feet thick, with land and fresh-water shells, covered with a thin layer of angular gravel from one to two feet thick.
4. A bed of partially rounded gravel containing well-rolled tertiary pebbles. In this bed the flint implements are chiefly found—ten to fourteen feet thick.
5. Formation of chalk.a.Part of elephant's molar, eleven feet from surface.b.Entire molar of mammoth (E primigenius), seventeen feet from surface.c.Position of flint hatchet, eighteen feet from surface.d.Gravel projecting five feet.
At St. Acheul, in bed No. 4, were found large numbers of flint implements. Some of them have the shape of a spear-head, and are over seven inches in length. The oval-shaped hatchets are so rude in some instances as to require a practised eye to decide their human origin. In the same bed are found small round bodies having a tubular cavity in the centre. Dr. Rigollot has suggested that these perforated stones or gravel were used as ornaments, possibly strung together as beads.
In this bed, No. 4, seventeen feet from the surface, was found a mammoth's tooth. About one foot below the tooth, in densely compressed gravel, was found a stone hatchet of an oval form.
Fig. 5.Fig. 5.Flint Implement From St. Acheul.Half the size of the original, which is seven and a half inches long.a.Side view.b.Same seen edgewise."These spear-headed implements have been found in greater number, proportionally to the oval ones, in the upper level gravel at St. Acheul, than in any of the lower gravels in the valley of the Somme. In these last, the oval form predominates, especially at Abbeville."—Antiquity of Man, p. 114.
Half the size of the original, which is seven and a half inches long.a.Side view.b.Same seen edgewise.
"These spear-headed implements have been found in greater number, proportionally to the oval ones, in the upper level gravel at St. Acheul, than in any of the lower gravels in the valley of the Somme. In these last, the oval form predominates, especially at Abbeville."—Antiquity of Man, p. 114.
That this bed was formed by action of glaciers is shown,not only from the well-rounded tertiary pebbles, but also from the great blocks of hard sandstone, some of which are over four feet in diameter. These large fragments not only abound at St. Acheul in both the higher and lower level gravels at Amiens, and at the higher level at Abbeville, but they are also traced far up the valley wherever the old diluvium occurs. All of these sandstones have been derived from the tertiary strata which once covered the chalk.
Fig. 6.Fig. 6.Flint Implement from Abbeville.a.Oval-shaped flint hatchet from Mautort near Abbeville, half size of original, which is five and a half inches long, from a bed of gravel underlying the fluvio-marine stratum.b.Same seen edgewise.c.Shows a recent fracture of the edge of the same at the pointa, or near the top. This portion of the tool,c, is drawn of the natural size, the black central part being the unaltered flint, the white outer coating, the layer which has been formed by discoloration or bleaching since the tool was first made.The entire surface of Figure 6 must have been black when first shaped, and the bleaching to such a depth must have been the work of time, whether produced by exposure to the sun and air before it was imbedded, or afterward when it lay deep in the soil.—Antiquity of Man.
a.Oval-shaped flint hatchet from Mautort near Abbeville, half size of original, which is five and a half inches long, from a bed of gravel underlying the fluvio-marine stratum.
b.Same seen edgewise.
c.Shows a recent fracture of the edge of the same at the pointa, or near the top. This portion of the tool,c, is drawn of the natural size, the black central part being the unaltered flint, the white outer coating, the layer which has been formed by discoloration or bleaching since the tool was first made.
The entire surface of Figure 6 must have been black when first shaped, and the bleaching to such a depth must have been the work of time, whether produced by exposure to the sun and air before it was imbedded, or afterward when it lay deep in the soil.—Antiquity of Man.
As the flint implements of Abbeville and Amiens are the same as those of St. Acheul, and from the same beds, what has already been said will apply to them. These implements have been found in these localities in great numbers, as several thousand of them already taken from the beds will amply testify.
From the gravel-pit in which were found the flint axes, at Abbeville, and close to the ancient chalk, was taken the celebrated human bone known as thejawof Moulin-Quignon. It was cotemporary with the axes, and undoubtedly some of the flint implements there found were fashioned by the man of whom that jaw formed so necessary a part.
This jaw-bone belonged to an old man, and is described as displaying "a tendency toward the animal structure in the shortness and breadth of the ascending ramus (the perpendicular portion of the lower jaw), the equal height of the two apophyses (a process or regular prominence forming a continuous part of the body of the bone), the indication of prognathism (projecting jaw) furnished by the very obtuse angle at which the ramus joins the body of the bone.[14]
Near the same locality other human bones were discovered Which presented the same characteristics.
Boucher de Perthes having pointed out that flint implements could be found in the valley of the Seine, in beds similar to those of Abbeville, the antiquaries were soon rewarded and Boucher de Perthes' prediction was fulfilled. M. Gosse, of Geneva, found the Abbeville type of implements in the lowest diluvial deposits associated with the remains of animals of that period.
The discovery made by Casiano de Prado, near Madrid, is very similar to those of Abbeville. "First, vegetable soil; then about twenty-five feet of sand and pebbles, under which was a layer of sandy loam, in which, during the year 1850, a complete skeleton of the mammoth was discovered. Underneath this stratum was about ten feet of coarse gravel, in which some flint axes, very closely resembling those of Amiens, have been discovered."[15]
The remains of man are also preserved in caverns associated with the fossil bones of the mammoth, the woolly-haired rhinoceros, cave-bear, and other extinct quadrupeds. Among these should be noticed Kent's Hole, which has furnished a mine of wealth. Of his discoveries Godwin-Austen says: "Human remains and works of art, such as arrow-heads and knives of flint, occur in all parts of the cave, and throughout the entire thickness of the clay; and no distinction founded on condition, distribution, or relative position can be observed, whereby the human can be separated from the other reliquiæ," which included bones of the mammoth (E. primigenius), rhinoceros (R. tichorrhinus), cave-bear (Ursus spelæus), cave-hyena (H. spelæus), and other mammalia. These researches were conducted in parts of the cave which had never been disturbed, and the works of man, in every instance, were procured from undisturbed loam or clay, beneath a thick covering of stalagmite; and all these must have been introduced before the stalagmite flooring had been formed.[16]These specimens of man's handicraft were found far below the stalagmite floor.[17]Closely allied to Kent's Hole is Brixham Cave. The following gives the general succession of deposits forming the contents of the cavern:
1. A layer of stalagmite varying from one to fifteen inches in thickness.
2. Next below, ochreous cave-earth, from one foot to fifteen feet in thickness.
3. Rounded gravel, in some places more than twenty feet in depth.
In the second layer there were found the remains of the mammoth, rhinoceros, cave-bear, cave-hyena, cave-lion, reindeer, and seven other species. Indiscriminately mixed with these bones were found many flint knives, but chiefly from the lowest part of the ochreous cave-earth, varying in depth from ten inches to thirteen feet. The antiquity of these cannot be doubted, from the simple fact, even if there was no other, that in close proximity to a very perfect flint tool was discovered the entire left hind leg of a cave-bear, and every bone in its natural position. From the bone earth there were taken fifteen knives, recognized, by the experienced antiquaries, as having been artificially formed. In the lowest gravel, underlying all, there were found imperfect specimens of flint knives. The fine layer of mud was deposited by the slow but regular action of water. Since these layers were formed the stream has cut its channel seventy-eight feet below its former level.[18]
On both banks of the Meuse, at Maestricht (Hollerd) are terraces of gravel covered with loess. Below the city, on the left bank, one of these terraces projects into the alluvial plain of the Meuse. During the construction of the canal the terrace was opened to a depth of sixty feet. The upper twenty feet consisted of loess and the lower forty feet of stratified gravel. Great numbers of molars, tusks, and bones of elephants, together with those of other mammalia, and a human lower jaw with teeth, were found in or near this gravel. The human jaw was at a depth of nineteen feet from the surface, in a stratum of sandy loam, beneath a stratum of pebbly and sandy beds, and immediately above the gravel. The stratum from which the jaw was taken was intact and had never been disturbed. But the jaw was somewhat isolated, and the nearest fossil object was the tusk of an elephant six yards distant, though on a horizontal plane. This fossil is probably older than that discovered at Lahr.It was probably covered just before the gush of the water when it first began to flow from the gorges and had washed the ground at some distance from the ice.[19]
The human skeleton from the undisturbed loess of the Rhine, near Lahr, was found in nearly a horizontal position, but in such a manner as to forbid the idea of sepulchre. These bones were exhumed from a perpendicular cliff of solid loess, about five feet high. The town of Lahr is situated four miles from, and about one hundred feet above, the Rhine, and not far from the tributary valley drained by the Schutter, flowing from the Black Forest.
In the alluvial plain into which the Schutter flows the the loess is two hundred feet thick. The loess rises eighty feet above the Schutter. At Lahr it has been denuded so as to form a succession of terraces on the right bank. It was in the lowest of these from which the skeleton was taken. Immediately below this bed there were found pebbles, and still lower down was a bed of gravel containing rounded stones of sandstone and gneiss from the Black Forest.
There are several interesting facts connected with this discovery. M. Boué considers that the loess of the Lahr is continuous with that of the Rhine, and before the loess had been denuded there was not less than eighty feet of loamy deposit above the human skeleton. The glaciers had deposited their great gravel beds, and had began to melt. The melting of them had formed a mixture of loam and gravel. Then when the torrents poured forth from the glaciers the loam was formed without the pebbles. The unfortunate man, whose remains were found, was buried far beneath the surface, during the very first part of the course of the violent streams pouring forth from the field of ice. The glaciers were then on the retreat, and the incautious man probably fell a victim while on the chase.[20]
The cave of La Naulette, Belgium, afforded a jaw-bone similar to the Moulin-Quignon. The bone came from a river deposit of loam covered with a layer of stalagmite, and at a depth of thirteen feet from the surface. Associated with it were the remains of the mammoth, woolly-haired rhinoceros, and flint implements. These implements present the same type as those of St. Acheul. With this jaw were also found a human ulna, two human teeth, and a fragment of a worked reindeer born. This jaw-bone is very thick, round in form, and the projection of the chin is almost entirely absent. The chin is said to hold an intermediate position between that of the animals and those of the present race of men. The cavities for the reception of the canine teeth are very wide, and one of the most remarkable things is that the three molars are reversed, that is the first true molar is the smallest, and the last the largest. The inner surface of the jaw at the point of the suture or symphysis, forms a line obliquely directed upwards. Taking the jaw all in all, it is the most ape-like human jaw ever discovered.[21]
The flint implements from Hoxne were found under three different layers or beds. The first, vegetable, a foot and a half in depth. The second was clay, seven and a half feet thick. The third, a bed of sand, with shells one foot in thickness. The fourth layer, containing the implements was a bed of gravel two feet in depth. The number of these flints was so great that they were carried out by the baskets-full, and thrown into the ruts of the adjoining road. On account of the great number, this spot might have been the place where they were manufactured. Their date is not coeval with the bowlder clay, but undoubtedly belong, to the last of this epoch.
The human bones found in the loess of the Rhine, near Colmar, were two fossilized fragments of the skull. They were found in undisturbed soil along with the fossil bones ofthe extinct species of mammoth, horse, gigantic deer, aurochs, and other mammalia. The fragment of the skull "showed a depressed forehead, strongly projecting superciliary arches, and a type, on the whole, approaching the so-calleddolichocephalic, or long-headed form."[22]These remains date so near the end of the glacial as to almost enter the inter-glacial.
Belgian Caverns.—The relics discovered by Dr. Schmerling, in the caves of Belgium, must be referred to the time of the retreat of the glaciers. The glaciers were still in existence, but their receding had freed immense tracts of land, and the space they now covered was small in proportion to their former extent. Whether it be considered or not, that vegetation greatly nourished and the great wild beasts were rapidly increasing, one thing must be noticed, and that is, floods must have succeeded or followed closely upon the retreat of the ice. Many remains, referred to the glacial epoch, may in reality, have occupied the time of the floods occurring just previous to the commencement of the inter-glacial.
The Belgian Caverns, near Liége, either belong exactly to the ice, or else to a period not far removed. Lyell considers the older monuments of the palæolithic period to be the rude implements found in ancient river gravel and in the mud and stalagmite caves.[23]Caves of this description are those reported on by Dr. Schmerling.
The caverns of the province of Liége were not the dens of wild beasts, but their contents had been swept in by the action of water. The bones of man "were of the same color, and in the same condition as to the amount of animal matter contained in them, as those of the accompanying animals, some of which, like the cave-bear, hyena, elephant, and rhinoceros, were extinct; others, like the wild-cat, beaver, wild boar, roe-deer, wolf, and hedgehog, still extant. The fossilswere lighter than fresh bones, except such as had their pores filled with carbonate of lime, in which case they were often much heavier. The human remains of most frequent occurrence were teeth detached from the jaw, and the carpal, metacarpal, tarsal, metatarsal, and phalangial bones separated from the rest of the skeleton. The corresponding bones of the cave-bear, the most abundant of the accompanying mammalia, were also found in the Liége caverns more commonly than any others, and in the same scattered condition."[24]In some of these caves, rude flint implements, of a triangular form, were found dispersed through the cave mud. Dr. Schmerling did not pay much attention to these, as he was engrossed in his osteological inquiries. The human bones were met with at all depths, in the cave mud and gravel, both above and below those of the extinct mammalia.
The floors of these caverns were incrusted with stalagmite.[25]In the cavern at Chokier there occur "three distinct beds of stalagmite, and between each of them a mass of breccia, and mud mixed with quartz pebbles, and in the three deposits the bones of extinct quadrupeds."[26]
FOSSIL SKULL OF THE ENGIS CAVE NEAR LIEGE.
The fossil skull from the cavern of Engis was deposited at a depth of about five feet, under an osseous breccia containing a tusk of the rhinoceros, the teeth of the horse, and the remains of small animals. The breccia was about three and one-fourth feet wide, and rose to the height of about five feet above the floor of the cavern. In the earth which contained the skull there was found, surrounding it on all sides, the teeth of the rhinoceros, horse, hyena, and bear, and with no marks of the earth having been disturbed.
There was also found the cranium of a young person, in the floor of the cavern, besides an elephant's tooth. When first observed, the skull was entire, but fell to pieces when removed from its position. Besides these there were found a fragment of a superior maxillary bone, with the molar teeth worn down to the roots, indicating that of an old man; two vertebræ, a first and last dorsal; a clavicle of the left side, belonging to a young individual of great stature; two fragments of the radius, indicating a man of ordinary height; a fragment of an ulna: some metacarpal bones; six metatarsal, three phalanges of the hand and one of the foot.
Dr. Schmerling found in this cave a pointed bone implement incrusted with stalagmite and joined to a stone.
Of the Engis skull Professor Huxley has remarked, "As Professor Schmerling observes, the base of the skull is destroyed, and the facial bones are entirely absent; but the roof of the cranium, consisting of the frontal, parietal, and the greater part of the occipital bones, as far as the middle of the occipital foramen, is entire, or nearly so. The left temporal bone is wanting. Of the right temporal, the parts in the immediate neighborhood of the auditory foramen, the mastoid process, and a considerable portion of the squamous element of the temporal, are well preserved."
A piece of the occipital bone, which Schmerling seems to have missed, has since been fitted on to the rest of the cranium by Dr. Spring, the accomplished anatomist of Liége.
"The skull is that of an adult, if not middle-aged man. The extreme length of the skull is 7.7 inches. Its extreme breadth, which corresponds very nearly with the interval between the parietal protuberances, is not more than 5.4 inches. The proportion of the length to the breadth is therefore very nearly as 100 to 70. If a line be drawn from the point at which the brow curves in towards the root of the nose, and which is called the 'glabella' (a, Fig. 8), to the occipital protuberance (d), and the distance to the highest point of the arch of the skull be measured perpendicularlyfrom this line, it will be found to be 4.75 inches. Viewed from above, the forehead presents an evenly rounded curve, and passes into the contour of the sides and back of the skull, which describes a tolerably regular elliptical curve.
Fig. 7.Fig. 7.Professor T. H. Huxley.
Fig. 8.Fig. 8.Side View of the Human Skull found in the Cave of Engis.a.Superciliary ridge and glabella.b.Coronal suture.d.The occipital protuberance.
a.Superciliary ridge and glabella.b.Coronal suture.d.The occipital protuberance.
"The front view shows that the roof of the skull was very regularly and elegantly arched in the transverse direction, and that the transverse diameter was a little less below the parietal protuberances, than above them. The forehead cannot be called narrow in relation to the rest of the skull, nor can it be called a retreating forehead; on the contrary, the antero-posterior contour of the skull is well arched, so that the distance along that contour, from the nasal depression to the occipital protuberance, measures about 13.75 inches. The transverse arc of the skull, measured from one auditory foramen to the other, across the middle of the sagittal suture, is about 13 inches. The sagittal suture itself is 5.5 inches long. The superciliary prominences or brow-ridges (a) are well, but not excessively, developed, and are separated by a median depression. Their principal elevation is disposed so obliquely that I judge them to be due to large frontal sinuses. If a line joining the glabella and the occipital protuberance (a,d, Fig. 8) be made horizontal, no part of the occipital region projects more than one-tenth of an inch behind the posterior extremity of that line, and the upper edge of the auditory foramen is almost in contact with a line drawn parallel with this upon the outer surface of the skull."[27]
Some of the views expressed by Professor Huxley are at variance with those of other eminent scientists. Lubbock reports him as saying, "There is no mark of degradation about any part of its structure. It is, in fact, a fair average human skull, which might have belonged to a philosopher, or might have contained the thoughtless brains of a savage."[28]Mr. Busk agrees and partially disagrees with Professor Huxley, for he remarked to Lyell, "Although the forehead was somewhat narrow, it might nevertheless be matched by the skulls of individuals of European race."[29]
Dr. Schmerling, Buchner, and Vogt are arrayed against Huxley. The first says, "I hold it to be demonstrated that this cranium has belonged to a person of limited intellectual faculties, and we conclude thence that it belonged to a man of a low degree of civilization."[30]"From the narrowness of the frontal portion it belonged to an individual of small intellectual development."[31]Buchner says, "In its length andnarrowness, the slight elevation of its forehead, the form of the widely separated orbits and the well developed supra-orbital arches, it resembles, especially when viewed from above, the celebrated Neanderthal skull, but in general is far superior to this in its structure."[32]Carl Vogt "regards it, with reference to the proportion of length to breadth, as one of the most ill-favored, animal-like and simian of skulls."[33]
The cause of this wide difference of opinion may arise from the failure to observe the fact that the older the formation in which a skull is found, the lower is the type. The ordinary observer, judging by the cast of the skull, would see nothing ape-like about it, and certainly would fail to see any indications of a philosopher.
NEANDERTHAL SKULL.
The Neanderthal skull was taken from a small cave or grotto in-the valley of the Düssel, near Düsseldorf, situated about seventy miles north-east of the region of the Liége caverns. The grotto is in a deep ravine sixty feet above the river, one hundred feet below the surface of the country, and at a distance of about ten feet from the Düssel River. It is fifteen feet deep from the entrance (f), which is seven or eight feet wide. Before the cavern had been injured, it opened upon a narrow plateau lying in front. The floor of the cave was covered four or five feet in thickness with a deposit of mud or loam, and containing some rounded fragments of chert. Two laborers, in removing this deposit, first noticed the skull, placed near the entrance, and further in met with the other bones. As the bones were not regarded as of any importance, at the time of their discovery, only the larger ones have been preserved.
Fig. 9.Fig. 9.Section of the Neanderthal Cave.a.Cavern sixty feet above the Düssel, and one hundred feet below the surface of the country atc.b.Loam covering the floor of the cave near the bottom of which the human skeleton was found.c,a. Rent connecting the cave with the upper surface of the country.d.Superficial sandy loam.e.Devonian limestone.f.Terrace, or ledge of rock.
a.Cavern sixty feet above the Düssel, and one hundred feet below the surface of the country atc.b.Loam covering the floor of the cave near the bottom of which the human skeleton was found.c,a. Rent connecting the cave with the upper surface of the country.d.Superficial sandy loam.e.Devonian limestone.f.Terrace, or ledge of rock.
Some discussion has arisen in respect to the geological time of these bones. There was no stalagmite overlying the mud or loam in which the skeleton was found, and no other bones met with save the tusk of a bear. There is no certain data given whereby its position may be known. Professor Huxley declares that the bones "indicate a very high antiquity."[34]Buchner is very positive in his statement, and declares that "the loam-deposit which partly fills the caves of the Neanderthal and the clefts and fissures of its limestone mountains, and in which both the Neanderthal bones and the fossil bones and teeth of animals were imbedded, is exactly the same that, in the caverns of the Neanderthal, covers the whole limestone mountain with a deposit from ten to twelve feet in thickness, and the diluvial origin of which is unmistakable."[35]Dr. Fuhlrott says, "The position and general arrangement of the locality in which they were found, place it, in my judgment, beyond doubt that the bones belong to the diluvium, and therefore to primitive times,i. e.they come down to us from a period of the past when our native country was still inhabited by various kinds of animals,especially mammoths and cave-bears, which have long since disappeared out of the series of living creatures."[36]
The diluvial or glacial origin of the Neanderthal skull is still further confirmed by the discoveries made, in the summer of 1865, in the Teufelskammer. This cavern is situated one hundred and thirty paces from the one in which the human bones were found, and on the same side of the river.. In the loam-deposit of this cave were found numerous fossil bones and teeth of the rhinoceros, cave-bear, cave-hyena, and other extinct animals. "A great part of these bones, especially those of the cave-bears, agree in color, weight, density, and the preservation of their microscopic structure, with the human bones found in the Feldhofner Cave (in which the Neanderthal man was found), and both are covered with the samedendrites, or tree-like markings."[37]
Before entering into a description and discussion of this remarkable skull, an enumeration of the other bones will be given. All the bones are characterized by their unusual thickness, and the great development of all the elevations and depressions for the attachment of muscles. The two thigh bones were in a perfect state, also the right humerus and radius; the upper third of the right ulna; the left ulna complete, though pathologically deformed, the coronoid process being so much enlarged by bony growth that flexure of the elbow beyond a right angle was impossible; the left humerus is much slenderer than the right, and the upper third is wanting. Its anterior fossa for the reception of the coronoid process is filled up with a bony growth, and, at the same time, the olecranon process is curved strongly downwards. The indications are that an injury sustained during life was the cause of this defect. There was an ilium, almost perfect; a fragment of the right scapula; the anterior extremity of a rib of the right side, and two hinder portions and one middle portion of ribs resembling more the ribs of a carnivorous animal than those of man. Thisabnormal condition has arisen from the powerful development of the thoracic muscles.
Fig. 10.Fig. 10.Side View of the Human Skull from Feldhofner Cave, in the Neanderthal, near Düsseldorf.a.The superciliary ridge and glabella.c.The apex of the lambdoidal suture.b.The coronal suture.d.The occipital protuberance.
a.The superciliary ridge and glabella.c.The apex of the lambdoidal suture.b.The coronal suture.d.The occipital protuberance.
The cranium is thus described by Professor Huxley. "It has an extreme length of 8 inches, while its breadth is only 5¾ inches, or in other words, its length is to its breadth as 100 is to 72. It is exceedingly depressed, measuring only about 3.4 inches from the glabello-occipital line to the vertex. The longitudinal arc, measured in the same way as in the Engis skull, is 12 inches; the transverse arc cannot be exactly ascertained, in consequence of the absence of the temporal bones, but was probably about the same, and certainly exceeded 10¼ inches. The horizontal circumference is 23 inches. But this great circumference arises largely from the vast development of the superciliary ridges, though theperimeter of the brain case itself is not small. The large superciliary ridges give the forehead a far more retreating appearance than its internal contour would bear out. To an anatomical eye the posterior part of the skull is even more striking than the anterior. The occipital protuberance occupies the extreme posterior end of the skull, when the glabello-occipital line is made horizontal, and so far from any part of the occipital region extending beyond it, this region of the skull slopes obliquely upward and forward, so that the lambdoidal suture is situated well upon the upper surface of the cranium. At the same time, notwithstanding the great length of the skull, the sagittal suture is remarkably short (4½ inches) and the squamosal suture is very straight."[38]... "The cranium, in its present condition, contains about sixty-three English cubic inches of water. As the entire skull could hardly have held less than twelve cubic inches more, its minimum capacity may be estimated at seventy-five cubic inches.... It has certainly not undergone compression, and, in reply to the suggestion that the skull is that of an idiot, it may be urged that theonus probandilies with those who adopt the hypothesis. Idiocy is compatible with very various forms and capacities of the cranium, but I know of none which present the least resemblance to the Neanderthal skull."[39]
Professor Huxley describes this skull to be the most ape-like of all the human skulls he has ever seen, and in its examination ape-like characters are met with in all its parts.[40]Buchner says that the face of the Neanderthal man must have presented a frightfully bestial and savage, or ape-like expression (see frontispiece).[41]Professor Schaaffhausen and Mr. Busk have stated that "this skull is the most brutal of all known human skulls, resembling those of the apes not only in the prodigious development of the superciliary prominences and the forward extension of the orbits,but still more in the depressed form of the brain-case, in the straightness of the squamosal suture, and in the complete retreat of the occiput forward and upward, from the superior occipital ridges."[42]
Professor Schaaffhausen and Dr. Buchner regarded this skull as a race-type, and Professor Huxley has said "that it truly forms only the extreme member of a series leading by slow degrees to the highest and best developed forms of human skulls."[43]
That this skull is a race-type is evident from the fact that it is not an isolated case. The fragment of the skull from the loess of the Rhine (Alsace), by its depressed forehead and strongly projecting superciliary arches, greatly resembles the Neanderthal skull. The skull from the calcareous tuff of Constatt, in its low, narrow forehead and strong superciliary arches, resembles the Neanderthal.[44]The cranium found in bone breccia, in Cochrane's Cave (Gibraltar), "resembles, in all essential particulars, including its great thickness, the far-famed Neanderthal skull. Its discovery adds immensely to the scientific value of the Neanderthal specimen, if only as showing that the latter does not represent, as many have hitherto supposed, a mere individual peculiarity, but that it may have been characteristic of a race extending from the Rhine to the Pillars of Hercules."[45]In speaking of the Neanderthal skull, Professor Schaaffhausen says, "It is worthy of notice that a similar, although smaller projection of the superciliary arches has generally been found in the skulls of savage races.... The remarkably small skull from the graves on the island of Moën, examined by Professor Eschricht; the two human skulls, described by Dr. Kutorga, from the government of Minsk (Russia), one of which, especially, shows a great resemblance to the Neanderthal skull; the human skeleton found near Plau, in Mecklenburg, in a very ancient grave, in a squatting position, ...the skull of which indicates a very distant period, when man stood on a very low grade of development;" and other similar discoveries near Mecklenburg, their skulls likewise presenting short, retreating foreheads and projecting eyebrows.[46]
Professor Huxley considers that the Borreby skulls, belonging to the stone age of Denmark, "show a great resemblance to the Neanderthal skull, a resemblance which is manifested in the depression of the cranium, the receding forehead, the contracted occiput and the prominent superciliary ridges."[47]
Human Skull of Arno.—The human skull, found by Professor Cocchi in the valley of the Arno, near Florence, in diluvial clay, together with various bones of extinct species of animals, is considered by Carl Vogt to be of like antiquity with the Engis and Neanderthal skulls.[48]
The age immediately preceding the glacial, and consequently the post-tertiary, is known as the pliocene epoch, the last of the tertiary.
The tertiary period began with the close of the cretaceous. A map of the early tertiary period would represent parts of Maryland, Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, the whole of Florida, the lower parts of Alabama, Mississippi, Texas, the whole of Louisiana, and the adjoining territory on both sides of the Mississippi, as far as Cairo, as covered with water. Also a great sea extending through Nebraska and the western part of Dacotah, and taking a north-westerly course until it emptied into the Pacific. In Europe, the great basin of Paris (excepting a zone of chalk), the greater part of Spain and Italy, the whole of Belgium, Holland, Prussia, Switzerland, Hungary, Wallachia, and northern Russia, as one vast sheet of water. England and France were connected by a band of rocks.
About the middle of the tertiary, a tropical climate and tropical fauna and flora spread over the whole of Europe. Palms, cedars, laurels, and cinnamon trees flourished in the valleys of Switzerland, and more than thirty different species of oak adorned the forests of that time.
In Europe, in the eocene, there have been found thirty species of crocodiles; many species of snakes, one twenty feet long; a dozen species of birds; tapirs (PalæothereandLophiodon), two species of hogs, some ruminants and rodents.
In the miocene, amongPachydermsmay be mentioned the mastodon, elephant, dinothere (an elephantine animal), rhinoceros, hog, horse, tapir, and hippopotamus; amongCarnivores, the machairodus, hyena, lion, and dog; amongRuminants, the camel, deer, and antelope. There were monkeys, and many other animals.
In the pliocene, besides those enumerated, are found the bear, hare, and other animals.
In the tertiary beds of America have been found mastodons, elephants, rhinoceroses, deer, camels, foxes, wolves, horses, whales, and other mammalia.
Owing to the great lapse of time it cannot be expected that many traces of man will be discovered in this early period.
Upon theoretical grounds Lyell thought it very probable that man lived in the pliocene; but in relation to miocene time, he says, "Had some other rational being, representing man, then flourished, some signs of his existence could hardly have escaped unnoticed, in the shape of implements of stone or metal, more frequent and more durable than the osseous remains of any of the mammalia."[49]Sir J. Lubbock, while admitting the existence of man in the pliocene, goes farther and says, "If man constitutes a separate family of mammalia, as he does in the opinion of the highest authorities, then, according to all palæontological analogies, he must have had representatives in miocene times. We need not, however, expect to find the proofs in Europe; our nearest relatives in the animal kingdom are confined to hot, almost to tropical climates, and it is in such countries that we are most likely to find the earliest traces of the human race."[50]Alfred R. Wallace out-distances any of his cotemporaries, for he says, "We are enabled to place the origin of man at a much more remote geological epoch than has yet been thought possible. He may even have lived in the miocene or eocene period,when not a single mammal was identical in form with any existing species."[51]
Some of the older and some of the recent discoveries of geologists have settled the question of tertiary man; and the "signs of his existence," in the "shape of implements of stone," as demanded by Lyell, have been furnished.
Man in the Pliocene.—It has already been intimated that the evidences of man are but few in this early epoch. The first example, in the following list, borders closely on the glacial, but far enough removed as to be referred to the pliocene.
In the construction of a canal between Stockholm and Gothenburg it was necessary to cut through one of those hills calledosars, or erratic blocks, which were deposited by the drift-ice during the glacial epoch. Beneath an immense accumulation of osars, with shells and sand, there was discovered in the deepest layer of subsoil, at a depth of about sixty feet, a circular mass of stones, forming a hearth, in the middle of which there were wood-coals. No other hand than that of man could have performed the work.[52]
In the pliocene beds in the neighborhood of the town of Savonia in Liguria, M. A. Issel found several bones which presented all the physical signs of very high antiquity. Dr. Buchner is of the opinion that before these bones can be employed as satisfactory evidence they must have a more accurate test by scientific authorities.[53]
In the upper pliocene beds at St. Prest (France), M. Desnoyers found traces of human action on the bones of animals belonging to the tertiary. These fractures are analogous to those of human action observed on bones from the glacial period, and identical with those made by northern tribes of the present day, on the skulls of ruminants. The marked bones found were those of the Southern elephant (E. meridionalis), rhinoceros (R. leptorinus), hippopotamus major,several species of deer, and two of the ox. Carl Vogt states that this discovery is not only genuine, but also, the formation in which the bones were found is decidedly tertiary. It is further characterized by the presence of the southern elephant (E. meridionalis). As this elephant became extinct before the glacial age, the bones consequently precede the glacial, and the age of the cave-bear, the mammoth, and tichorrhine rhinoceros. The eminent French naturalist, Quatrefages, confirms the testimony of Desnoyers.[54]
The conclusions of Desnoyers are confirmed beyond a doubt by the more recent discoveries of Abbé Bourgeois. In the same tertiary strata of St. Prest, in which were found the marked or fractured bones, Bourgeois discovered worked flints, including flakes, awls, and scrapers.[55]
A human skull, belonging to the pliocene, was found by James Matson, at Altaville, in Calaveras county, California, at a depth of one hundred and thirty feet, under five beds of gravel separated by five layers of lava, associated with the bones of an extinct rhinoceros, camel, and horse. The base of the skull is imbedded in a mass of bone-breccia and small pebbles of volcanic rock. The shape of the skull resembles that of the Digger Indians, and is of remarkable thickness.[56]
Man in the Miocene.[57]—M. Bourgeois has found, in a stratum of miocene near Pontlevoy, numerous worked flints, and other flints which have been subjected to the action of heat. These works of man were associated with the remains of the acerotherium (an extinct species allied to the rhinoceros), and beneath five distinct beds, one of which contained the rolled bones of rhinoceros, mastodon, and dinotherium.[58]
M. Tardy found a flint-flake of undoubted workmanship in the miocene beds of Aurillac (Auvergne), together with the remains ofdinotherium giganteum, andmachaerodus latidens.[59]
M. Bourgeois reports that Abbé Delaunay had found near Pouance (Maine-et-Loire), fossil bones of ahalitherium(an herbivorous cetacean of the miocene), with evident signs of having been operated upon by cutting instruments.[60]
In the miocene gravel beds of Colorado and Wyoming territories, chert-flakes, hammers, chisels, knives, and wrought shells have been found.[61]
Eocene.—As yet geologists have failed to discover any traces of man in the Eocene epoch.
Of the first appearance of man on the globe there is no precise knowledge. His origin is a mystery. The place of his birth is generally supposed to be in Central Asia. There the geologist looks with a longing eye, and hopes ultimately to unravel, not only the hidden mystery of the birth-place of his race, but also, how or through what natural process he sprang into existence.
If the miocene be the earliest point in his history, and Central Asia the place of his nativity, then he was ushered upon the scene of life during the period of, and surrounded by, the numerous fauna of India, At this time her mammalia included, besides the quadrumana, elephant (seven species), mastodon (three species), rhinoceros (five species), horse (three species), hippopotamus (four to seven species), hog (three species), camel, giraffe, sivatherium (an elephantine stag, having four horns and supposed to have had the bulk of an elephant and greater height), antelope, musk-deer, sheep, ox (several species), dinotherium, porcupine, species of hyena, lion, and many others.
It cannot be presumed that man's intellectual faculties were ordinarily developed, as it would not be natural to suppose he was superior to that of later times. Judging from the remains of later times, man could have been but very little removed from the brute. It is natural to suppose that at first he had no fire, no weapons of offence or defence. His food must have been the herbs, roots, and the fruits of the tree, possibly with an occasional morsel of raw meat.His pillow was a stone, his retreat a cave or the boughs of a wide-spreading tree, and his clothing a natural coat of hair.
In the presence of the fierce beasts, man's domain might seem to be of short duration. Providence has ordered all things wisely. Placed low in the scale of life—brutal, selfish, prowling, yet cautious—man, by the very force of circumstances, was to develop gradually the powers of his mind. With the elephant and the mastodon he could not cope nor would they molest him. To the fierce carnivora he might fall a prey. From these he could flee, and find a shelter in the tops of the trees or some secure fastness of the earth. Learning his own strength by experience, he would venture forth on excursions, and meet face to face his deadly foe. For self-defence he discovered, probably by accident, that a club was a powerful weapon with which to beat back his fierce opponent. Gradually he came to learn that a sharp flint driven into the end of a club was a safer and more deadly weapon. With this he could withstand an unequal contest.
The mode of life, together with the trials of his strength, developed his muscular system. His muscles became large and tough, and his bones thick and heavy. The earliest type of man is generally supposed to bedolichocephalic, or long-headed. The walls of the skull were thick, and the crown low. He was of ordinary stature, but built for action, and of great power. His make-up was the result of his surroundings.
His advancement was very slow. Throughout the entire length of the miocene and pliocene epochs it is not traceable. There was no revolution in his mind; one step in advance would have been a mighty leap. Nor could it be expected that there should be rapid progress. The mind was brutal; and all the instincts sensual. But there was pending a mighty change. The tropical climate should change into a winter of snow and ice. Man should feel it, and be benefited by the new danger. His sluggish mind should be quickened,and the inventive genius should be called into action. The sun no longer could give its heat. The forests grew cold, the chilling winds swept over the plains, and the retreat in the cave was damp and forbidding. The wild beasts were either dying of cold, or else becoming clothed with thick, long hair, and retreating before the accumulating snow. Man earnestly looked about him. He suffered greatly, and his numbers grew less. Fire had been produced. How, no one can tell; possibly by accident. He now became more careful of the fire, and with brand in hand he went from place to place kindling the fires at the various resting-places. Nor was this sufficient. His ingenuity was taxed to its greatest extent. Colder and colder grew the winds. The snow, coming in great flakes, was soon consolidated, and became as ice. The body could not be kept warm. Clothing must be had, and this must be furnished by the wild beasts. Their hides must assist in protecting the life of man. The stiffened, frozen animals would not alone furnish sufficient covering. Knives must be invented. From the flint rude knives were fashioned, by means of which the skins were removed and transferred to the bodies of men. But the long winter continuing, the lives of the living animals must be forfeited, both for the flesh and and the skins. Rude, almost shapeless arrow-heads were produced. Wood must be had with which to warm and cook, and rude rafts formed, by means of which the swelling rivers might be crossed. Then those stone hatchets of the Somme were shaped, and answered the purpose.
Man was at last prepared to face the rigors of winter, the perils of ice, and secure himself against starvation. Not content with his conflicts with nature, his brutal passion is aroused against his fellows. Death-dealing blows fall rapidly upon each other, the blood flows freely, the bones give way, and the weaker one has succumbed. There are fierce contentions over the common prey, and the strong impose upon the weak. True to his instinct, he is gregarious. He lives in communities; and the more daring—the hunters—having theircommon places of meeting, fashion their weapons, and vie with each other in feats of prowess.
During the glacial epoch the condition of man must have remained unchanged, after he had supplied himself with rude stone weapons. His time was spent, for the most part, in self-preservation. He was retreating before, yet bounding over, the frozen flood in pursuit of game. This experience must ultimately tell for good. When the glaciers began to recede, man followed closely, and forgot not the value of those stone weapons which had secured food for himself. They served against the cave-bear, cave-hyena, cave-lion, and would be of great service in the ages yet to come. By a little remodelling they could be used to greater advantage; and this change of shape was accomplished, and other uses of flint were made known.
Man's form, aspect, and true position are comprehended by the relics of the glacial age. The human bones tell a tale which any anatomist may read, and even one not well skilled in the art. The primitive type is no mystery, and those fossil bones tell of the terrific strifes of by-gone times.
The Neanderthal man has already been described. Its structure is animal. Its history agrees with the generally received idea of primitive man as conceived by the geologist. The illustration (frontispiece) presents him bestial and ape-like. A powerful organization, and well adapted to those times. His bones tell of fearful conflicts. He lived to an old age, as the traces of every suture are effaced. His skull was very thick. The strong, prominent superciliary arches denote large perceptives, making him watchful and always on the alert. Those bones tell of a terrible conflict. The left arm was broken; who knows but in a contest with the great cave-bear. He survived the contest and lived to see that arm dwindle and become almost useless. Over the right eye he received a blow, from some source, so great as to carry away a portion of the bone. The claw of a cave-bear, or a flint weapon in the hand of one of his race, may have producedthat fracture. Still he lived, and the wound healed. All this tells of his strength and hardihood. It gives an inside view of the wonderful hardships and vicissitudes of primeval man.
The Engis skull belongs to the same type, though less bestial. Possibly this individual did not enter upon the chase, and engage in the manly pursuits of those times. He may have been an adviser or a dandy; or, his ingenuity may have led him to the vocation of fashioning weapons and implements from the flint.
In the time of the Engis man there were large as well as short, heavy-set men. In the same cavern there was found a clavicle belonging to a young person who must have been of great stature.
The jaws of La Naulette and Moulin-Quignon display a great tendency to animal structure, and confirm the impressions as given of the primitive condition of man during the glacial and pre-glacial ages.
The glaciers have departed. Summer comes again. The forests bloom and the wild beast roams about. Many species withstood the long siege of cold; others perished; still others followed the ice as it retreated, preferring the cold to the coming heat. The floods had abated and man spread himself over the different tracts blooming with flowers and radiant with earthly splendors.
The evidences of man's existence during this period are numerous, consisting in works of art and fossil remains. Only a few examples are given, as not many will be required to present the evidence and show man's condition.
The hyena-den at Wokey Hole, explored by Mr. Dawkins, affords specimens of the works of man. When discovered this den was filled to the roof withdébris. Under this rubbish was found several layers of the excrement of the cave-hyena (H. spelæa), each of which indicates an old floor and a separate period of occupation.
The implements were under these layers of excrement, showing that the cave had been occupied by the hyenas after the time of the savages. These implements had not been disturbed by the action of water. In the bone earth along with the remains of the cave-hyena were found those of the mammoth, Siberian rhinoceros, (R. tichorrhinus), gigantic ox (Bos primigenius), gigantic Irish deer (Megaceros Hibernicus), reindeer, cave-bear, cave-lion (Felis spelæa), wolf (Canis lupus), fox (Canis vulpes), and the teeth and bones of the horse in great numbers. Intermixed with these bones werechipped flints, a bleached flint weapon of the spear-head Amiens type, and arrow-heads made of bone.