The presence of the Crô-Magnon race in western Europe during Azilian-Tardenoisian times is not sustained, so far as we know, by any anatomical evidence, but is suggested by the mode of burial of two skeletons found by Piette in the Azilian deposits of the station of Mas d'Azil. This burial, like that of Ofnet, is typical of Upper Palæolithic and not of Neolithic times. These skeletons lay in the 'Azilian' layer (VI) described below. As the smaller bones were missing, Piette concluded that the remains had been for some time exposed to the weather before burial, and that the larger bones had been scraped and cleaned with flint knives, and then colored red with oxide of iron before interment. According to other authorities, the traces of scraping and cleaning are doubtful; there can be no question, however, that the separation of the bones of the skeleton and the use of coloring matter constitute strong evidence that this Azilian burial was the work of members of the Crô-Magnon race.
In addition to what we have said as to the survival of the Crô-Magnon race in the preceding chapter, the opinion of Cartailhac[(1)] may be cited: "The race of Crô-Magnon is well determined. There is no doubt about their high stature, and Topinard is not the only one who believes that they were blonds. We have traced them through the 'Reindeer Period' into the Neolithic Epoch, where they were widely distributed and positively related either to the ancient or actual populations of modern France, being especially characteristic of our region [France] and of the western Mediterranean. While the race of Crô-Magnon predominated in the south and in the west, that of Furfooz predominated in the northeast of France and in Belgium. These brachycephals were probably brown-haired or of dark coloring."
But before observing further the characters of these four or five races, let us examine their industries.
Discovery of the Azilian Type Station
As remarked above, it is believed that these industries prevailed between 7,000 and 10,000 years before our era, that is, between the close of Magdalenian times and the beginning of the Neolithic or New Stone Age. This transition period corresponds with the interval in which the Azilian-Tardenoisian culture swept all over western Europe and completely replaced the Magdalenian. From Castillo in the Cantabrian Mountains of northern Spain to Ofnet on the upper Danube there is a complete replacement by this new culture. The Magdalenian culture does not linger anywhere; it is totally eliminated; the suddenness of the change both in the animal life and in the industry is nowhere more clearly indicated than at the type station of Mas d'Azil in southern France, which may now be described.
In 1887 Edouard Piette commenced his exploration of the deposits in the great cavern of Mas d'Azil. This station takes its name from the little hamlet of Mas d'Azil in the foot-hills of the Pyrenees about forty miles southwest from Toulouse. Here the River Arize winds for a quarter of a mile through a lofty natural tunnel traversed by the highway from St. Girons to Carcassonne. A rich layer of Magdalenian deposits first attracted Piette's attention, and he found here some of the finest examples of late Magdalenian art, but above these deposits he discovered a hitherto unrecognized industrial stage, to which he gave the name Azilian. The Azilian layers yielded over one thousand specimens of flattened and double-barbed harpoons made of the horns of the stag, thus widely differing from the late Magdalenian harpoons which are rounded and made of the horns of the reindeer. The entire succession of deposits, as explored by Piette, is an epitome of the prehistory of Europe from early Magdalenian times to the Age of Bronze, and should be compared with the successive deposits of Castillo (p. 164), Sirgenstein (p. 202), Ofnet (p. 476), and Schweizersbild (p. 447).
Fig. 246. Western entrance to the great station of Mas d'Azil. "Here the River Arize winds for a quarter of a mile through a lofty natural tunnel traversed by the highway from St. Girons to Carcassonne." Photograph by N. C. Nelson.
The Mas d'Azil section is as follows: