Primitive Man

by Louis Figuier

Fig. 145.—Position of Skeletons in a Swedish Tomb of the Stone Age.

Fig. 145 represents the position in which the skeletons were found.

M. Nilsson has propounded the opinion that the "passage-graves" are nothing but former habitations, which had been converted into tombs after the death of those who had previously occupied them. When the master of the house had breathed his last—especially in the case of some illustrious individual—his surviving friends used to place near him various articles of food to provide for his long journey; and also his weapons and other objects which were most precious to him when in life; then the dwelling was closed up, and was only reopened for the purpose of bearing in the remains of his spouse and of his children.

Sir J. Lubbock shares in this opinion, and brings forward facts in its favour. He recites the accounts of various travellers, according to which, the winter-dwellings of certain people in the extreme north bear a very marked resemblance to the "passage-tombs" of the Stone Age. Of this kind are the habitations of the Siberians and the Esquimaux, which are composed of an oval or circular chamber placed a little under the surface of the ground, and completely covered with earth. Sir J. Lubbock thinks, therefore, that in many cases habitations of this kind may have been taken for tumuli—a mistake, he adds, all the more likely to be made because some of these mounds, although containing ashes, remains of pottery, and various implements, have not furnished any relics of human bones.

In his work on the 'Sépultures de l'Age de la Pierre chez les Parisii,' M. Leguay, a learned architect and member of the Archælogical Society, has called attention to the fact that the construction of these dolmens betrays, as existing in the men of this epoch, a somewhat advanced degree of knowledge of the elements of architecture:—

"The interment of the dead," says M. Leguay, "took place, during the polished-stone epoch, in vaults, or a kind of tomb constructed on the spot, of stones of various thicknesses, generally flat in shape, and not elevated to any very great height, being laid without any kind of cement or mortar. These vaults, which were at first undivided, were subsequently separated into compartments by stones of a similar character, in which compartments bodies were placed in various positions. They were covered with earth or with flat stones, and sometimes we meet with a circular eminence raised over them, formed of a considerable heap of stones which had been subsequently brought thither; this fact was verified by M. Brouillet in 1862 at the Tombelle de Brioux (Vienne).

"This kind of interment bears evidence of some real progress. Polished flint instruments are met with intermingled with worked stones which have been brought from a distance. Pottery of a very significant character approaches that of the epoch at which ornamentation commenced; and the Tombelle de Brioux has furnished two vessels with projecting and perforated handles formed in the clay itself. I met with specimens similar to these both in shape and workmanship in the cremation-tombs at Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, which, as I have previously stated, appeared to me to be later in date than the simple interment situated below them.

"The first element in the art of construction, that is, stability, is manifested in these latter monuments. They do not come up to the fine dolmens, or to the monuments which followed them, but the principle on which stones should be laid together is already arrived at. The slab forming the covering is the first attempt at the lintel, the primitive base of architectural science. By insensible degrees the dimensions of the monument increased, the nature of the materials were modified, and, from the small elementary monument to the grand sepulchral dolmen, but one step remained to be made—a giant step, certainly, but not beyond the reach of human intelligence.

"This step, however, was not accomplished suddenly and without transitional stages. We find a proof of this in the beautiful ossuary discovered in 1863, at Chamant near Senlis (Oise), on the property of the Comte de Lavaulx. This monument does not yet come up to the most beautiful of the class; but it possesses all the inspirations which suggested the form of its successors, of which, indeed, it is the type.