"The bottom of the sepulchral chamber of a dolmen is generally covered with a layer of flints which have been subjected to fire; this is the floor on which the body was deposited; it was then covered with a thin coating of earth, and the tomb was closed. Yet, as we have just observed, it was but very rarely that dolmens contained only one skeleton. They must, therefore, have been opened afresh in order to deposit other bodies. It must have been on these occasions, in order to contend with the miasma of putrefaction, that they lighted the fires, of which numerous and evident traces are seen inside the dolmens. This course of action continued, as it appears, until the time when the dolmen was entirely filled up: but even then, the tomb does not, in every case, seem to have been abandoned. Sometimes the most ancient skeletons have been displaced to make room for fresh bodies. This had taken place in a dolmen near Copenhagen, which was opened and searched in the presence of the late King Frederick VII.
"A dolmen situated near the village of Hammer, opened a few years ago by M. Boye, presented some very curious peculiarities. In addition to flint instruments, human bones were discovered, which had also been subjected to the action of fire. We are, therefore, led to suppose, that a funeral banquet had taken place in the vicinity of the tomb, and that some joints of human flesh had formed an addition to the roasted stag. This is, however, the only discovery of the kind which has been made up to the present time, and we should by no means be justified in drawing the inference that the inhabitants of Denmark at this epoch were addicted to cannibalism.
"The dead bodies were deposited along with their weapons and implements, and also with certain vessels which must have contained the food which perhaps some religious usage induced them to leave close to the body. For a long time it was supposed that it was the custom to place these weapons by the side of men only. But in a dolmen at Gieruen, a hatchet was found near a skeleton which was evidently that of a woman.
"We now give the inventory of a 'find' made in a Danish dolmen, that of Hielm, in the Isle of Moen, which was opened in 1853. The sepulchral chamber was 16½ feet in length, 11½ feet in width, and 4½ feet in height.
"In it were discovered twenty-two spear-heads, the largest of which was 11 inches in length, and the smallest 5½ inches; more than forty flint flakes or knives from 2 to 5 inches in length; three flat hatchets, and one rather thicker; three carpenter's chisels, the longest of which measured 8 inches; a finely-made hammer 5 inches long; three flint nuclei exactly similar to those found in the kitchen-middens; and lastly, in addition to all these flint articles, some amber beads and forty earthen vessels moulded by the hand." [28]
What were the funeral customs in use among men during the polished-stone epoch? and what were the ceremonies which took place at that period when they buried their dead? These are questions which it will not be difficult to answer after a due investigation of the dolmens and tumuli.
In a great number of tumuli, animal bones have been found either broken or notched by sharp instruments. This is an indication that the funeral rites were accompanied by feasts just as in the preceding epochs.
The body which was about to be enclosed in the tumulus was borne upon boughs of trees, as is the case among some savage tribes of the present day. The men and women attending wore their best attire; necklaces of amber and shells adorned their necks. Men carrying torches walked in front of the procession, in order to guide the bearers into the dark recesses of the sepulchral chambers.
From these data fig. 146 has been designed, which gives a representation of a funeral ceremony during the polished-stone epoch.