See also G. Hervé, Les populations lacustres, p. 140; His and Rütimeyer, Crania Helvetica, pp. 12, 34, etc.; and the note on p. 275 of Rice Holmes’s Cæsar’s Conquest of Gaul. Ripley gives useful and concise discussions on pp. 120, 471, 488 and 501.
121 : 19. See both Keller and Schenck for the numbers of dwellings.
121 : 22. There were, of course, the caves and rock shelters used during a large part of the year, but probably no other regularly constructed dwellings served as permanent, all-the-year-round places of abode prior to the lake dwellings, and it is doubtful if these were inhabited in winter. It is generally believed that the custom of building pile villages arose from considerations of safety. This protection would be absent when the lakes were frozen over, and at the same time the huts would be exposed on all sides, including the floor, to the wintry blasts sweeping the lakes. They would in this way be rendered practically uninhabitable during the winter season.
Keller declares that the same type of dwelling is found in the whole circle of countries which were formerly Celtic. (Introduction, p. 2.) The Crannoges of Scotland and Ireland continued in use until the age of iron in those countries. In Switzerland the lake dwellings disappeared about the first century (p. 7). The population was numerous (p. 432), large enough to have to depend upon cattle and agriculture (p. 479).
This type of dwelling is found from Ireland to Japan, and even in South America. Many lake dwellings exist at the present day. The Welsh, Scotch and Irish Crannoges are related in structure to the European fascine types (Keller, p. 684 and Introduction). Others are built somewhat differently, and are, of course, of independent origin. An ancient site was unearthed at Finsbury, on the outskirts of London not long since, where there used to be a marsh. The inhabitants of this lake-dwelling were native outcasts during Romano-British times.
121 : 26. See Schenck, and Keller, p. 6. On p. 140 of Keller we read: “The Pile Dwellings of eastern Switzerland ceased to exist before the bronze age or at its beginnings; those of western Switzerland came to their full development during this period.” On p. 37, describing the settlement of Mooseedorfsee Keller says: “A very striking circumstance ought to be mentioned, namely, that even heavy implements, such as stone chisels, grinding or sharpening stones, etc., were found quite high in the relic bed, while lighter objects, such as those made out of bone, were met with much deeper.” It is known that the Mooseedorfsee settlement is very old. No metal has been found here, but a bone arrowhead is described by Keller on p. 38. He remarks that the bones of very large animals were uncommonly numerous. It seems as if the earlier inhabitants were users of bone rather than of stone implements.
122 : 1. Herodotus, V, 16 describes them. He also is the source of our information regarding the keeping of cattle, although archæological finds have proved the location of stables out on the platforms between the houses. His interesting account is given herewith: “Their manner of living is the following. Platforms supported upon tall piles stand in the middle of the lake, which are approached from land by a single narrow bridge. At the first the piles which bear up the platforms were fixed in their place by the whole body of the citizens, but since that time the custom which has prevailed about fixing them is this: they are brought from a hill called Orbêlus, and every man drives in three for each wife that he marries. Now the men all have many wives apiece; and this is the way in which they live. Each has his own hut, wherein he dwells, upon one of the platforms, and each has also a trap door giving access to the lake beneath; and their wont is to tie their baby children by the foot with a string, to save them from rolling into the water. They feed their horses and their other beasts upon fish, which abound in the lake to such a degree that a man has only to open his trap door and to let down a basket by a rope into the water and then to wait a very short time, when he draws it up quite full of them. The fish are of two kinds, which they call the paprax and the tilon.”
122 : 3. In the Introduction, p. 2, and elsewhere Keller says regarding cattle: “Cattle were kept, not on land, as in the Terramara region, but on the platforms themselves, out in the lakes. Many charred remains of stables and stable refuse have been taken from the lakes, but only from certain parts of the sites, between those of the houses.” See also Schenck, p. 188.
Rice Holmes, pp. 89–90 of Ancient Britain, says of that country that agriculture was limited in the Neolithic, but flourished in the Bronze Age.
122 : 14. The Terramara Period. Keller, pp. 378 seq. As related to Switzerland, pp. 391, 393. For swamp and river bank sites, pp. 391, 397 seq. For bronze in Terramara settlements, p. 386. For the Upper Robenhausian, see Schenck, p. 190, and Montelius, La civilisation primitive en Italie. Peet, The Stone and Bronze Ages in Italy, and Munro, The Lake Dwellings of Europe and Palæolithic Man and the Terramara Settlements must also be read in this connection. Schwerz, Völkerschaften der Schweiz, gives, for the average cranial indices of the Lake Dwellers, 79 during the Stone Age, 75.5 in the Copper Age, and 77 in the Bronze Age. Of these last 14 per cent only were brachycephalic, 20 per cent were extremely long-headed. In the Iron Age 46 per cent were brachycephalic. Consult also Deniker, 2, p. 316.