Head of a horse from the Thayngen Cave.
Figure 42.
Bear engraved on a bone from the Thayngen Cave.
I referred above to ail exceptional example of prehistoric art found beyond the borders of France. In excavations in the Thayngen Cave, on the borders of Switzerland and Wurtemberg, twenty most remarkable examples were found, in which it is easy to recognize the horse ([Fig. 41]), the bear ([Fig. 42]), and the reindeer grazing ([Fig. 43]).[25] All, especially the last named, are rendered with such perfection, that it was at first supposed that they were the work of a forger. A searching inquiry has proved that they are nothing of the sort; a skilful zoölogist would have been needed to represent the Ovibos moschatus ([Fig. 44]), which retired many centuries ago towards the extreme north. If we do find a few rare attempts at art in other districts, they are absolutely rudimentary. The staff of office found in the Goyet Cave is of very rude workmanship. The Brussels Museum contains a few other specimens, of which the most important is a fragment of sandstone from the Frontal Cave, on which a few uncertain scratches represent what looks like a stag. Some indistinct traces of engraving have been made out on the bones found in the Altamira Cave, near Santander, and recently a bone on which a kind of horse was engraved, was picked up at Cresswell’s Crags, Derbyshire, in a cave known in the district as Mother Grundy’s Parlor. This specimen, as were those of Thayngen, was associated with numerous bones of Quaternary animals, amongst which those of the hippopotamus were the most curious.
Figure 43.
Reindeer grazing, from the Thayngen Cave.
The representation of the human figure is extremely rare. I have already mentioned the young man trying to strike an aurochs which is running away from him; and the woman wearing a necklace. The former ([Fig. 45]), found at Laugerie, is engraved on a piece of reindeer antler about twenty-five centimetres long. The aurochs with its head down and quantities of bristling hair, widely open nostrils, arched and uplifted tail, presents the appearance of a terrified animal endeavoring to escape the danger threatening it. The man is naked, and has a round head, his hair is stiff and seems to stand up on the top of his skull; on the chin a short beard can clearly be made out; the face expresses the delight and excitement of the chase. The neck is long, the arm short, and the spine of unusual length. In the other example of the representation of the human figure, that of the woman wearing a necklace, drawn on a piece of a shoulder-blade of a reindeer, she is seen lying by a stag, and would seem to be in an advanced state of pregnancy. The piece of bone however is broken, and the head of the woman is lost, which of course greatly lessens the value of the relic.