Fragment of human tibia with exostosis enclosing the end of a flint arrow.
In other cases the victims seem to have lived for some time. We have already spoken of wounds in crania that had healed, and we may add that a few years ago a, human bone was presented to the Archæological Society of Bordeaux which still retained a flint arrow-head in the wound it had made. Traces could clearly be made out of the inflammation caused by the presence of the foreign body, and the bony tissue secreted by the periosteum had, so to speak, taken the mould of the arrow ([Fig. 78]).
In the cave known as the Trou d’Argent (Basses-Alpes) amongst the bones of ruminants and carnivora, fragments of pottery and rubbish of all kinds, was found a piece of humerus ([Fig. 79]) pierced at the elbow joint and very neatly cut at the lower end, no doubt with the help of some of the implements of hard rock scattered about the cave. The position of this human bone amongst the remains of animals and fragments of a meal, points to its being a relic of a scene of cannibalism; adding yet another proof to what I said at the beginning of this work.
Figure 79.
Fragment of human humerus pierced at the elbow joint, found in the Trou d’Argent.
Similar facts are reported front England and Germany. Dr. Wankel mentions an interesting prehistoric deposit at Prerau, near Olmutz, amongst the bones of animals belonging to the most ancient Quaternary fauna, such as the mammoth, the cave-bear, the cave-lion, the glutton, and the arctic fox; and amongst clumsy bone and ivory weapons and ornaments he found a human jaw and a femur covered with strip produced by flint hatchets. In 1801 Mr. Cunnington took several skeletons from a barrow near Heytesbury, the skull of one of which had been broken with a blunt implement; and Sir R. Hoare speaks of a skull from the neighborhood of Stonehenge split open by a blow from one of these formidable weapons. Several crania taken from a long barrow at West Kennet have similar wounds.
Similar facts were noticed at Littleton-Drew, at Uley, at Cotswold, and at Rodmarten, and from this Dr. Thurmam concluded that nearly all those who were buried in long barrows had met with a violent death.[15] He speaks, however, of one skull pierced with a large hole, the edges of which had become rounded smooth, showing the action of a recuperative process, and proving that the injured man had long survived his serious wound. In 1809, a farmer of Kirkcudbrightshire set to work to demolish a large cairn that interfered with his tilling of the soil, and which, according to popular tradition, was the tomb of a Scotch king. In taking away the earth the workmen found a large stone coffin, in which lay the skeleton of a man of great stature. The arm had been almost separated from the trunk by the blow of a diorite hatchet, a broken bit of which remained imbedded in the bone.[16]
One of the few crania that can with certainty be said to have belonged to Lake Dwellers of Switzerland was found at Sutz, near Zurich; this skull was fractured at the back. The roundness of the wound, which had been serious enough to cause death, has led authorities to conclude that it was made with one of the formidable pick-hammers, so many of which were found in the lake of Bienne.[17] Nilsson speaks of a human cranium pierced with a flint arrow, and of another, both found at Tygelso (Scandinavia), containing a dart made out of the antler of an eland.[18] At Chauvaux, at Cesareda, and Gibraltar other crania have been found bearing the marks of mortal wounds, and if we cross the Atlantic we meet with similar instances. Lund tells us that at Lagoa do Sumidouro crania were found pierced with circular tools, whilst near them lay the implements that had caused death.[19] At Comox, in Vancouver Island, a skeleton was found with a flint knife imbedded in one of the bones, and at Madisonville (Ohio) another, one of the bones of which was pierced by a triangular stone arrow; whilst beneath a mound in Indiana was picked up a skull pierced by a flint arrow more than six inches long. Excavations at Copiapo (Chili) brought to light the skeleton of a man who had sustained no less than eight wounds from arrows. The force with which they must have been shot is really astonishing; one had broken the upper jaw and knocked out several teeth, penetrating to the brain; and others were still sticking in the vertebrae and ribs.[20]
In the New as in the Old World man survived many of these horrible wounds, and a skull found under a mound near Devil’s River shows a serious wound inflicted many years before death, and one of the Peruvian crania in the Peabody Museum bears a long frontal fracture, doubtless produced by the violent blow of a club; the five or six fragments still to be made out are, so to speak, solidified, and the wounded man had evidently lived on for many years, thanks apparently to his good constitution alone, for there are no signs of the performing of any surgical operation, such as the removal of the splinters of bone, for instance.[21]