There were originally a good many hearths about the camp, and it was near to one of them that the spoon was found, figured in an earlier chapter of this book ([Fig. 25]). With it were picked up polished fibrolite, basalt, chloromelanite, serpentine, and diorite hatchets; evidently made in the neighborhood, as is proved beyond a doubt by the numerous chips and partly worked pieces lying about, as well as the discovery of no less than thirty polishers, many of them showing signs of long service. Bone implements of all kinds and whistles made of the phalanges of oxen are also constantly found. Even if the presence of these objects does not enable us to come to any final conclusion, they are at least most useful and interesting in enabling us to put together little by little a picture of the life of the most ancient inhabitants of France.
The camp of Catenoy, Dear Liancourt (Oise) is arranged very much in the same manner as that of Chassey.[12] Cæsar’s Camp, as it is called by the people of the neighborhood, forms a long triangle, the apex of which rests on the eastern extremity of the plateau. Excavations have yielded a number of Gallic-Roman objects, with some polished hatchets, some broken, others intact, with stone and bone weapons, resembling but for a few slight differences those we have described so often. Numerous fragments of pottery were also picked up, which pottery, hand-made and mixed with crushed shells, seldom has either handles or any attempt at ornamentation. Weapons, implements, and pottery are all alike totally different from any Roman or Gallic work known. It is impossible to study the relics at Catenoy without coming to the conclusion that the camp was occupied at periods prior to Gallic and Roman times, and that there, as in many other districts, the Latin conquerors had succeeded an unknown vanquished race.
De Quatrefages has accurately made out a series of works extending along the left bank of the Nive, as far as Itsassou, and of which the Pas-de-Roland marks the extreme limit. A merely superficial examination is enough to show that these defences existed only on the side to which access would otherwise have been easy, while the height overlooking the river on the other side, which is impregnable by nature, has been left untouched. Here too we find the name Cæsar’s Camp given to the relics, a fact of common occurrence all over France, where the great captain was long held in honor. Quatrefages is, however, of opinion that the works are neither Roman, Gallic nor Celtic, and he even arrives by a process of elimination at the conclusion that they were erected by the Iberians, who preceded the Aryans, and have left so deep an impress on all the countries they successively occupied. We do not feel able to accept entirely this hypothesis; but no suggestion of the eminent professor must be overlooked by those who earnestly seek with unbiassed minds to ascertain the truth.
Gregory of Tours relates that at the time of the invasion of the Vandals, the Gabali took refuge with their families in the Castrum Gredonense, and there, for two years, energetically resisted the invaders.[13] Grèze, now a little market town of the department of Lozère, is the castrum of which the old French chronicler speaks, and Dr. Prunières there collected forty stone hatchets, differing in no material respect from others found in such numbers elsewhere, with flint knives and scrapers, bone stilettos, and millstones, doubtless used for grinding grain, all of which are to the learned French professor proofs of the existence there of a Neolithic station before the historic period.
In the department of Alpes-Maritimes a series of defensive works crown the circle of mountains which rise from the shores of the Mediterranean. These intrenchments certainly date from a remote period, though we cannot assign them to any definite time, and the fact that they have been repaired at different epochs proves that they were successively occupied.[14] They consist principally of circular or elliptical enceintes surrounded by walls of stones without mortar, and they vary in diameter from some 39 to 328 feet. One of the largest is that on the Colline des Mulets, above Monte Carlo.
Figure 84.
Prehistoric spoon and button found in a lake station at Sutz (Switzerland).
Although the pile-dwellings of Switzerland and of the terremares of Italy would appear to have been in themselves protection enough, their inhabitants did not neglect other means of defence, from which we may gather that they were engaged in constant and terrible struggles. The terremares were generally surrounded by a talus or rampart of earth, with an external fosse which protected the approaches to the dwellings. The rampart of Castione (Parma), which dates from the Bronze age, was even strengthened inside with large timber caissons.[15] In Switzerland, some works recently undertaken to deflect the course of the Aar, on its exit from Lake Bienne, have led to the discovery of a village of the Stone age, with the bridges leading to it and the little forts intended to protect it.[16] As have the neighboring settlements, this station has yielded a great many arrows, hatchets, scrapers, and harpoons. We give an illustration of a curious marrow spoon, and of a round object which seems to have been a button ([Fig. 84]), as they mark the progress made.
Great Britain is intersected by lines of fortifications of unknown origin, but certainly of extreme antiquity. We may mention Dane’s Dyke, Wandyke, the Devil’s Dyke at Newmarket, and Offa’s Dyke, running from the Bristol Channel to the Dee, and dividing England from Wales. Ancient camps and intrenchments, Sir John Lubbock tells us, crown the greater number of the hills of England. General Pitt-Rivers explored several of these camps in the county of Sussex. Many extend over considerable areas, and all contain numerous worked flints and other relics of prehistoric industry. These relics are met with in great numbers at the base of the intrenchments, so that we may justly conclude that they date from the same epoch.