The most celebrated of these camps is that of Cissbury, three miles north of Worthing. We may also mention that of Hod-Hill in Dorsetshire, which greatly resembles the one at Cissbury, but we will describe the latter in some detail.[17] It is situated on a somewhat lofty plateau of irregular form, its site having been chosen with great skill as one offering great facilities for defence. The earthen ramparts and the fosses protecting them cover an area of sixty acres, and their importance varies according to the relief of the ground; thus the thickness of the walls is very much greater on the eastern side where an attack would have been most fraught with danger; four doors give access to the interior, and on each side of these doors are ruins of rectangular structures strengthening their defence. Archæologists, however, are of opinion that these redoubts, though their construction is exactly similar to the rest of the fortifications, are of more recent date. In fact Roman tiles have been found amongst the ruins, but these really prove nothing, as every one is agreed that Cissbury was occupied by the Romans after the subjugation of England by them; and the only point at issue is really whether the walls of which the ruins still remain date from the Roman period, or from times prior to their arrival. We ourselves lean to the latter opinion, as drinking-water is absolutely wanting; a very important point, as the Roman generals always made it their first care to pitch their camps near a good water-supply. On the western slope at Cissbury on each side of the ramparts are fifty funnel-shaped depressions, some of which are as much as seventy feet in diameter and twelve feet deep. These holes may have served as refuges, and the larger ones were certainly lived in, as is proved by the charred stones of the hearths and the pieces of charcoal found near them; moreover, Tacitus[18] tells us that the Germans lived in similar habitations. Whatever, however, may have been their ultimate use, these hollows were in the first place dug out with a view to obtaining flints in the marly chalk forming the bill; and recent excavations have revealed the existence of galleries connecting the depressions. When they became later human habitations some of the inside openings were blocked up with lumps of chalk, carefully piled up so as to make entrance extremely difficult, greatly adding to the security of the inmates.
Thirty of these shafts were excavated in succession; and amongst the rubbish of all kinds with which they were filled were found some well cut celts, showing no trace of polish, and some weapons or tools of the Moustérien type. The number of half-finished implements, and the even greater quantity of chips, points to these shafts having formed a centre of manufacture. Many of the implements were made of stag-horn, and amongst them we must mention some picks which, curiously enough, exactly resemble those of Belgium and the south of France.[19] Similar wooden picks are found in the copper mines of the Asturias, in the salt mines of Salzburg, and in a petroleum well recently opened on the frontier between the United States and Canada. In all these localities traces can be made out of ancient mining operations. But to return to Cissbury: from amongst the prehistoric ruins there were also taken, numerous fragments of pottery, not at all like Roman ware, with the bones of the horse, goat, boar, and ox, all still represented in the fauna of England; with oyster-shells, and the shells of both land and sea mollusca, of species still to be found in Great Britain. But no trace has so far been discovered of metals, and neither the flint implements nor the bones of animals have any of the marks of rust so characteristic of the Bronze and Iron ages. Must we not then conclude that these shafts were sunk at a time long prior to the earliest historic period?
The walls of the subterranean galleries of Cissbury bore not only cup-shaped ornaments, strive, and curved or broken lines, recalling those on the megalithic monuments of Scotland and Ireland; but Park Harrison has made out some regular runes, or written characters, of which a reproduction was shown at the Paris Exhibition in 1878. This last fact is the more curious, as Sayce discovered in a passage giving access to a cave near Syracuse some characters somewhat similar in form, to which he assigns a proto-Phœnician origin. We may add that certain characters made out at Cissbury, differing but little from the modern letter b or the figure 6, are also found in the most ancient Palmyrian, Copt, and Syrian alphabets. Were this fact completely established, still more, if it were corroborated by other analogous facts, we should in it have a very valuable indication of the relations of England with the most ancient known navigators.
Germany also contains some ancient fortifications, of which the most remarkable are the Heidenmauer of Saint Odila, near Hermeskiel, between the Moselle and the Rhine. Huge stones, piled up without cement, form a triple enceinte, but there is nothing to connect these remains with prehistoric times. It is the same with the intrenchments in the Grand Duchy of Posen, the existence of which was announced at a meeting of the Anthropological Society of Berlin.[20] Many of these defensive works, notably those of Potzrow and of Zabnow, bad been erected on piles. In the district between Thorn and the Baltic are numerous mounds of the shape of a truncated cone, the platform of which is surrounded by an embankment some 590 feet in diameter.[21] Near many of these were picked up many broken human bones, mixed together in the greatest confusion with weapon, hatchets, and hammers, resembling Neolithic types. Everything bears witness to the struggles of which these mounds were the scene.
Similar relies of a past still obscure are met with in the south of Europe. Cartailhac has brought into notice the citanias, which are strange fortified towns in Portugal. On the plateau of Mouinho-da-Moura, southwest of Lisbon, were found numerous polished hatchets, associated with shells of marine mollusca and the bones of mammals belonging to species still extant.[22] This station was protected by intrenchments of so great an extent that it has been impossible to examine the whole of them. There are also near the same place several caves, now nearly choked up. One of them was originally a regular tunnel; the cutting leading to the entrance was made of earth and small stones; it contained the bones of animals, some cinders, and four large vases of coarse workmanship. It is difficult to make out what this cave was used for, the great confusion in which the bones lay excluding all idea of its having been a tomb. Ribeiro had already made out at Lycea an intrenched camp protected by clumsily constructed walls. Inside the enceinte he picked up numerous fragments of ornamented pottery, with polished hatchets, shells, and a good many bones of animals. He also made out several sepulchres.[23]
Figure 85.
General view of the station of Fuente-Alamo.
The prehistoric station of La Muela de Chert in Maeztrago reminds us of those of Portugal. It is situated on a little eminence, protected on the north and east by the natural escarpment of the plateau, and on other sides by a wall of some height made of stones without mortar. Some foundations of an oval shape, on which doubtless were built the homes of the inhabitants, can be made out in the middle of the enceinte. We can, however, but repeat here what we have said so often elsewhere, that it is impossible to fix the exact date at which these intrenchments were made. The discovery, however, of polished flint hatchets, diorite lance-heads, and a few bones of ruminants and cerviæ unknown in Spain in prehistoric times, would appear to point to a very considerable antiquity. Lastly, two young Belgian engineers[24] have lately made out between Almeria and Carthagena a considerable number of prehistoric stations in which can be traced successively the different Stone ages and those of Copper and of Bronze. Several of these stations ([Fig. 85]) are regular fortified camps, protected by thick stone walls cemented with a thin layer of clay. The fire which destroyed the habitations has left behind, beneath the ashes and cinders, numerous objects, with the aid of which we are able to form a picture of the life led by the men who built the fortifications, and we know that they were agriculturists, for the very stores of grain have been found charred and agglutinated by fire. In the more recent stations flint, which was in the earliest time the one material used, has disappeared and is replaced by the copper, of which a plentiful supply was found in the rich mines riddling the mountains. Excavations have even brought to light the workshop of the metallurgist, with its moulds and vases converted into crucibles, its essays at new forms, its scoriae, and lastly its finished weapons, showing real skill in their production.
Although it is impossible to assign to them a definite date, we must, to make this part of our work complete, say a few words on the earthworks met with in Roumania. A former minister of that principality, M. Odobesco,[25] classes them as valla, tumuli, and cetati de pamentu or citadels.