The latter lay on the back, the right arm bent, the left extended; both legs were contracted and to the right. In general, this attitude recalls that of the skeletons of La Ferrassie and the Grotte des Enfants (Grimaldi). At Le Moustier too, the skeleton was found in a somewhat similar position.
At La Chapelle-aux-Saints, the associated fauna includes the Reindeer, Horse, a large bovine form (? Bison), Rhinoceros tichorhinus, the Ibex, Wolf, Marmot, Badger and Boar.
It would seem that this particular cave had served only as a tomb. For other purposes its vertical extent is too small. The stone artefacts are all perfect tools: no flakes or splinters being found as in habitations. The animal remains are supposed to be relics of a funeral feast (or feasts). But the presence of the Rhinoceros is perhaps antagonistic to such an explanation.
Le Moustier (Dordogne). The skeleton lay on its right side, the right arm bent and supporting the head; the left arm was extended. The stratum upon which the body rested consisted largely of worked flint implements. These are assigned to the later Acheulean and earlier Mousterian epochs.
Two features in contrast with the conditions at La Chapelle are to be noticed. It is doubtful whether the skeleton at Le Moustier had been literally interred. It seems rather to have been placed on what was at the time the floor of the grotto, and then covered partly with earth on which implements were scattered. Indications of a definite grave were found at La Chapelle. Again at Le Moustier, other parts of the same grotto had been occupied as habitations of the living. At La Chapelle this seems not to have been the case.
The evidence of the accompanying animal remains also differs in the two cases. At Le Moustier, only small and very fragmentary animal bones with the tooth of an ox were found in the immediate vicinity of the human skeleton. An extended search revealed bones of Bos primigenius in the cave. No bones of the Reindeer were found and their absence is specially remarked by Professor Klaatsch, as evidence that the skeleton at Le Moustier is of greater antiquity than the skeleton accompanied by reindeer bones at La Chapelle. In any case, it would seem that no great lapse of time separates the two strata.
La Ferrassie. The skeleton was found in the same attitude as those of La Chapelle and Le Moustier, viz. in the dorsal position, the right arm bent, the left extended, both legs being strongly flexed at the knee and turned to the right side. The bones were covered by some 3·5 m. of débris: stone implements were yielded by strata above and below the body respectively. Beneath the skeleton, the implements are of Acheulean type, while above and around it the type of Le Moustier was encountered. Aurignacian implements occurred still nearer the surface.
In regard to the evidence of interment the conditions here resemble those at Le Moustier rather than those of La Chapelle. The human skeleton did not appear to have been deposited in a grave, but simply laid on the ground, covered no doubt by earth upon which flint implements were scattered. But the cave continued to be occupied until at the close of the Aurignacian period a fall of rock sealed up the entrance. It is difficult to realise the conditions of life in such a cave, after the death of a member of the community, unless, as among the cave-dwelling Veddas of Ceylon, the cave were temporarily abandoned (Seligmann, 1911). It is possible that the normal accumulation of animal remains created such an atmosphere as would not be greatly altered by the addition of a human corpse, for Professor Tylor has recorded instances of such interments among certain South American tribes. But it is also conceivable that the enormously important change in custom from inhumation to cremation, may owe an origin to some comparatively simple circumstance of this kind. The animal remains at La Ferrassie include Bison, Stag, and Horse, with a few Reindeer. The general aspect is thus concordant with that at La Chapelle.