The human skeletons in the Trou du Frontal, situated in a picturesque limestone cliff on the banks of the Lesse, near Furfooz, are considered by M. Dupont to be of the same age as the contents of the caves close by the Trou des Nutons and Trou Rosette, which have been inhabited by palæolithic savages. The following is the section ([Fig. 69]) which he gives of the deposits. Close to the river Lesse is the alluvium (No. 1), below which is a clay (No. 2), with angular blocks passing upwards under the rock shelter, and filling the cave. Under this is a stratum of loam (No. 3), resting on gravel (No. 4). Sixteen human skeletons were discovered in the sepulchral cavity (S), at the mouth of which was a large slab of rock (D), by which it was originally blocked up. A singular urn, with a round bottom and with the handles perforated for suspension, was found at the entrance, together with flint flakes, ornaments in fluorine, and eocene shells perforated for suspension. Outside, at the points H H, was an accumulation of broken bones, belonging to the lemming, tailless hare (Lagomys), beaver, wild cat, boar, horse, stag, urus, chamois, goat, and other animals, birds and fishes. From the occurrence of fragments belonging to two reindeer, it is considered by M. Dupont to belong to the reindeer age. The old hearth was close by, at F ([Fig. 69]).
Fig. 69.—Section of the Trou du Frontal. (Dupont.)
From this section we may infer, that the rock-shelter was used by man at the points H H and F before the formation of the stratum No. 2, which is probably merely subaerial rain-wash, due to the disintegration of the adjacent rocks, and that the sepulchral cavity was a place of burial either before, or while No. 2 was accumulated. Can we further conclude that there is any necessary connection between the refuse-heap and the sepulchre in point of time? M. Dupont holds that the contents of all the caves in the cliff are palæolithic, and that the sepulchral cavity is therefore of that age.[159] It seems to me, however, that the evidence in favour of this view is not conclusive. The burial place may have belonged to one people, and the refuse-heaps in the neighbouring caves and outside the slab in the rock-shelter of the Trou du Frontal to another. The form of the urn is remarkably like some of those which have been obtained from the neolithic pile-dwellings of Switzerland, and therefore may possibly imply that the interment is of that age.
The human remains were mixed pêle mêle with stones and yellow clay within the chamber. Two skulls, sufficiently perfect to allow of measurement, show that their possessors were broad-headed (brachy-cephalic), and of the same type as those of Sclaigneaux. They are considered by the late Dr. Pruner-Bey to belong to the “type Mongoloide,” and are believed by M. Dupont to prove that the palæolithic inhabitants of Belgium were a Mongoloid race. They seem, however, to be of the same general order as the broad-skulls from the neolithic caves and tombs of France, and from the round barrows of Great Britain, as well as those from the neolithic tombs of Borreby and Moën in Scandinavia. And they are looked upon by MM. de Quatrefages, Virchow, and Lagneaux,[160] as presenting the same type as that which is to be recognized in the present population of Belgium, in the neighbourhood, for example, of Antwerp.
These affinities may be explained by the view advanced by Dr. Thurnam, that the broad-heads of the British, French, and Scandinavian tombs are cognate with the modern Fin; or by the higher generalisation of Prof. Huxley, that the Swiss “Dissentis” skull, the South German, the Sclavonian, and the Finnish, belong to one great race of fair-haired, broad-headed, Xanthochroi “who have extended across Europe from Britain to Sarmatia, and we know not how much further to the east and south.”[161]
Besides these broad crania, M. Lagneaux[162] calls attention to a fragment, sufficiently perfect to indicate a skull of the long type (très dolicho-céphale), and that differed from them in many other particulars. In the Trou du Frontal, therefore, there is proof that a long and a short-headed race lived in Belgium side by side, just as a similar association in the cave of Orrouy establishes the same conclusion as to the neolithic dwellers in France. And since skulls of both these types have been discovered in the neolithic caves of Sclaigneaux and Chauvaux, the interment in the Trou du Frontal may probably be referred to that date.
The Cave of Gendron.
The sepulchral cave of Gendron[163] on the Lesse, in which fourteen skeletons were discovered lying at full length, and in regular order, along with one flake and some fragments of pottery, is of uncertain age, since those articles were found at the entrance, and have no necessary connection with the interments. And if they were deposited at the same time, M. Dupont’s view that they stamp the neolithic age is rendered untenable by the fact that flakes and rude pottery were in use as late as the date of the Roman conquest of Britain, and are frequently met with in association with articles of bronze and of iron. And for the same reasons the neolithic age of the human bones in the Trou de Sureau and of the Trou de Pont-à-Lesse is open to considerable doubt. The contents, however, prove these caves to be post-pleistocene.