We have seen in the [fifth] and [sixth] chapters that the prehistoric caves which are so unimportant in the ages of bronze and iron, were used in the neolithic age throughout western Europe both for habitation and burial, and that they therefore offer us most valuable materials for working out the ethnology of Europe at that remote time. The two races of men, the remains of which they contain, are represented by the modern Basque and Berber on the one hand, and on the other by the Celt, and in Russia and Germany by the cognate Finn, Sclave, and Wend. And since all the human remains described in the present chapter, those of Cro-Magnon and possibly of the Grotta dei Colombi being exempted, belong to one of other of these types, they may be referred to the neolithic age with a high degree of probability. In the present stage of the inquiry, it is much safer to put them into a distinct class, apart from those to which we can assign a relative age with tolerable certainty.
In the long ages which elapsed between the close of the pleistocene period and the dawn of history other races than these may have occupied Europe, and have passed away without leaving any clue as to their identity. But in the present state of our knowledge we are justified only in concluding, that the oldest population in prehistoric times was non-Aryan, the traces of which are left behind not merely in the caves and tombs, but in language,[173] and in the small dark-haired inhabitants of western and southern Europe.
The prehistoric peoples lived under physical conditions very different from those of central and western Europe at the present time; the surface of the country being covered with rock, forest, and morass, which afforded shelter to the elk, bison, urus, stag, megaceros, and wild boar, as well as to innumerable wolves. They arrived from the east with cereals and domestic animals, some of which, such as the Bos longifrons and Sus palustris, reverted to their original wild state. From the very exigencies of their position they lived partly by hunting, and they gradually pushed their way westward, carrying with them the rudiments of that civilization which we ourselves possess.
It is an open question whether they came into contact with the palæolithic races which preceded them.
The climate which they enjoyed was sufficiently severe to allow the reindeer to inhabit the district on which now stands the city of London, and its severity may also be inferred from the thickness of the bark of the Scotch firs, observed by Mr. Godwin-Austen in the submarine forests of the south of England, and by Mr. James Geikie in those of Scotland. The area of Great Britain was greater then, than now, since a plain extended seawards from the coast-line, nearly everywhere, supporting a dense forest of Scotch fir, oak, birch, and alder, the relics of which are to be seen in the beds of peat, and the stumps of the trees, near low-water mark on most of our shores. And it may be inferred that the forest extended a considerable distance from the present sea margin, from the large size of the trunks of the trees.[174]
CHAPTER VIII.
THE PLEISTOCENE CAVES OF GERMANY AND GREAT BRITAIN.
Relation of Pleistocene to Prehistoric Period.—Magnitude of the Interval.—Animals.—Physical changes.—Excavation and filling up of Valleys: Fisherton; Freshford.—Comparison of Deposits in Valleys with those of Caves.—Differences of Mineral Condition.—The Pleistocene Caves of Germany: Gailenreuth; Kühloch.—Of Great Britain.—The Caves of Yorkshire: Kirkdale.—Of Derbyshire: The Dream Cave.—Of North Wales, near St. Asaph.—Of South Wales, in counties of Glamorgan, Caermarthen, Pembroke.—Of Monmouth.—Of Gloucestershire.—Of Somersetshire: Uphill, Banwell, Bleadon, Sandford Hill, Wookey Hole.—The District of Mendip higher in Pleistocene age than now.—The condition of bones gnawed by Hyænas.—The Caves of Devonshire: Oreston; Brixham; Kent’s Hole.—The probable age of the Machairodus of Kent’s Hole.—Those of Ireland, Shandon.
Relation of Pleistocene to Prehistoric Period.
We have seen, in the [fifth] and [sixth] chapters, that the caves offer valuable information as to the prehistoric ethnology of Europe, and that they prove the ancient neolithic population to stand directly related to the Basque and Celtic elements in the present inhabitants of Britain, France, and Spain. We shall discover in the course of this and the following chapters that no such continuity can be made out between the palæolithic man of the pleistocene age and any of the races now living in our quarter of the world; and we shall see that he is separated from his neolithic successor by an interval of time, the length of which cannot be measured in terms of years. Before the pleistocene group of caves be examined, it will be necessary to define the relation that exists between the prehistoric and the pleistocene periods.