We have already traced the art of engraving, as it first appears in late

Aurignacian times, into the Solutrean; in the latter it is but feebly

represented. Its further development in early Magdalenian times is found

in the engravings made with more delicate or more sharply pointed flint

implements, capable of drawing an excessively fine line; these were

doubtless the early Magdalenian _microliths_. The animal outlines, with an

indication of hair, are frequently sketched with such exceedingly fine

lines as to resemble etchings; the figures are often of very small

dimensions and marked by much closer attention to details, such as the

eyes, the ears, the hair both of the head and the mane, and the hoofs; the

proportions are also much more exact, so that these engravings become very

realistic. Breuil ascribes to the early Magdalenian the engraved mammoth

tracings of Combarelles. Engravings of this period are also found in the

grottos of Altamira in Spain, and of Font-de-Gaume in Dordogne, and to

this stage belongs the group of does at Altamira, distinguished by the

peculiar lines of the hair covering the face. The subjects chosen are

chiefly the red deer, reindeer, mammoth, horse, chamois, and bison. The

striated drawings of Castillo and Altamira, which partly represent hair

and are partly indications of shading, belong to this period.

[Illustration: FIG. 197. Primitive outline engravings of woolly mammoths

of Aurignacian or early Magdalenian times, from the walls of the cavern of

Combarelles. After Breuil.]

[Illustration: FIG. 198. Engraved outlines and hair underlying the

painting of one of the mammoths, from the wall of the _Galerie des

Fresques_, Font-de-Gaume. After Breuil.]

[Illustration: FIG. 199. Charging mammoth engraved on a piece of ivory

tusk, from the station of La Madeleine. After E. Lartet. For the sake of

showing this figure clearly, other outlines in this drawing, which were

probably designed to indicate a herd of charging mammoths, are omitted or

represented by dotted lines. This classic engraving, described on pages

384 and 385, is one of the most lifelike Palæolithic representations known

of an animal in action.]

The engravings in the grotto of La Mouthe were discovered by Rivière, in

1895, and were the means of directing attention afresh to the

long-forgotten parietal art found in Altamira by Sautuola in 1880. The

drawings at La Mouthe begin about 270 feet from the entrance and may be

traced for a distance of 100 feet, scattered in various groups; they

manifestly belong to a very primitive stage, probably early Magdalenian,

the point of chief interest being that, while the greater part of the

engravings are in simple incised lines, here and there the contour is

enforced by a line of red or black paint; this is the beginning of a

method pursued throughout the Magdalenian parietal art, in which the

artist carefully sketches his contours with sharp-pointed flints before he

applies any color. This treatment, at first limited to the simple

outlines, led to tracing in many of the details with engraved lines, the

eyes, the ears, the hair; thus Breuil has shown that in its final

development a carefully worked-out engraving underlies the painting. In

the La Mouthe drawings the proportions are very bad; they represent the

reindeer, bison, mammoth, horse, ibex, and urus; spots of red are

sometimes splashed on the sides of the animals; here and there is a bit of

superior work, such as the reindeer in motion.

[Illustration: FIG. 200. Engraved outlines believed to represent human

grotesques or masked figures found on the cavern walls of Marsoulas,

Altamira, and Combarelles. After Obermaier.]

The cavern of Combarelles, discovered in 1901, in Dordogne, near Les

Eyzies, contains by far the most remarkable record of early Magdalenian

art; there are upward of four hundred drawings and engravings representing

almost every animal of early Magdalenian times, among them the horse,

rhinoceros, mammoth, reindeer, bison, stag, ibex, lion, and wolf; there

are also between five and six representations of the men of the time, both

masked and unmasked; the style is more recent than that of the oldest

drawings in Font-de-Gaume, but much more ancient than the period of

polychrome art.[AY] The gallery is 720 feet long, and barely 6 feet broad;

the drawings begin about 350 feet from the entrance, and are scattered at

irregular intervals to the very end. In general the art is very fine and

evidently largely the work of one artist; representations of the woolly

rhinoceros and of the mammoth are very true to life; there is a pair of

splendid lions, male and female; the drawings of the horse are abundant,

and side by side we have a representation of several types of horses, the

pure forest type with the arched forehead, the small, fine-headed Celtic

type, and a larger type reminding us of the kiang, or wild ass. Here the

greater part of the work is engraving, as contrasted with the painted

outlines in the cavern of Niaux and with the etched outlines of the Grotte

de la Mairie.

[Illustration: FIG. 201. Entrance to the cavern of Combarelles near Les

Eyzies, Dordogne, where upward of four hundred wall engravings have been

discovered. Photograph by Belvès.]

[Illustration: FIG. 202. Cave-bear engraved in outline, from the cavern of

Combarelles. After Breuil.]

[Illustration: FIG. 203. Stone lamp of Magdalenian age discovered in the

grotto of La Mouthe by E. Rivière. It is cut in sandstone and ornamented

on the lower surface with the head and horns of the ibex. Such lamps were

doubtless used by the artists to light the deep recesses of the caverns.

After Rivière, redrawn by Erwin S. Christman. One-third actual size.

(Compare Pl. VII.)]

Even a large cavern like Combarelles offers comparatively few surfaces

favorable to these engraved lines; but, small or large, such surfaces were

eagerly sought, sometimes near the floor, sometimes on the walls, and

again on the ceilings; even with the brilliant light of an acetylene lamp

it is now difficult to discover all these outlines, some of which are

drawn in the most unlooked-for places. If the extremely fine incisions,

such as those representing the hair of the mammoth, are so difficult to

detect with a powerful illuminant, one may imagine the task of the

Crô-Magnon artists with their small stone lamps and wick fed by the

melting grease. One such lamp has been found in the grotto of La Mouthe,

about 50 feet from the entrance; the workman's pick broke it into four

pieces, only three of which were recovered. The shallow bowl contained

some carbonized matter, an analysis of which led Berthelot, the chemist,

to conclude that an animal fat was used for lighting purposes. Like most

other implements, this lamp is decorated--in this instance by an

engraving of the head and horns of the ibex. Three of these lamps have

been found in Charente and Lot, and it is noteworthy that lamps similar to

those of the Magdalenian period are used in Dordogne at the present day.

[Illustration: FIG. 204. Entrance to the cavern of La Pasiega, not far

from Castillo. The seated figure with the staff is M. l'Abbé Henri Breuil,

the present leader in the study of Upper Palæolithic art. Photograph by N.

C. Nelson.]

In the great cavern of Castillo,[AZ] at Puente-Viesgo, discovered in 1903

by Alcalde del Rio, which is entered by the majestic grotto already

described on p. 162, the animal drawings are mostly of an archaic

character, belonging to the very beginnings of early Aurignacian parietal

art. The most abundant subjects are horses and deer, which entirely

replace the reindeer drawings so abundant in central France, outlines of

the stag and of the doe being very numerous; on the other hand, the bison

and the ox are rarely drawn. Belonging to the category of most primitive

painting are the simple outlines in black of a horse and of a mammoth, the

two limbs of one side being represented as inverted triangles, terminating

in a sharp point, like the drawings of children. Of more recent style are

the rather crude polychrome bisons, numerous hands outlined in red, and a

vast number of tectiform signs and symbols which represent inferior work

of the middle Magdalenian period.

[Illustration: FIG. 205. Carefully engraved half-figure of a bison, from

the cavern of Marsoulas; an example of the engraver's work preceding the

application of color. After Breuil. One-eighth actual size.]

On the other side of the same mountain is the grotto of Pasiega,

discovered in 1912 by Doctor Hugo Obermaier. This small grotto, about 500

feet above the river, receives its name as a retreat of the shepherds. In

the floor is a very narrow opening through which one rapidly descends by

means of a tube of limestone barely large enough to admit the passage of

the body. The interior is very labyrinthine. After passing through the

_Galerie des Animaux_ and the _Galerie des Inscriptions_, one reaches,

after a most difficult détour, the terminal chamber, which Obermaier has

called the _Salle du Trône_, the throne-room; here there is a natural seat

of limestone, with supports at the sides for the arms, and one can still

see the discoloration of the rock by the soiled hands of the magicians or

of the artists. In this _salle_ there are a few drawings and engravings

on the walls, and a few pieces of flint have been discovered. In no other

cavern, perhaps, is there a greater sense of mystery as to the influence,

whether religious, magical, or artistic, which impelled men to seek out

and enter these dangerous passages, the slippery rocks illumined at best

by a very imperfect light, leading to the deep and dangerous recesses

below, where a misstep would be fatal. The impulse, whatever it may have

been, was doubtless very strong, and in this, as in other caverns, almost

every surface favorably prepared by the processes of nature has received a

drawing. No industrial flints have been found at the entrance to this

cavern, but some have been traced into the interior. The art is considered

partly of late Aurignacian, perhaps of Solutrean, and certainly in part of

early Magdalenian times; in general it is much more recent than that of

Castillo. It consists both of engravings and painted outlines, with

proportions usually excellent and sometimes admirable. The paintings of

deer are in yellow ochre, of the chamois in red. There are altogether 226

paintings and 36 engravings, in which are represented 50 roe-deer, 51

horses, 47 tectiforms, 16 _Bos_, 15 bison, 12 stags, 9 ibexes, 1 chamois,

and 16 other forms, distributed in all parts of the cave. The outlines are

in solid red color or in stripes of red or black, or there is a series of

spots; the subjects are chiefly the stag, the doe, the wild cattle (which

are rather common), the bison (which are less common), the ibex, and the

chamois. Among the numerous representations of the horse there are two

small engravings of a type with erect mane, both the feet and the hair

being indicated with great care, the limbs well designed and of excellent

proportions, clearly in early Magdalenian style. Of the utmost interest is

the discovery here of two horses drawn with rounded forehead and drooping

mane, the only instance in which the drooping mane of the modern type of

horse (_Equus caballus_) has been observed in the cavern drawings.

[Illustration: FIG. 206. Herd of horses engraved on a small slab of stone,

found in the grotto of Chaffaud, Vienne, France. After Cartailhac. This

impressionistic grouping and perspective is very exceptional in

Palæolithic design. About nine-tenths actual size.]

[Illustration: FIG. 207. Impressionistic design of a herd of reindeer

engraved on the radius of an eagle nearly eight inches in length, found in

the upper Magdalenian layers of the Grotte de la Mairie. After Capitan and

Breuil.]

In the advanced development of middle or high Magdalenian art, parietal

engraving with finely pointed flint implements presents a nearer approach

to the truth both of proportion and of detail than do the earlier stages.

In this stage the engravings seem to consist chiefly of independent animal

figures and to furnish a prelude to the application of color. A simple but

striking example of approaching perfection of technique is seen in the

bison (Fig. 205) engraved in the cavern of Marsoulas, where the profile is

outlined and great shaggy masses of hair beneath the neck are admirably

indicated. In these drawings the complicated details of the feet, with

their characteristic tufts of hair, and of the head show far more careful

observation. In the great series of bison at Font-de-Gaume the entire

animal is sketched in with these finely engraved lines, as brought out

through the wonderfully close observation and studies of Breuil. This is

quite similar to the practice of the modern artist who sketches his figure

in crayon or charcoal before applying the color.

[Illustration: FIG. 208. Reindeer and salmon engraved on an antler, from

Lorthet, Hautes-Pyrénées. After Piette. This design is believed to

represent a herd of reindeer crossing a stream, one of the very rare

Palæolithic attempts at composition.]

There are two quite different styles in this engraving, one seen in the

deep incised lines of the reindeer head in the cavern of Tuc d'Audoubert

(Fig. 232), a complete design in itself, another seen in the deep

incisions in the limestone outlining the horses and the bison as observed

in the cavern of Niaux (Fig. 174). Here the engraved line is followed by

the application of a black painted line, the effect being to bring out the

body in the surrounding rock so as to give the silhouette a high relief.

In the drawings in the large on these curved wall surfaces, only part of

which could be seen by the eye at one time, the difficulties of

maintaining the proportions were extreme, and one is ever impressed by the

boldness and confidence with which the long sweeping strokes of the flint

were made, for one rarely if ever sees any evidences of corrected outline.

Only a lifelong observer of the fine points which distinguish the

different prehistoric breeds of the horse could appreciate the

extraordinary skill with which the spirited, aristocratic lines of the

Celtic are executed, on the one hand, and, on the other, the plebeian and

heavy outlines of the steppe horse. In the best examples of Magdalenian

engraving, both parietal and on bone or ivory, one can almost immediately

detect the specific type of horse which the artist had before him or in

mind, also the season of the year, as indicated by the representation of a

summer or winter coat of hair.

[Illustration: FIG. 209. Outlines of a lioness and a small group of horses

of the Celtic or Arab type, a delicate wall engraving in the _Diverticule

final_ of the cavern of Font-de-Gaume. After Breuil.]

The realism of most of the parietal art passes into the impressionism of

the excessively fine engravings on bone or reindeer horn, executed with a

few strokes, of a herd of horses or of reindeer (Fig. 207), or where a

herd of deer is seen (Fig. 208) crossing a stream full of fishes, as in

the well-known engravings on reindeer horn found in the grotto of Lorthet,

in the Pyrenees. This is one of the very rare instances in Palæolithic

art, either engraving or painting, which shows a sense of composition or

the treatment of a subject or incident involving more than one figure.

Others are the herd of passing reindeer found engraved on a bit of schist

in the grotto of Laugerie Basse, the lion facing a group of horses

engraved on a stalagmite at Font-de-Gaume, and the procession of mammoths

engraved upon a procession of bison in the same cavern.

BEGINNINGS OF PAINTING

The beginnings of painting in Aurignacian times, consisting of simple

contours and crude outlines in red or black, with little or no attempt at

shading, pass in early Magdalenian time(24) into a long phase of

monochromes, either in black or red, in which the technique pursues a

number of variations, from simple linear treatment, continuous or dotted,

to half tints or full tints, gradually encroaching on the sides of the

body from the linear contour. Of this order are the figures in flat tints

and shading, resembling those of the Chinese, without modelling; also the

figures entirely covered with dots, such as are seen at Marsoulas,

Font-de-Gaume, and Altamira. The tints, as in the drawing of the galloping

steppe horse, pass inward from the black outline to enhance the effect of

roundness or relief. In the splendid series of paintings in the cavern of

Niaux there is little more than the black outline of the body, but the

covering of the sides with lines, indicating the hair, lends itself to the

rounded presentation of form. A somewhat similar effect is sought in the

lines of the woolly rhinoceros painted in red in the cavern of

Font-de-Gaume, which Breuil attributes to the Aurignacian stage, but which

also suggests the early Magdalenian.

[Illustration: FIG. 210. Early painting. A small horse of the Celtic or

Arab type, with painted outline and body colored in black, from a wall of

the cavern of Castillo, Spain. After Breuil.]

[Illustration: FIG. 211. Early painting. Galloping horse of the Celtic or

of the steppe type painted in black and white, from a wall of the cavern

of Font-de-Gaume. After Breuil.]

[Illustration: FIG. 212. Opening (cross) of the cavern of Niaux, in the

Pyrenees, near Tarascon.]

DRAWINGS IN VARIOUS CAVERNS OF THE EARLY AND MIDDLE MAGDALENIAN

The grandest cavern thus far discovered in France is that of Niaux (1906),

which from a small opening on the side of a limestone mountain and 300

feet above the River Vic de Sos extends almost horizontally 4,200 feet

into the heart of the mountain.(25) Not far from Tarascon on the Ariège it

lay near one of the most accessible routes between France and Spain.

Passing through the long gallery beyond the borders of the subterranean

lake which bars the entrance, at a distance of half a mile we reach a

great chamber where the overhanging walls of limestone have been finely

polished by the sands and gravels transported by the subglacial streams;

on these broad, slightly concave panels of a very light ochre color are

drawings of a large number of bison and of horses, as fresh and brilliant

as if they were the work of yesterday; the outlines drawn with black oxide

of manganese and grease on the smooth stone resemble coarse lithography.

The animals are drawn in splendid, bold contours, with no cross-hatching,

but with solid masses of bright color here and there; the bison, as the

most admired animal of the chase, is drawn majestically with a superb

crest, the muzzle most perfectly outlined, the horns indicated by single

lines only, the eyes with the defiant expression highly distinctive of the

animal when wounded or enraged. Here for the first time are revealed the

early Magdalenian methods of hunting the bison, for upon their flanks are

clearly traced one or more arrow or spear heads with the shafts still

attached; the most positive proof of the use of the arrow is the apparent

termination of the wooden shaft in the feathers which are rudely

represented in three of the drawings. There are also many silhouettes of

horses which strongly resemble the pure Asiatic steppe type now living in

the desert of Gobi, the Przewalski horse, with erect mane and with no

drooping forelock; in contrast to the bison, the eyes are rather dull and

stupid in expression. There are also drawings of other types of horses, a

very fine ibex, a chamois, a few outlines of wild cattle, and a very fine

one of the royal stag; we find no reindeer or mammoth represented. In some

of the narrower passages the rock has been beautifully sculptured by

water, and the artists have been quick to take advantage of any natural

lines to add a bit of color here or there and thus bring out the outline

of a bison.

[Illustration: FIG. 213. Engraved and painted horse, apparently of the

Celtic type and with heavy winter coat, from the cavern of Niaux. There is

a mark behind the right shoulder which has been interpreted as the sign of

an arrow or spear head. After Cartailhac and Breuil. (Compare Fig. 174.)]

[Illustration: FIG. 214. Professor Emile Cartailhac at the entrance of the

cavern of Le Portel, Ariège. Photograph by H. F. Osborn.]

[Illustration: FIG. 215. Finely engraved outlines of the Celtic horse and

of the reindeer, in the Grotte de la Mairie, near Teyjat, Dordogne. After

Capitan and Breuil.]

Presenting the widest possible contrast to Niaux is the cavern of Le

Portel, west of Tarascon, with its contracted entrance and a very rapidly

descending passage hardly broad enough to admit the body. This narrow and

tortuous cave terminates in an extremely small passage, so narrow as

barely to admit the athletic and determined artist explorer, the Abbé

Breuil. Here, as in Font-de-Gaume and other caverns, is one of the

greatest mysteries of the cave art, namely, that these terminal and

dangerous _diverticules finals_ were wrought with some of the most careful

and artistic designs. Le Portel, like Niaux, reveals a single style, but

one altogether different. Very numerous bison are drawn in outline both in

red and black; the sides of the body are often dotted with red or hatched

in close parallel lines. On a long horizontal panel are seen many bison in

red, and one observes here a finely drawn pair of bison feet in the best

Magdalenian style. The horse as represented here is of a quite different

type with thin upper tail and a tail-tuft resembling that of the wild ass,

so that one is almost tempted to believe that the kiang is intended, but

the ears are too short; it has a high rump and a high, splendidly arched

neck, like that of the stallion, and the eye is better drawn; the body is

covered with long vertical or oblique lines which might be mistaken for

stripes, but this hatching is a matter of technique only. Again, the mane

is erect, and there is no forelock; in fact, none of these Magdalenian

artists has represented the horse with the forelock, indicating that this

character of the modern horse was unknown in western Europe and probably

came in during Neolithic times.

[Illustration: FIG. 216. Reindeer, cave-bear, and two horses of the

large-headed forest type with arched forehead, engraved on a panel about

twenty inches in length in the Grotte de la Mairie. After Capitan and

Breuil.]

[Illustration: FIG. 217. Wild cattle, bull and cow (_Bos primigenius_),

engraved in the Grotte de la Mairie, each figure being about twenty inches

in length. After Capitan and Breuil.]

Of an entirely different type are the beautifully engraved miniature

figures of animals discovered in 1903 in the Grotte de la Mairie.(26) The

outlines, from 18 to 20 inches in length, are sharply engraved on the

limestone stalagmites; they are all in the middle Magdalenian style and

include the stag, reindeer, bison, cave-bear, lion, wild cattle, and two

very distinct types of horses: one of these types is large-headed with an

arched forehead; this is probably the forest type and perhaps represents

the horse most abundant at the Solutré encampment (see p. 288); the other

horse is small-headed, with a perfectly flat, straight forehead,

corresponding with the Arab or Celtic pony type.

DRAWINGS AND PAINTINGS OF THE END OF THE MIDDLE MAGDALENIAN

The fourth and final developmental phase of painting flowers out toward

the end of middle Magdalenian times in the grand period of polychromes.

These are first etched with underlying lines engraved with flint, the

surface of the limestone having been previously prepared by the thinning

or scraping of the borders (_raclage_) to heighten the relief of the

drawing; then a very strong contour is laid down in black, and this may be

followed by a further contour line in red (the use of black and red is

very ancient); an ochreous brown color is mixed in, conforming well with

what we know to be the tints of the hairy portions of the bison. Thus

gradually a complete polychrome fresco art develops. The final stage of

this art follows, in which the filling out of various tones of color

requires the use of black, brown, red, and yellowish shades. The

underlying or preliminary engraving now begins to recede, being retained

only for the tracing in of the final details of the hair, the eyes, the

horns, and the hoofs. The early stages of this art are seen in the

cavern of Marsoulas, and its height is reached in the mural frescos of

Font-de-Gaume and in the ceiling of Altamira, the latter still in a

perfect and brilliant state of preservation.

[Illustration: FIG. 218. Outline of one of the bison in the _Galerie des

Fresques_ at Font-de-Gaume, showing the preliminary etching or engraving

preparatory to the polychrome fresco painting. After Breuil.]

[Illustration: PL. VIII. One of the bisons on the ceiling of Altamira,

representing the final stage of polychrome art in which four shades of

color are used. After Breuil.]

[Illustration: FIG. 219. Entrance on the right to the grotto leading to

the great cavern of Font-de-Gaume on the Beune. Photograph by N. C.

Nelson.]

To prepare the colors, ochre and oxide of manganese were ground down to a

fine powder in stone mortars; raw pigment was carried in ornamented cases

made from the lower-limb bones of the reindeer, and such tubes still

containing the ochre have been found in the Magdalenian hearths; the

mingling of the finely ground powder with the animal oils or fats that

were used was probably done on the flat side of the shoulder-blade of the

reindeer or on some other palette. The pigment was quite permanent, and in

the darkness of the Altamira grotto it has been so perfectly preserved

that the colors are still as brilliant as if they had been applied

yesterday.

The art of the grotto of Marsoulas, in the Pyrenees, is both of an

earlier and of a later period; the engraved lines, as of the head and

front of a bison, are beautifully done in advanced Magdalenian style, deep

incisions representing the larger outlines and finer incisions

representing the hair; here the outlines are also traced in color, and

there are several masks or grotesques of the human face; these last are

treated with a total disregard of the truth which characterizes the animal

work. Among the few bison represented here, some are covered with dots or

splashes of color, others show the painted outline which begins to extend

over the surface with gradations of tint, anticipating the color effects

attained in the finished paintings of Altamira and of Font-de-Gaume. All

the details of the early technique are found here: the artist outlines the

form with an engraved line; he traces in black color the contours of the

head and of the body; he begins to apply masses of red over the figure.

This beginning of polychrome art at Marsoulas is a step toward coloring

the entire surface with red ochre and black, as in the finished paintings

of a later period.

[Illustration: FIG. 220. Map of the cavern of Font-de-Gaume, showing the

'Rubicon,' the _Grande Galerie des Fresques_, in which the chief

polychrome paintings are found, and the _Diverticule final_. After

Capitan.]

[Illustration: FIG. 221. Narrow passage in the cavern of Font-de-Gaume,

known as the 'Rubicon.' On the left wall at this point are two painted

bison, and on both walls are marks left by the claws of the cave-bear.

After Lassalle.]

The grand cavern of Font-de-Gaume,(27) on the Beune, not far from Les

Eyzies, contains the most complete record of Upper Palæolithic art,

especially from the close of Aurignacian to the close of Magdalenian

times. There are crude Aurignacian drawings, simple outlines painted in

black, outlines supplemented by the indication of hair (examples of the

early stages in the development of polychrome work as well as of the very

highest stages), compositions like the lion and the group of horses, and

the murals in the _Galerie des Fresques_, which show a general composition

in the processions of animals, as well as some special compositions such

as the reindeer and bison facing each other. The life depicted is largely

that of the tundras, mammoths, rhinoceroses, and reindeer, but it also

includes the steppe or Celtic type of horse, represented galloping (Fig.

211), and a small group of horses of the Arab or Celtic type. Of the

meadow fauna the bison is generally represented in preference to the wild

ox or urus.

[Illustration: FIG. 222. Plan of a portion of the left wall decoration in

the _Galerie des Fresques_ at Font-de-Gaume, showing reindeer and the

procession of bison. After Breuil.]

Throughout the cavern the favorable surfaces of the walls are crowded with

engravings, and in the _Galerie des Fresques_, beyond the narrow passage

known as the 'Rubicon' (Fig. 221), we see altogether the finest examples

of Upper Palæolithic art. On each side of this gallery is a peculiarly

advantageous mural surface, broad, relatively smooth, and gently concave

(Pl. VII), probably the best which any cavern afforded, and here we

observe great processions of mammals superposed upon each other, like the

records of a palimpsest, as if such a surface was so rare that it was

visited again and again. The most imposing series is that of the bison,

done in the finest polychrome style, mostly headed in one direction. The

reindeer form another series and in some instances face each other,

although mainly arranged in a long procession facing to the left. This

superposition of drawing upon drawing ends with the latest superposition

in finely incised lines of a great procession of mammoths upon that of the

polychrome bisons. It is somewhat difficult to reconcile a religious or

votive interpretation with the multiplication of these drawings upon each

other. Moreover, it appears to be inconsistent with the reverent spirit

which pervades the work in this and in all other caverns, for what

impresses one most is the absence of trivial work or meaningless drawings.

[Illustration: FIG. 223. Another portion of the left wall decoration of

the _Galerie des Fresques_, showing the preliminary engraving (above), and

the painting (below) of the great procession of mammoths, superposed upon

drawings of the bison, reindeer, and horse. This section is about fourteen

feet in length. After Breuil.]

It seems as if at every stage in their artistic development these people

were intensely serious about their work, each drawing being executed with

the utmost possible care, according to the degree of artistic development

and appreciation.

In the great gallery of frescos we find not less than eighty figures, in

some cases partly covered by a fine sheen of stalagmitic limestone; these

include 49 bison, 4 reindeer, 4 horses, and 15 mammoths. The bison

polychromes have suffered somewhat in color and are far less brilliant

than those at Altamira. In the polychromes the color is applied either in

long lines of red or black surrounding the contours of the animal or in

flat tints placed side by side, or again the two colors are mingled and

give intermediate tints with striking effect. On one of the finest of

these bison is the underlying drawing of a reindeer, a wild boar, and the

superposition of an excellent engraving of a mammoth, which is represented

on an altogether different scale, so that it falls well within the body

lines of the bison (Fig. 224). In each of these mammoths the grotesque but

truthful contour is preserved in the drapery of hair which almost

completely envelops the limbs; the emphasizing of the sudden depression of

the dorsal line behind the head is everywhere the same and undoubtedly

conforms very closely to nature.

[Illustration: FIG. 224. Detail of the engraving of the central group of

figures on the left wall decoration of the _Galerie des Fresques_ (see

Fig. 223), showing the etching of a mammoth superposed upon that of a

bison, superposed in turn upon those of a reindeer and of a wild boar.

These figures are on different scales, and in the present faded condition

of the frescoes are difficult to detect. After Breuil.]

[Illustration: FIG. 225. Entrance to the cavern of Altamira, showing the

proximity of the roof of the cavern to the present surface of the earth.

Photograph by N. C. Nelson.]

After passing the _Galerie des Fresques_ we penetrate to the final recess

called the _Diverticule final_, through excessively narrow tubular

openings barely admitting the body, and we are again overcome with the

mystery as to what impulse carried this art into the dark, deep portions

of the caverns. If it were due to a feeling partly religious which,

regarded the caverns with special awe, why do we find equally skilful and

conscientious work on all the mobile utensils of daily life and of the

chase, apart from the caverns? The superposition of one drawing upon

another, which is especially characteristic of this cavern, does not seem

to strengthen the religious interpretation.

It would appear that the love of art for art's sake, akin in a very

rudimentary form to that which inspired the early Greeks, together with

the fine spaces which these caverns alone afforded for larger

representations, may be an alternative explanation. There is no evidence

that numbers of people entered these caverns. If this had been the case

there would be many more examples of inartistic work upon the walls. It is

possible that the Crô-Magnon artists constituted a recognized class

especially gifted by nature, quite distinct from the magician class or the

artisan class. The dark recesses of the caverns opening back of the

grottos may have been held in awe as mysterious abodes. In line with this

theory is the suggestion that the artists may have been invited into the

caverns by the priests or medicine-men to decorate the walls with all the

animals of the chase.

[Illustration: FIG. 226. Plan showing the grouping of bison, horses, red

deer, and wild boar, in the polychrome paintings on the ceiling of

Altamira. After Breuil.]

The polychromes of the ceiling of Altamira in northern Spain, which rank

in the crude art of Palæolithic times much as the ceiling of the Sistine

Chapel does in modern art, are somewhat more conventional in technique

than those of Font-de-Gaume, but they are manifestly the work of the same

school, and prove that the technique of art spread like that of engraving,

of sculpture, and of the preparation of flint and bone implements all over

southwestern Europe. One could not have more striking proof of the unity

of race, of a community of life, and of an interchange of ideas among

these nomadic people than the close resemblance which is observed in the

art of Altamira, Spain, and that of Font-de-Gaume, 290 miles distant, in

Dordogne.

[Illustration: FIG. 227. The ceiling of Altamira, showing the round

projecting bosses of limestone on which the recumbent figures of the bison

are painted. After Lassalle.]

[Illustration: FIG. 228. Female bison lying down with the limbs drawn

beneath the body, so that only the horns and tail project beyond the

convex surface of the limestone boss on the ceiling of Altamira. After

Breuil.]

Very picturesque is the account of the discovery of this wonderful

ceiling, made not by the Spanish archæologist Sautuola himself, but by his

little daughter, who, while he was searching for flints on the floor of

the cavern, was the first to perceive the paintings on the ceiling and to

insist upon his raising his lamp aloft. This was in 1879, long before the

discovery of parietal art in France. The ceiling is broad and low, within

easy reach of the hand, and the oval bosses of limestone (Fig. 227), from

4 to 5 feet in length and from 3 to 4 in width, led to the development

here of one of the most striking characteristics of all Palæolithic art,

namely, the artist's adaptation of the subject to his medium and to the

character of the surface upon which he was working. It seems to show a

high order of creative genius that each of these projecting bosses was

chosen for the representation of a bison lying down, with the limbs drawn

up in different positions beneath the body (Fig. 228) and very carefully

designed, and with the tail or the horns alone projecting beyond the

convex surface to the surrounding plane surface. This is the only instance

known where the bison are represented as lying down, in most lifelike

attitudes, showing the soles of the hoof, observed with the greatest care

and represented by a few strong and significant lines. Thus while the

Altamira coloring inclines to conventionality, the pose of these animals

indicates the greatest freedom of style and mastery of perspective

anywhere observed. In this wonderful group there is also a bison

bellowing, with his back arched and his limbs drawn under him as if to

expel the air. One striking feature in all these paintings is the vivid

representation of the eye, which in every case is given a fierce and

defiant character, so distinctive of the bison bull when enraged. We also

observe a wild boar in a running attitude and several spirited

representations of the horse and of the female deer. The cavern of

Altamira, besides this _chef-d'œuvre_, contains work of a very advanced

character, as indicated in the imposing engraving of the royal stag (Fig.

229), which is altogether the finest representation of this animal which

has thus far been discovered in any cavern.

[Illustration: FIG. 229. The royal stag (_Cervus elaphus_) engraved on the

ceiling of the cavern of Altamira. About twenty-six inches in length.

After Breuil. One-eighth actual size.]

Altamira, like Font-de-Gaume, presents many phases of the development of

art in Magdalenian times. There is a Solutrean layer in the foyer of this

great cavern, but Breuil is not inclined to attribute any of the art to

this period. The first entrance of Altamira by the Crô-Magnon artists is

dated by the discovery of engravings on bone of the female red deer, which

are identical with those on the walls and which belong to very ancient

Magdalenian times, the period at which the caverns of Castillo and La

Pasiega were also entered.(28)

SCULPTURE

Animal sculpture in the round, which is indicated by the few statuettes

found with the burial at Brünn, Moravia, and by the ivory mammoth

statuette found at Předmost, continued into early Magdalenian times and

certainly constitutes one of the most distinctive features of the art of

that period, because in the later Magdalenian it took a different trend in

the direction of decorative sculpture. Only two fine examples of early

Magdalenian animal sculpture have been found, but these are of such a

remarkable character as to indicate that modelling in the round was widely

pursued at this time. These are the bisons discovered in 1912 in the

cavern of Tuc d'Audoubert near Montesquieu, in the Pyrenees, and the fine

bas-reliefs of horses at the shelter of Cap-Blanc, on the Beune, in

Dordogne.

[Illustration: FIG. 230. Statuette of a mammoth in reindeer horn from the

Abri de Plantade at Bruniquel. After Piette. "A statuette presenting the

general form of the mammoth with some fantastic features. It formed part

of a pendant of which the shank, terminating with a perforation, has been

broken. The tusks were laid against this shank and strengthened it. The

incisions bordered by notches suggest the nostrils of some imaginary

monster. The trunk seems to grow out of the neck, not the head. The tail

having been broken off in Palæolithic times, the owner made a hole in the

back and inserted one there. The material was too thin to admit of

representing the proper thickness of the animal. It was made to be viewed

from the side."]

[Illustration: FIG. 231. Entrance to the cavern of Tuc d'Audoubert, near

Montesquieu-Avantès in the Pyrenees. This is one of the rare instances in

which the stream that formed the cavern is still flowing from the

entrance. Photograph by N. C. Nelson.]

[Illustration: FIG. 232. Head of a reindeer deeply incised or engraved in

the limestone wall of the cavern of Tuc d'Audoubert. After Bégouen.]

In company with Professor Cartailhac the writer had the good fortune to

enter the cavern of Tuc d'Audoubert a few days after its discovery by the

Comte de Bégouen and his sons; it is still in the making, for out from the

entrance flows a stream of water large enough to float a small boat, by

which the first of a series of superbly crystallized galleries is reached.

After passing through a labyrinth of passageways and chambers a favorable

surface was found where the Bégouen party showed us a whole wall covered

with low-engraving reliefs, very simply done, fine in execution, with sure

and firm outlines of the bison, the favorite subject as in all other

caverns; horses fairly well executed and of the same steppe type as those

in the near-by cavern of Niaux; one superbly engraved contour of the

reindeer, with its long, curved horns; the head of a stag with its horns

still in the velvet; and a mammoth. All this work is engraved; there are

no drawn outlines, but here and there are splashes of red and black color.

Shortly afterward a great discovery was made in this cavern; it is

described as follows by the Comte de Bégouen:[BA] "To-day I am happy to

give you excellent news from the cavern Tuc d'Audoubert. As you were the

first to visit this cavern, you will also be the first to learn that in

an upper gallery, very difficult of access, at the summit of a very narrow

ascending passage, and after having been obliged to break a number of

stalactites which completely closed the entrance, my son and myself have

found two superb statuettes in clay, about 60 cm. in length, absolutely

unbroken, and representing bison. Cartailhac and Breuil, who have come to

see them, were filled with enthusiasm. The ground of these chambers was

covered with imprints of the claws of the bear, skeletons of which were

buried here and there. The Magdalenians have passed through this ossuary

and have drawn out all the canine teeth to make ornaments of them. Their

steps left their fine impressions on the humid and soft clay, and we still

see the outlines of several bare human feet. They had also lost several

flakes of flint and the tooth of an ox pierced at the neck; we have

collected them, and it seems as if they had only dropped yesterday; the

Magdalenians also left an incomplete model of a bison and some lumps of

kneaded clay which still carry the impression of their fingers. We produce

the proof that in this period all branches of art were cultivated." This

model of the male and female bison in clay has been described by

Cartailhac as of perfect workmanship and of ideal art.

[Illustration: FIG. 233. Two bison, male and female, modelled in clay,

discovered in the cavern of Tuc d'Audoubert. The length of each of these

models is about two feet. After Bégouen.]

[Illustration: FIG. 234. One of a series of horses of the high-bred Celtic

type, sculptured in high relief on the wall of the cliff shelter known as

Cap-Blanc. The actual length of each of these sculptures is about seven

feet. After Lalanne and Breuil.]

The procession of six horses cut in limestone under the sheltering cliff

of Cap-Blanc is by far the most imposing work of Magdalenian art that has

been discovered. The sculptures are in high relief and of large size and

are in excellent proportion; they appear to represent the high-bred type

of desert or Celtic horse, related to the Arabian, so far as we can judge

from the long, straight face, the slender nose, the small nostrils, and

the massive angle of the lower jaw; the ears are rather long and pointed,

and the tail is represented as thin and without hair; they were found

partly buried by layers containing implements of middle Magdalenian

industry, and they are therefore assigned to an early Magdalenian date in

which animal sculpture in the round reached its climax.

[Illustration: FIG. 235. Head of a horse sculptured on a reindeer antler,

from the Magdalenian layer of Mas d'Azil on the right bank of the Arize.

After Piette. Actual size.]

[Illustration: FIG. 236. Statuette carved on a fragment of mammoth tusk,

representing a horse of Celtic type with mane erect, from the grotto of

Les Espelugues, Lourdes. After Piette. About one and one-third actual

size.]

From the early to the middle Magdalenian period animal sculpture in bone,

horn, and ivory was followed as decorative art in a bold and highly

naturalistic manner. Adaptation of the animal figure to the surface and to

the material employed is nowhere shown in a more remarkable way than in

the bâtons, the dart-throwers, and the poniards. Of all the work of the

Upper Palæolithic, these decorative heads and bodies are, perhaps, the

most highly artistic creations in the modern sense. The famous horse found

in the late Magdalenian levels of Mas d'Azil (Fig. 235) and the small

horses from the grotto of Espelugues, of the middle Magdalenian, are full

of movement and life and show such certainty and breadth of treatment that

they must be regarded as the masterpieces of Upper Palæolithic glyptic

art. The ibex carved on the dart-thrower from the grotto of Mas d'Azil

(Fig. 178) indicates observation and a striking power of expression; while

all the details are noted, the treatment is very broad.

[Illustration: FIG. 237. Head of a woman with head-dress sculptured in

ivory, from the Magdalenian levels of Brassempouy. After Piette. One and

one-fifth actual size.]

The continuation of animal sculpture in the round is seen in the

well-known horse statuette from the grotto of Lourdes; the partly

decorative striping is a step in the direction of conventional treatment.

The sculptured reindeer discovered by Bégouen in the grotto of Enlène is

treated in a somewhat similar style.

Small human figurines again appear in the form of statuettes in bone or

ivory, representing the renaissance of the spirit of human sculpture. Some

of this work is apparently in search of beauty and with altogether

different motives from the repellent feminine statuettes of middle and

late Aurignacian times, for the subjects are slender and the limbs are

modelled with relative skill. As in the earlier works, there is a partial

failure to portray the features, which is in striking contrast to the

lifelike treatment of animal heads. Very few examples of this work have

been found, and most of them have been broken. To this period belong the

Venus statuette of Laugerie Basse and the head of a girl carved in ivory

found at Brassempouy (Fig. 237) with the features fairly suggested and an

elaborate head-dress.

GEOGRAPHIC DISTRIBUTION OF THE MAGDALENIAN CULTURE

In Magdalenian times the Crô-Magnon race undoubtedly reached its highest

development and its widest geographic distribution, but it would be a

mistake to infer that the boundaries of the Magdalenian culture also mark

the extreme migration points of this nomadic people, because the

industries and inventions may well have spread far beyond the areas

actually inhabited by the race itself.

Absence of Magdalenian influence around the northerly coasts of the

Mediterranean is certainly one of the most surprising facts. Breuil has

suggested that Italy remained in an Aurignacian stage of development

throughout Magdalenian times and indicates that there is much evidence

that Magdalenian culture never penetrated into this peninsula, for in

Italy the Aurignacian industrial stage is succeeded by traces of the

Azilian. This geographic gap, however, may be filled at any time by a

fresh discovery. In Spain, also, the Magdalenian culture is known only in

the Cantabrian Mountains, but never farther south, one of the earliest

sites found in this region being the grotto of Peña la Miel, visited by

Lartet in 1865, and one of the most famous the cavern of Altamira,

discovered by Sautuola in 1875; to the northeast is the station of

Banyolas. So far the eastern provinces of Spain have not yielded any

implements of engraved or sculptured bone.

[Illustration: FIG. 238. Geographic distribution of the principal

Magdalenian industrial stations in western Europe.]

In contrast to this failure to reach southward, the Magdalenian culture is

widely extended through France, Belgium, England, Germany, Switzerland,

Austria, and as far east as Russia. It would appear either that the men of

Magdalenian times wandered far and wide or that there was an extensive

system of barter, because the discovery of shells brought for personal

adornment from the Mediterranean seashores to various Magdalenian sites in

France and in central Europe seems to indicate a wide-spread intercourse

among these nomadic hunters and a system of trade reaching from the coasts

of the Mediterranean and the Atlantic to the valley of the Neckar in

Germany and along the Danube in Lower Austria. Another proof of this

intercourse is the wide distribution not only of similar forms of

implements but of very similar decorations; as an instance, Breuil notes

the likeness of schematic engravings on reindeer horn in the two

primitive Magdalenian layers of Placard, Charente, to those found in the

Polish cavern of Mas̆zycka, near Ojcow, and to others in the corresponding

layers of Castillo, near Santander, of Solutré on the Saône, and of

various sites in Dordogne. A very distinctive geometric decoration on bone

is that of broken zigzag lines with little intercalated transverse lines,

which we notice at Altamira, in northern Spain, and which also occurs here

and there in Dordogne and in Charente and extends to the grottos of

d'Arlay in the Jura. Another style of ornament, with deep pectinate and

punctuate lines, found in the very ancient Magdalenian of Placard, also

occurs in the most ancient layers of Kesslerloch, Switzerland. Spiral

ornaments like those on the bone weapons of Dordogne, of Arudy, and of

Lourdes are found at Hornos de la Peña, in the Cantabrian Mountains. The

spread of analogous decoration is still more striking when we find it

occurring in the details of sculpture or in a certain type of dart-thrower

(_propulseur_), which extended from the Pyrenees eastward to the Lake of

Constance. Inventions like that of the harpoon and fashions like those of

the decorative _motifs_ were carried from point to point.

This influence does not lead to identity. Some of the phases of art and of

decoration are confined to certain localities; for example, the engravings

of deer on the bone shoulder-blades in the caverns near Santander, Spain,

are not duplicated in France; also there are numerous local styles

witnessed in the forms and decorations of the javelin, the lance, and the

harpoon; these variations, however, do not conceal the element of

community of culture and of similar fluctuations of industry and art

between widely distant stations.

Many Magdalenian stations were crowded around the sheltered cliffs of

Dordogne (Fig. 238). Besides these, we observe the Magdalenian sites of

Champs, Ressaulier, and the grotto of Combo-Negro in Corrèze; south of

Dordogne and Corrèze are other stations along the Garonne and the Adour.

Some of the finest examples of Magdalenian art have come from Bruniquel,

on the Aveyron, near the boundary between Tarn-et-Garonne and Tarn, where

no less than four important sites have been excavated.

[Illustration: FIG. 239. Necklace of marine shells, from the cave of

Crô-Magnon, mostly periwinkles, some related to species now living in the

North Sea, _Purpura_, _Turitella_, and _Fusus_. After E. Lartet. The

Crô-Magnon grotto dwellers used shells belonging to existing species,

while in the deposits at La Madeleine and Laugerie Basse fossil shells are

found. The use of seashore shells as ornaments in various parts of the

interior of Europe indicates that they were brought long distances in

trade. The remains of such ornaments were found with the skeleton of

Aurignacian age from Paviland, Wales. Necklaces were also made of small

plates of ivory and the perforated teeth of the cave-bear. One-third

actual size.]

The culture map of France in Magdalenian times is covered from north to

south with these ancient camp sites, either clustered along the river

borders, where erosion has created shelters, or in the great outcrops of

limestone along the northern slopes of the Pyrenees, where the exposure of

the limestone has led to the formation of grottos and caverns, or on the

plateaus where game abounded or flint could be found for the rapidly

declining flint industry. Near the Gulf of Lyons are the stations of Bise,

Tournal, Narbonne, and Crouzade; extending westward toward the headwaters

of the Ariège are La Vache, Massat, and the great tunnel station of Mas

d'Azil, formed by the River Arize; here the Magdalenian levels discovered

by Piette have yielded some of the most notable Magdalenian works of

art, including animal statuettes, bas-reliefs, and engravings with incised

contours.

Farther west, on the headwaters of the Garonne, is Gourdan, where Piette

began his remarkable excavations in 1871 and discovered two of the ancient

Magdalenian phases of sculpture; then comes the more westerly group of

Aurensan, Lorthet, and Lourdes, the latter a grotto which has yielded one

of the finest examples of the horse sculptured in ivory, and which has

since become famous as the site of a miracle and of modern pilgrimage.

Between the Garonne and the Bay of Biscay lie the stations of Duruthy and

the Grotte du Pape of Brassempouy, the latter occupied in Magdalenian

times, but best known as a centre of late Aurignacian sculpture of

statuettes.

To the northeast, in the very heart of the mountainous region of Auvergne,

is the station of Neschers, where a flow of lava from Mount Tartaret

descended over the slopes of Mont-Doré and covered a Mousterian industrial

deposit with its mammoth fauna and then, after a lapse of time, became the

site of a Magdalenian industrial camp, so that Boule has been able to

determine the geologic age of the most recent volcanic eruptions in

France, those of the Monts d'Auvergne, as having occurred between the

periods of Mousterian and Magdalenian industry.

In view of the frequent occurrence of Aurignacian and Solutrean camps as

well as of Neolithic stations in southeastern France, we are surprised at

the extreme rarity there of Magdalenian flint implements. However, Capitan

has recognized a Magdalenian station at Solutré, near the headwaters of

the Saône, and not far from this site is the station of Goulaine, which

has yielded an enormous flint scraper or anvil, the largest Upper

Palæolithic implement ever found; it is carefully chipped around the

entire curved edge and weighs over 4-1/4 pounds. To the north of the

Dordogne is the celebrated grotto of Placard, in Charente, where the dawn

of the Magdalenian industry has been discovered, and again directly north

of this is the grotto of Chaffaud, at Savigné, where the first engraved

bone of the 'Reindeer Age' was discovered in 1834; not far from this is

the shelter of Garenne, near St. Marcel (Indre), which has afforded a

fine figure of a galloping reindeer.

[Illustration: FIG. 240. Geographic distribution of the Magdalenian and

other Palæolithic stations on the upper waters of the Rhine and of the

Danube. The chief Magdalenian stations are: _Andernach_, _Bockstein_,

_Buchenloch_, _Gansersfelsen_, _Höhlefels bei Hütten_, _Höhlefels bei

Schelklingen_, _Hohlestein_, _Kartstein_, _Kastlhänghöhle_, _Kesslerloch_,

_Martinshöhle_, _Munzingen_, _Niedernau_, _Oberlarg_, _Ofnet_,

_Propstfels_, _Schmiechenfels_, _Schussenquelle_, _Schweizersbild_,

_Sirgenstein_, _Strassberg_, _Wildhaus_, _Wildscheuer_, and

_Winterlingen_. After R. R. Schmidt, modified and redrawn.]

These geographic and artistic records are of intense interest as carrying

the Périgord or Dordogne culture northward. Somewhat to the east, on the

headwaters of the Cure, a tributary of the Yonne, there is an important

group including over sixty open shelters formed in the Jurassic limestone,

in which characteristic Magdalenian bone implements have been found. Of

these the most famous are the Grotte des Fées, and the Grotte du

Trilobite, both of which were first entered by the Neanderthals in

Mousterian times and were again sought by the Crô-Magnons in Magdalenian

times. Passing still farther north, the Crô-Magnons visited the borders of

the Somme and sought the historic flint station of St. Acheul, which had

been frequented by races of men for thousands of years previous, back to

Pre-Chellean times.

To the northeast are the stations of Belgium, chiefly made known through

the labors of Dupont, distributed along the valleys of the Lesse and of

the Meuse and yielding characteristic Magdalenian flints as well as a

number of engravings on bone. We may be sure that this region was under

Crô-Magnon rule and that their control extended over into Britain, where,

it will be recalled, a Crô-Magnon skeleton was found at Paviland, in

western Wales. Here, again, in Magdalenian times the Crô-Magnon race was

probably wide-spread over southern Britain. At Bacon's Hole, near Swansea,

Wales, there is a wall decoration consisting of ten red bands, which,

according to Breuil and Sollas, may possibly be of Palæolithic age. More

definite is the Magdalenian industry observed at the Cresswell Crags, in

Derbyshire; while near Torquay, Devonshire, is the famous station of

Kent's Hole, discovered in 1824, in which a bone needle has been found and

several harpoons with double rows of barbs belonging to the late

Magdalenian industry.

[Illustration: FIG. 241. Reindeer engraved around a piece of reindeer

antler, from Kesslerloch, Switzerland. This is a unique instance of the

portrayal of landscape in Palæolithic art. After Heim. Slightly more than

three-quarters actual size.]

In Germany, whereas only three Solutrean stations have been

discovered,(29) there are no less than fourteen Magdalenian stations to

attest the wide spread of that culture. Thus the favorite grotto of

Sirgenstein, near the centre of the Magdalenian stations on the upper

waters of the Danube, although abandoned in Solutrean times, was again

entered by man during the early Magdalenian culture stage. Coincident with

the return of man to this great grotto was the arrival of the banded

lemming (_Myodes torquatus_), the herald of the cold tundra wave of life

in the far north. At the very same time man with the banded lemming

arrived at Schweizersbild, near the Lake of Constance; at a slightly

earlier period, with the dawn of Magdalenian culture, man entered the

sister station of Kesslerloch. It certainly appears that a cold moist

climate accompanying the Bühl advance influenced all the Crô-Magnon

peoples of this region just north of the Alpine glaciers and compelled

them to seek the grottos and shelters. There are, however, some open

stations in this general region, for example, at Schussenried,

Württemberg; the Magdalenian culture layer is not found in a grotto, but

lies under a deposit of peat mingled with the remains of the reindeer,

horse, brown bear, and wolf. Again, among the best-known sites along the

middle Rhine is the open-air station of Andernach. Demonstrating the

eastward distribution of the art of engraving on ivory and bone is the

presence in Andernach and in the grotto of Wildscheuer, near Steeten, on

the Lahn, of engravings of this character. Thus far these are the only

German stations in which such engravings have been found.

Of especial interest also is the open Magdalenian 'loess' station of

Munzingen, on the upper Rhine, because it proves that the highest layers

of the 'upper loess,' corresponding with the dry or steppe period of

climate, were contemporaneous with the advanced or late Magdalenian

industry, also because this final 'upper loess' stage about corresponds

with the period when the last of the arctic tundra mammals began to

abandon central Europe. It was at this critical geologic time that the

late Magdalenian culture began to draw to a close. Kesslerloch,

Switzerland, has yielded a considerable number of engravings on bone,

including one of the finest examples of a browsing reindeer (Fig. 241),

and Schweizersbild also has yielded a considerable number of rather crude

engravings.

Frequented in Magdalenian times was that part of the Swabian Jura lying

between the headwaters of the Neckar and of the Danube; along the course

of the Danube, from Propstfels, near Beuron, in the southwest, to Ofnet,

in the northeast, extend the other stations of Höhlefels bei Hütten,

Schmiechenfels, and Bocksteinhöhle.

West of the Danube the industry was carried into the present region of

Bavaria, as indicated by the recent discovery of Kastlhäng.(30) Here,

beginning with the early Magdalenian (_Gourdanien inférieur_ of the French

school) and extending to the middle or high Magdalenian (_Gourdanien

supérieur_), we find a complete series of Magdalenian stations; the middle

Magdalenian layer is of exactly the same type as that found in the Abri

Mège of Dordogne and in the lower levels of the Grotte de la Mairie; the

same culture stage is again observed in southern Germany in the stations

of Schussenquelle and of Höhlefels, and it extends eastward into Austria

in the station of Gudenushöhle as well as into several Moravian stations,

for example, that of Kostelík.

These facts are of extraordinary interest, for they show that the

civilization, such as it was, of the Upper Palæolithic was very widely

extended. This marks an important social characteristic, namely, the

readiness and willingness to take advantage of every step in human

progress, wherever it may have originated. At this point, therefore, it is

interesting to compare the Magdalenian industry of Germany with that of

France.(31) Germany shows the same technical and stylistic tendencies and

the same evolutionary direction as France. The mammalian life was, of

course, the same in both countries, for in each region the giant types of

mammals still survived, and the banded lemming of the arctic appears in

the sheltered valleys of the Dordogne as well as in Belgium and in

Germany. The vicissitudes of climate were undoubtedly the same; we observe

the alternation of cold moist climate in the early Magdalenian along the

upper Danube as well as in the early Magdalenian of the type station of La

Madeleine, Dordogne. Again, we observe the transition into the dry cold

climate in the steppe character of the fauna both along the upper Rhine,

at Munzingen, and also beneath the shelter station of La Madeleine, as

recorded by Peyrony.

More vital still for this community of industrial culture was the

community of race, for at Obercassel we find the same Crô-Magnon type as

that discovered beneath the sheltering cliffs of Dordogne. It appears

probable that the inventions of the central region of Dordogne travelled

eastward when we note the fact that none of the prototypes of early forms

of the harpoon which were common in southern France occur in any of the

stations of central Europe, but the single-rowed harpoon is characteristic

of the middle Magdalenian all over Germany. Other primitive Magdalenian

bone implements, such as the bone spear point with the cleft base, the

bâtons, and the needles, are also of rare occurrence in the German

stations. In late Magdalenian times, however, a complete community of

culture is established, for the industry of both countries in flint and

bone appears to be very similar: flint microliths appear in increasing

number and variety; beside the small flint flakes with blunted backs,

numerous feather-shaped flakes of Pre-Tardenoisian type are found, as well

as the types of graving flints. Some specialties of French Magdalenian

culture did not find their way into Germany; for example, the graver of

the 'parrot-beak' type has been found in France but has not been traced

far eastward. In both countries, however, are found upper Magdalenian

chisels of reindeer horn and perfected bone needles, bâtons, and harpoons

with double rows of barbs. On the other hand, works of art and decorative

designs in horn and bone are almost entirely wanting in German localities,

with the exception of the stations of Andernach and Wildscheuer previously

mentioned. In late Magdalenian times, both in Germany and France, we find

the Eurasiatic forest fauna becoming more abundant.

[Illustration: FIG. 242. Entrance to the grotto of Kesslerloch, near Lake

Constance. Photograph by N. C. Nelson.]

[Illustration: FIG. 243. The famous shelter station of Schweizersbild,

under a protecting cliff of limestone, near Lake Constance, Switzerland.

On the right stands Dr. Jakob Nüesch, who has devoted three years to the

excavation and study of this site. Photograph by N. C. Nelson.]

The two famous Swiss stations of Kesslerloch and Schweizersbild, near

Lake Constance, appear throughout Magdalenian times to have been in very

close touch with the cultural advances of Dordogne. Kesslerloch(32) has

yielded 12,000 flints of small dimensions, resembling in their succession

those of the type station of La Madeleine; also needles, single and double

harpoons, dart-throwers, bâtons, as well as the fine engravings mentioned

above; bone sculpture is represented here in the unique head of a musk-ox

(_Ovibos moschatus_), in carvings of the reindeer and of other animals on

the batons and weapons of the chase. Kesslerloch lies on the edge of a

moderately wide valley, traversed by a brook; in this sheltered,

well-watered, hilly region, the trees flourished and harbored the forest

animals, while the glaciers, retreating and leaving damp and stony areas,

were closely followed by the tundra fauna; the woolly rhinoceros and

mammoth persisted here longer than in other parts of Europe; the horse of

Kesslerloch is said to show resemblances to the Przewalski horse of the

desert of Gobi, in central Asia, and is consequently referred to the

steppe type. The development of the flints takes place step by step with

that of the sister cavern of Schweizersbild, and in early Magdalenian

times these flints are found associated with the arrival of the great

migration of the arctic tundra rodents, the banded lemmings (_Myodes

torquatus_). A hearth with ashes and coals and many charred bones of old

and young mammals, including the woolly rhinoceros, has been found here;

the animal life altogether includes twenty-five species of mammals, among

them the woolly mammoth, woolly rhinoceros, reindeer, and lion.

Less than four miles distant from Kesslerloch, in a small valley about two

miles north of Schaffhausen, is the other famous Swiss station of

Schweizersbild. The Crô-Magnons were attracted to this spot by the

protecting cliff of isolated limestone rock rising sheer from the

meadow-land, at the base of which is a shelter facing southwest, with an

entrance of about 30 feet in height, commanding a wide view of the distant

valley. In the accumulations at the base of this shelter we find a

complete prehistory of the human, industrial, faunal, and climatic changes

of this region of Switzerland from early Magdalenian into Neolithic times.

It was not until the true early Magdalenian, after both the Aurignacian

and Solutrean stages had closed, that man first found his way here during

the _Bühl_ advance, the period of the deposition of the _Upper Rodent

Layer_ with its cold arctic and steppe fauna;(33) but from this time the

grotto was occupied at intervals until full Neolithic times. The beginning

of these industrial deposits is estimated by Nüesch as having occurred

between 24,000 and 29,000 years ago, but we have adopted a somewhat lower

and more conservative estimate. In descending order the various layers of

this shelter, as studied by Nüesch, are as follows:

SECTION OF THE SCHWEIZERSBILD DEPOSITS

_Neolithic_

6. Layer of humous earth, between 15 and 19 inches in thickness,

containing Neolithic implements.

5. Gray culture layer, about 15 inches in thickness, including many

fire-hearths, ornaments of shell, polished Neolithic flints, and

unglazed pottery. The true forest fauna includes the brown bear,

badger, marten, wolf, fox, beaver, hare, squirrel, short-horned wild

ox (_Bos taurus brachyceros_), and reindeer, also the domesticated

goat and sheep.

_Upper Palæolithic_

4. Thin layer of forest-living rodents, principally squirrels. Split

bones and worked flints; no carvings in bone or horn; industry of late

Magdalenian or close of _Magdalenian_ Upper Palæolithic age; evidences

that climate was changing, steppe conditions passing away, and forests

becoming more dominant; only a few steppe species; the forest species

include the reindeer, hare, pika, squirrel, ermine, and marten.

3. Yellow culture layer, steppe period, rich in fire-hearths and

yielding 14,000 flints of _middle_ [? and late] _Magdalenian_ age;

engravings on reindeer antlers, ornaments of shells and teeth. Mixed

fauna with steppe and forest types predominant; of the few tundra

forms, reindeer very abundant and also arctic fox, but banded lemming

and other tundra types entirely lacking; steppe and desert fauna

includes the kiang, Persian maral deer, Pallas's cat (_Felis manul_),

steppe horse, and steppe suslik; of alpine type, the ibex; numerous

forest species, pine marten, beaver, squirrel, red deer, roe-deer, and

wild boar.

2. Arctic tundra rodent layer, 20 inches in thickness; period of the

_Bühl_ Postglacial advance; the banded lemming (_Myodes torquatus_)

most abundant, mingled with _early Magdalenian_ flint and bone

implements; one fire-hearth; abundant tundra fauna, including all

tundra types except the Obi lemming, and the musk-ox (_Ovibos

moschatus_) which is found in Kesslerloch; indications of a very cold,

moist climate; the banded lemming, arctic fox, arctic hare, reindeer,

wolverene, ermine, also such forest forms as the wolf, fox, bear,

weasel, and a number of northern birds.

1. Gravel bed and old river deposit, recognized by Boule as belonging

to the moraines of the fourth glaciation.

This wonderful deposit of human artifacts and animal remains gives us a

complete registration of the changes of climate in this region

accompanying the changes of culture and the development of the Magdalenian

race.

Turning our survey to the course of the Danube, we note that several

Magdalenian stations extend into the provinces of Lower Austria, chief

among them being both the open 'loess' station of Aggsbach, and that of

Gobelsburg; there is also the Hundssteig near Krems, better known as the

station of Krems, and the cavern known as the Gudenushöhle; in the latter

station the characteristic bâtons, javelins, and bone needles have been

found.[BB]

[Illustration: FIG. 244. The open loess station of Aggsbach, on the

Danube, near Krems. After Obermaier.]

The cavern district of Moravia attracted a relatively large population,

and among the numerous stations are the grottos of Kr̆íz̆, Žitný,

Kostelík, Bycis̆kala, Schoschuwka, Balcarovaskala, Kůlna, and Lautsch.

Near the Russian border bone implements like those of Gudenushöhle on the

Danube have been found at the station of Kůlna, and the industrial

stratification of Šipka is very clear. Not far from Cracow, across the

Russian border, the caverns in the region of Ojcow were entered by men

carrying the Magdalenian culture. Another site in Russia is the grotto of

Mas̆zycka, and characteristic Magdalenian harpoons, needles, and bâtons de

commandement with other implements have also been found to the eastward,

in the neighborhood of Kiev, in the Ukraine.

DECLINE OF THE MAGDALENIAN CULTURE

The highest point touched by the Crô-Magnon race in the middle or high

Magdalenian appears to correspond broadly with the cold arid period of

climate in the interval between the _Bühl_ and _Gschnitz_ advances in the

Alpine region, during which the steppe mammals spread widely over

southwestern Europe. The saiga antelope, for example, a highly

characteristic steppe type, is represented in one of the most skilful bone

carvings found in the late Magdalenian layers of Mas d'Azil; also the

steppe type of horse is frequently represented in the most advanced

engravings of late Magdalenian times. How far this cold, relatively dry

climate influenced the artistic and creative energy of the Crô-Magnons is

largely a matter of conjecture. The entirely independent records of La

Madeleine, of Schweizersbild, and of Kesslerloch concur in associating the

highest stage of Magdalenian history of art with the predominance of the

steppe fauna and evidences of a cold dry climate. That the mammoth still

abounded is seen in the mammoth engravings which are superposed on those

of the bison in Font-de-Gaume.

[Illustration: FIG. 245. Front and side views of a saiga antelope carved

upon a bone dart-thrower from the Magdalenian deposits of Mas d'Azil.

After Piette.]

The succeeding life period is that of the retreat of the tundra and

steppe mammals and of the increasing rarity of the reindeer and of the

mammoth in southwestern Europe; it corresponds broadly with the returning

cold and moist climate of the second Postglacial advance known in the Alps

as the _Gschnitz_ stage. With the spread of the forests and the retreat to

the north of the reindeer, the principal source both of the supply of food

and clothing and of all the bone implements of industry and of the chase,

a new set of life conditions may have gradually become established. If it

is true, as most students of geographical conditions and of the climate

maintain, that Europe at the same time became more densely forested, the

chase may have become more difficult, and the Crô-Magnons may have begun

to depend more and more upon the life of the streams and the art of

fishing. It is generally agreed that the harpoons were chiefly used for

fishing and that many of the microlithic flints, which now begin to appear

more abundantly, may have been attached to a shaft for the same purpose.

We know that similar microliths were used as arrow points in predynastic

Egypt.

Breuil(35) observes very significant industrial changes in closing

Magdalenian times: first, the beginning of small geometric forms of flints

suggesting the Tardenoisian types; second, the occasional use of stag horn

in place of reindeer horn; third, a modification in the form of bone

implements toward the patterns of Azilian times; fourth, the rapid

decline--one may almost say sudden disappearance--of the artistic spirit.

Schematic and conventional designs begin to take the place of the free

realistic art of the middle Magdalenian.

Thus the decline of the Crô-Magnons as a powerful race may have been due

partly to environmental causes and the abandonment of their vigorous

nomadic mode of life, or it may be that they had reached the end of a long

cycle of psychic development, which we have traced from the beginning of

Aurignacian times. We know as a parallel that in the history of many

civilized races a period of great artistic and industrial development may

be followed by a period of stagnation and decline without any apparent

environmental causes.

CRÔ-MAGNON DESCENDANTS IN MODERN EUROPE

We might attribute this great change, which affected all of western

Europe, to the extinction of the Crô-Magnon race were it not for the

existing evidence that the race survived throughout the

Azilian-Tardenoisian or close of the Upper Palæolithic. On the close of

the Palæolithic the race broke up throughout western Europe into many

colonies, which can perhaps be traced into Neolithic and even into recent

times. The anatomical evidence for this survival theory chiefly consists

of the highly characteristic form of the head.

In Europe a very broad face and a long, narrow cranium is such an

infrequent combination that anthropologists maintain that it affords a

means of identifying the descendants of the prehistoric Crô-Magnon race

wherever they persist to-day. Since Dordogne was the geographic centre of

the race in Upper Palæolithic times, is it merely a coincidence that

Dordogne is still the centre of a similar type? Ripley(36) has given us a

valuable résumé of our present knowledge of this subject. The most

significant trait of the long-headed people of Dordogne is that in many

cases the face is almost as broad as in the normal Alpine round-headed

type; in other words, it is strongly disharmonic; in profile the back part

of the head rises and in front view the head is narrowed at the top; the

skull is very low-vaulted; the brow ridges are prominent; the nose is well

formed; the cheek-bones are prominent, and the powerful cheek muscles give

a peculiarly rugged cast to the countenance. The appearance, however, is

not repellent, but more often open and kindly. The men are of medium

height, but very susceptible to environment as regards stature; they are

tall in fertile places, and stunted in less prosperous districts. They are

not degenerate at all, but keen and alert of mind. The present people of

Dordogne agree with but one other type of men known to anthropologists,

namely, the ancient Crô-Magnon race. The geographical evidence that here

in Dordogne we have to do with the survivors of the real Crô-Magnon race

seems to be sustained by a comparison of the characteristics of the

prehistoric skulls found at Crô-Magnon, Laugerie Basse, and elsewhere in

Dordogne, with the heads of the types of to-day. The cranial indices of

the prehistoric skulls, varying from 70 per cent to 73 per cent,

correspond with indices of the living head of 72 per cent to 75 per cent.

None of the people of Dordogne are quite so long-headed as this, the

average index of the living head in an extreme district being 76 per cent;

but within the whole population there are much lower indices.

The probability of direct descent becomes stronger when we consider the

disharmonic low-skulled shape of the Crô-Magnon head and the remarkable

elongation of the skull at the back. In the prehistoric Crô-Magnons the

brows were strongly developed, the eye orbits low, the chin prominent. The

facial type has been characterized by de Quatrefages(37) as follows: "The

eye depressed beneath the orbital vault; the nose straight rather than

arched; the lips somewhat thick, the jaw and the cheek-bones strongly

developed, the complexion very brown, the hair very dark and growing low

on the forehead--a whole which, without being attractive, was in no way

repulsive."

In southern France we observe a continuity not only of the head form but

of the prevalence of black hair and eyes. Why should this Crô-Magnon type

have survived at this point and have disappeared elsewhere? In order to

consider the particular cause of this persistence of a Palæolithic race,

we must, with Ripley, broaden our horizon, and consider the whole

southwest from the Mediterranean to Brittany as a unit.

The survival is partly attributed to favorable geographical environment

and partly to geological and racial barriers. On the north the intrusion

of the Teutonic race was shut off and competition was narrowed down to the

Crô-Magnon and Alpine types.

If the people of Dordogne are veritable survivors of the Crô-Magnons of

the Upper Palæolithic, they certainly represent the oldest living race in

western Europe, and is it not extremely significant that the most

primitive language in Europe, that of the Basques of the northern

Pyrenees, is spoken near by, only 200 miles to the southwest? Is there

possibly a connection between the original language of the Crô-Magnons, a

race which once crowded the region of the Cantabrian Mountains and the

Pyrenees, and the existing agglutinative language of the Basques, which is

totally different from all the European tongues? This hypothesis,

suggested by Ripley,(38) is very well worth considering, for it is not

inconceivable that the ancestors of the Basques conquered the Crô-Magnons

and subsequently acquired their language.

The prehistoric Crô-Magnon men would seem, therefore, to have remained in

or near their early settlements through all the changes of time and the

vicissitudes of history. "It is, perhaps," observes Ripley, "the most

striking instance known of a persistency of population unchanged through

thousands of years."

The geographic extension of this race was once very much wider than it is

to-day. The classical skull of Engis, Belgium, belongs to this type. It

has been traced from Alsace in the east to the Atlantic in the west. Ranke

asserts that it is to be found to-day in the hills of Thuringia, and that

it was a prevalent type there in the past. Verneau considers that it was

the type prevailing among the extinct Guanches of the Canary Islands.

Collignon(39) has identified it in northern Africa, and regards the

Crô-Magnons as a subvariety of the Mediterranean race, an opinion

consistent at least with the archæological evidence that this race came

into Europe with the Aurignacian culture, which was circum-Mediterranean

in distribution. Traces of Crô-Magnon head formation are found among the

living Berbers.

At present, however, this race is believed to survive only in a few

isolated localities, namely, in Dordogne, at a small spot in Landes, near

the Garonne in southern France, and at Lannion in Brittany, where nearly

one-third of the population is of the Crô-Magnon type. It is said to

survive on the island of Oléron off the west coast of France, and there is

evidence of similar descent to be found among the people of the islands

of northern Holland. The people of Trysil, on the Scandinavian peninsula,

are characterized as having disharmonic features, possibly representing an

outcrop of the Crô-Magnon type.

Our interest in the fate of the Crô-Magnons is so great that the Guanche

theory may also be considered; it is known to be favored by many

anthropologists: von Behr, von Luschan, Mehlis, and especially by Verneau.

The Guanches were a race of people who formerly spread all over the Canary

Islands and who preserved their primitive characteristics even after their

conquest by Spain in the fifteenth century. The differences from the

supposed modern Crô-Magnon type may be mentioned first. The skin of the

Guanches is described by the poet Viana as light-colored, and Verneau

considers that the hair was blond or light chestnut and the eyes blue; the

coloring, however, is somewhat conjectural. The features of resemblance to

the ancient Crô-Magnons are numerous. The minimum stature of the men was 5

feet 7 inches, and the maximum 6 feet 7 inches; in one locality the

average male stature was over 6 feet. The women were comparatively small.

The most striking characters of the head were the fine forehead, the

extremely long skull, and the pentagonal form of the cranium, when seen

from above, caused by the prominence of the parietals--a Crô-Magnon

characteristic. Among the insignia of the chiefs was the arm-bone of an

ancestor; the skull also was carefully preserved. The offensive weapons in

warfare consisted of three stones, a club, and several knives of obsidian;

the defensive weapon was a simple lance. The Guanches used wooden swords

with great skill. The habitation of all the people was in large,

well-sheltered caverns, which honeycombed the sides of the mountains; all

the walls of these caverns were decorated; the ceilings were covered with

a uniform coat of red ochre, while the walls were decorated with various

geometric designs in red, black, gray, and white. Hollowed-out stones

served as lamps. We may conclude with Verneau that there is evidence,

although not of a very convincing kind, that the Guanches were related to

the Crô-Magnons.(40) His observations on these supposed Crô-Magnons of

the Canary Islands are cited in the Appendix, Note V. We regret that

Verneau in his memoir(41) does not present his more recent views in regard

to the prehistoric distribution of this great race.

(=1=) Breuil, 1912.7, p. 203.

(=2=) _Op. cit._, p. 205.

(=3=) James, 1902.1.

(=4=) Heim, 1894.1, p. 184.

(=5=) Schmidt, 1912.1, p. 262.

(=6=) Fraunholz, 1911.1.

(=7=) Geikie, 1914.1, pp. 25, 26.

(=8=) Boule, 1899.1.

(=9=) Breuil, 1912.7, pp. 203-205.

(=10=) Obermaier, 1912.1, pp. 341, 342.

(=11=) Martin, R., 1914.1, pp. 15, 16.

(=12=) Verworn, 1914.1.

(=13=) _Op. cit._, p. 646.

(=14=) Breuil, 1912.7, p. 201.

(=15=) Lartet, 1875.1.

(=16=) Breuil, 1912.7, p. 213.

(=17=) Schmidt, 1912.1, p. 136.

(=18=) Breuil, _op. cit._, pp. 216, 217.

(=19=) Breuil, 1909.3.

(=20=) _Op. cit._, p. 410.

(=21=) Cartailhac, 1906.1, pp. 227, 228.

(=22=) Rivière, 1897.1; 1897.2.

(=23=) Reinach, 1913.1.

(=24=) Breuil, 1912.1, p. 202.

(=25=) Cartailhac, 1908.1.

(=26=) Capitan, 1908.1, pp. 501-514.

(=27=) _Ibid._, 1910.1, pp. 59-132.

(=28=) Breuil, 1912.1, pp. 196, 197.

(=29=) Schmidt, 1912.1, p. 116.

(=30=) Fraunholz, 1911.1.

(=31=) Schmidt, 1912.1, p. 154.

(=32=) Déchelette, 1908.1, vol. I, pp. 191-194.

(=33=) Nehring, 1880.1; 1896.1.

(=34=) Bayer, 1912.1, pp. 13-21.

(=35=) Breuil, 1912.7, pp. 212, 216.

(=36=) Ripley, 1899.1, pp. 39, 165, 173, 174-179, 211, 406.

(=37=) _Op. cit._, p. 176.

(=38=) _Op. cit._, p. 181.

(=39=) Collignon, 1890.1.

(=40=) Verneau, 1891.1.

(=41=) _Ibid._, 1906.1.