THE CRO-MAGNON RACE
The evidence of the rocks points rather definitely to a clash between
the Cro-Magnons and the Neanderthals. There are places, such as the
valley of the Somme, where early Aurignacian retouched stones, probably
of Cro-Magnon working, appear below a layer of the latest Mousterian
implements, typical of the Neanderthals. The same is true of other
stations. This indicates that the Cro-Magnons held the station,
temporarily abandoned it to the Neanderthals and then repossessed
themselves of it.
A brief resume of the history of the stone implements will throw
light upon the problem. Of industrial and domestic implements, the
Pre-Chellean culture had the planing tool, scraper, borer, knife,
and hammer stone. The Chellean added to these the _coup de poing_,
or hand-stone, with its varied uses. The Acheulean brought this tool
to perfection, and added the chopper; the Mousterian added nothing,
but perfected the scraper. In the Upper Old Stone Age, chopper and
hand-stone disappear; the anvil stone comes in, and disappears after
the Azilian, while the others continue. The Solutrean adds the
polisher, the Magdalenean supplements with the lamp and the mortar.
This is the story in brief of the industrial implements.
Of weapons of war and the chase, the Pre-Chellean begins only with
the knife. The Chellean adds the hand-stone as a hand-axe and dagger;
the Acheulean brings on the throwing-stone and the point; these are
all appearing in the Lower Old Stone Age. In the Upper division, the
hand-stone disappears, while the Aurignacian includes the lance or
lance-knife, and the lance-head; the Magdalenean for the first time
shows the arrow point. Only the arrow-point and the knife persist in
the later stages of the Upper Old Stone Age.
No implements of art, sculpture, or engraving appear in the lower
divisions of the Paleolithic. Beginning with the Aurignacian, the
drill, the chisel, the etching tool, and the graver appear, and
continue until the end of the Old Stone Age.
Bone implements are not found until the Mousterian, when we have the
anvil and the awl. The Aurignacian brings in bone blades, javelin
points, spear points, needles, smoothers, wedges, chisel, and the
ceremonial staff; the Solutrean adds the dagger, fishhook, and harpoon;
the Magdalenean has the spear-thrower, shuttle, pin and wand. These
taper off at the end of the Paleolithic.
One of the chief sources of the change which swept over western Europe
was in the increased brain power of the Cro-Magnons, especially in
the development of the almost modern forehead and forebrain. Their
brains were capable of ideas, of reasoning, of imagination; they were
more highly endowed artistically than any uncivilized race which has
ever been discovered. The Neanderthals, except in the slow development
of symmetry in their implements, seem to have lacked the artistic
instinct entirely; the Cro-Magnon artistic capacity was nearly as great
as that of the modern races. They were apparently capable of advanced
education; had a developed aesthetic and religious sense; and were
organized into highly specialized communities.
One interesting thing about the Europe of the Upper Old Stone Age is
that there were at least five differing races in it at the same time.
There were, first, the Grimaldi negroids; secondly, the Cro-Magnons,
noted for their artistic ability; thirdly, the Brunn race, probably
entering Europe directly from Asia through Hungary; fourthly, a
long-headed race with a narrow face, perhaps forerunners of the
Neolithic or polished stone invasion; fifthly, the Furfooz or Grenelle
race, very broad-headed, entering Europe probably from central Asia,
bringing the Azilian industry already developed. There may have been
other races. All of this happened in the last 25,000 years.
During Aurignacian times, France was still connected with England by a
broad land highway; the British Isles were united to each other. The
Aurignacian life, which was chiefly Cro-Magnon, centered in grottoes
or caverns. Throughout western Europe the climate was still dry and
chilly; in the Postglacial period, now commencing, there were three
Postglacial advances of the Alps ice-caps, although there was no great
glacial period. In addition to the caverns, there were a few notorious
open camps, such as the one at Solutre, the famous hunting station for
wild horse, which gave its name to the Solutrean culture. The remains
of 100,000 skeletons of horses have been located here. These wild
horses here and elsewhere were not bred and reared by men, as far as
the evidence goes; they were hunted for food. It was the far East, not
Europe, which discovered that the horse could be used as a beast of
burden.
In 1823 the first Cro-Magnon skeleton was discovered, in the Paviland
cave, in western Wales. The bones were stained red. This was long
called the “Red Lady”; it is identified now as a Cro-Magnon male. In
1852, seventeen skeletons were discovered at Aurignac, in France;
these gave the name to the culture. In 1868, in Cro-Magnon, in the
Dordogne, France, portions of five skeletons were unearthed; these
gave the name to the race. A number of subsequent discoveries have
been made, including the fourteen skeletons in the Grimaldi grottoes.
The race was exceptionally tall; the face was broad, the eye-orbits
long and narrow; the skull was long and large, with marked brain
capacity, indicating that here was a high racial type belonging to
_Homo sapiens_. The head is disharmonic, that is, long and at the
same time broad across the face. The upper part of the face is almost
vertical, as in modern races. The men of this race varied from 5
feet 11 inches to 6 feet 4; the women were noticeably shorter. With
an average male height well over six feet, it may well be said that
“there were giants in those days.” The shin-bones were long, indicating
fleetness of foot. The flattened form of this bone indicates that the
men were used to squatting, while engaged in industrial occupations.
The long leg and strong thigh bone are both typical of a hunting race.
The shoulders were broad, the arms relatively short. The race, with a
cranial capacity averaging 1,800 c. cm., was one of the finest that the
world has ever seen. The appearance of the face most resembles tribes
living today north and south of the Himalayas. The characteristics were
definitely Asiatic rather than African.
In 1909 O. Hauser discovered, in the shelter of Combe-Capelle, a
skeleton which has been called the Aurignacian man. The height is only
5 feet 3 inches. In many characteristics it resembles the Cro-Magnon;
and, until further evidence is adduced, it may be best included as a
transition type of the Cro-Magnons.
The burial customs during the Aurignacian times were decidedly quaint.
The use of color to paint the skeletons, as in the Paviland skeleton
found in Wales, is characteristic. The Grimaldi infant skeletons are
not colored, but are accompanied by a vast number of small perforated
shells, evidently forming a sort of burial mantle. The female skeleton
here was wrapped in a bed of unperforated shells; the legs were
extended, the arms stretched beside the body. One of the large male
skeletons had legs extended and arms folded, and was decorated with a
crown of perforated shells. Another rested on its left side, with the
limbs slightly flexed, the forearm folded, and the head decorated with
a circle of perforated stones colored red. Other skeletons have been
found in a layer of red earth containing iron; two of these skeletons
rest on the left side, the limbs extended or slightly flexed, and with
shells in abundance surrounding the forehead, chest, and one limb.
The ornaments, weapons, and, in some cases, food placed beside these
bodies, indicated some sort of belief in survival of existence. The
use of color points to its probable use as a decoration for the bodies
while alive.
The Aurignacian marks the beginning of definite art. The art products
of this and succeeding ages range from the primitive mammoth, painted
in red ochre in the cavern of Pindal, showing only two limbs, to the
exquisite tinted bisons on the ceiling of Altamira, Spain, representing
a high stage of art, in which four colors were used. There were
drawings in all stages of completion, and carved figurines in talc,
limestone, and, soapstone. Elaborate carvings were made on reindeer
horn. Human skulls were shaped into drinking cups. There is a marked
similarity between the human figures and primitive African art, which
lends color to the theory that the Cro-Magnon people traveled along the
north shore of Africa, bringing with them the Aurignacian industry,
which may have been modified along the route by contact with African
sources. Small carved figures similar to the Aurignacian, especially
representations of the female form, are found in baked clay along
the valley of the Nile. These figurines have in common the great
development of the parts connected with maternity, and in some cases a
headdress similar to early Egyptian art. There are many silhouettes
of hands on the walls of these grottoes, of which a large number are
mutilated in one or more fingers.
Above the Aurignacian culture came the Solutrean. In the west of
Europe, during this period, were the Cro-Magnons; in the east, were the
men of Brunn. In 1871 a skullcap was discovered at Brux, in Bohemia; in
1891 a skeleton, evidently belonging to the same race, was discovered
at Brunn, in Moravia, deeply embedded. These are of a much lower type
than the Cro-Magnons; but, differing sharply from the Neanderthals,
are entitled to be regarded as members of _Homo sapiens_. The Predmost
“mammoth hunters,” remains of twenty of whom were excavated in 1880 in
Moravia, also belong to this race. The Solutrean industry, carried on
by both Brunn and Cro-Magnon men, brought to its highest development
the art of chipping flints. The famous laurel-leaf points, thin and
exquisitely shaped, are characteristic of this culture. This culture
apparently came from the east, from Asia, just as the Aurignacian
apparently entered Europe from the south, along the northern coast of
Africa and the northern coast of the Mediterranean. In purely artistic
work this period does not rank as high as the Aurignacian; the chief
energy apparently went to the fashioning of flint weapons. At the same
time, artistic advance can be discovered.
The Solutrean was succeeded by the Magdalenean period, the most
fascinating of all the stages of the Old Stone Age. This period marks
the height of Paleolithic civilization; it marks the crest of the
development of the Cro-Magnons, prior to their sudden decline and
disappearance as the dominant type in western Europe. The men of
this time are commonly known as the Magdaleneans, taking their name
from the typical culture station of La Madeleine, France. The period
probably reached from 16,000 B.C. onward. There are elaborately
decorated javelin points of bone, fitted for attachment to a wooden
shaft. The art of the period is the culmination of the art begun in the
Aurignacian and continued through the Solutrean. We find numberless
representations both of individual animals and of herds. Most
frequently the subjects chosen were the bison, mammoth, wild horse,
reindeer, wild cattle, deer, and rhinoceros; less often the ibex,
wild boar, and wolf appear; there are hardly ever pictures of fishes
or of plant life. We find the lion and the bear, but not the hyena,
now disappearing from Europe. The elaborate carved wands, made of
reindeer horn, point to a tribal organization. It is possible that the
tribesmen were specialized into chieftains, priests, and medicine men,
hunters, fishermen, flintworkers, hide-dressers, makers of clothing
and footwear, makers of ornaments, engravers, sculptors in wood, bone,
ivory, and stone, artists with color and brush, and numerous other
pursuits. A strong sense of truth animated their artistic work, as well
as a distinct feeling for beauty.
The human remains of the time are predominantly Cro-Magnon, of a
modified type. The height of the race has grown much less; this may
have been due to the severe climatic conditions of the Postglacial Era.
New features creep into the burial ceremony, such as the separation of
the head from the body. Elaborate bone harpoons, at first barbed on
one side only, later on both sides, have been found widespread. Flint
blades with toothed edges, elaborate bone needles, are often located;
but toward the end of the period, the workmanship of these degenerates.
But no primitive art has touched the Magdalenean at its height. Herds
are pictures, with detailed study of the first and last animal,
and symbolic horns or heads for the remainder. There are elaborate
frescoes, showing great processions of mammoths, bison, reindeer, and
horse. The cavern of Altamira, in northern Spain, is in many ways the
most remarkable of all the Magdalenean stations.
And then there was a sudden decline. We cannot with any certainty
fix upon the cause; the psychic circle of growth, maturity, and
decline, may have run its course. There is no distinct environmental
alteration, which can be held responsible. The race did not disappear;
it apparently broke up into many colonies, which can perhaps be traced
through Neolithic and even recent times. The shape of the Cro-Magnon
head, long and with a broad face, the type known as disharmonic, is
still found in the region around Dordogne, France, today. These people
are not degenerate in any particular; they are keen and alert. It is
quite possible that these people of Dordogne today represent by far
the oldest race living in western Europe; it is a significant fact
that the oldest speech spoken in Europe, the Basque among the northern
Pyrenees, is spoken near by, within two hundred miles. Authorities
suggest a possible connection between the Basque language, different
from all the other tongues of Europe, and the vanished language of the
Cro-Magnons. Ripley suggests that it is not inconceivable that the
ancestors of the Basques conquered the Cro-Magnons dwelling there, and
took over in whole or in part their ancient speech.
Among other localities where the skulls resemble the Cro-Magnon are
certain portions of Thuringia, and the recently extinct race of
Guanches of the Canary Islands. Such skulls have been discovered in
northern Africa, among living Berbers. But the chief centers of modern
heads resembling the Cro-Magnons are the Dordogne region, at Landes
near the Garonne in southern France, at Lannion in Brittany, where a
third of the population are of the Cro-Magnon type, and on the island
of Oleron off the west coast of France. Perhaps the inhabitants of
Trysil, on the Scandinavian peninsula, who show the same disharmonic
features, are an offshoot of the Cro-Magnons.
It may be worth while to look for a moment at the vanished Guanches of
the Canary Islands, who were conquered by Spain in the 15th Century.
The average height was over six feet for the males, and less for the
females. The heads had points of resemblance to the Cro-Magnons.
The offensive weapons in warfare consisted of three stones, a club,
and several stone knives; the defensive weapon was a simple lance.
They also used wooden swords with great skill. They lived in large,
well-sheltered caverns, whose walls were always decorated. The ceilings
were covered with red ochre, the sidewalls with various geometric
designs in red, black, gray, and white. Hollowed-out stones served as
lamps. Here is surely evidence of kinship to the vanished Cro-Magnons.