7. Seven objects like daggers, lance-heads, or knives, rudely
hammered, are also supposed to be of pure copper (Nos. 10 and 11).
The winged celt and the larger of the two swords are not noticed in
either of the reports of the various investigations, but I am assured
they form part of the same find; and, in corroboration of this, I find
they are included in a photograph issued by the authorities of the
Museum, purporting to be a representation of all the metal objects
from the Pfahlbauten.
[Illustration: Fig. 45.--LAIBACH. Nos. 14 and 15 = ¼, and the rest =
½ real size.]
_Objects of Wood._--A canoe 15½ feet long and 2½ feet wide was
pointed at both ends. Also a toy canoe. Fragments of a few dishes,
such as a large plate, a spoon of yew wood, and some bowls--one of
which is scooped out of a large round natural protuberance of a tree.
A few elongated pebbles rolled in birch bark. Portions of bast ropes,
and some coils of very fine carbonised linen threads.
Two remarkable machines ("Biberfälle") (=Fig. 46=), each constructed
out of one solid piece of wood, and having two movable valves in the
centre worked by projecting pivots resting loosely in corresponding
holes in the machine. These valves are freely movable when pushed
upwards, but this motion is arrested just a little short of the
perpendicular by the slanting shape of their posterior edges, so
that, when left to themselves, they always fall together, and never
backwards. The one here represented is in a very perfect state of
preservation; and the other, though now in a fragmentary condition,
clearly shows that in its structure it was precisely similar to the
former. These peculiar implements, though found at a little distance,
are considered of contemporary date with the lake-dwelling remains,
as they were in the same archæological stratum, and about the same
depth in the peat. The one here figured is made of oak, and measures
32 inches long, 12 inches broad, and 4 inches deep. The aperture, when
the valves are open, measures 9 by 5 inches. The most recent opinion
as to the use of these machines is that they were beaver traps--an
opinion that derives much probability from the extraordinary number
of the skeletons of this animal which have been found among the
food-refuse of the inhabitants of this lake-dwelling.
[Illustration: =Fig. 46.=--LAIBACH. Wooden machine, supposed to be a
Beaver-trap.]
Such machines are not absolutely new to archæology, and the little
that is known about them rather strengthens the opinion above given
as to their use. The first discovered to which attention was directed
in archæological journals was figured and described in 1873[32] by
Dr. Hildebrandt, of Tribsees, Neu-Vorpommern. It measures 29½ inches
long, and 6 inches broad at the ends, and has two movable valves in
the centre. It was found in a peat bog at a depth of 5 to 6 feet
below the surface, and is now preserved in the Museum at Greifswald.
Dr. Hildebrandt conjectured that it was some kind of trap for catching
fish.
In reply to Dr. Hildebrandt's notice of the machine found at Tribsees,
Professor F. Merkel, of Rostock, wrote to say[33] that two similar
ones were found in different parts of North Germany, which he
considered to be otter traps rather than fish traps. One of them was
found in the moor of Samow, near Gnoien, at a depth of 6 or 7 feet,
and is now in the Museum at Rostock.
[Illustration: =Fig. 47.=--Wooden machine, 3 feet long, from North
Germany.]
It is remarkably like the one from Laibach, and differs only in being
4 inches longer, and having three holes in the valves instead of two
(=Fig. 47=). A third[34] was found in a moor at Friedrichsbruch,
near Flatow, in the province of West Preussen, which was sent to
the Märkisches Museum. At no time within historical times were such
machines known to be in use, so that their function still remains
conjectural, unless the circumstantial evidence derived from the
Pfahlbau at Laibach decides them to be "Biberfälle."
While the proofs of the above remarks were still in my hands, I
received from Dr. Luigi Meschinelli, of the Geological Museum of the
Royal University of Naples, a copy of an article by him, entitled
"Studio Sugli Avanzi Preistorici della Valle di Fontega."[35]
The objects described in this memoir were found, in the course of
excavating peat, in a small valley which opens into Lake Fimon in
the vicinity of Vicenza. Among numerous industrial remains of man,
consisting of fragments of pottery, various implements of stone and
flint, a bronze celt, and a Roman coin of the time of the Emperor
Adrian, were three curious and novel objects of wood shaped like
small canoes. One of these machines--the best preserved, though not
the largest--is carefully described and figured by Dr. Meschinelli,
and from his minute description there can be no doubt it is another
example of the same apparatus which I have just described as having
been found in North Germany and Laibach Moor.
[Illustration: =Fig. 47=_a_.--Wooden machine from FONTEGA, 28 inches
long, with detached valves, and some worked sticks found along with
it.]
The body of the Italian machine was constructed out of one piece of
oak, and measured 28 inches long, 6¾ inches broad, and 2¾ inches
thick (=Fig. 47=_a_). The opening in the centre, which was closed by
two valves revolving on projecting pivots, and resting along their
axis in a deep groove cut on each side of the machine, measured 6½
inches by 3½ inches on the under side, so that this would be the
actual size of the aperture when the valves were open. Associated
with the machine, as will be seen from the illustration, were several
worked portions of sticks, evidently the _débris_ of some kind of
mechanism attached to it. Similar sticks were found along with the
Laibach examples. It will be observed that the dimensions of the
Italian one are a little less than those of the previously described
machines, but that in all other respects they are identical. The other
two found at Fontega were, according to Dr. Meschinelli, precisely
similar to the one he describes.
Among the organic remains from these peat excavations I find no
mention made of the osseous remains of the beaver, neither is this
animal included by Lioy among the fauna of the lake-dwellings at
Fimon. So far, therefore, there is no presumptive evidence that the
machines described by Dr. Meschinelli were _beaver-traps_. That,
however, the beaver frequented the Po valley during prehistoric times
we have positive evidence in the discovery of its bones in several
localities--as, for example, the terremare of Castellaccio (B. 457)
and Cogozzo (B. 389a).
Puzzled to account for these curious machines which so fortunately
attracted the attention of Dr. Meschinelli, he concludes his notice of
them thus:--
"A che cosa poteva servire questo oggetto? Era forse un modello per
costruire poi una piroga di dimensioni maggiori per utilità pratica?
Portata a queste dimensioni, serviva essa al trasporto, o meglio
quei congegni erano stati inventati a facilitare la pesca? Volle
invece l'artefice sbizzarrire il suo genio inventivo nel costruire un
trastullo cosi grazioso? E perchè allora costruirne due di eguali?"
It may be interesting to add that in 1859 a wooden machine, which
evidently comes under the same category as the above, was found in
a bog in the townland of Coolnaman, parish of Aghadowey, county
Derry, Ireland. It is figured in _The Ulster Journal of Archæology_
(vol. vii. p. 165), as an "antique wooden implement," which is thus
described by the editor:--
"It was discovered embedded in a solid bank of turf, at a depth of 4
feet from the surface, the bog extending to a great depth underneath.
No other article was found near it. It is entirely of wood, and
measures as follows:--Extreme length, 3 feet 5 inches; breadth across
the centre, 7½ inches; depth, 2½ inches; lid, 14 inches long
and 3½ inches broad; under hole, 12¾ inches long and 3½ inches
broad. The upper edges have evidently been higher on all sides, when
perfect--probably on a level with the lid or small door--or even
extending still higher, so as to form a kind of trough. The lid is
now somewhat narrower than the opening which it is intended to close,
but, no doubt, was made to fit accurately when in use. It moves up and
down on a hinge formed by two projections which lie in corresponding
hollows, and seems to have been opened and shut by means of a handle
inserted into a hole in its centre. These hinges have, no doubt, been
kept in their place by some part of the wood above them which is now
lost. From each end of the lid and on a level with its upper surface
there runs a hollow groove, sloping regularly downwards to the end of
the implement, and terminating in a hole which perforates the bottom,
seemingly for the discharge of a liquid. Towards each end are two
lateral holes placed opposite to each other, one in each lip of the
groove, apparently to receive a rope passed through them to serve as
a handle for removing the article from place to place. The under side
of the implement is flat, having in its centre an oblong hole (the
bottom opening of the cavity covered by the lid), which has all its
four edges sloped or bevelled.... Coolnaman, which gives name to the
townland, is a considerable hill, entirely cultivated, but surrounded
at its base by a bog of unknown depth, which evidently occupies the
site of an ancient lake. On the side of the hill where the implement
was discovered the turf has become quite solidified, and forms a dense
black mass up to the surface."
[Illustration: =Fig. 47=_b_.--Antique wooden implement from Ireland,
showing upper and under surfaces. Length, 3 feet 5 inches.]
In looking at =Fig. 47=_b_, which shows the upper and under sides
of this implement, it will be at once seen that it differs from the
Continental examples only by having one valve or lid closing the
central aperture instead of two. Neither the editor nor any of the
parties who had examined this curious machine at the time had ever
seen anything of the kind before, and no rational explanation of
its use has ever since been offered. One thought it was a fishtrap
intended to be placed in a river; another, that it was a kind of pump;
a third, that it was a machine for making peats; and a fourth, that
it was a cheese-press (_Ibid._, p. 289).
To find so many of these machines, of unknown use and so remarkably
similar in structure, in such widely separate districts as Ireland,
North Germany, Styria, and Italy, must be a matter of interest to
archæologists, and no one can say that the correct explanation of
their use is to be found in any of the suggestions hitherto offered on
this point. I may mention one element which may help in the solution
of this problem, viz. that all the examples from Italy, Laibach, and
Ireland were found in bogs that were formerly lakes. Perhaps this
is true in regard to those from North Germany, but the point is not
referred to in the short notices which have appeared of them. If these
machines are really traps they could only be used in water where the
animal could insert its head from below, and among amphibious animals
the _otter_ and _beaver_ are the only ones to which all the conditions
involved in the trap theory could apply.[36]
_Organic Remains._--In the report of the investigations for the year
1877 Dr. Deschmann gives the following analysis of the osseous remains
collected, which shows the relative frequency of the respective
animals:--
Individuals. Individuals.
Sheep, a horned variety 147 | Wild Boar 28
Stag 131 | Bear 18
Beaver 52 | Bison 17
Domestic Ox, with 48 pieces of horn 35 | Dog 16
Goat 31 | Roe 12
Badger 31 | Wolf 2 to 3
Marsh Pig 35 | Elk 3 to 4
Some of these bones contained crystals of vivianite, resembling
in this respect the osseous remains found on some of the Scottish
crannogs, especially that at Lochlee. (B. 373, p. 88.)
The _Bos primigenius_ is also represented by a portion of horn 21
inches long. The presence of hazel nuts with gnawed holes also points
to the existence of some small rodents, probably the dormouse. One
or two bones (metacarpal bone of a deer and an ulna of the bear) are
covered all over with groups of peculiarly-striated markings, as if
made with a file; but for what purpose, or whether the work of man or
of some rodent animal, remains a mystery.
There is also a considerable quantity of the bones of birds, the spine
bones of fish, jawbones of large pike, carp, etc., and a portion of
the shell of a tortoise (_Emis lutaria_).
Of human remains there are two skulls of adults, minus the facial
part, another of a child, a lower jaw, and a few bones of the
extremities.
Notwithstanding a minute search, no traces of any kind of corn have
hitherto come to light; but we must not therefore conclude that
the lake-dwellers were ignorant of agriculture and the ordinary
cereals, as grain is so apt to decompose unless it happens to be in
a carbonised state. It is, however, probable that the cultivation
of grain was not the chief industry of the colony, and that the
mealing-stones which were in such abundance must have been used
for grinding some other kind of food as well as grain, such as the
kernels of hazel-nuts and water-chestnuts. The water-chestnut (_Trapa
natans_), according to Deschmann, does not grow at the present time in
Carniola; nor has it ever, since the earliest botanical examination of
the country by Scopoli, been considered a native plant in the _Flora
Carniolica_. In the last century the monks of the Cistercian order,
at Sittich, cultivated it in their ponds. Pliny, however, distinctly
states that in ancient times it was used as a food. "Thraces qui ad
Strymona habitant foliis tribuli equos saginant, ipsi nucleo vivunt,
panem facientes prædulcem, et qui contrabit ventrem." (H. Nat., xxii.
10-12.)
Among the vast quantity of osseous remains there is not a single
fragment of the skeleton of the horse. On the other hand, it
is calculated that the deer is represented by no less than 500
individuals, and the beaver by at least 140. For the latter this is
a colossal figure, seeing that the richest station in beaver remains
among the Swiss lake-dwellings, viz. Moosseedorfsee, numbers only
eight individuals. The animal is now extinct in the country, nor has
it ever been mentioned in any of the historical annals of Carniola.