ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF SOCIOLOGY, MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF
TECHNOLOGY, BOSTON, LECTURER IN ANTHROPOLOGY AT COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY,
NEW YORK.
Prehistoric archæology is possessed of a distinct advantage over
linguistics in the investigation of racial problems; for human remains
are often discovered in connection with the implements, utensils, or
trinkets by which the civilization of an extinct people is
archæologically determined. To attempt even an outline of the cultural
history of Europe would be obviously impossible in this place. It
would fill a complete volume by itself alone. Furthermore, the short
span of forty years since the inception of archæological science has
not sufficed to produce complete unanimity of opinion among the
leading authorities. Many important questions, especially concerning
eastern Europe, are still awaiting settlement. All that we can hope to
do is to describe what may be termed a few fixed points in European
cultural history. This, as in our discussion of physical origins,[B]
we shall attempt to do by means of definite propositions, concerning
which there is now substantial agreement.
I. _In western and southern Europe an entirely indigenous culture
gradually evolved during the later stone age. This was characterized
by great technical advance in fashioning implements, carvings, and
designs in stone, bone, ivory, and copper; by the construction of
dolmens and habitations of stone; by pottery-making; and possibly even
by a primitive system of writing._
A marked reaction has taken place during the last ten years among
archæologists respecting the course of cultural development in France.
It was long believed that after the first crude attempts of the
palæolithic epoch an extended _hiatus_ ensued, followed by the sudden
appearance of a more highly developed civilization, brought by an
immigrant broad-headed race from the East. Two waves of invasion were
described: the first bringing polished stone, a later one introducing
bronze, cereals, agriculture, and the domestication of animals. Not
even credit for the construction of the great stone dolmen tombs was
granted to the natives in Gaul, for these were all ascribed to an
invasion from the North. The undoubted submergence of the primitive
long-headed population of France by a brachycephalic type from the
East, to which we have already adverted, was held accountable for a
radical advance in civilization. Even the existence of a bronze age
was denied to this country, it being maintained that the introduction
of bronze was retarded until both metals came in together from the
Orient in the hands of the cultural deliverers of the land. The
absence of a distinct bronze age was speedily disproved; but the view
that France and western Europe were saved from barbarism only by a new
race from the East still held sway. It is represented by the classical
school of G. de Mortillet, Bertrand, Topinard, and a host of minor
disciples. The new school, holding that a steady and uninterrupted
development of culture _in situ_ was taking place, is represented
notably by Reinach[C] in France and by Sergi[D] in Italy. Their proof
of this seems to be unanswerable. Granting that it is easier to borrow
culture than to evolve it, a proposition underlying the older view, it
seems nevertheless that the West has too long been denied its rightful
share in the history of European civilization.
[Illustration: NEOLITHIC IVORY CARVING. Mas d'Azil.
(By special permission. Further reproduction prohibited.)]
A notable advance in the line of culture entirely indigenous to
southwestern Europe has been lately revealed through the interesting
discoveries by Piette at the station of Brassempuoy and in the grotto
of Mas d'Azil. Carvings in ivory, designs upon bone, evidence of a
numerical system, of settled habitations, and, most important of all,
of a domestication of the reindeer, of the horse, and the ox in the
pure stone age have been found; and that, too, in the uttermost
southwestern corner of Europe. In the lake dwellings of Switzerland,
as also in Scandinavia, a knowledge of agriculture, pottery, and the
domestication of animals is evinced, likewise as a native discovery.
From other quarters of the continent in the stone age comes similar
testimony to a marked advance of man culturally. The justly celebrated
carving of a reindeer from Thayngen, almost worthy of a modern
craftsman, betrays no mean artistic ability. The man who drew it was
far from being a savage, even if he knew no metals, and buried his
dead instead of cremating them. The evidence as to early domestication
of animals is perhaps the most startling. Carved horses' heads, with
halters and rude bridles, have been surely identified by Piette and
others.
[Illustration: BONE CARVING. Thayngen. (After Bertrand, 1891.)]
A system of writing seems also to have been invented in western Europe
as far back as the stone age.[E] Letourneau and Bordier have advanced
good evidence to this effect, although it is not yet incontestably
proved. The Phoenicians were perhaps antedated in their noted
invention by the dolmen builders, by the lake dwellers of the earliest
times, and, according to Sergi, also by the people of the Villanova
pre-Etruscan culture in Italy. In an earlier time still in the Po
Valley, as far back as the stone-age _Terramare_ period, pottery was
made, and that, too, of a very decent sort. And all this time there is
not the slightest evidence of contact with or knowledge of the East.
As Reinach says, in no dolmen, no lake station, no excavation of the
stone age is there any trace of an Assyrian or Babylonian cylinder, or
even an Egyptian amulet. Even the jade and nephrite found in western
Europe from Switzerland to Norway, which has so long been regarded as
evidence of early commerce with the East, he denies as proof of such
contact. The case thus put may perhaps be over-strenuously stated, yet
one can not but realize from it that western Europe has too long been
libeled in respect of its native aptitude for civilization. This is
not constituted of bronze alone, nor is its trade-mark cremation.
Thus, while an intensive outbreak of culture of a high order may not
have arisen west of the Alps, it can no longer be denied that the
general standard of intelligence was surely rising of its own native
volition.
II. _Throughout the eastern Alpine highlands, a culture far more
highly evolved than the neolithic one in the West, and betraying
certain Oriental affinities, appears at a very early time, a thousand
years or more before the Christian era. This prehistoric civilization
represents a transitional stage between bronze and iron._
In a secluded valley in upper Austria, close to the border line of
Salzburg, by the little Alpine hamlet of Hallstatt, a remarkable
necropolis was discovered more than a half century ago, which marked
an epoch in archæological research. Excavations at this place alone,
far from any present considerable seat of population, have already
revealed more than three thousand graves. The primitive culture here
unearthed, represented by all kinds of weapons, implements, and
ornaments, bore no resemblance to any of the then known classical ones
of the Mediterranean basin. Its graves contained no Roman coins or
relics. There was nothing Greek about it. It contained no trace either
of writing or chronology. It was obviously prehistoric; there was no
suggestion of a likeness to the early civilizations in Scandinavia. It
was even more primitive than the Etruscan, and entirely different from
it, especially in its lack of the beautiful pottery known to these
predecessors of the Romans. Little wonder that von Sacken, who first
adequately described it in 1868, and Hochstetter, who worthily carried
on his researches, believed that Hallstatt represented an entirely
indigenous and extinct Alpine civilization. On the other hand, so
exceedingly rich and varied were the finds in this out-of-the-way
corner of Europe, that another and quite different view seemed
justifiable. Might this not be an entirely exotic culture? products
gained by trade from all parts of the world, being here deposited with
their dead by a people who controlled the great and very ancient salt
mines hereabouts? Neither of these interpretations of this find at
Hallstatt have been exactly verified by later researches, and yet its
importance has not lessened in the least. By later discoveries all
over eastern Europe south of the Danube, from the Tyrol over to the
Balkan peninsula, as well as throughout northern Italy, Würtemberg,
and even over into northeastern France, the wide extension of this
civilization[F] proves that it must in a large measure have developed
upon the spot, and not come as an importation from abroad. On the
other hand, its affinity in many details with the cultures both of
Italy and Greece proved that it had made heavy drafts upon each of
these, profiting greatly thereby. The best opinion to-day is, that it
constitutes a link in the chain of culture between eastern and western
Europe. As such it is of primary importance in any study of European
origins.
[Illustration: BRONZE SITULA.