CHAPTER XI.

MAN OF THE NEOLITHIC.

From the human bones found in peat-bogs and tumuli, man is represented as having a narrow but round skull, with a projecting ridge above the eyebrows, showing he was round-headed, his eyebrows overhanging, small of stature though stout, and having a great resemblance to the Laplanders. In many respects the race was much superior to that of the preceding epoch. Man advanced rapidly in the arts, and made great progress in civilization. He had passed out of the barbarous, and might be called a semi-barbarian.

_Habitations._--Man's habitation varied according to the locality. In the extreme south of France he continued for a considerable length of time to occupy the caves and rock-shelters; in Switzerland, the pile-buildings, and in Denmark he undoubtedly had rude huts placed close together and in proximity to the shell-heaps.

_Clothing._--Clothing also varied according to locality. Where the wild animals were numerous their skins were used--there being no incentive to substitute other material. Coarse material made of fibrous plants had come into use. The lake-dwellers clothed themselves with this material, and completely protected their bodies. They also used sandals for their feet, as these have been found with the usual indications of usage.

_Food._--Where wild animals could be obtained they were used, and the marrow of the long bones extracted. To this, fish and birds were added. In Denmark the principal food was the different species of the edible mollusk. In Switzerland a higher order and greater variety of food was used. The meat of the wild animals, birds, and fish was varied with bread made of barley and wheat, and fruit and berries. The meat was not only obtained from the wild animal, but they provided against the uncertainty of the chase by domesticating the boar, ox, sheep, and goat. The horse and dog were domesticated to assist in the chase, but sometimes served for food, probably during a famine.

If these people were cannibals, the evidence must rest solely on the human bones discovered at a dolmen near the village of Hammer, Denmark, which had been subjected to the action of fire. They were found together with some flint implements. But this evidence is not sufficient to lead to the conclusion that at the funeral banquets human flesh was used along with the roasted stag.

_Arts and Manufactures._--The flint hatchets of the refuse-heaps are generally of an imperfect type; the long knives indicate a considerable amount of skill; the bodkins, spear-heads, and scrapers are but little improved. In the latter part of this epoch, the various kinds of implements, especially in Switzerland, attained to a surprising degree of perfection, in so much so, it is difficult to understand how this was achieved without the use of metal. They were made into various shapes, and with the design of pleasing the eye.

Besides the various types of implements common to the different countries, the tribes of Denmark manufactured a drilled hatchet, which is combined in various ways with the hammer. A specimen of this type is represented in Fig. 16, now in the Museum of Copenhagen. It is pierced with a round hole, in which the handle was fixed. The cutting edge describes an arc of a circle, and the other end is wrought into sharp angular edges.

New inventions were brought into use. Among them was a comb which, according to shape, might be compared to the dung-fork of the American stables. Ornaments for the body, made of various materials were fashioned. Pottery was still in a rough state, though gradually improving. The loom was invented, and various kinds of cloth were manufactured. Also out of the fibrous plants cordage was made, which again was fashioned into nets for fishing. Many canoes at various places have been found, showing that they were not only used for fishing but also for carrying cargoes. Workshops were established, and there the stone implements were made and polished; one of these shops was at Pressigny.

Some idea may be had of the vast number of stone implements which occur, when it is considered that in the Museum of Copenhagen there are about twelve thousand, consisting of flint axes, wedges, broad, narrow, and hollow chisels; poniards, lance-heads, arrow-heads, flint flakes, and half-moon-shaped implements. In other collections in Denmark there are twenty thousand implements. The museum at Stockholm contains about sixteen thousand, and the Royal Irish Academy owns seven hundred flint-flakes, five hundred and twelve celts, more than four hundred arrow-heads, fifty spear-heads, seventy-five scrapers, and numerous other objects of stone, such as sling-stones, hammers, whetstones, grain-crushers, etc.[75] Some of these implements, however, may belong to other epochs.

War must have been carried on to a considerable extent, as fortified camps have been discovered in Belgium, at Furfooz, and other places. Their weapons were the axe, the arrow, the spear, and possibly the knife. These were wrought with great care.

_Agriculture._--Man commenced to till the ground in this age, and thus laid the true foundation of civilization. He probably was forced to do it. The beasts of the forest were gradually decreasing. They had nourished him in the infancy of his mind, and now he should begin to look to the soil, and by the cultivation of its products he must sustain his life. His principal implement of agriculture must have been the sharpened stick, pointed with deer-horn. He cultivated the cereals, made his corn-mill, and stored the grain for winter use.

_Burial._--How the colonists of the lake-dwellings disposed of their dead is unknown. In Denmark, and many other places, the dead were buried in dolmens or tumuli. A dolmen is a monument consisting of several perpendicular stones covered with a great block or slab. When it is surrounded by circles of stone it takes the name _cromlech_. The dolmens occur also in Scandinavia, France, and Brittany. They were formerly considered to have been Druidical sacrificial altars. They were usually covered over with earth, and in them were buried from one to twenty persons, accompanied with their implements. When a person died, the tomb was reopened to receive the new occupant. At such a time fire was used for the purpose of purifying the atmosphere of the tomb. In Brittany, in the vicinity of the tombs, there were set up in the ground enormous blocks of stone, that have received the name of _menhirs_, the most noted of which is that at Carnac. When these dolmens remain in the state in which they were left, still covered with earth, they take the name of _tumuli_. Comparatively few of the tumuli belong to the neolithic. In these, large numbers of bodies have been found, and none of them in a natural position, but cramped up and their heads resting between the knees.

Judging from the calcined bones, which are frequently met with at the tomb, it may be inferred that victims were offered during the funeral ceremonies, perchance a slave, or the widow. Lubbock is of opinion that when a woman died in giving birth to a child, or even while still suckling it, the child was interred alive with her.[76]

This hypothesis is substantiated by the great number of cases in which the skeleton of a woman and child have been found together. In the ceremonies at the tomb, some read the belief in a future state of existence. The evidence, however, is no clearer than that in the previous epochs. Man undoubtedly had such a belief, but science does not reveal it.