192 



NUMBER OF PILES USED. 



appear to have avoided the use of large trees, except in 

 making their canoes. Their piles were embedded in the mud 

 from one to five feet, and must also have projected from four to 

 six feet above the water level, which cannot have been very 

 different from what it is at present. They must, therefore, 

 have had a length of from fifteen to thirty feet, and they were 

 from three to nine inches in diameter. The pointed extremity 

 which entered into the mud still bears the marks of the fire 

 and the rude cuts made by the stone hatchets. The piles 

 belonging to the Bronze period, being prepared with metal 

 axes, were much more regularly pointed, and the differences 

 between the two have been ingeniously compared to those 

 shown by lead pencils well and badly cut. Moreover, a cut 

 by a stone axe is necessarily more or less concave, whereas 

 those made with metal are flat. To drag the piles to the lake, 

 and fix them firmly, must also have required much labour, 

 especially when their number is considered. At Wangen 

 alone M. Lohle has calculated that 50,000 piles were used ; 

 but we must remember that these were probably not all 

 planted at one time nor by one generation. "Wangen, indeed, 



was certainly not built in a day, but 

 was, no doubt, gradually enlarged as 

 the population increased. Herodotus 

 informs us that the Preonians made 

 the first platform at the public ex- 

 pense, but that, subsequently, at every 

 marriage (and polygamy was per- 

 mitted), the bridegroom was expected 

 to add a certain number of piles to 

 the common support. Fig. 163 repre- 

 sents a section taken at Eobenhausen, 

 section at Niederwyi. and shows two series of piles, one 

 over the other. The layer of ashes appears to indicate that 

 the settlement was burnt down, and subsequently rebuilt. 



FIG. 163. 



ZJ 



