232 DISTRIBUTION OF THE SHELL-MOUNDS. 



trees grow. A good section of such a Kjokkenmodding can 

 hardly fail to strike with astonishment any one who sees it 

 for the first time, and it is difficult to convey in words an exact 

 idea of the appearance which it presents. The whole thick- 

 ness consists of shells, oysters being at Meilgaard by far the 

 most numerous, with here and there a few bones, and still 

 more rarely stone implements or fragments of pottery. Except- 

 ing just at the top and bottom, the mass is quite unmixed 

 with sand and gravel ; and, in fact, contains nothing but what 

 has been in some way or other subservient to the use of man. 

 The only exceptions which I could see were a few, very few, 

 rough flint pebbles, which were probably dredged up with 

 the oysters. While we were in this neighbourhood, we visited 

 another Kjokkenmodding at Fannerup on the Kolindsund, 

 which was even in historical times an arm of the sea, but is 

 now a fresh-water lake. Other similar deposits have been 

 discovered at various points along the Danish coast. Generally 

 it is evident that deposits of this nature were scattered here 

 and there over the whole shore, but that they were never 

 formed inland. The whole country was more intersected by 

 fjords during the Stone period even than it is now. Under 

 these circumstances it is evident that a nation which subsisted 

 principally on marine naollusca would never form any large 

 inland settlements. In some instances, indeed, Kjokkenmod- 

 dings have been found as far as eight miles from the present 

 coast, but in these cases there is good reason for supposing that 

 the land has encroached on the sea. On the other hand, in 

 those parts were Kjokkenmoddings do not occur, their absence 

 is no doubt occasioned by the waves having to a certain extent 

 eaten away the shore : an explanation which accounts for their 

 being so much more frequent on the borders of the inland 

 fjords than on the coast itself; and which seems to deprive 

 us of all hope of finding any similar remains on our eastern 

 and south-eastern shores. Shell-mounds, although probably 



