390 THE CONE OF THE TINIERE. 



relative position. The layer of the Stone Age was but slightly 

 interrupted, while that of the Bronze era was easily distin- 

 guishable by its peculiar character and colour. 



It must be confessed that the starting-point of this argu- 

 ment, viz. the so-called "Koman" layer, is far from being 

 satisfactorily determined. It is quite possible that tiles were 

 used in Switzerland before the "Koman" period; it is pro- 

 bable that they continued in use to a later period. The coin 

 found in the " Kornan" layer was so much worn as to be unde- 

 terminable ; it had, therefore, probably been long in use. M, 

 Uhlmann has also argued* that the bones found in the lower 

 layer are not such as we should expect to find in a Stone 

 Age deposit, since they are not so much discoloured as those 

 from the Stone Age Pfahlbauten, and all belong to domestic 

 animals. Only fourteen determinable fragments, however, 

 were found, and of these several probably belonged to a single 

 individual. Moreover, it would be very illogical to compare 

 the condition of bones from a peat-moss with those which 

 had been lying in a material such as that forming the cone of 

 the Tiniere. 



M. Morlot did not disguise from himself that there were 

 certain elements of doubt in the case, but on the whole it 

 seemed to him that the phenomena were so regular and so 

 well marked that he was justified in applying to them a cal- 

 culation, with some little confidence of at least approximate 

 accuracy. Making some allowances ; for instance, admitting 

 three hundred years instead of one hundred and fifty, for the 

 period since the embankment, and taking the Koman period 

 as representing an antiquity of from sixteen to eighteen cen- 

 turies, he obtains for the age of Bronze an antiquity of from 

 2900 years to 4200 years, for that of the Stone period from 

 4700 to 7000 years, and for the whole cone an age of from 



* Ueber Thierreste und Gebisstheil gefunden in den Schuttablage- 

 rimgen der Tiniere. Bern, 1858. 



