PREHISTORIC TOMBS OF EASTERN ALGERIA. 399 



feet wide. The largest dolmen observed was covered by a quite regu- 

 larly oblong slab about nine and a half feet long and four or five feet 

 wide. There were but two side stones, but several at the end. It was 

 only about a foot above the level of the ground, and the interior was 

 about four feet deep and three and a half feet wide. In another the 

 lateral stones were nine feet long and over five feet high, with eight or 

 nine stones at each end. Others had a slab at each end. These may 

 have been modified at a later period, for the Komans had occupied this 

 valley, this region being a portion of the Numidia of Latin authors. 



The average measurements of the dolmens given by Bourguignat 

 are from one meter to 1.25 in length, 0.50 to 0.75 in breadth, and 0.60 

 to 0.80 meter in height. 



The dolmen-field, so far as time allowed us to observe it, was from 

 about eight hundred to a thousand yards long, and in width about 

 five hundred feet. The dolmens themselves were arranged irregularly 

 in lines about fifty feet apart, and the lines extended in an easterly and 

 westerly direction. Bourguignat states that the general orientation is 

 southwest and northwest, the four angles of the dolmens corresponding 

 to the four cardinal points. 



The rows of dolmens extend down to near the bottom of the valley, 

 to a point near the little hamlet of Boknia, which is built of stones, with 

 the pitched roofs thatched, and the rough walls not whitewashed, 

 though they often are in the well-to-do c douars.' 



The interior or floor of the dolmen consisted of a soft black loam, 

 and I set one of the Moors, whom we will call Mahmoud, digging up the 

 soil with his stick. He soon unearthed a human radius, some vertebrae 

 and a portion of a human skull, besides several specimens of the com- 

 mon European snail (Helix aspersa), of which more anon. 



It will be readily seen that the bodies of the dead in dolmens of the 

 dimensions of those of Algeria must have been bent or doubled up in 

 order to be buried. The dolmens of the land of Moab, east of the 

 Dead Sea, are also said to be small. On the other hand, those of France 

 and Holland are often twelve feet in length and in some of them a per- 

 son could stand upright. 



There were no traces of tunnels (allees couvertes) to be seen by us, 

 nor any indications that earth had been heaped over the dolmens, as 

 is frequently the case in Brittany. Bourguignat, however, states that 

 the dolmenic chamber was covered with a tumulus. On the other hand, 

 no tumuli are known to exist in Tunisia. 



In the time at our command it was not possible to examine the 

 whole cemetery, as the greater part of it was in ruins or overgrown 

 with the mastic or lentisk shrubs (Pistacia lentiscus) which yield the 

 gum-mastic. 



Moreover, many of the dolmens had evidently been destroyed, as we 



