322 GENERAL VIEWS ON ARCHAEOLOGY. 



of bone, or of wood, there has not been found the smallest vestige of 

 any metal whatsoever, either of iron or even of bronze. Such is, for 

 instance, the piled locality in the littoral bog of the very small lake of 

 Moosseedorf, near Hofwyl, at two leagues from Berne, which has been 

 examined with great talent by Dr. Uhlmann, at Miinchenbuchsee. 1 

 Such is also the very extensive piling at Waugen in Lake Constance, 

 near Stein, discovered and examined by a very intelligent peasant ot 

 the place, who had been specially taught and directed by Dr. Ferdinand 

 Keller, the leader of the Society of Antiquaries of Zurich. It was also 

 Dr. Keller who published the first general essay on the lacustrine 

 habitations of ancient Helvetia, describing the piling at Meilen in the 

 Lake of Zurich, and who has thus-opened the path in this direction. 2 



The locality of Meilen presents the same assemblage of objects, the 

 same character as Moosseedorf and Waugen, and belongs therefore 

 also to the age of stone. But the presence of two specimens in bronze, 

 a paltry little bronze bracelet of great simplicity and a bronze hatchet- 

 knife of the lightest kind, proves that here the lacustrine establishment 

 of the primitive population lasted until the commencement of the in- 

 troduction of bronze into Switzerland. Meilen has also furnished a 

 very small number of stone hatchets with holes in them for handles, 

 articles which are entirely deficient at Moosseedorf, where stone hatch- 

 ets without holes are abundant, as also at Meilen. 



Elsewhere we have pile-works of the age of bronze in full develop- 

 ment. One of the most remarkable places belonging to this category 

 is situated in the Lake of Bienne, between Bienne and Nidau. It is 

 called the Steinberg by the fishermen, who have long known it, as 

 they have generally all these ancient pile-works, because they cannot 

 cast their nets in them, on account of their liability to be torn. The 

 Steinberg has been examined by the most active of the collectors in 

 Switzerland, Colonel Schwab, at Bienne. Another remarkable place 

 is the pile-work of the age of bronze at Morges, examined by M. 

 Forel. We may form some idea of the richness of these localities, 

 when we are told, that the Steinberg alone has contributed 500 bronze 

 hair-pins, and that at Morges have been fished up forty bronze hatchets, 

 without counting many other objects of the same metal. 



Lastly a ver} r recent discovery of M. Schwab's leads to the presump- 

 tion that there have been in Lake Neufchatel lacustrine habitations of 

 the age of iron. The indefatigable collector has found there, together 

 with the gallic sword of iron, hatchets of iron, shaped like those of 

 bronze, and which are evidently remains of the age of bronze, charac- 

 terizing the beginning of the age of iron. 



The existence of lacustrine constructions in Europe, after the intro- 

 duction of iron, is confirmed by the following narrative of Herodotus: 

 "The Pa3onians of Lake Prasias (probably now Lake Takinos, in the 



1 A. John and J. Uhlmann. Die Pfahlbanalterthiimer von Moosseedorf. Berne, 1857. 



2 F. Keller. Die Kelteschen Pfahlbauten en den Schwerzerseen. Memoirs of the Society 

 of Antiquaries of Zurich; 1854. 



F. Keller.' Pfahlbauten, Zweiter Bericht. Memoirs of the Society of Antiquaries, of 

 Zurich; 1858. 



See also the eighth article of Mr. Troyon in the Guide to Swiss History and Antiquity 

 Zurich, June 1858. 



