^ 



"y/f'>"ii/^'TT^n\ 



After Sollas 

 A reindeer grazing, from the cavern of Kesslerloch, near Thayugen, Switzerland, engraved 

 on a shaft-straightener. This is a famous Magdalenian masterpiece and is reproduced in 

 about its original size 



which there seems to have been some painting but so far as known nothing 

 distinctive. 



In our day we are apt to think of decorative art as either geometric 

 or highly conventionahzed in design. This is especially noticeable in the 

 Museum's collection from the Plains Indians, and in the specimens of Peru- 

 vian cloth, Navajo blankets and Indian basketry. One looks almost in vain 

 for such technique among the works of Aurignacian and Magdalenian man. 

 It is true that there are occasional attempts at geometric forms on the walls 

 among the cave paintings, but these are far from being the ever repeated 

 series of true decorative designs. It is true that decorative design appears on 

 certain bone and ivory implements of the Magdalenian stage, but it is clearly 

 subordinate to and far less numerous than the pictorial engravings. One 

 may read in books that in the palaeolithic period man was very skillful in 

 realistic art, but pictorial not decorative art, while in the subsequent neo- 

 lithic period he did no drawing but contented himself with the elaboration of 



After Hay Laukester 

 Kestoratiou of a remarkable engraving on horn from the cavern of Lorthet. In many 

 respects this is the finest example of Magdalenian art. Wo si ill have however a trace of the 

 disregard of composition so characteristic of the whole period 

 294 



