ANTIQUITY OF MAN IN EUROPE—-MACCURDY. 547 
as representing 2,000 years, the time required for the whole series 
of deposits is estimated at 24,000 years. The total time elapsed 
since the maximum advance of the Wiirm glaciation is still longer, 
30,000 years being none too high an estimate for it. 
When could Wildkirchli have been inhabited? It hes within the 
region of glaciation. It could not have been occupied during the 
Wiirm glacial period, because it is at a height of 1,500 meters, while 
the snow line of the Wiirm glaciation was only 1,200 meters. It is 
self-evident that man could not have taken up his abode above the 
snow line. Even during the Biihl stage of the glacial retreat the 
snow line was still as low as 1,500 meters. Man could have come 
there only after the Biihl stage. But after the Biihl stage we have a 
different fauna and flora; so that man must have inhabited Wild- 
kirchli before the last (Wiirm) glacial epoch, that is to say during 
an interglacial (Riss-Wiirm) epoch with climatic conditions simi- 
lar to those of the present day. 
During the last glacial epoch the Wildkirchli caverns were filled 
with ice or snow, and hence no deposits of any kind were formed. 
The sterile layer one-half meter thick at the top of the floor deposits 
represents the accumulation since the close of the glacial period. 
Tf we allow 30,000 years for post-Wiirmian times we must allow as 
much more for the last glacial epoch. Thus to reach the Riss-Wiirm 
interglacial period and man’s occupancy of Wildkirchli caverns 
would mean going back about 100,000 years. We have here an atypic 
late Mousterian, or perhaps lower Aurignacian, industry. 
An interesting feature in the development of our knowledge of 
cavern life is that pertaining to paleolithic mural decorations. 
These were first discovered in the cavern of Altamira, province of 
Santander, Spain, explored in 1879 by Sautuola. They were, how- 
ever, not accepted as authentic. About ten years later Léopold 
Chiron reported mural decorations in the cavern of Chabot (Gard), 
but the discovery was received with the same skepticism as that which 
befell the earlier announcement of Sautuola. With the discovery by 
Emile Riviére, in 1895, of wall engravings in the cavern of La 
Mouthe (Dordogne), the tide was finally turned in favor of their 
authenticity. Thereupon, other caverns were searched and revealed 
similar phenomena. In 1906 Francois Daleau announced the dis- 
covery of wall engravings at Pair-non-Pair (Gironde), and the fol- 
lowing year Félix Regnault found frescoes on the cavern walls of 
Marsoulas (Haute-Garonne). Since 1900 discoveries of this class 
are to be numbered by the dozen, and the literature has been en- 
riched by more detailed accounts of the cavern decorations discovered 
prior to the date in question. 
The cavern of Altamira, situated near Santillana, is a series of 
grand halls united by corridors. The entry is modern, being formed 
