CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY i 57 



posed one upon the other in a section of a depth of about thirty feet, ten archaeological 

 strata proceeding from the Mousterian (two levels) to the Neolithic by way of the 

 Aurignacian (three levels), the Solutrian, the Magdalenian (two levels), and the Azilian. 

 Thus the classical seriation of cultural stages is no longer a matter of theory; it is a matter 

 of palpable fact (L' Anthropologie, 1912). 



Passing on to consider these stages in detail, there is, in the first place, not a little 

 new: info rmation that relates to the Mousterian epoch. Thus M. Comment has dis- 

 covered in the Valley of the Somme a well-developed Mousterian industry in conjunc- 

 tion with a warm fauna (Congres d'Anthrop. et d'Archeol. prehist., Geneva, 1912); thus 

 helping to confirm, we may note, the hypothesis of Professor Sollas, who, despite the 

 usual association of the Mousterian culture with a boreal fauna, is disposed to assign it 

 to the. interval between the last two glaciations. No less than three Mousterian cave- 

 occupations have come to light between 1910 and 1912 in the Island of Jersey, and the 

 fact that they occurred at a time when the bed of the Channel was sufficiently elevated 

 for Jersey to be joined to France (as is proved by the presence of a Continental fauna, 

 rhinoceros tichorhinus, reindeer, and so on) provides what may prove a useful datum for 

 solving the chronological problem (Archaeologia, 1911, 1912; Man, Nov. 1912 and 

 Bulletins de la Societe Jersiaise). Mr. Reginald Smith has called attention to an exten- 

 sive factory of Mousterian implements of an unusual size situated at Northfleet in Kent 

 in the middle-terrace gravels of the Thames; and it remains to be seen whether the 

 terraces of the Thames and Somme and the evidences of oscillation of the bed of the 

 Channel cannot be brought into some sort of correlation (Archaeologia, 1911). Finally, 

 the utilisation of bone in late Mousterian times found by Dr. H. Martin at La Quina in 

 Charente helps us to understand how the transition took place from the Mousterian to 

 the Aurignacian stages of culture (Recherches stir V evolution du M ouster ien dans le gise- 

 ment de La Quina, Charente, 1910). 



On the late Palaeolithic period, comprising the Aurignacian, Solutrian, and Magda- 

 lenian cultures, light continually pours in. Fresh sites are reported from almost every 

 part of Europe. In England, for instance, the Paviland cave at Gower in S. Wales, 

 already suspected to be Aurignacian (see Sollas, o.c. 213), has been proved to be so by 

 the discovery of characteristic implements, while even Aurignacian wall-paintings are 

 suggested by certain remains in Bacon Hole in the same neighbourhood (Times, Oct. 

 14, 15, 29, 1912); and Mr. R. Smith, more doubtfully, claims an Aurignacian age for 

 other English sites (Archaeologia, 1912). Here, however, it must suffice to deal in some 

 detail with the rapidly increasing extent of our knowledge of the evolution of late- 

 quaternary fine-art. In particular, the determination of the relative ages of various 

 typical sets of cave-engravings and cave-paintings has recently made great strides. 

 Whereas the contributions of the intermediate Solutrian period remain undetermined 

 (though it is certain that the Solutrians were not artists merely in respect to flint, as 

 witness the statuette of a mammoth in ivory discovered by Dr. Kriz at the Solutrian 

 station of Predmost in Moravia, see V Anthropologie, 1912, 273), 'yet there are clear 

 proofs that on the one hand such rudimentary graffiti as those of Gargas in Hautes Pyre- 

 nees are Aurignacian, and, on the other hand, that the far more evolved polychromes of 

 Font-de-Gaume in Dordogne, or of Altamira near Santander in the North of Spain, are 

 advanced Magdalenian (L'Abbe H. Breuil, "L'age des cavernes et roches ornees de 

 France et d'Espagne," Revue Archeol., 1912). A method, not yet fully given to the 

 world, of constructing as it were a stratigraphy of these works of art, consists in observ- 

 ing the superimpositions due to the fact that the ancient painters made light of utilising 

 an already occupied rock-surface. The cave discovered by Col. Willoughby Verner in 

 the Serrania Ronda in the South of Spain (see Saturday Review, Oct. 19, 26, 1912) is 

 destined to yield especially valuable results in this respect, having no less than a four- 

 fold mural palimpsest to show. Apart from engraving and painting, new forms of art 

 belonging to the late Pleistocene age are coming to light, the most notable being Dr. 

 Lalanne's discovery of sculptured bas-reliefs representing human figures, male and 

 female, at Laussel in Dordogne (L' Anthropologie, 1911, 257; 1912, 129); and the extraor- 



