258 



NATURE 



[January 13 1898 



of the knife, with its steel back, had doubtless been used along 

 with the flint for the purpose of obtaining fire, as in Neolithic 

 times a similar office was discharged by flint and a nodule of 

 pyrites. These accompaniments of the Australian interments 

 show that men in a lower grade of culture and intellectual power 

 utilise, as opportunity offers, objects representing a much higher 

 civilisation. It is possible, therefore, that some of the mixed 

 interments ascribed to the Bronze Age may be the graves of 

 Neolithic men who, in conjunction with articles of their own 

 manufacture, had employed the material introduced by a bronze- 

 using race, with whom they had been brought in contact, and 

 whose usages ihey had more or less imitated. 



That the inhabitants of prehistoric Scotland were not a 

 homogeneous people, but exhibited diff'erent types in their 

 physical configuration, so as to justify the conclusion that they 

 were not all of the same race, has long been accepted by 

 archreologists. The first observer who made a definite state- 

 ment, based on anatomical data, was the late Sir Daniel Wilson, 

 in his well-known "Prehistoric Annals of Scotland," Whilst 

 admitting that the material at his disposal was scanty, he 

 thought that he was justified in stating that the primitive race in 

 Scotland possessed an elongated dolichocephalic head, which 

 he termed boat shaped, or kumbecephalic. This race, he said, 1 

 was succeeded by a people with shorter and wider skulls, which 

 possessed brachycephalic proportions. Further, he considered 

 that both these races preceded the intrusion of the Celtre into 

 Scotland. But the evidence is by no means satisfactory that the 

 interments from which Wilson obtained the long kumbecephalic 

 skulls were of an older date than those which yielded the 

 brachycephalic specimens. So far, therefore, as rests upon 

 these data, one cannot consider it as proved that a long-headed 

 race preceded a broad-headed race in Scotland, and that both 

 were antecedent to the Celtre. 



Evidence from other quarters must be looked for, especially 

 from the extensive researches of Thurnam, Greenwell, RoUeston 

 and other archaeologists into prehistoric interments in England ; 

 and by the study of the material which has accumulated in 

 Scotland since the publication of Sir Daniel Wilson's "Pre- 

 historic Annals." 



The remains of prehistoric man in England subsequent to the 

 Palaeolithic Age have for the most part been found in mounds 

 and tumuli, some of which were very elongated in form, others 

 more rounded, so that they have been divided into the two 

 groups of Long and Round barrows. There is a consensus of 

 opinion that the long barrows were constructed by a race which 

 inhabited England prior to the construction of the round bar- 

 rows. The long barrows are indeed the most ancient sepulchral 

 monuments in South Britain ; obviously they were erected 

 before the use of bronze or other metal became known to the 

 people. They belonged, therefore, to the Neolithic Age, as is 

 testified by the implements and weapons found in them being 

 formed of stone, flint, bone and horn, and by the absence of 

 metals. They are not widely distributed in England, but are 

 found especially in a few counties in the north,, as Yorkshire 

 and Westmorland, and in the western counties in the .south. 

 The builders of these barrows in their interments practised both 

 inhumation and cremation, but the burnt bones were never 

 found in urns. 



The study of the human remains obtained from the English 

 long barrows by Drs. Thurnam and Rolleston proves that the 

 crania were distinctly dolichocephalic, and that the height was 

 greater than the breadth. Those measured by Dr. Thurnam 

 gave a mean length-breadth index 71 4, whilst Dr. Rolleston's 

 series were 72 "6. 



The round barrows were constructed by a bronze-using 

 people. The crania obtained in them were, as a rule, brachy- 

 cephalic. Of twenty-five skulls mea.sured by Dr. Thurnam 

 seventeen had the length-breadth index 80 and upwards, and 

 in six of these the index was 85 and upwards. Only four were 

 dolichocephalic, whilst in three the index ranged from 77 to 79- 

 In the brachycephalic skulls the height was less than the breadth. 

 As similar physical conditions prevailed both in England and 

 Scotland during the Polished Stone and Bronze periods, there 

 is a strong presumption that the two races had, in succession to 

 each other, migrated from South to North Britain. Un- 

 fortunately very few skulls have been preserved which can with 

 certainty be ascribed to Neolithic man in Scotland, but those 

 that have been examined from Papa Westray, the cairn of Get 

 and Oban, are dolichocephalic, and doubtless of the same race 

 as the builders of the English long barrows. 



Seventeen skulls from interments belonging to the Bronze 

 period have been examined by the author. The mean length- 

 breadth index of twelve was 81 "4, and the highest index was 

 88 "6. In each skull the height was less than the breadth. In 

 the other five specimens the mean index was 74 ; the majority, 

 therefore, were brachycephalic. In only one specimen was the 

 jaw prognathic ; the nose was almost always long and narrow; 

 the upper border of the orbit was, as a rule, thickened, and 

 the height of the orbit was materially less than the width. 

 The capacity of the cranium in three men ranged from 1380 to 

 1555 c.c. ; the mean being 1462 c.c. In stature the Bronze 

 men were somewhat taller than Neolithic men. The thigh 

 bones of the Bronze Age skeletons gave a mean platymeric 

 index 75 "i, materially below the average of 81 8 obtained by 

 Dr. Hepburn from measurements of the femora of modern 

 Scots. ' The tibiae of the same skeletons gave a mean platy- 

 knemic index 68"3 ; intermediate, therefore, between their 

 Neolithic predecessors and the present inhabitants of Britain. 

 Many of the tibite also possessed a retroverted direction of 

 the head of the bone ; but the plane of the condylar articular 

 surfaces was not thereby affected, so that the backward direction 

 of the head exercised no adverse influence on the assumption 

 of the erect attitude. 



Whilst in England the Bronze Age round barrows are numerous 

 and the burials in short cists are comparatively rare, in Scotland 

 the opposite prevails. Whilst part of Dr. Thurnam's aphorism, 

 viz. " long barrows, long skulls," applies to both countries, 

 the remaining part, "short barrows, short skulls," should be 

 modified in Scotland to " short cists, short or round skulls." 



The presence of dolichocephalic skulls in the interments of 

 the Bronze Age shows that the Neolithic people had commingled 

 with the brachycephalic race. Similarly the Bronze men, 

 though subject to successive in%asions by Romans, Angles, and 

 Scandinavians, have persisted as a constituent element of the 

 people of Great Britain. The author has found a strong brachy- 

 cephalic admixture in the crania of modern Scots, in Fife, the 

 Lothians, Peebles, and as far north as Shetland. In 116 speci- 

 mens measured, 29, i.e. one-quarter, had a length-breadth 

 index 80 and upwards, and in five of these the index was more 

 than 85. 



The question has been much discussed whether the people of 

 the Polished Stone Age were descended from the men of the 

 Ruder Stone Age, or were separated from them by a distinct 

 interval of time. The latter view has been supported by Prof. 

 Boyd Dawkins, who contends that there is a great zoological 

 break between the fauna of the Palaeolithic, Pleistocene period 

 and that of the Neolithic Age, and that the two periods are 

 separated from each other by a revolution in climate, geography 

 and animal life.- 



Undoubtedly many large characteristic mammals of the 

 Palaeolithic fauna had entirely disappeared from Britain and 

 western Europe, but some nine or ten species, as the otter, 

 wolf, wild cat, wild boar, stag, roe, urus and horse, were con- 

 tinued into the Neolithic period ; at which time the dog, small 

 ox, pig, goat, and perhaps the sheep, as is shown by their 

 osseous remains, were also naturalised in Britain. The continuity 

 of our island with the continent by intermediate land, which 

 existed during Palaeolithic times, also became severed, and a 

 genial temperate climate replaced more or less arctic conditions. 

 Man, however, possesses a power of accommodation, and of 

 adapting himself to changes in his environment, such as is not 

 possessed by a mere animal. The locus of an animal is regu- 

 lated by the climate and the nature of the food, so that a 

 change of climate, which would destroy the special food on 

 which an animal lives, would lead to the extinction of the 

 animal in that locality. Man, on the other hand, is omni- 

 vorous, and can sustain himself alike on the flesh of seals, 

 whales and bears in the Arctic circle, and on the fruits which 

 ripen under a tropical sun. Man can produce fire to cook his 

 food and to protect himself from cold, and can also manufacture 

 clothing when necessary. Palaeolithic man has left evidence 

 that he had the capability to improve, for the cave men were 

 undoubtedly in advance of the men who made the flint im- 

 plements found in the river drifts. The capacity of the few 

 crania of Palaeolithic man which have been preserved is quite 

 equal to, and in some cases superior to that of modern savages. 

 So far as regards the implements which he manufactured and 



1 Journal of A u at. and Phys., October 1896, vol. xxxi. 



2 " Cave Hunting, and Journal oi Anthropological Institute," vol. xxiii., 

 February 1894. 



NO. 1472, VOL. 57] 



