482 



NATURE 



[August 16, 191 7 



There are many other interesting- features in 

 the pocket-book, amongst which may be mentioned 

 the tables of meteorological data, a description of 

 compass errors and their elimination, scouting and 

 signalling, a glossary of aeronautical terms, and a 

 bibliography of aeronautics. The pocket-book 

 makes a good beginning at collecting the skeleton 

 tables and formulae of the aeronautical industry, 

 and may be expected to grow and keep pace with 

 the text-books of the day. 



(3) This book, one of a series of four contem- 

 plated by the author, consists of a collection of 

 papers from various sources, of which the most 

 prominent are the aerodynamical laboratories at 

 the National Physical Laboratory and at Auteuil. 

 The collection is uncritical, and in some cases the 

 author is out of his depth. This is the case in the 

 discussion of dynamical similarity, and more 

 generally on all the theoretical topics dealt with in 

 the book. 



Aeronautics is still so new th^t work only three 

 or four years old may need modification in the 

 light of more recent experience before it can be 

 used safely in a general scheme which includes 

 this later work. It is the absence of these modifi- 

 cations which renders the book very little better 

 than the original papers, and only so far as it 

 leads to a wider distribution of knowledge has it 

 any value. 



The author limits the scope of his book to that 

 part of aerodynamics which refers specifically to 

 the performarfce of an aeroplane, and leaves to 

 a separate volume the aerodynamical data which 

 are concerned in the discussion of stability and 

 control. It is clear that the author is handicapped 

 by the restrictions which war places on publica- 

 tion, and considerable revision and addition may 

 be expected at the end of hostilities. 



THE GLASTONB UR Y LA KE VILLA GE. 

 The Glastonbury Lake Village: A Full Description 

 of the Excavations and the Relics Discovered, 

 1892-1907. By A. Bulleid and H. St, George 

 Gray. Vol. ii. Pp. xxxv—xl + 353-724 + plates 

 lix— ci. (Glastonbury Antiquarian Society, 1917.) 

 Price, 2 vols., 3Z. 35. net. 



n["'HIS- volume completes the record of one of 

 ■*- the most important excavations which have 

 recently been carried out in this country. It falls 

 into two parts : first, a descriptive catalogue of 

 the objects discovered in the course of the excava- 

 tion, prepared by a competent archaeologist, Mr. 

 St. George Gray, who was trained in the new 

 school of archaeological work under General Pitt 

 Rivers, the pioneer in scientific processes of ex- 

 cavation ; secondly, articles on plants, wild and 

 cultivated, by Mr. Clement Reid ; on the remains 

 of birds, by Mr. C. W. Andrews ; and an im- 

 portant series of papers by Prof. Boyd Dawkins 

 on wild and domesticated animals, the inhabitants 

 of the village, the range of the Iberic race in the 

 prehistoric Iron age, and the place of that race in 

 British ethnology. 



The catalogue prepared by Mr. St. George Gray 

 is a good piece of ethnographical work, each 

 NO. 2494, VOL. 99] 



specimen being carefully described with a lavish 

 display of illustrations. Indeed, it is more than 

 a mere catalogue ; it might be better described as, 

 a handbook for the archaeologist, because he not 

 only describes the specimens with which he is 

 dealing, but compares each article with similar 

 objects found elsewhere, and gives careful refer- 

 ences to a large number of papers in scientific 

 journals. It might be worth considering whether 

 this part of the book might be reprinted in a 

 cheaper form for the use of field workers. 



In order to complete the survey of this interest- 

 ing site it may be hoj>ed that the chance of re- 

 covering the village burial-ground will not be 

 overlooked. In its absence some important ques- 

 tions must remain unanswered. In Britain during 

 the prehistoric Iron age inhumation and cremation 

 were both recognised methods for the disposal of 

 the dead. This was probably the case in Glaston- 

 bury, and though a good deal of pottery has been 

 recovered, it is as yet impossible to say how 

 much of it may have been used for funerary pur- 

 poses. 



The valuable series of papers contributed by 

 Prof. Boyd Dawkins enables us to understand the 

 physical types of the people, their connection with 

 other races, and in some measure, with the help 

 of the articles found on the .site, to reconstruct 

 their local culture. From the sporadic distribu- 

 tion of the human bones, as well as their general 

 isolation, he believes that we must suppose that a 

 general massacre of the inhabitants occurred, and 

 this conclusion is amply supported by marks of 

 violence found on some of the skulls. Like their 

 neighbours, they seem to have been subject to 

 Belgic tribes which at the time of the Roman con- 

 quest had become the dominant power in southern 

 Britain. The Lake-village was probably stormed 

 and sacked by some Belgic tribesmen when they 

 took possession of Somerset some time between 

 Caesar's invasion and the Claudian conquest. As 

 M. Salomon Reinach has shown in the case of 

 some of the Celts of Gaul, these Belgae were 

 possibly head-hunters, and a weak settlement like 

 this would be likely to provoke attack. In other 

 places, like Wookey Hole and Worlebury, some 

 survivors returned and reoccupied their houses. 

 But at Glastonbury the whole population may 

 have been wiped out or enslaved, and the site has j 

 remained uninhabited down to the present day. | 

 Possibly they were too weak to make effective i 

 resistance. The scarcity of weapons, even amongf 

 people occupied in pastoral and industrial pur- 

 suits, is striking; out of 107 objects of iron, only 

 seven could be classed in this category. At the 

 same time, though sporadic fires used to occur, 

 there seems to have been no general conflagration. 



As regards the racial affinities of the inhabitants, 

 they were members of the Iberic stock, the oldest 

 ' element as yet traced in the existing European 

 peoples. Thev were closely connected with their 

 neighbours, the Silures, and probably they lost 

 their Iberic tongue when- they passed under the 

 rule of the Goidels, and learned, in the Bron/ 

 age, to speak Gaelic. This Gaelic tongue wa 

 in its turn replaced by the Brythonic — ^^'elsh. 



