68 KELIQULE AQU1TANKLE. 



Shelter. Then follows another thin layer of hearth-stuff (D), O'lO metre thick, 

 also containing pieces of charcoal, bones, and worked flints. This bed is in its 

 turn overlain by a layer of fallen limestone rubbish (E), 0'50 metre thick. 

 Lastly there is over these a series of more important layers, all of them con- 

 taining, in different proportions, charcoal, bones (broken, burnt, and worked), 

 worked flints (of different types, but chiefly Scrapers), flint cores, and pebbles of 

 quartz, granite, &c. from the bed of the Vezere and bearing numerous marks of 

 hammering. Altogether these layers seem to have reference to a period during 

 which the cave was inhabited, if not continuously, at least at intervals so short 

 as not to admit of intercalations of debris falling from the roof between the 

 different hearth-layers which correspond with the successive phases of this (the 

 third) period of habitation. The first (lowest) of these layers (F) is full of 

 charcoal, and has a thickness of 0-20 metre ; it does not touch the back of the 

 cave, but extends a little further than the earlier layers. At its line of contact 

 with the calcareous debris beneath, the latter is strongly reddened by the action 

 of fire. 



On the last-mentioned hearth-layer is a bed of unctuous reddish earth (G), 

 O30 metre thick, containing similar objects, though in less quantities. Last 

 in succession is a carbonaceous bed (H), the widest and thickest of all, having 

 an average thickness of 0'30 metre ; at the edges it is only O'lO metre thick ; 

 but in the centre (X), where it cuts into the subjacent deposits, which were 

 excavated by the inhabitants in making the principal hearth, it attains a depth 

 of 0'60 metre. This bed, being by far the richest in pieces of charcoal, in bones, 

 pebbles of quartz, worked flints, flint cores, and bone implements, such as points 

 or dart-heads, arrow-heads, &c., may be regarded as indicative of a far more 

 prolonged habitation than the previous. 



Above this thick hearth-layer is a bed of yellowish earth (I), rather argil- 

 laceous, also containing bones, flints, and implements of bone, as well as amulets 

 or pendants. This appears to be limited upwards by a carbonaceous bed (J), very 

 thin and of little extent, - 05 metre thick, which M. Laganne observed before 

 my arrival, but of which only slight traces remained afterwards. 



It was on the upper part of this yellow band (I), and at the back of the Cave, 

 that the human skeletons and the accessories of the sepulture were met with ; 

 and all of them were found in the calcareous debris (K), except in a small space 

 in the furthest hollow at the back of the Cave. This last deposit also contains 

 some worked flints, mixed up with broken bones, and with some uninjured bones 

 referable to small Rodents and to a peculiar kind of Fox. 



