HORSE SJCRIFICES IN GAUL AND BRITAIN, iii 



among the ancient Gauls, and horses and other creatures 

 were sacrificed. ' When they have conquered,' writes 

 Caesar, ' they sacrifice whatever captured animals may 

 have survived the conflict.' ' Their funerals, considering 

 the state of civilization among the Gauls, are magnifi- 

 cent and costly ; and they cast into the fire all things, 

 including living creatures, which they suppose to have 

 been dear to them when alive ; and a little before this 

 period, slaves and dependents who were ascertained to have 

 been beloved by them, were, after the regular funeral rites 

 were completed, burnt together with them.'' 



With regard to Britain, Sir John Lubbock" remarks, 

 that the very frequent presence of the bones of animals in 

 tumuli appears to show that, with prehistoric man, se- 

 pulchral feasts were generally held in honour of the dead; 

 and the numerous cases in which interments were accom- 

 panied by burnt human bones, tend to prove the preva- 

 lence of still more dreadful customs, and that not only 

 horses and dogs, but slaves also, were frequently sacrificed 

 at their masters' graves. 



All the remains of horses found in prehistoric barrows 



' The chiefs of Unyamwezi generally are interred by alarge assem- 

 blage of their subjects with cruel rites. A deep pit is sunk, with a kind 

 of vault or recess projecting from it 5 in this the corpse, clothed with 

 skin and hide, and holding a bow in the right hand, is placed sitting, 

 with a pot of pombe, upon a dwarf stool, while sometimes one, but 

 more generally three female slaves, one on each side and the third in 

 front, are buried alive to preserve their lord from the horrors of solitude.' 

 — Burton. The Lake Regions of Central Africa, vol. ii. 



According to Crantz, the Esquimaux lay a dog's head by the grave 

 of a child, for the soul of a dog, say they, can find its way everywhere, 

 and will show the ignorant babe the way to the land of souls. 



' Bell. Gallic, lib. vi. cap. 17, 19. " Prehistoric Times, p. 115. 



