176 PICTURE-WRITING OF THE AMERICAN INDIANS. 
appeared, and the ground was entirely leveled when the digging was commenced 
some years ago. a 
The characters (Fig. 139) are carved in intaglio on the farthest stone of the en- 
trance, on the left side. The whole of the inscription measures 1,10 in height 
and 82 centimeters in width, and may be divided into two groups, an upper and a 
lower one. 
The upper character represents a rectangular figure divided into three transverse 
sections; in the third section and almost in the center is a cupule. 
The lower character is more complicated and more difficult to describe. The first, 
or left-hand portion, represents a stone hatchet with a shaft; there is no doubt as 
to this, in my mind, as the outlines are perfectly clear, the design of the hatchet 
being very distinct. This hatchet measures 0™, 108 in length and 38"™ in width to the 
edge of the blade. These are precisely the most common dimensions of the hatchets 
of our country. As to the remainder of the character, I think an interpretation of 
it difficult and premature. 
On the whole, the result of an examination of these inscriptions leaves the im- 
pression that the author did not seek to cover a stone with ornamentation, for these 
outlines have nothing whatever of the ornamental, but that he wished to represent 
4° his people, by intelligible symbols, some particular idea, 
Bf. Cartailhac (a) begins an account of petrog- 
lyphs in the Department of Morbihan, in the old 
province of Brittany, translated and condensed as 
follows: 
It is hardly possible to give a description of the designs 
in the covered way of Gavr’ inis. They are various linear 
combinations, the lines being straight, curved, undulating, 
‘y isolated, or parallel, ramified like a fern, segments of con- 
centric circles, limited or not, and decorating certain com- 
partments with close winding spirals, recalling vividly the 
figures produced by the lines on the skin in the hollow of 
the hand and on the tips of the fingers. 
In the midst of accumulated and very oddly grouped 
lines, which no doubt are merely decorative, there are 
found signs which must have had a meaning, and some figures easy to determine. 
The hatchet, the stone hatchet and no other, the large hatchet of Tumiac, of 
Mané-er-Hrotg, and of Mont Saint Michel, is represented in intaglio or in relief, 
real size. A single pillar of Gayr’ inis bears eighteen of them. Less numerous 
groups are seen on some other blocks of the same covered way. 
On a little block placed under the ceiling in order to wedge up one of the covering 
slabs, is seen the image of a hatchet with handle, conformable to a type found in the 
marsh of Ehenside in Cumberland, England. On many other monuments the pres- 
ence of the same figures of hatchets, with handles or without, has been observed. 
The most curious slab is certainly that of Mané-er-Hroég. It had been broken, and 
its three pieces had been thrown in disorder before the threshold of the erypt. One 
of its faces, very well smoothed off, bears a cartouche in the form of a stirrup, filled 
with enigmatic signs and surrounded above and below by a dozen hatchets with 
handles, all engraved. 
One other sign, the imprint of the naked foot, is to be noted, found only once on 
this slab. Two human footprints are traced on one of the pillars of the crypt of the 
of the Petit-Mont in Arzon. They are said to be divided off, by a slight relief, from 
the rest of the granite frame on which they are sculptured, and which contains 
other drawings. Similar figures, engrayed on rock or on tombstones, are cited from 
abroad, iii lands far apart. In Sweden, the prints of naked or sandaled feet are 
Fig. 139.—Petroglyph in 
Epone, France. 
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