Sept. t4, 1871 | 
NATURE 389 

by some early race of men, and subsequently as a cemetery, 
and since the corpses had been deposited on the old in- 
habited surface, the human bones were more or less inter- 
mingled with those of the animals. The entrance had 
been blocked up with a barrier of large stones, and the 
interior was filled nearly to the roof with the fine red silt 
introduced through the crevices in the roof by the rain. 
The human remains, which were described by Prof. Busk 
in the essay on the discoveries published in the Journal of 
the Ethnological Society, January 1871, presented points 
of very high interest ; for while the skulls were rather 
above than below the present average cranial capacity, 
some of the leg-bones were remarkable for the peculiar 
antero-posterior flattening or platycnemism of the shin- 
bones. And this flattening was caused by the prolon- 
gation of the bone in front of the inter-osseous ridge, 
and not in any great degree by its posterior exten- 
sion, which is the distinctive feature of the tibize found in 
the caves of Cro Magnon and of Gibraltar. The fact 
that these platycnemic leg-bones were associated with 
others of the ordinary forms, and for the most part be- 
longing to the young, and probably to females, while the 
skulls were of the same type, proves that the character is 
not one of race, as M. Broca believed, but rather one 
peculiar to the individual and perhaps to the sex. 
Subsequently, I was able to bring this interesting 
sepulchral cave into relation with remains of man from 
other parts of Denbighshire, through the courtesy of Mrs. 
Williams Wynn, in whose possession were a skull and 
severallong bones obtainedsome years agoinacave at Cefn, 
and of the same type as those from Perthi Chwareu 
They were found along with the remains of sheep or goat, 
pig, fox, badger, and stag, and four flint flakes. 
A chambered tomb at Cefn, explored in 1869 by Mrs. 
Williams Wynn, under the care of the Rev. D. R. 
Thomas and myself, and consisting of a chamber sft. wide 
and oft. long, which gradually contracted until it joined a 
passage 6ft. long and 2it. wide, contained considerably 
more than twelve human skeletons buried in the sitting 
posture, of various ages, and presenting in some cases 
platycnemic tibize. The skulls were of the same type as 
those from Perthi Chwareu, and some were possessed of 
peculiar upturned nasal bones that pointed unmistakeably 
in the direction of a ez retroussé. A few small broken 
flint pebbles were the only foreign matters in the tomb, 
which was built of large rough slabs of limestone placed 
on edge, and covered with capstones, and finally buried 
under a carnedd of loose fragments of limestone. A 
second chambered tomb with a passage was discovered 
by the Rev. D. R. Thomas in this carnedd in 1871, which 
was full of human remains of the same kind as those 
which I have mentioned, and in addition a few remains of 
dog, pig, sheep, and roe-deer were found, A broken flint 
and a round stone were also met with. 
The remarkable correspondence of the human remains 
in the carnedd and the Cefn Cave with those of Perthi 
Chwareu, proves that the race of men who buried their 
dead in the tombs is the same as that which used the 
caves for its last resting-places. The stone chambers, 
with their low entrance and narrow passage, are indeed 
caves artificially made, and it is very possible that the 
idea of making “ Ganggraben,” or gallery graves, is derived 
from the ancient custom of living in and burying in 
caves. 
It becomes an interesting question to ascertain the rela- 
tive age of these cave dwellers and carnedd builders, who 
have so completely passed out of remembrance that their 
very name has perished. The evidence offered by the 
flint flakes may be at once dismissed as being valueless, 
because they were buried with the dead at least as late as | 
the Roman occupation of Britain, and they merely indicate | 
an antiquity not less than that of the conversion of the | 
Romano-Celts to Christianity, a date which is very hotly 
contested at the present time. Nor does an appeal to the 
_ remains of the animals help us very much. The domestic 

animals are nearly the same as those still kept in the 
district, and were introduced into Europe during the 
Neolithic age. The dog, however, so far as I know, was 
not usually eaten in Britain in Roman times, although it 
was an article of food in the Neolithic age in Switzerland 
and in Yorkshire. The sitting posture also of the corpses 
points in the Neolithic direction, as well as the correspon- 
dence of the skulls with those termed “ river bed.” by Prof, 
Huxley, and others which are undoubtedly of the newer 
stone age, On this evidence, therefore, the Neolithic date 
of these ancient dwellers in Denbighshire might be in- 
ferred with a high degree of probability. 
All doubt, however, on the point has been removed by 
my discovery of a second cave some 300 yards removed 
from the first, during the exploration carried on by Mr. 
Lloyd, of Rhagatt, at the end of last August. Like the 
first it ran nearly horizontally into the rock, and was 
blocked up with earth and large masses of stone, and it 
contained the broken bones of the same animals associated 
with skeletons of the same type. The corpses had been 
buried in the sitting posture. During the first day’s digging 
we obtained a beautiful polished axe made of greenstone, 
and with the edge-uninjured by use, which had evidently 
been interred for some motive or other along with the 
dead, as well as a few splinters of flint, and one well-de- 
fined scraper of the same sort as those which the Eskimos 
use inserted into a handle of bone or antler. We added 
also the bear, U. Arctos, to the list of animals. And 
subsequently we met with a remarkably fine flint flake 
rather over three inches in length, which was in juxta- 
position to a small heap of human bones belonging to one 
skeleton, and rested on the ancient floor of the cave that 
was indicated by a mortar-like mass of decayed stalag- 
mite. There were also many fragments of a rude black 
hand-made pottery, composed of clay, worked up with 
small fragments of stone to prevent fracture while it was 
being subjected to the fire. Some were nearly an inch in 
thickness ; while others ranged from a quarter to half an 
inch. It is of the same kind as that which is commonly 
met with in caves, occurring alike in Kihloch and 
Gailenreuth, and in Kent's Hole, being very frequently 
discovered in association with Neolithic remains. After 
clearing out the horizontal passage for a distance of 1oft, 
from the entrance, we found that it expanded into a 
chamber, of the dimensions of which we are unable to 
form an idea, as it was nearly full up to the roof with @é677s, 
The floor underneath the decomposed stalagmite consists 
of atenacious gray clay, which has never yet yielded any 
remains either in Yorkshire, Wales, or Somerset, and 
is probably the result of the melting of the glaciers, 
the traces of which are abundant in the neighbourhood. 
A third cave, running into the rock parallel with the 
last at a distance of 12ft., contained similar remains of 
man and the animals, as well as a fourth, which stands 
about half-way between Perthi Chwareu and those of 
Rhos-digre. 
The interest of this discovery consists in the fact that 
the group of caves which has been used by a race of 
herdsmen in long-forgotten times as habitations and burial 
places, and the tombs at Cefn, must be referred to the 
Neolithic age. And we can now be certain that those 
people who have manifested the peculiar flattening for- 
wards of the shin in Denbighshire belong tothatage. It 
is a point also well worthy of note that the cranial capacity 
of these Neolithic men was not inferior to that of the 
average civilised man, although the ridges and processes 
for muscles indicated a greater physical power, 
The clue to this remarkable series of caves was afforded 
by a small box of bones forwarded by Mr. Darwin, and 
obtained from the dét77s of a refuse heap in a neighbour- 
ing ridge, on which the Neolithic men happened to hold 
their feasts. We have by no means yet exhausted the 
evidence of a social state now unknown in Europe, which 
is presented by the caves and tumuli of Denbighshire. 
W. Boyp DAWKINS 
