312 



NA rURE 



[January 14, 1906 



to be found in Neolithic times in north-western 

 Europe. 



The portraits of the West Greenland type show that 

 they approximate much more closely to the European 

 type. These people live much further south, on the 

 tracts of land left between the margin of the great 

 Greenland glacier and the west coast. The West 

 Greenlanders appear to have abundant supplies of food, 

 obtained by hunting and fishing, walrus, seal, halibut, 

 and salmon in the greatest abundance being readily 

 obtainable by the active native. They are very hos- 

 pitable and superstitious, the latter trait, accord- 

 ing to the author, being due to the influence of the 

 long winter night. 



The East Greenlanders have now mostly migrated 



-V. 



i 



jjp^ 



:l 

 iff 



from the east coast to West (ireenland. .Apparently, 

 before they moved, owing to their isolation they had 

 reverted to a state of savagery and developed a kind 

 of murderous mania which led to the most terrible 

 tragedies. Now, when living amongst the West 

 Greenlanders, they appear to have greatly advanced 

 under the influence of the Danish missionaries. 



The map attached to the volume would be of much 

 greater value if it contained more of the places 

 referred to in the text. 



This book, however, will take a high place as a 

 study of the characteristics of an extremely interesting 

 and fast vanishing people by a competent and 

 sympathetic observer. 



NO. 2046, VOL. 79] 



A HUMAN FOSSIL FROM THE DORDOGSE 

 VALLEY.' 



'T'HE curtain which conceals the early history of our 

 ■*• race is being in these last years lifted at frequent 

 intervals to afford us glimpses into the distant past. 

 Among the latest revelations are those by the Swiss 

 explorer, iM. Hauser, of a nearly complete human 

 skeleton — not yet fully described — from a rock-shelter 

 in the Vezere \'alley, chinless, with the great orbits 

 and retreating forehead characteristic of the Neander- 

 thal type; and those still more recently made by the 

 well-known prehistorians the .\bb(?s J. and A. 

 Bouyssonie and M. L. Bardon during their excavation 

 of a cave opening in the vale of a small tributary of the 

 Dordogne river, in the commune of La 

 Chapelle-aux-Saints, in the Corr^ze. Their 

 careful and scientifically conducted excava- 

 tions had previously, in 1905, been rewarded 

 bv the discovery of numerous quartz and 

 ■:>. jaspcroid flint implements, scrapers (radoirs) 



■^ and lance-heads (pointcs), with others rather 



better finished and suggestive of the Aurig- 

 nacian, which, taken with the entire absence 

 of ruder amygdaloid implements (coups de 

 poing) and of all worked bone, fixes with 

 precision the archaeological horizon as Late 

 Moustcrian. The fauna associated with these 

 industri.il relics includes reindeer, horse 

 (rare), badger, woolly rhinoceros, marmot, 

 wolf, fox, sheep or goat, a large bovine, 

 and birds, and is characteristic of the cold 

 climate of that epoch, which corresponds, in 

 geological terms, to the Middle Pleistocene. 

 During last autumn the same three archae- 

 ologists resumed their investigations, with 

 the result that on .August 3, while digging 

 a trench in the cave, they uncovered a 

 human skeleton, lying on its back, with the 

 head, which was protected by stones, 

 directed to the east. The right arm was bent 

 so that the hand lay towards the body, the 

 left ;irm was slightly extended, and the 

 limbs were drawn up. .Above the head were 

 several large fragments of bone laid flat, 

 while near by was placed the terminal 

 phal;mges of the hind hoof, with several of 

 its assDciated bones, of a large bovine. The 

 body was, therefore, intentionally buried, 

 and as there is an entire absence of fire- 

 places it is concluded by the excavators, but 

 probably not with universal accord, that the 

 cave was not used as a dwelling, but only 

 as a burying-place, where the abundance of 

 bones and implements indicate only the hold- 

 ing of numerous funeral-feasts. 

 ! People of These human remains, which are of the 



greatest anthropological importance and 

 interest, have been described by M. Mar- 

 cellin Boule, the distinguished palaeontologist, 

 in a preliminary note read on December 14 last 

 before the French .Academy of Sciences, and pub- 

 lished in the Comptes rendiis of the academy cited 

 below. The bones comprise a much broken cranium 

 and mandible, vertebrae and limb-bones of a man of 

 r6om. (a little more than 5 feet 2 inches) in stature. .As 

 the edges of the cranial fragments were unworn, it was 

 possible to piece them very accurately together. The 



1 "L'Homme fossile de 

 M. Marcellin Boule (Ccmpti 

 No. 24, December 14, 1908). 



" Dtfcouverte d'un squelette ITumain 

 (Corrize)." Note de MM. A. and J. Bouys 

 reniius, t. cxlvii.. No. 35, December 21, 1908). 



a La Chapelle-aux-Saints 

 et L. Bardon {Comptes 



