^62 



NATURE 



[July 31, 1913 



SfJSS n An , d f Iusi f' and below a few of them These latter seem attributable for the most 



1 Abbe Breuil has found small, poorly executed, part to peoples who, while in the Paleolithic 



but realistic figures of the same kind as those at I stage of evolution, did not progress through 



Batuecas. The signs agree with those that are ; the Aurignacian-Solutrian-Magdalenian line of 



found superimposed on Magdalenian drawings evolution that extends from Cantabria to Poland 



L £ e ,i TS! u an - area ,' so , th . ere is Iittle but advanced in the direction of the industries 



doubt that they character.se the Azilian culture. termed "Capsian » by de Morgan and "Getuhan" 



by Pallary. The eastern 

 Spanish art may have been 

 derived from north of the 

 Pyrenees or influenced by it, 

 at the same time undergoing 

 a local development. On 

 the other hand, Breuil notes 

 that influences of the schem- 

 atic art of the south-west 

 were felt in the Magdalenian 

 art of Cantabria and even 

 of the Pyrenees, and that a 

 cave in Ariege also shows 

 pictorial influence from the 

 artistic province of east and 

 north-east Spain. 



"As a result of the arrival 

 of . Neolithic man in the 

 south of the Iberian penin- 

 sula, the Capsians flowed 

 over the Magdalenian 

 world, substituting their 

 schematic art for the real- 

 istic art of the Magda- 

 lenians ; borrowing from 

 them some slightly modified 

 industrial objects, like the 

 harpoon, they spread not 

 only to Gascony and Aqui- 

 taine, but to Dauphine, 

 Switzerland, Bavaria, and even to Scotland. 

 On the other hand, some Capsians of 

 Andalusia and Murcia seem to have rallied 

 to the new state of things, since certain 

 painted rocks represent ' idols ' known only 

 in _ the ancient Neolithic age in these 

 regions, and certain Portuguese dolmens 



F>G. 3—Hunting scene painted in a brownish red, older than the very diagrammatic red signs ( 

 hatching) ana later than the light red hind in the centre. Scale, about J. 



Prof. Breuil has given in Rev. Arch., xix., 1912, 

 p. 193, a large number of sketches from central 

 and south Spain which are evidently degraded 

 representations of the human form. 



In the same article he points out that, so far 

 as is known, the art of the Franco-Cantabrian 

 area developed in situ throughout a considerable 

 period during which the cli- 

 mate, vegetation, and fauna 

 were modified several times, 

 while migrations of peoples, 

 all of whom were hunters and 

 collectors, took place in differ- 

 ent directions. The realistic 

 representations of animals by 

 the Aurignacians continued 

 through Solutrian to the end 

 of Magdalenian times, and 

 until the extinction of the 

 reindeer in France and central 



ffi 



m 



nj 



Fig. 4.— Azilian signs at Eatu 



|||/ IHfHf. 

 * * $ 



» (Salamanca) which 

 Andalmia 



coloured pebbles and petro^lyphs of 



Europe. Human figures, as we. have seen, were preserve a mural decoration conceived in 



rarely portrayed except at the beginning of this their style. Perhaps other Capsian groups, driven 



series of cultures. Then an invasion from the from Morocco by the newcomers, migrated into 

 Italian and Iberian peninsulas brought other ; central Sudan, unless the strange analogy of the 



peoples to north-west Europe, who painted paintings found there with those of Andalusia be 



schematic and geometric forms, often very like purely fortuitous." 



those painted on rocks in south and west Spain. A. C. Haddon. 

 XO. 2 283, VOL. 91] 





