ScJ)t. 2, iSSo] 



NATURE 



423 



Keltic that so much confusion has beeu imported into ethnologi- 

 cal nomenclature ; hence the common-sense conclusion seems to 

 be that neither type can strictly be termed Keltic, and that such 

 a term had better be used only in linguistic anthropology.' The 

 Kelt is merely a person who speaks a Keltic language, quite 

 regardless of his race, though it necessarily follows that all 

 persons who speak these languages, if not actually of one blood, 

 must have been, at some period of their history, in close social 

 contact. In this sense, all the inhabitants of Britain, at the 

 period of the Roman invasion, notwithstanding the distinction 

 between Xanthochroi and Melanochroi, were probably to be styled 

 Kelts. There can be little doubt that the xanthous Britons 

 alw.ays spoke a Keltic tongue; but it is not S3 easy to decide 

 what was the original speech of their melanochroic neighbours. 



The existence of two types of population, dark and fair, side 

 by side, is a phenomenon which was repeated in ancient Gaul. 

 As the Silures were to Britain so were the Aquitani to Gaul-- 

 they were the dark Iberian element. Strabo states that while 

 the natives of Keltic and Belgic Gaul resembled each other, the 

 Aquitanians differed in their physical characters from both of 

 these peoples, and resembled the Iberians. But Tacitus has left 

 on record the opinion that the Silures also resembled the Ibe- 

 rians ; hence the conclusion that the Silures and the Aquitanians 

 were more or less alike. Now it is generally believed that the 

 relics of the old Aquifanian population are still to be found 

 lingering in the neighbourhood of the Pyrenees, being repre- 

 sented at the present day by the Basques. A popular notion 

 has thus fgot abroad that the ancient Silures must have been 

 remotely affined to the Basque populations of France and 

 Spain. Nevertheless the modern Basques are so mixed a 

 race that, although retaining their ancient language, their physi- 

 cal characters have been so modified that we can hardly expect 

 to find in them the features of the old Silurians. Thus, accord- 

 ing to the Rev. Wentworth Webster, the average colour of the 

 Basque hair at the present day is not darker than chestnut.- 



Neither does language render us any aid towards solving the 

 Basque problem. If the Silures were in this country prior to 

 the advent of the Cymry, and if they were cognate with the 

 Basques, it seems only reasonable to suppose that some spoor of 

 their Iberian speech, Iiowever scant, might still be lingering 

 among-t us. Yet philologists have sought in vain for the traces 

 of any Euskarian element in the Cymraeg. Prince Louis Lucien 

 Bonaparte, perhaps the only philologist in this country who has 

 a right to speak with authority on such a subject, has obligingly 

 informed me that he knows of no connection whatever between 

 the two languages. Still it must be remembered that the Iberian 

 affinity of the Silures, suggested by the remark of Tacitus, does 

 not necessarily mean Basque affinity. Some philologists have 

 even denied that the Basques are Iberians.'' All that we 

 seek at present to establish is this — that the dark Britons, 

 represented by the tribe of Silures, although they came to be a 

 Keltic-speaking people, were distinct in race from the fair 

 Britons, and therefore in all likelihood were originally distinct 

 in speech. Nor should it be forgotten that relics of a pre-Keltic 

 non-Aryan people have been detected in a few place-names in 

 Wales. Thus, Prof. Rhys is inclined to refer to this category 

 such names as Menapia, Mona, and Mynwy •* — the last-named 

 being a place (Msimiouth) within the territory of the old Silures, 

 where we are now assembled. We may also look for light upon 

 this subject from a paper which will be laid before the depart- 

 ment by Mr. Hyde Clarke. On the whole it seems to me safer 

 to follow Prof. RoUeston in speaking of the dark pre-Keltic 

 element as Silurian rather than as Basque or as Iberian.' 

 {"British Barrows," p. 630.) 



There is, however, quite another quarter to which the anthro- 

 |3oIogist who is engaged in this investigation m.ay turn with fair 

 promise of reward. I need scarcely remind any one in this de- 

 partment of the singularly suggestive paper which was ^^•ritten 

 more than fifteen years ago by the late Dr. Thurnam, "On the 



^ An excellent argument against the employment of national names by 

 anthropolosists will be found in a paper by Mr. A. L. Lewis " On the Evils 

 arising from the Use of Historical National Names as Scientific Terms." — 

 yourii. Anthrop. Inst-, vol. viii., 1879, p. 825. 



* "The Basque and the Kelt," joitrn. Anthrop. Inst., vol. t., 1876 

 p. 5. 



^ " La Langue Iberienne ct la Langue Basque.' Par M. van Eys. 

 Revue lie Lhigmstu]uc, July, 1874. 



■* " Lectures on Welsh Philology," second edition, p. 181. 



5 W. V n Humboldt in his famous essay, " Prufung der Untersuchungen 

 iiber die Urbewohner Hispaniens vermittelst der Vaskischcn .Sprpche," does 

 not admit, on philological evidence, any extension of the Iberians to this 

 country. See c. 44: *' Ueber den Aufenthalt iberis:her Vulkerscliaften 

 ausserhalb Iberien in den von Celten bewohnten Landem." 



Two Principal Forms of Ancient British and Gaulish Skulls." ' 

 The long-continued researches of this eminent archxological 

 anatomist led him to the conclusion that the oldest sepulchres of 

 this country — the chambered and other long barrows which he 

 explored in Wilts and Gloucestersliire — invariably contained the 

 remains of a dolichocephalic people,, who were of short stature, 

 and apparently were unacquainted \\ith the use of metals. The 

 absence of metal would alone raise a saspicion that these 

 elongated tumuli were older than the round, conoidal, or bell- 

 shaped barrows, which contain objects of bronze, if not of iron, 

 with or without weapons of stone, and commonly associated 

 with the remains of a taller brachycephalic people. 



Even before Dr. Thurnam forcibly pointed attention to this 

 distinction, it had been independently observed by so experienced 

 a barrow-opener as the late Mr. Bateman,- whose researches were 

 conducted in quite another part of the country — the district of the 

 ancient Cornavii. Moreover, Prof. Daniel Wilson's studies in 

 Scotland had led him to conclude that the earliest population of 

 Britain were dolichocephalic, and possessed, in fact, a form of 

 skull which, from its boat-like shape, he termed kiimbccephaliL ^ 

 Nor should it be forgotten that as far back as JS44 the late Sir 

 W. R. Wilde expressed his belief that in Ireland the most 

 ancient type of skull is a long skull, which he held to belong to 

 a dark-complexioned people, probably aboriginal, who were 

 succeeded by a fair, round-headed race." * 



But while this succession of races was recognised by several 

 observers, it remained for Dr. Thurnam to formulate the relation 

 between the shape of the skull and that of the barrow in a neat 

 aphori-sm which has become a standing dictum in anthropology 

 — " Long barrows, long skulls; round barrows, round skulls; 

 dolichotaphic barrows, dolichocephalic crania ; brachytaphic 

 barrows, brachycephalic crania." No doubt exceptional cases 

 may occur in which round skulls have been found in long 

 barrows, but these have generally been explained as being due 

 to secondary interments. On the other hand, the occasional 

 presence of long .'kuUs in round barrow s presents no difficulty, 

 since no one supposes that the early dolichocephali were extermi- 

 nated by the brachycephali, and it is therefore probable thit 

 during the bronze-using period, when round tumuli were in 

 general use, the two peoples may have dwelt side by side, the 

 older race being, perhaps, in a state of subjugation. 



It is not pretended that Thurnam's apophthegm has more than 

 a local application. "This axiom," its author admitted, "is 

 evidently not applicable, unless with considerable limitations, to 

 France." Although it is here called an "axiom," it is by no 

 means a self-evident proposition, the relation between the shape 

 of the skull and the shape of the burial-mound being purely 

 arbitrary. The proposition which connects the two is simply the 

 expression of the results of accumulated observations, and it is 

 of course open to doubt whether the number of observations was 

 sufficiently great to warrant the generalisation. But the only 

 test of the validity of any induction lies in its verification when 

 applied to fresh instances, and it is remarkable that when long 

 barrows and chambered tumuli have since been opened in this 

 coitntry the evidence has tended in the main to confirm Dr. 

 Thurnam's proposition. ' , ^ , , 



It is commonly believed that the brachycephali of the round 

 barrows came in contact with the dolichocephali as an invading, 

 and ultimately as a conquering, race. Not only were they armed 

 with superior weapons — superior in so far as a metal axe is a 

 better weapon than a stone axe— but they were a taller and more 

 powerful people. Thurnam's measurements of femora led to the 

 conclusion that the average height of the brachycephali was 5 

 feet 8-4 inches, while that of the long-headed men was only 5 

 feet 5'4 inches.'* Not only were they taller, but they were 

 probably a fiercer and more warlike race. In the skulls from 

 the round ban'ows the superciliary ridges are more prominent, 

 the nasals diverge at a more abrupt angle, the cheek-bones are 

 high, and the lower jaw projects, giving the face an aspect of 

 ferocity, which contrasts unfavourably with the mild features of 

 the earlier stone-using people. 



On the whole, then, the researches of archceological anatomists 

 tend to prove that this country was tenanted in ante-historic or 

 pre-Roman times by two peoples who were ethnically distinct 

 from each other. It is difficult to resist the temptation of apply- 



» tUmoirs of the Anthrop. Sjc. Lond., vol. i. 1865, p. 120; vol. iii. 1870, 



= "Ten Years' Diggings." 1861, p. 146. 



3 " Prehistoric Annals of Scotland," 1851.^^ 



4 " On the Ethnology of the Ancient Iiish. 



5 Mem. Anthrop. Soc. Lond., vol. iii. 1870, p. 73. 



