ABSENCE OF CERTAIN BONES. 183 



Europe until about the ninth century, the dog* appears to 

 have been the only domestic animal of the period; and 

 though it may fairly be asked whether the bones may not 

 have belonged to -a race of wild dogs, the question admits of 

 a satisfactory answer. 



Among the remains of birds, the long bones which form 

 about one- fifth of the skeleton, are, in the Kjokkenmoddings, 

 about twenty times as numerous as the others, and are almost 

 always imperfect, the shaft only remaining. In the same 

 manner it would be impossible to reconstruct a perfect skele- 

 ton of the quadrupeds, certain bones and parts of bones being 

 always absent. In the case of the ox, for instance, the 

 missing parts are the heads of the long bones (though while 

 the shaft only of the femur is found, in the humerus one end 

 is generally perfect), the back bone except the two first 

 vertebrae, the spinous processes, and often the ribs, and the 

 bones of the skull except the lower jaw and the portion 

 round the eyes. It occurred to Prof. Steenstrup that these 

 curious results might, perhaps, be referred to dogs ; and, 

 on trying the experiment, he ascertained that the bones 

 which are absent from the Kjokkenmoddings are precisely 

 those which dogs eat, and those which are present are the 

 parts which are hard and solid and do not contain much 

 nourishment. Prof. Steenstrup has since published a diagram 

 of a skeleton, tinted in such a manner as to show at a glance 

 which of the bones occur in the Kjokkenmoddings, and 

 points out that it coincides exactly with one given by M. 

 Flourens to illustrate those portions of the skeleton which 

 were first formed. Although a glance at the longitudinal 

 section of a long bone, as, for instance, of a femur 

 and a comparison of the open cancellated tissue of the 

 two ends with the solid, close, texture of the shaft, at once 



* From the marks of knives on the was then, as it is still among several 

 bones, it seems evident that the dog savage tribes, an article of food. 



