6 W. J. Perry — Megalithic Monuments 



dolmens and stone circles in Devon and Cornwall (19. See 

 Map). They are, with a few exceptions, enclosed within 

 certain areas that are defined on the map. What are these 

 areas ? They are those of the granite formations of these two 

 counties. What possessed the megalith-builders to choose 

 granite formations on which to settle ? They must have had 

 some good reason for choosing these areas and ignoring 

 others probably just as suitable, Exmoor for example. The 

 solution that I wish to suggest is as follows. A former 

 director of the Geological Survey makes this statement with 

 regard to these granite areas. " Granite, or its modification 

 elvan, occurs near, or at, all the localities where tin and copper 

 so abound as to be worked and produce good mines, while 

 lead, antimony, manganese, iron, and zinc are discovered in 

 sufficient quantities to be profitably raised at a distance from 

 granite or elvan " (2, 285-6). I suggest, therefore, that the 

 megalith-builders in these areas were seeking and working 

 some mineral. The two most likely possibilities are gold and 

 tin, both of which occur in all these areas (10, 580.5., 3, 70). 

 Of course there is but little gold left now, and much of the 

 tin is exhausted, but there is good reason for concluding that 

 gold must have in the past been much more plentiful than at 

 present in these areas. It is well known that gold was used 

 in the Eastern Mediterranean from the beginning of neolithic 

 times, so it is natural to find that our country was apparently 

 sought out by men who were attracted by the lure of the gold 

 it contained. The history of California, South Africa and 

 Australia during the past century show with the utmost clear- 

 ness the motives that lead men from civilised countries to 

 those that are not civilised. The prime cause of such a move- 

 ment is not the desire to cultivate the land, but to seek wealth. 

 Apparently the men of these days were bitten by the same 

 motive. So we can account for the presence of megalith- 

 builders in Britain by the assumption that they came after the 

 gold and settled in greatest numbers where they found it. 



It is possible that the gold-hunt had an important conse- 

 quence. For, throughout Europe, France, Spain, England, 

 Ireland, and elsewhere, gold occurs in close conjunction with 

 tin, for both proceed from the same geological formations and 

 both have approximately the same specific gravity. The men 

 who were washing the gravels of Dartmoor for gold could not 

 fail to find the tin that existed there. Thus in the various 

 parts of Europe where there is a common distribution of 

 megalithic monuments and gold-washings, such as Spain, 

 France, England, Ireland, there is the possibility that tin was 



