1870.] Be Mortuis. 343 



vanced to the Iron period when Central Europe was in the Bronze 

 age. If, therefore, according to the testimony of ancient authors 

 and monuments, bronze and iron were used in the earliest ages in 

 the countries round the shores of the Mediterranean, the commence- 

 ment of these periods in the inland and northern parts of Europe 

 was regulated entirely by the greater or less amount of intercourse 

 between these countries and those to whom we are indebted for a 

 knowledge of metals, so essential to civilization. We may even at 

 the present day observe a similar irregularity in the distribution of the 

 products of higher civilization and art. Nor do these divisions give 

 us any positive certainty ; for in very few burial places or early 

 settlements are the remains found so purely distinctive as to enable 

 us conclusively to attribute them to any one of the three periods. 



It seems very certain that there was no hard line of demarcation 

 between the three periods, but that the new materials were spread 

 abroad like any other article of trade, and that the more useful tools 

 gradually superseded those of less value.* 



We should hardly, writes Sir John Lubbock,t have hoped to 

 ascertain much of the manner in which the people of the Bronze 

 age were dressed. Considering how perishable are the materials 

 out of which clothes are necessarily formed, it is wonderful that any 

 fragments of them should have remained to the present day. There 

 can be little doubt that the skins of animals were extensively used 

 for this purpose, as indeed they have been in all ages of man's 

 history ; many traces of linen tissue also have been found in English 

 tumuli of the Bronze age and in the Swiss lakes. Even a single 

 fragment throws much light on the manufactures, if we may call 

 them so, of the period to which it belongs ; but fortunately we need 

 not content ourselves with any such partial knowledge as this, as 

 we possess the whole dress of a chief belonging to the Bronze age. 



On a farm occupied by M. Dahls, near Kibe, in Jutland, are 

 four tumuli, known as Great Kongehoi, Little Kongehoi, Guldhoi, 

 and Treenhoi. This last was examined in 1861 by MM. Worsaae 

 and Herbst. It is about 50 ells in diameter and 6 in height, being 

 composed of a loose sandy earth. In it, near the centre, were found 

 three wooden coffins, two of full size, and one evidently intended 

 for a child. The coffin with which we are now particularly con- 

 cerned was about 9 feet 8 inches long and 2 feet 2 inches broad 

 on the outside ; its internal measurements were 1\ feet long and 

 1 feet 8 inches broad. It was covered by a movable lid of corre- 

 sponding size. The contents were peculiar and very interesting. 



While, as might naturally be expected, we find in most ancient 

 graves only the bones and teeth, all the soft parts having long ago 

 decayed away, in some cases — and this was one of them — almost 



* Keller's 'Lake-Dwellings: ' translated by J. E. Lee, F.S.A. 

 f ' Pie-historic Times.' 



