Secrets of Earth and Sea

No estimate can be made of the time represented by the 65,000 feet of fossiliferous strata known to us and the same thickness of non-fossiliferous deposit which precedes them. There are no facts known upon which a calculation of the related lapse of time can be based. But most geologists would agree that whilst we have good ground for assigning half a million years to the formation of the Pleistocene strata, it is not an unreasonable supposition that the period required for the formation of the fossiliferous rocks which precede them in time, is not less and probably more than five hundred million years.

The pictures and carvings with which we are for the moment concerned all belong to the later Pleistocene or Reindeer epoch. None have been found in the middle and earlier Pleistocene, though finely-chipped flints of several successive types are found in those earlier beds. So that it is clear that many successive ages of man had elapsed in Western Europe before these pictures—immensely ancient as they are—were executed. The men who made these works of art had ages of humanity, tradition, and culture (of a kind) behind them. Yet they were themselves tens of thousands of years earlier than the ancient Egyptians!

Our illustrations show a variety of drawings and carvings. It appears probable that the primitive intention of ancient man in depicting animals was "to work magic" on those which he hunted. This is the case at the present day among many "savage" races. The drawings of bisons in Fig. 19 are from the walls of the cavern of Font de Gaume, in the Dordogne, and are about 5 ft. long, partly engraved and scraped, partly outlined in black, and coloured. The body is often coloured in red, white and black, so as to give a true representation of the masses of hair and surface contours. A specially well preserved painting of this kind—from the cavern of Altamira—is shown in Fig. 18, where the colours of the original—black, red, and brown, and white are indicated by the varied shading. These drawings, like those of the mammoths figured in the last chapter, are found in the recesses of caverns where no daylight reaches them, and must have been executed and viewed by aid of torch or lamp-light. They probably were exhibited as part of a ceremony connected with witchcraft and magic. These, like the mammoths and all the specimens figured here, were executed in the Reindeer, or later Pleistocene period. The exact "horizon" of each is, as a rule, well ascertained, but there is uncertainty as to whether some specimens should be attributed to the Aurignacian or to the Magdalenian horizon—and as to whether work by men of the Magdalenian race is not in some cases associated in the cave deposits with that by the earlier negroid Aurignacians.

The horses shown are from various caves. Fig. 12 is drawn in black on the wall of a cave at Niaux (Ariège), and Fig. 11 is a similar drawing from a cave in the Haute Garonne. Both are remarkable for the exact representation of natural poses of the horse. Figs. 13, A and B, are also from the walls of caves. The latter is remarkable for the large head, short mane, and thick muzzle, which closely correspond with the same parts in the existing wild horse of the Gobi desert in Tartary (to be seen alive in the Zoological Gardens in London). The horse drawn in Fig. 11 seems to belong to a distinct race, suggesting the Southern "Arab" horse rather than the heavier and more clumsy horse of the Gobi desert. Fig. 13, C, is engraved of the size here given, on a piece of reindeer's antler. It is remarkable for the halter-like ring around the muzzle. A similar cord or rope is seen in Fig. 12 and in Fig. 13, A.

In Fig. 20 we have a wonderful outline of a bear engraved on a piece of stone, from the cave of Teyjat, in the Dordogne; Fig. 22, the head of a wolf on the wall of the cave of Combarelles, Dordogne; Fig. 23, lion (mane-less), engraved on the wall of the same cave; Fig. 21, small bear, engraved on a pebble; Fig. 24, a duck engraved on a piece of reindeer's antler (Gourdan, Haute Garonne); Fig. 17, the square-mouthed, two-horned rhinoceros, drawn in red (ochre) outline on the wall of the cavern of the Font de Gaume. This drawing is 2-1/2 ft. long. In successful characterization the bear (Fig. 20), the wolf (Fig. 22), and the feline (Fig. 23) far surpass any of the attempts at animal drawing made by modern savages, such as the Bushmen of South Africa, Californian Indians, and Australian black fellows.

Fig. 27 is an outline sketch of a rock-carved statue, 18 in. high, proved by the kind of flint implements found with it to be of Aurignacian age. It was discovered on a rubble-covered face of a rock-cliff at Laussel, in the Dordogne, by M. Lalanne. The woman holds a bovine horn in her right hand. The face is obliterated by "weathering." Four other human statues were found in the same place, one a male, much broken, but obviously standing in the position taken by (Fig. 28) a man throwing a spear or drawing a bow. [3] Near these were found a frieze of life-sized horses carved in high relief on the rock. These are the only statues of any size, executed by the Reindeer men, yet discovered.

The later horizons of the Reindeer period or Upper Pleistocene yield some beautiful outline engravings of red deer and reindeer (Fig. 16) on antler-bone, as well as of other animals. One celebrated carving I have described in the first chapter of this book. It is now regarded as probable that whilst the art of the Aurignacians persisted and developed in the South of France and North-West of Spain until and during the time of the Magdalenian horizon, yet a distinct race, with a different style of art, spread through South-East Spain and also from Italy into that region, and affected injuriously the "naturalistic" Aurignacian art, and superseded it in Azilian and Neolithic times. We find late drawings (Azilian age?) in some of the east Spanish caves of a very much simplified character, small human figures armed with bow and arrow, and others reduced to geometric or mere symbolic lines derived from human and animal form (see Fig. 52, p. 206). The latest studies of Breuil on this subject tend to throw light by aid of these simplified inartistic and symbolic drawings on the migrations of very early races in the south and south-east of Europe, and to connect them perhaps with North African contemporary races. The subject is as difficult as it is fascinating. Those who wish to get to the original sources of information should consult the last ten years' issues of the invaluable French periodical called "L'Anthropologie," edited by Professor Marcelin Boule.