[Illustration: STONEHENGE FROM THE SOUTH-EAST]

 ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS AND THEIR BUILDERS

 BY

 T. ERIC PEET

 FORMERLY SCHOLAR OF QUEEN'S COLLEGE, OXFORD; LATELY CRAVEN FELLOW IN THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD AND PELHAM STUDENT AT THE BRITISH SCHOOL OF ROME

 HARPER & BROTHERS LONDON AND NEW YORK 45 ALBEMARLE STREET, W. 1912

 _Published October, 1912_. 

 PREFACE

The aim of this volume is to enable those who are interested inStonehenge and other great stone monuments of England to learn somethingof the similar buildings which exist in different parts of the world, ofthe men who constructed them, and of the great archæological system ofwhich they form a part. It is hoped that to the archæologist it may beuseful as a complete though brief sketch of our present knowledge of themegalithic monuments, and as a short treatment of the problems whicharise in connection with them. 

To British readers it is unnecessary to give any justification for thecomparatively full treatment accorded to the monuments of Great Britainand Ireland. Malta and Sardinia may perhaps seem to occupy more thantheir due share of space, but the usurpation is justified by themagnificence and the intrinsic interest of their megalithic buildings. Being of singularly complicated types and remarkably well preserved theynaturally tell us much more of their builders than do the simplermonuments of other larger and now more important countries. In these twoislands, moreover, research has in the last few years been extremelyactive, and it is felt that the accounts here given of them will containsome material new even to the archæologist. 

In order to assist those readers who may wish to follow out the subjectin greater detail a short bibliography has been added to the book. 

For the figures and photographs with which this volume is illustrated Ihave to thank many archæological societies and individual scholars. Plate III and part of Plate II I owe to the kindness of Dr. Zammit, Director of the Museum of Valletta, while the other part of Plate II isfrom a photograph kindly lent to me by Dr. Ashby. I have to thank theSociety of Antiquaries for Figures 1 and 3, the Reale Accademia deiLincei for Figures 17 and 20, and the Société préhistorique de France, through Dr. Marcel Baudouin, for Figure 10. I am indebted to the RoyalIrish Academy for Figure 8, to the Committee of the British School ofRome for Figure 18, and to Dr. Albert Mayr and the Akademie derWissenschaften in Munich for the plan of Mnaidra. Professors Montelius, Siret and Cartailhac I have to thank not only for permission toreproduce illustrations from their works, but also for their kindinterest in my volume. Figure 19 I owe to my friend Dr. Randall MacIver. The frontispiece and Plate I are fine photographs by Messrs. TheGraphotone Co. , Ltd. 

In conclusion, I must not forget to thank Canon F. F. Grensted for muchhelp with regard to the astronomical problems connected with Stonehenge. 

 T. ERIC PEET. 

LIVERPOOL, _August 10th, _ 1912. 

 CONTENTS

 CHAPTER PAGE

 I. INTRODUCTION 1

 II. STONEHENGE AND OTHER GREAT STONE MONUMENTS IN ENGLAND AND WALES 15

 III. MEGALITHIC MONUMENTS IN SCOTLAND AND IRELAND 34

 IV. THE SCANDINAVIAN MEGALITHIC AREA 52

 V. FRANCE, SPAIN AND PORTUGAL 59

 VI. ITALY AND ITS ISLANDS 76

 VII. AFRICA, MALTA, AND THE SMALLER. MEDITERRANEAN ISLANDS 90

 VIII. THE DOLMENS OF ASIA 114

 IX. THE BUILDERS OF THE MEGALITHIC MONUMENTS, THEIR HABITS, CUSTOMS, RELIGION, ETC 123

 X. WHO WERE THE BUILDERS, AND WHENCE DID THEY COME? 143

 BIBLIOGRAPHY 159

 INDEX 167

 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

 PLATES

 Stonehenge from the south-east _Frontispiece_

 FACING PAGE I. Stonehenge from the south-west 17 II. Mnaidra, doorway of Room H. The _Nuraghe_ of Madrone in Sardinia 82III. Temple of Mnaidra, Malta. Apse of chief room 100

FIGURE PAGE 1. Plan of Stonehenge 16 2. Avebury and Kennet Avenue 23 3. Plans of English Long Barrows 31 4. Horned tumulus, Caithness 39 5. Plans of three dolmen-types 40 6. Type-plan of simple corridor-tomb 42 7. Type-plan of wedge-shaped tomb 44 8. Corridor-tomb at New Grange, Ireland 47 9. Corridor-tomb at Ottagården, Sweden 53 10. Plan of La Pierre aux Fées, Oise, France 61 11. Chambered mound at Fontenay-le-Marmion, Normandy 63 12. Plan of La Grotte des Fées, Arles, France 65 13. The so-called dolmen-deity, Petit Morin, France 66 14. Plan of corridor-tomb at Los Millares, Spain 69 15. Section and plan of a _talayot_, Majorca 72 16. Section and plan of the _nau_ d'Es Tudons 73 17. Elevation, section and plan of a Sardinian _nuraghe_ 83 18. Plan of Giant's Tomb at Muraguada, Sardinia 87 19. Plan of stone circle at the Senâm, Algeria 94 20. Plan of the Sese Grande, Pantelleria 97 21. Plan of the Sanctuary of Mnaidra, Malta 99 22. Dolmen with holed stone at Ala Safat 115

 ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

 CHAPTER I

 INTRODUCTION

To the south of Salisbury Plain, about two miles west of the smallcountry town of Amesbury, lies the great stone circle of Stonehenge. Forcenturies it has been an object of wonder and admiration, and evento-day it is one of the sights of our country. Perhaps, however, few ofthose who have heard of Stonehenge or even of those who have visited itare aware that it is but a unit in a vast crowd of megalithic monumentswhich, in space, extends from the west of Europe to India, and, in time, covers possibly more than a thousand years. 

What exactly is a megalithic monument? Strictly speaking, it is abuilding made of very large stones. This definition would, of course, include numbers of buildings of the present day and of the medieval andclassical periods, while many of the Egyptian pyramids and temples wouldat once suggest themselves as excellent examples of this type ofbuilding. The archæologist, however, uses the term in a much morelimited sense. He confines it to a series of tombs and buildingsconstructed in Western Asia, in North Africa, and in certain parts ofEurope, towards the end of the neolithic period and during part of thecopper and bronze ages which followed it. The structures are usually, though not quite invariably, made of large blocks of unworked orslightly worked stone, and they conform to certain definite types. Thebest known of these types are as follows: Firstly, the menhir, which isa tall, rough pillar of stone with its base fixed into the earth. Secondly, the trilithon, which consists of a pair of tall stones set ata short distance apart supporting a third stone laid across the top. Thirdly, the dolmen, which is a single slab of stone supported byseveral others arranged in such a way as to enclose a space or chamberbeneath it. Some English writers apply the term cromlech to such astructure, quite incorrectly. Both menhir and dolmen are Breton words, these two types of megalithic monument being particularly frequent inBrittany. Menhir is derived from the Breton _men_, a stone, and _hir_, long; similarly dolmen is from _dol_, a table, and _men_, a stone. Somearchæologists also apply the word dolmen to rectangular chambers roofedwith more than one slab. We have carefully avoided this practice, alwaysclassing such chambers as corridor-tombs of an elementary type. Fourthly, we have the corridor-tomb (_Ganggrab_), which usually consistsof a chamber entered by a gallery or corridor. In cases where thechamber is no wider than, and hence indistinguishable from the corridor, the tomb becomes a long rectangular gallery, and answers to the French_allée couverte_ in the strict sense. Fifthly, we come to the_alignement_, in which a series of menhirs is arranged in open lines onsome definite system. We shall find a famous example of this at Morbihanin Brittany. Sixthly, there is the cromlech (from _crom_, curve, and_lec'h_, a stone), which consists of a number of menhirs arranged toenclose a space, circular, elliptical or, in rare cases, rectangular. 

These are the chief types of megalithic monument, but there are otherswhich, though clearly belonging to the same class of structure, showspecial forms and are more complicated. They are in many casesdevelopments of one or more of the simple types, and will be treatedspecially in their proper places. Such monuments are the _nuraghi_ ofSardinia and the 'temples' of Malta and Gozo. 

Finally, the rock-hewn sepulchre is often classed with the megalithicmonuments, and it is therefore frequently mentioned in the followingpages. This is justified by the fact that it generally occurs inconnection with megalithic structures. The exact relation in which itstands to them will be fully discussed in the last chapter. 

We have now to consider what may be called the architectural methods ofthe megalithic builders, for although in dealing with such primitivemonuments it would perhaps be exaggeration to speak of a style, yetthere were certain principles which were as carefully and as invariablyobserved as were in later days those of the Doric or the Gothic stylesin the countries where they took root. 

The first and most important principle, that on which the whole of themegalithic construction may be said to be based, is the use of theorthostatic block, i. E. The block set up on its edge. It is clear thatin this way each block or slab is made to provide the maximum of wallarea at the expense of the thickness of the wall. Naturally, indistricts where the rock is of a slabby nature blocks of a more or lessuniform thickness lay ready to the builders' hand, and the appearance ofthe structure was much more finished than it would be in places wherethe rock had a less regular fracture or where shapeless boulders had tobe relied on. The orthostatic slabs were often deeply sunk into theground where this consisted of earth or soft rock; of the latter casethere are good examples at Stonehenge, where the rock is a soft chalk. When the ground had an uneven surface of hard rock, the slabs were setupright on it and small stones wedged in beneath them to make them standfirm. Occasionally, as at Mnaidra and Hagiar Kim, a course of horizontalblocks set at the foot of the uprights served to keep them more securelyin position. With the upright block technique went hand in hand theroofing of narrow spaces by means of horizontal slabs laid across thetop of the uprights. 

The second principle of megalithic architecture was the use of more orless coursed masonry set without mortar, each block lying on its sideand not on its edge. It is quite possible that this principle is lessancient in origin than that of the orthostatic slab, for it usuallyoccurs in structures of a more advanced type. Thus in simple andprimitive types of building such as the dolmen it is most rare to finddry masonry, but in the advanced corridor-tombs of Ireland, the Giants'Graves and _nuraghi_ of Sardinia, and in the 'temples' of Malta thistechnique is largely used, often in combination with the upright slabsystem. Indeed, this combination is quite typical of the best megalithicwork: a series of uprights is first set in position, and over this arelaid several horizontal courses of rather smaller stones. We must notethat the dry masonry which we are describing is still strictlymegalithic, as the blocks used are never small and often of enormoussize. 

Buildings in which this system is used are occasionally roofed withslabs, but more often corbelling is employed. At a certain height eachsucceeding course in the wall begins to project inwards over the last, so that the walls, as it were, lean together and finally meet to form afalse barrel-vault or a false dome, according as the structure isrectangular or round. Occasionally, when the building was wide, it wasimpossible to corbel the walls sufficiently to make them meet. In thiscase they were corbelled as far as possible and the open space stillleft was covered with long flat slabs. 

It has often been commented on as a matter of wonder that a peopleliving in the stone age, or at the best possessing a few simple tools ofmetal, should have been able to move and place in position such enormousblocks of stone. With modern cranes and traction engines all would besimple, but it might have been thought that in the stone age suchbuilding would be impossible. Thus, for instance, in the 'temple' ofHagiar Kim in Malta, there is one block of stone which measures 21 feetby 9, and must weigh many tons. In reality there is little that ismarvellous in the moving and setting up of these blocks, for the toolsneeded are ready to the hand of every savage; but there is something towonder at and to admire in the patience displayed and in theorganization necessary to carry out such vast pieces of labour. Great, indeed, must have been the power of the cult which could combine theforce of hundreds and even thousands of individuals for long periods oftime in the construction of the great megalithic temples. Perhaps slavelabour played a part in the work, but in any case it is clear that weare in the presence of strongly organized governments backed by apowerful religion which required the building of temples for the godsand vast tombs for the dead. 

Let us consider for a moment what was the procedure in building a simplemegalithic monument. It was fourfold, for it involved the finding andpossibly the quarrying of the stones, the moving of them to the desiredspot, the erection of the uprights in their places, and the placing ofthe cover-slab or slabs on top of them. 

With regard to the first step it is probable that in most cases theplace chosen for a tomb or cemetery was one in which numbers of greatstones lay on the surface ready to hand. By this means labour wasgreatly economized. On the other hand, there are certainly cases wherethe stones were brought long distances in order to be used. Thus, inCharente in France there is at La Perotte a block weighing nearly 40tons which must have travelled over 18 miles. We have no evidence as towhether stones were ever actually quarried. If they were, the means usedmust have been the stone axe, fire, and water. It was not usual in theolder and simpler dolmens to dress the stones in any way, though in thelater and more complicated structures well-worked blocks were oftenused. 

The required stones having been found it was now necessary to move themto the spot. This could be done in two ways. The first and simpler isthat which we see pictured on Egyptian monuments, such as the tomb ofTahutihotep at El Bersheh. A rough road of beams is laid in the requireddirection, and wooden rollers are placed under the stone on this road. Large numbers of men or oxen then drag the stone along by means of ropesattached to it. Other labourers assist the work from behind with levers, and replace the rollers in front of the stone as fast as they pass outbehind. Those who have seen the modern Arabs in excavation work movehuge blocks with wooden levers and palm-leaf rope will realize that forthe building of the dolmens little was needed except numbers and time. 

The other method of moving the stones is as follows: a gentle slope ofhard earth covered with wet clay is built with its higher extremityclose beside the block to be moved. As many men as there is room forstand on each side of the block, and with levers resting on beams orstones as fulcra, raise the stone vertically as far as possible. Othermen then fill up the space beneath it with earth and stones. The processis next repeated with higher fulcra, until the stone is level with thetop of the clay slope, on to which it is then slipped. With a littlehelp it now slides down the inclined plane to the bottom. Here a freshslope is built, and the whole procedure is gone through again. Themethod can even be used on a slight uphill gradient. It requires lessdragging and more vertical raising than the other, and would thus bemore useful where oxen were unobtainable. 

When the stones were once on the spot it is not hard to imagine how theywere set upright with levers and ropes. The placing of the cover-slabwas, however, a more complicated matter. The method employed wasprobably to build a slope of earth leading up from one side to thealready erected uprights and almost covering them. Up this the slabcould be moved by means of rollers, ropes, and levers, until it was inposition over the uprights. The slope could then be removed. If thedolmen was to be partly or wholly covered with a mound, as somecertainly were, it would not even be necessary to remove the slope. 

Roughly speaking, the extension of megalithic monuments is from Spain toJapan and from Sweden to Algeria. These are naturally merely limits, andit must not be supposed that the regions which lie between them allcontain megalithic monuments. More exactly, we find them in Asia, inJapan, Corea, India, Persia, Syria, and Palestine. In Africa we havethem along the whole of the north coast, from Tripoli to Morocco; inlandthey are not recorded, except for one possible example in Egypt andseveral in the Soudan. In Europe the distribution of dolmens and othermegalithic monuments is wide. They occur in the Caucasus and the Crimea, and quite lately examples have been recorded in Bulgaria. There are nonein Greece, and only a few in Italy, in the extreme south-east corner. The islands, however, which lie around and to the south of Italy affordmany examples: Corsica, Sardinia, Malta, Gozo, Pantelleria, andLampedusa are strongholds of the megalithic civilization, and it ispossible that Sicily should be included in the list. Moving westward wefind innumerable examples in the Spanish Peninsula and in France. To thenorth we find them frequent in the British Isles, Sweden, Denmark, andNorth Germany; they are rarer in Holland and Belgium. Two examples havebeen reported from Switzerland. 

It is only to be expected that these great megalithic monuments of aprehistoric age should excite the wonder and stimulate the imaginationof those who see them. In all countries and at all times they have beencentres of story and legend, and even at the present day many strangebeliefs concerning them are to be found among the peasantry who livearound them. Salomon Reinach has written a remarkable essay on thisquestion, and the following examples are mainly drawn from thecollection he has there made. The names given to the monuments oftenshow clearly the ideas with which they are associated in the minds ofthe peasants. Thus the Penrith circle is locally known as "Meg and herDaughters, " a dolmen in Berkshire is called "Wayland the Smith's Cave, "while in one of the Orkney Isles is a menhir named "Odin's Stone. " InFrance many are connected with Gargantua, whose name, the origin ofwhich is doubtful, stands clearly for a giant. Thus we find a rockcalled the "Chair of Gargantua, " a menhir called "Gargantua's LittleFinger, " and an _allée couverte_ called "Gargantua's Tomb. " Namesindicating connections with fairies, virgins, witches, dwarfs, devils, saints, druids, and even historical persons are frequent. Dolmens areoften "houses of dwarfs, " a name perhaps suggested or at least helped bythe small holes cut in some of them; they are "huts" or "caves offairies, " they are "kitchens" or "forges of the devil, " while menhirsare called his arrows, and cromlechs his cauldrons. In France we havestones of various saints, while in England many monuments are connectedwith King Arthur. A dolmen in Wales is his quoit; the circle at Penrithis his round table, and that of Caermarthen is his park. Both in Englandand France we find stones and altars "of the druids"; in the Pyrenees, in Spain, and in Africa there are "graves of the Gentiles" or "tombs ofidolaters"; in Arles (France) the _allées couvertes_ are called"prisons" or "shops of the Saracens, " and the dolmens of the EasternPyrenees are locally known as "huts of the Moors. " Dolmens in India areoften "stones of the monkeys, " and in France there are "wolves' altars, ""wolves' houses, " and "wolves' tables. "

Passing now to more definite beliefs connected with megalithicmonuments, we may notice that from quite early times they have been--asindeed they often are still--regarded with fear and respect, and evenworshipped. In certain parts of France peasants are afraid to shelterunder the dolmens, and never think of approaching them by night. Inearly Christian days there must have been a cult of the menhir, for thecouncils of Arles (A. D. 452), of Tours (A. D. 567), and of Nantes (A. D. 658) all condemn the cult of trees, springs, and _stones_. In A. D. 789Charlemagne attempted to suppress stone-worship, and to destroy thestones themselves. In Spain, where, as in France, megalithic monumentsare common, the councils of Toledo in A. D. 681 and 682 condemned the"Worshippers of Stones. " Moreover there are many cases in which amonument itself bears traces of having been the centre of a cult inearly or medieval times. The best example is perhaps the dolmen ofSaint-Germain-sur-Vienne, which was transformed into a chapel about thetwelfth century. Similar transformations have been made in Spain. Inmany cases, too, crosses have been placed or engraved on menhirs inorder to "Christianize" them. 

Remarkable powers and virtues have been attributed to many of themonuments. One of the dolmens of Finistère is said to cure rheumatism inanyone who rubs against the loftiest of its stones, and another healsfever patients who sleep under it. Stones with holes pierced in them arebelieved to be peculiarly effective, and it suffices to pass thediseased limb or, when possible, the invalid himself through the hole. 

Oaths sworn in or near a megalithic monument have a peculiar sanctity. In Scotland as late as the year A. D. 1438 "John off Erwyne and WillBernardson swor on the Hirdmane Stein before oure Lorde ye Erie offOrknay and the gentiless off the cuntre. "

Many of the monuments are endowed by the credulous with life. The menhirdu Champ Dolent sinks an inch every hundred years. Others say that apiece of it is eaten by the moon each night, and that when it iscompletely devoured the Last Judgment will take place. The stones ofCarnac bathe in the sea once a year, and many of those of the Périgordleap three times each day at noon. 

We have already remarked on the connection of the monuments with dwarfs, giants, and mythical personages. There is an excellent example in ourown country in Berkshire. Here when a horse has cast a shoe the ridermust leave it in front of the dolmen called "The Cave of Wayland theSmith, " placing at the same time a coin on the cover-stone. He must thenretire for a suitable period, after which he returns to find the horseshod and the money gone. 

 CHAPTER II

 STONEHENGE AND OTHER GREAT STONE MONUMENTS IN ENGLAND AND WALES

Stonehenge, the most famous of our English megalithic monuments, hasexcited the attention of the historian and the legend-lover since earlytimes. According to some of the medieval historians it was erected byAurelius Ambrosius to the memory of a number of British chiefs whomHengist and his Saxons treacherously murdered in A. D. 462. Others addthat Ambrosius himself was buried there. Giraldus Cambrensis, who wrotein the twelfth century, mingles these accounts with myth. He says, "There was in Ireland, in ancient times, a pile of stones worthy ofadmiration called the Giants' Dance, because giants from the remotestpart of Africa brought them to Ireland, and in the plains of Kildare, not far from the castle of Naas, miraculously set them up. .. . Thesestones (according to the British history) Aurelius Ambrosius, King ofthe Britons, procured Merlin by supernatural means to bring from Irelandto Britain. "

From the present ruined state of Stonehenge it is not possible to statewith certainty what was the original arrangement, but it is probablethat it was approximately as follows (see frontispiece):

[Illustration: FIG. 1. Plan of Stonehenge in 1901. (After_Archæologia_. ) The dotted stones are of porphyritic diabase. ]

There was an outer circle of about thirty worked upright stones ofsquare section (Fig. I). On each pair of these rested a horizontalblock, but only five now remain in position. These 'lintels' probablyformed a continuous architrave (Pl. I). The diameter of this outercircle is about 97-1/2 feet, inner measurement. The stones used aresarsens or blocks of sandstone, such as are to be found lying about inmany parts of the district round Stonehenge. 

[Illustration: Plate I. STONEHENGE FROM THE SOUTH-WEST Photo Graphotone Co. To face p. 17]

Well within this circle stood the five huge trilithons (_a-e_), arrangedin the form of a horseshoe with its open side to the north-east. Eachtrilithon, as the name implies, consists of three stones, two of whichare uprights, the third being laid horizontally across the top. Theheight of the trilithons varies from 16 to 21-1/2 feet, the lowest beingthe two that stand at the open end of the horseshoe, and the highestthat which is at the apex. Here again all the stones are sarsens and allare carefully worked. On the top end of each upright of the trilithonsis an accurately cut tenon which dovetails into two mortices cut one ateach end of the lower surface of the horizontal block. Each upright ofthe outer circle had a double tenon, and the lintels, besides beingmorticed to take these tenons, were also dovetailed each into its twoneighbours. 

Within the horseshoe and close up to it stand the famous blue-stones, now twelve in number, but originally perhaps more. These stones are notso high as the trilithons, the tallest reaching only 7-1/2 feet. Theyare nearly all of porphyritic diabase. It has often been asserted thatthese blue-stones must have been brought to Stonehenge from a distance, as they do not occur anywhere in the district. Some have suggested thatthey came from Wales or Cornwall, or even by sea from Ireland. Now, therecent excavations have shown that the blue-stones were brought toStonehenge in a rough state, and that all the trimming was done on thespot where they were erected. It seems unlikely that if they had beenbrought from a distance the rough trimming should not have been done onthe spot where they were found, in order to decrease their weight fortransport. It is therefore possible that the stones were erratic blocksfound near Stonehenge. 

Within the horseshoe, and near its apex, lies the famous "Altar Stone"(A), a block measuring about 16 feet by 4. Between the horseshoe and theouter circle another circle of diabase stones is sometimes said to haveexisted, but very little of it now remains. 

The whole building is surrounded by a rampart of earth several feethigh, forming a circle about 300 feet in diameter. An avenue still 1200feet in length, bordered by two walls of earth, leads up to the rampartfrom the north-east. On the axis of this avenue and nearly at itsextremity stands the upright stone known as the Friar's Heel. 

In 1901, in the course of repairing the central trilithon, carefulexcavations were carried out over a small area at Stonehenge. More thana hundred stone implements were found, of which the majority were flintaxes, probably used for dressing the softer of the sandstone blocks, andalso for excavating the chalk into which the uprights were set. Aboutthirty hammer-stones suitable for holding in the hand were found. Thesewere doubtless used for dressing the surface of the blocks. Mostremarkable of all were the 'mauls, ' large boulders weighing from 36 to64 pounds, used for smashing blocks and also for removing large chipsfrom the surfaces. Several antlers of deer were found, one of which hadbeen worn down by use as a pickaxe. 

These excavations made it clear that the blue-stones had been shaped onthe spot, whereas the sarsens had been roughly prepared at the placewhere they were found, and only finished off on the spot where they wereerected. 

What is the date of the erection of Stonehenge? The finding of so manyimplements of flint in the excavations of 1901 shows that the structurebelongs to a period when flint was still largely used. The occurrence ofa stain of oxide of copper on a worked block of stone at a depth of 7feet does not necessarily prove that the stones were erected in thebronze age, for the stain may have been caused by the disintegration ofmalachite and not of metallic copper. At the same time, we must notinfer from the frequency of the flint implements that metal was unknown, for flint continued to be used far on into the early metal age. Moreover, flint tools when worn out were simply thrown aside on thespot, while those of metal were carefully set apart for sharpening orre-casting, and are thus seldom found in large numbers in an excavation. We have, therefore, no means of accurately determining the date ofStonehenge; all that can be said is that the occurrence of flint in suchlarge quantities points either to the neolithic age or to acomparatively early date in the copper or bronze period. It is unlikelythat stone tools would play such a considerable rôle in the late bronzeor the iron age. 

At the same time it must not be forgotten that Sir Arthur Evans hasspoken in favour of a date in the first half of the third century B. C. He believes that the great circles are religious monuments which in formdeveloped out of the round barrows, and that Stonehenge is thereforemuch later than some at least of the round barrows around it. That it isearlier than others is clear from the occurrence in some of them ofchips from the sarsen stones. He therefore places its building late inthe round barrow period, and sees confirmation of this in the fact thatthe round barrows which surround the monument are not grouped in regularfashion around it, as they should have been had they been later indate. 

Many attempts have been made to date the monuments by means ofastronomy. All these start from the assumption that it was erected inconnection with the worship of the sun, or at least in order to takecertain observations with regard to the sun. Sir Norman Lockyer noticedthat the avenue at Stonehenge pointed approximately to the spot wherethe sun rises at the midsummer solstice, and therefore thought thatStonehenge was erected to observe this midsummer rising. If he couldfind the exact direction of the avenue he would know where the sun roseat midsummer in the year when the circle was built. From this he couldeasily fix the date, for, owing to the precession of the equinoxes, thepoint of the midsummer rising is continually altering, and the positionfor any year being known the date of that year can be foundastronomically. But how was the precise direction of this very irregularavenue to be fixed? The line from the altar stone to the Friar's Heel, which is popularly supposed to point to the midsummer rising, hascertainly never done so in the last ten thousand years, and thereforecould not be used as the direction of the avenue. Eventually Sir Normandecided to use a line from the centre of the circle to a modernbenchmark on Sidbury Hill, eight miles north-east of Stonehenge. On thisline the sun rose in 1680 B. C. With a possible error of two hundredyears each way: this Sir Norman takes to be the date of Stonehenge. 

Sir Norman's reasoning has been severely handled by hisfellow-astronomer Mr. Hinks, who points out that the direction chosenfor the avenue is purely arbitrary, since Sidbury Hill has no connectionwith Stonehenge at all. Moreover, Sir Norman determines sunrise forStonehenge as being the instant when the edge of the sun's disk firstappears, while in his attempts to date the Egyptian temple of Karnak hedefined it as the moment when the sun's centre reached the horizon. Wecannot say which alternative the builders would have chosen, andtherefore we cannot determine the date of building. 

Sir Norman Lockyer has since modified his views. He now argues that thetrilithons and outer circle are later additions to an earlier temple towhich the blue-stones belong. This earlier temple was made to observe"primarily but not exclusively the May year, " while the later temple"represented a change of cult, and was dedicated primarily to thesolstitial year. " This view seems to be disproved by the excavations of1901, which made it clear that the trilithons were erected before andnot after the blue-stones. 

Nothing is more likely than that the builders of the megaliths had someknowledge of the movements of the sun in connection with the seasons, and that their priests or wise men determined for them, by observing thesun, the times of sowing, reaping, etc. , as they do among many savagetribes at the present day. They may have been worshippers of the sun, and their temples may have contained 'observation lines' for determiningcertain of his movements. But the attempt to date the monuments fromsuch lines involves so many assumptions and is affected by so manydisturbing elements that it can never have a serious value for thearchæologist. The uncertainty is even greater in the case of templessupposed to be oriented by some star, for in this case there is almostalways a choice of two or more bright stars, giving the most divergentresults. 

[Illustration: FIG. 2. Avebury and the Kennet Avenue. (After Sir R. Colt Hoare. )]

Next in importance to Stonehenge comes the huge but now almost destroyedcircle of Avebury (Fig. 2). Its area is five times as great as that ofSt. Peter's in Rome, and a quarter of a million people could standwithin it. It consists in the first place of a rampart of earth roughlycircular in form and with a diameter of about 1200 feet. Within this isa ditch, and close on the inner edge of this was a circle of about ahundred upright stones. Within this circle were two pairs of concentriccircles with their centres slightly east of the north-and-south diameterof the great circle. The diameters of the outer circles of these twopairs are 350 and 325 feet respectively. In the centre of the northernpair was a cover-slab supported by three uprights, and in the centre ofthe southern a single menhir. All the stones used are sarsens, such asare strewn everywhere over the district. 

An avenue flanked by two rows of stones ran in a south-easterlydirection from the rampart towards the village of Kennet for a distanceof about 1430 yards in a straight line. 

At a distance of 1200 yards due south from Avebury Circle stands thefamous artificial mound called Silbury Hill. It is 552 feet in diameter, 130 in height, and has a flat top 102 feet across. A pit was driven downinto its centre in 1777, and in 1849 a trench was cut into it from thesouth side to the centre, but neither gave any result. It is quitepossible that there are burials in the mound, whether in megalithicchambers or not. 

South-west of Avebury is Hakpen Hill, where there once stood twoconcentric ellipses of stones. A straight avenue is said to have runfrom these in a north-westerly direction. Whether these three monumentsnear Avebury have any connection with one another and, if so, what thisconnection is, is unknown. 

There are many other circles in England, but we have only space tomention briefly some of the more important. At Rollright, inOxfordshire, there is a circle 100 feet in diameter with a tall menhir50 yards to the north-east. Derbyshire possesses a famous monument, thatof Arbor Low, where a circle is surrounded by a rampart and ditch, whilethat of Stanton Drew in Somerset consists of a great circle A and twosmaller circles B and C. The line joining the centres of B and A passesthrough a menhir called Hauptville's Quoit away to the north-east, whilethat which joins the centres of C and A cuts a group of three menhirscalled The Cove, lying to the south-west. 

In Cumberland there are several circles. One of these, 330 feet indiameter with an outstanding menhir, is known as "Long Meg and herDaughters. " Another, the Mayborough Circle, is of much the same size, but consists of a tall monolith in the centre of a rampart formedentirely of rather small water-worn stones. A similar circle not farfrom this is known as King Arthur's Round Table; here, however, there isno monolith. Near Keswick there is a finely preserved circle, and atShap there seems to have existed a large circle with an avenue of stonesrunning for over a mile to the north. 

Cornwall possesses a number of fine monuments. The most celebrated isthe Dance Maen Circle, which is 76 feet in diameter and has twomonoliths to the north-east, out of sight of the circle, but stated tobe in a straight line with its centre. Local tradition calls the circle"The Merry Maidens, " and has it that the stones are girls turned intostones for dancing on Sunday: the two monoliths are called the Pipers. The three circles known as the Hurlers lie close together with theircentres nearly in a straight line in the direction N. N. E. By S. S. W. AtBoscawen-un, near Penzance, is a circle called the Nine Maidens, and twocircles near Tregeseal have the same name. Another well-known circle inCornwall is called the Stripple Stones: the circle stands on a platformof earth surrounded by a ditch, outside which is a rampart. In thecentre is a menhir 12 feet in height. 

At Merivale, in Somersetshire, there are the remains of a small circle, to the north of which lie two almost parallel double lines of menhirs, running about E. N. E. By W. S. W. , the more southerly of the two linesoverlapping the other at both extremities. 

With what purpose were these great circles erected? We have alreadymentioned the curious belief of Geoffrey of Monmouth with regard toStonehenge, and we may pass on to more modern theories. James I wasonce taken to see Stonehenge when on a visit to the Earl of Pembroke atWilton. He was so interested that he ordered his architect Inigo Jonesto enquire into its date and purpose. The architect's conclusion wasthat it was a Roman temple "dedicated to the god Caelus and built afterthe Tuscan order. "

Many years later Dr. Stukeley started a theory which has not entirelybeen abandoned at the present day. For him Stonehenge and other stonecircles were temples of the druids. This was in itself by no means aridiculous theory, but Stukeley went further than this. Relying on aquaint story in Pliny wherein the druids of Gaul are said to use as acharm a certain magic egg manufactured by snakes, he imagined that thedruids were serpent-worshippers, and essayed to see serpents even in theforms of their temples. Thus in the Avebury group the circle on HakpenHill was for him the head of a snake and its avenue part of the body. The Avebury circles were coils in the body, which was completed by theaddition of imaginary stones and avenues. He also attempted with evenless success to see the form of a serpent in other British circlegroups. 

The druids, as we gather from the rather scanty references in Cæsar andother Roman authors, were priests of the Celts in Gaul. Suetoniusfurther speaks of druids in Anglesey, and tradition has it that in Walesand Ireland there were druids in pre-Christian times. But that druidsever existed in England or in a tithe of the places in which megalithiccircles and other monuments occur is unlikely. At the same time, it isnot impossible that some of the circles of Ireland, Wales, and Francewere afterwards used by the druids as suitable places for meeting andpreaching. 

Fergusson in his great work _Rude Stone Monuments_ held a remarkableview as to the purpose of the British stone circles. He believed thatthey were partly Roman in date, and that some of them at least markedthe scene of battles fought by King Arthur against the Saxons. Thus, forexample, he says with regard to Avebury, "I feel it will come eventuallyto be acknowledged that those who fell in Arthur's twelfth and greatestbattle were buried in the ring at Avebury, and that those who survivedraised these stones and the mound of Silbury in the vain hope that theywould convey to their latest posterity the memory of their prowess. " Itis hardly necessary to take this view seriously nowadays. Stonehenge, which Fergusson attributes to the same late era, has been proved byexcavation to be prehistoric in origin, and with it naturally go therest of the megalithic circles of England, except where there is anycertain proof to the contrary. 

The most probable theory is that the circles are religious monuments ofsome kind. What the nature of the worship carried on in them was it isquite impossible to determine. It may be that some at least were builtnear the graves of deified heroes to whose worship they wereconsecrated. On the other hand, it is possible that they were templesdedicated to the sun or to others of the heavenly bodies. Whether theyserved for the taking of astronomical observations or not is a questionwhich cannot be decided with certainty, though the frequency with whichmenhirs occur in directions roughly north-east of the circles isconsidered by some as a sign of connection with the watching of solarphenomena. 

Dolmens of simple type are not common in England, though they occur withcomparative frequency in Wales, where the best known are the so-calledArthur's Quoit near Swansea, the dolmen of Pentre Ifan in Pembrokeshire, and that of Plas Newydd on the Menai Strait: in Anglesey they are quitecommon. In England we have numerous examples in Cornwall, especiallywest of Falmouth, among which are Chun Quoit and Lanyon Quoit. There aredolmens at Chagford and Drewsteignton in Devonshire, and there is onenear the Rollright Circle in Oxfordshire. 

Many of the so-called cromlechs of England are not true dolmens, but theremains of tombs of more complicated types. Thus the famous Kit's CotyHouse in Kent was certainly not a dolmen, though it is now impossible tosay what its form was. Wayland the Smith's Cave was probably athree-chambered corridor-tomb covered with a mound. The famousMen-an-tol in Cornwall may well be all that is left of a chamber-tomb ofsome kind. It is a slab about 3-1/2 feet square, in which is a hole1-1/2 feet in diameter. There are other stones standing or lying aroundit. It is known to the peasants as the Crickstone, for it was said tocure sufferers from rickets or crick in the back if they passed ninetimes through the hole in a direction against the sun. The Isle of Manpossesses a fine sepulchral monument on Meayll Hill. It consist of sixT-shaped chamber-tombs arranged in a circle with entrances to the northand south. There is also a corridor-tomb, known as King Orry's Grave, atLaxey, and another with a semicircular façade at Maughold. 

Among the megalithic monuments of our islands the chambered barrows holdan important place. It is well known that in the neolithic period thedead in certain parts of England were buried under mounds of notcircular but elongated shape. These graves are commonest in Wiltshireand the surrounding counties of Dorsetshire, Somersetshire, andGloucestershire. A few exist in other counties. Some contain no chamber, while others contain a structure of the megalithic type. It is withthese latter that we have here to deal. Chambered long barrows are mostfrequent in Wiltshire, though they do occur in other counties, as, forexample, Buckinghamshire, where the famous Cave of Wayland the Smith iscertainly the remains of a barrow of this kind. In Derbyshire andStaffordshire a type of chambered mound does occur, but it seemsuncertain from the description given whether it is round or elongated. 

[Illustration: FIG. 3. (_a_)--Barrow at Stoney Littleton, Somersetshire. (_b_)--Barrow at Rodmarton, Gloucestershire. (_c_)--Chambers of barrow at Uley, Gloucestershire. (After Thurnam, _Archæologia, _ XLII. )]

Turning first to the Wiltshire and Gloucestershire group of barrows wefind that they are usually from 120 to 200 feet in length and from 30 to60 in breadth. In some cases there is a wall of dry stone-masonry aroundthe foot of the mound and outside this a ditch. The megalithic chamberswithin the mound are of three types. In the first there is a centralgallery entering the mound at its thicker end and leading to a chamberor series of chambers (Fig. 3, _a_ and _c_). Where this gallery entersthe mound there is a cusp-shaped break in the outline of the mound asmarked by the dry walling, and the entrance is closed by a stone block. The chambers are formed of large slabs set up on edge. Occasionallythere are spaces between successive slabs, and these are filled up withdry masonry. The roof is made either by laying large slabs across thetops of the sides or by corbelling with smaller slabs as at StoneyLittleton. 

In the second type of chambered barrow there is no central corridor, butchambers are built in opposite pairs on the outside edge of the moundand opening outwards (Fig. 3, _b_). The two best known examples of thisare the tumuli of Avening and of Rodmarton. 

In the third type of barrow there is no chamber connected with theoutside, but its place is taken by several dolmens--so small as to bemere cists--within the mound. 

The burials in these barrows seem to have been without exceptioninhumations. The body was placed in the crouched position, eithersitting up or reclining. In an untouched chamber at Rodmarton were foundas many as thirteen bodies, and in the eastern chamber at Charlton'sAbbott there were twelve. With the bodies lay pottery, vases, andimplements of flint and bone. 

 CHAPTER III

 MEGALITHIC MONUMENTS IN SCOTLAND AND IRELAND

The stone circles of Scotland have been divided into three types--theWestern Scottish, consisting of a rather irregular ring or pair ofconcentric rings; the Inverness type, in which a chamber entered by astraight passage is covered by a round tumulus with a retaining wall ofstone, the whole being surrounded by a regular stone circle; and theAberdeen type, which is similar to the last, but has a 'recumbent' stonebetween two of the uprights of its outer circle. 

The first type occurs in the southern counties, in the islands of thewest and north coasts, and also extends into Argyll and Perthshire. Themost famous example is the Callernish Circle in the Isle of Lewis. Thecircle is formed by thirteen stones from 12 to 15 feet high, and itscentre is marked by an upright 17 feet high. From the circle extends aline of four stones to the east and another to the west. To the southruns a line of five uprights and several fallen stones, and to theN. N. E. Runs a double line, forming as it were an avenue with ninestones on one side and ten on the other, but having no entrance to thecircle. Inside the circle, between the central stone and the east sideof the ring, is what is described as a cruciform grave with three cellsunder a low tumulus. In this tomb were found fragments of human boneapparently burnt. It has been suggested that the tomb is not part of theoriginal structure, but was added later. 

The native tradition about this circle as repeated by Martin in 1700 wasthat it was a druidical place of worship, and that the chief druid stoodnear the central stone to address the assembled people. This traditionseems to have now disappeared. 

In the island of Arran, between Brodick and Lamlash, is a damaged circle21 feet in diameter. At a distance of 60 feet from its circumference ina direction 35° east of south is a stone 4 feet high. In the centre ofthe circle was found a cist cut in the underlying rock containing bluishearth and pieces of bone. Above were an implement and some fragments offlint. 

On the other side of the island there were still in 1860 remains ofeight circles, five of sandstone and three of granite, quite close toone another. The diameter of the largest was 63 feet, and the higheststone reached 18 feet. One of them was a double ring. In four of themwere found cists containing pottery, flint arrow-heads, a piece of abronze pin, and some fragments of bone. Others appear to contain nocists. 

In the other islands of the west coast few circles seem to remain; thereare, however, one at Kirkabrost in Skye, and another at Kingarth inBute. 

At Stromness in Orkney is the famous circle called the Ring of Brogar. It originally consisted of sixty stones forming a circle 340 feet indiameter, outside which was a ditch 29 feet wide. In a direction 60°east of south from the centre, and at a distance of 63 chains, is astanding stone called the Watchstone, 18 feet high, and 42 or 43 chainsfurther on in the same line is a second stone, the Barnstone, 15 feethigh. To the left of this line are two stones apparently placed atrandom, and to the right are the few remaining blocks of the Ring ofStenness, somewhere to the north of which was the celebrated piercedblock called the "Stone of Odin, " destroyed early in the last century. At a distance of 42 or 43 chains to the north-east of the Barnstone liesthe tumulus of Maeshowe. This tumulus conceals a long gallery leadinginto a rectangular chamber. The walls of this latter are built ofhorizontal courses of stones, except at the corners, where there aretall, vertically-placed slabs. The chamber has three niches or recesses, one on each of its closed sides. The roof is formed by corbelling thewalls and finishing off with slabs laid across. If one sits within thechamber and looks in a direct line along the passage one sees theBarnstone. 

A series of measurements and alignments have been taken to connect theMaeshowe tumulus with the Ring of Brogar. Thus we have already seen thatthe distance from the Barnstone to the Watchstone is the same as fromthe Barnstone to the tumulus. Moreover, the Watchstone is equidistantfrom the ring and from the tumulus. Again, a line from the Barnstone tothe tumulus passes through the point of the midsummer sunrise and also, on the other horizon, through the point of the setting sun ten daysbefore the winter solstice; the line from the Watchstone to the BrogarRing marks the setting of the sun at the Beltane festival in May and itsrising ten days before the winter solstice, while the line from Maeshoweto the Watchstone is in the line of the equinoctial rising and setting. These alignments are the work of Mr. Magnus Spence; readers must choosewhat importance they will assign to them. 

The Inverness type of circle is entirely different from that of which wehave been speaking. The finest examples were at Clava, seven miles fromInverness, where fifty years ago there were eight still in existence. One of these is still partly preserved. It consists of a circle 100 feetin diameter consisting of twelve stones. Within this is a cairn ofstones with a circular retaining wall of stone blocks 2 or 3 feet high. The cairn originally covered a circular stone chamber 12-1/2 feet indiameter entered by a straight passage on its south-west side. In otherwords, the Inverness monuments are simply chamber-tombs covered with acairn and surrounded by a circle. 

Around Aberdeen we find the third type of circle. It consists of acist-tomb covered by a low mound, often with a retaining wall of smallblocks, but there is no entrance passage leading into the cist. Outsidethe whole is a circle of large upright blocks with this peculiarity, that between the two highest--generally to the south or slightly east ofsouth--lies a long block on its side, occupying the whole intervalbetween them. The uprights nearest this 'recumbent' block are thetallest in the circle, and the size of the rest decreases towards thenorth. Of thirty circles known near Aberdeen twenty-six still possessthe 'recumbent' stone, and in others it may originally have existed. 

Passing now to monuments of more definitely sepulchral type we find thatthe dolmen is not frequent in Scotland, though several are known in thelowlands and in part of Argyllshire. 

To the long barrows of England answer in part at least the chamberedcairns of Caithness and the Orkneys. The best known type is a longrectangular horned cairn (Fig. 4), of which there are two fine examplesnear Yarhouse. The largest is 240 feet in length. The chamber iscircular, and roofed partly by corbelling and partly by a large slab. Inthe cairn of Get we have a shorter and wider example of the horned type. Another type is circular or elliptical. In a cairn of this sort atCanister an iron knife was found. On the Holm of Papa-Westra in theOrkneys there is an elliptical cairn of this kind containing a longrectangular chamber running along its major axis with seven smallcircular niches opening off it. The entrance passage lies on the minoraxis of the barrow. 

[Illustration: FIG. 4. Horned tumulus at Garrywhin, Caithness. (After Montelius. )]

The megalithic monuments of Ireland are extremely numerous, and arefound in almost every part of the country. They offer a particularinterest from the fact that though they are of few different types theydisplay all the stages by which the more complex were developed from themore simple. It must be remembered that most if not all the monuments weshall describe were originally covered by mounds of earth, though inmost cases these have disappeared. 

The simple dolmen is found in almost all parts of the country. Itssingle cover-slab is supported by a varying number of uprights, sometimes as few as three, oftener four or more. It is of greatimportance to notice the fact that here in Ireland, as elsewhere in themegalithic area, e. G. Sardinia, we have the round and rectangulardolmens in juxtaposition (Fig. 5, _a_ and _c_). 

[Illustration: FIG. 5. Type-plans of _(a)_ the round dolmen; _(b)_ the dolmen with portico; _(c)_ the rectangular dolmen. ]

Occasionally one of the end-blocks of the dolmen instead of justclosing up the space between the two nearest side-blocks is pushed backbetween them so as to form with them a small three-sided portico outsidethe chamber, but still under the shelter of the cover-slab (Fig. 5, _b_). A good example of this exists at Gaulstown, Waterford, where atable-stone weighing 6 tons rests on six uprights, three of which formthe little portico just described. The famous dolmen of Carrickglass, Sligo, is a still more developed example of this type. Here the chamberis an accurate rectangle, and the portico is formed by adding twoside-slabs outside one of the end-slabs, but still under the cover. Thislast is a remarkable block of limestone weighing about 70 tons. Thisform of tomb is without doubt a link between the simple dolmen and thecorridor-tomb. The portico was at first built under the slab by pushingan end-stone inwards. Then external side-stones formed the portico, though still under the slab. The next move was to construct the porticooutside the slab. The portico then needed a roof, and the addition of asecond cover to provide it completed the transition to the simplercorridor-tomb. In many cases the Irish simple dolmens were surrounded bya circle of upright stones. At Carrowmore, Sligo, there seems to havebeen a veritable cemetery of dolmen-tombs, each of which has one or morecircles around it, the outermost being 120 feet in diameter. The tombsin these Carrowmore circles were not always simple dolmens, but oftencorridor-tombs of more or less complicated types. Their excavation hasnot given very definite results. In many cases human bones have beenfound in considerable quantities, sometimes in a calcined condition; butthere is no real evidence to show that cremation was the burial ritepractised. The calcination of human bones may well have been caused bythe lighting of fires in the tomb, either at some funeral ceremony, orin even later days, when the place was used as a shelter for peasants. Afew poor flints were found and a little pottery, together with manybones of animals and some pins and borers of bone. The most importantfind made, however, was a small conical button made of bone with twoholes pierced in its flat side and meeting in the middle. It is a typewhich occurs in Europe only at the period of transition from the age ofstone to that of bronze, and usually in connection with megalithicmonuments. 

[Illustration: FIG. 6. Type-plan of the simple rectangular corridor-tomb or _allée couverte_. ]

We pass on now to consider the simplest form of corridor-tomb, that inwhich there are several cover-slabs, but no separate chamber (Fig. 6). These tombs occur in most parts of Ireland. At Carrick-a-Dhirra, CountyWaterford, there is a perfect example of the most simple type. The tombis exactly rectangular and lies east and west, with a length of 19 feetand a breadth of 7-1/2. At each end is a single upright, and each longside consists of seven. The chamber thus formed is roofed by five slabs. The whole was surrounded by a circle of about twenty-six stones, and nodoubt the chamber was originally covered by a mound. In a somewhatsimilar example at Coolback, Fermanagh, the remains of the ellipticalcairn are still visible. 

But in most cases the plan of the corridor-tomb is complicated by a kindof outer lining of blocks which was added to it. Most of the monumentsare so damaged that it is difficult to see what the exact form of thislining was. Whether it merely consisted of a line of upright blocksclose around the sides of the chamber or whether these supported somefurther structure which covered up the whole chamber it is difficult tosay. In some cases the roof-slab actually covers the outer line ofblocks, and here it seems certain that this outer line served simply toreinforce the chamber walls, the space between being filled with earthor rubble. However, at Labbamologa, County Cork, is a tomb called LeabaCallighe, in which this was certainly not the case. The length of thewhole monument is about 42 feet. The slabs cover the inner walls of thechamber, but not the outer lining: this last forms a kind of outer shellto the whole monument. It is shaped roughly like a ship, and runs to apoint at the east end, thus representing the bow. The west end isdamaged, but may have been pointed like the east. The whole reminds onevery forcibly of the _naus_ of the Balearic Isles and the Giants' Gravesof Sardinia. Occasionally the corridor-tomb has a kind of portico at itswest end. 

[Illustration: FIG. 7. Type-plan of wedge-shaped tomb. The roof slabs are two or more in number. ]

In Munster the corridor-tomb takes a peculiar form (Fig. 7). It liesroughly east and west, and its two long sides are placed at a slightangle to one another in such a way that the west end is broader than theeast. In a good example of this at Keamcorravooly, County Cork, thereare two large capstones and the walls consist of double rows of slabs, the outer being still beneath the cover-slabs. On the upper surface ofthe covers are several small cup-shaped hollows, some of which at leasthave been produced artificially. 

These wedge-shaped structures are of remarkable interest, for exactlythe same broadening of the west end is found in Scandinavia, in the_Hünenbetter_ of Holland, in the corridor-tombs of Portugal, and in thedolmens of the Deccan in India. 

In some Irish tombs the corridor leads to a well-defined chamber. In acurious tomb at Carrickard, Sligo, the chamber was rectangular and layacross the end of the corridor in such a way as to form a T. The wholeseems to have been covered with an oval mound. In another at Highwood inthe same county a long corridor joins two small circular chambers, thetotal length being 44 feet. The corridor was once divided into foursections by cross-slabs. The cairn which covered this tomb wastriangular in form. 

In the county of Meath, in the parish of Lough Crew, is a remarkableseries of stone cairns extending for three miles along theSlieve-na-Callighe Hills. These cairns conceal chamber-tombs. The cairnsthemselves are roughly circular, and the largest have a circle ofupright blocks round the base. The chambers are built of upright slabsand are roofed by corbelling. Cairn H covered a corridor leading to achamber and opening off on each side into a side-chamber, the wholegroup thus being cruciform. In these chambers were found human remainsand objects of flint, bone, earthenware, amber, glass, bronze, and iron. Cairn L had a central corridor from which opened off seven chambers in avery irregular fashion. Cairn T consisted of a corridor leading to afine octagonal chamber with small chambers off it on three sides. 

The chief interest of these tombs lies in the remarkable designsengraved on some of the stones of the passages and chambers. They arefairly deeply cut with a rather sharp implement, probably a metalchisel. They are arranged in the most arbitrary way on the stones andare often crowded together in masses. There is no attempt to depictscenes of any kind, nor is there, indeed, any example of animal life. Infact, the designs seem to be purely ornamental. The most frequentelements of design are cup-shaped hollows, concentric circles or ovals, star-shaped figures, circles with emanating rays, spirals, chevrons, reticulated figures, parallel straight or curved lines. There seems tobe no clue as to the meaning of these designs. They may have been merelyornamental, though this is hardly likely. 

At New Grange, near Drogheda, there is a similar series of tumuli, oneof which has become famous (Fig. 8). It consists of a huge mound ofstones 280 feet in diameter surrounded by a circle of upright blocks. Access to the corridor is gained from the south-east side. This corridorleads to a chamber with three divisions, so that corridor and chamberstogether form a cross with a long shaft. The walls are formed of roughslabs set upright. In the passage the roof is of slabs laid rightacross, but the roof of the chamber is formed by corbelling. On thefloor of each division of the chamber was found a stone basin. 

[Illustration: Figure 8. Corridor-tomb at New Grange, Ireland (Coffey, _Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy_, 1892. )]

Around the edge of the mound runs an enclosure wall of stones lying onthe ground edge to edge. A few of these are sculptured. The finest is agreat stone which lies in front of the entrance and shows awell-arranged design of spirals and lozenges. There are also engravingson one of the stones of the chambers. These designs are in general moreskilful than those of Lough Crew. They consist mainly of chevrons, lozenges, spirals, and triangles. 

The monuments we have so far described are all tombs. Ireland alsopossesses several stone circles. The largest are situated round LoughGur, 10 or 12 miles south of Limerick. There was at one time a finecircle west of Lough Gur at Rockbarton, but it is now destroyed. On theeastern edge of the lough is a double concentric ring of stones, thediameter of the inner circle being about 100 feet. The rings are 6 feetapart, and the space between them is filled up with earth. In 1869 anexcavation was made within the circle and revealed some human remains, mostly those of children from six to eight years old. 

Further north is a remarkable group of monuments known as theCarrigalla circles. The first is a plain circle (L) 33 or 34 feet indiameter, composed of twenty-eight stones. The space within them isfilled up with earth to form a raised platform. At a distance of 75 feetare two concentric circles, diameters 155 and 184 feet respectively, made of stones 5 or 6 feet high. The space between the two circles isfilled with earth. Within these is a third concentric circle about 48feet in diameter made of stones of the same size. This group of threeconcentric circles we will call M. The line joining the centres of L andM runs in a direction of 29° or 30° west of north and passes through astone (N) 8 feet high standing on the top of a ridge 2500 feet away. There are two other stones more to the west (O and P) in such a positionthat the line joining them (41° west of north) passes through the centreof M, from which they are distant 860 and 1450 feet respectively. Further, a line through the centre of L and a great standing stone (Q)2480 feet from it in a direction 10° east of south passes through thehighest point in the district, 1615 feet away and 492 feet in height. 

Mr. Lewis compares this group of monuments with that of Stanton Drew inSomersetshire. In both a line joining the centre of two circles passesthrough a single stone in a northerly direction, and there is in both afixed line from the centre of the larger circle. Captain BoyleSomerville, R. N. , finds that the line 29° or 30° west of north wouldmark the setting of Capella in B. C. 1600, or Arcturus 500 B. C. ; he addsthat the direction 41° west of north would suit Capella in 2500 B. C. OrCastor in 2000 B. C. 

On the west side of Lough Gur is another group of monuments. There is inthe first place a circle 55 feet in diameter. On a line 35° east ofnorth from this is a stone 10 feet high, and the same line producedstrikes a prominent hill-top. Somewhere to the south-west of thiscircle, perhaps with its centre in the line just described, lay a secondcircle between 150 and 170 feet in diameter, destroyed in 1870. Threeother stones mentioned by early writers as being near the circles havenow disappeared. The direction 35° east of north is the same as that ofthe King-stone with regard to the Rollright Circle in Oxfordshire. Thisline, allowing a height of 3° for the horizon, would, according to SirNorman Lockyer, have struck the rising points of Capella in 1700 B. C. And Arcturus in 500 B. C. 

To the south of the destroyed circle is another about 150 to 155 feet indiameter, with stones of over 5 feet in height set close together. Earthis piled up outside them to form a bank 30 feet wide. There is anentrance 3 feet wide in a direction 59° east of north from the centre ofthe circle. There is said to have been at one time a cromlech 100 feetwide due south of the circle and connected with it by a paved way. SirNorman Lockyer thinks that the position of the doorway is connected withobservation of the sun's rising in May. Moreover, the tallest stone ofthe circle, 9 feet high, is 30° east of north from the centre, adirection which according to him points to the rising of Capella in 1950B. C. And Arcturus in 280 B. C. 

 CHAPTER IV

 THE SCANDINAVIAN MEGALITHIC AREA

In Scandinavia megalithic monuments abound. They have been studied withunusual care from quite an early date in the history of archæology, andclassified in the order of their development. The earliest type appearsto be the simple dolmen with either four or five sides and a very roughcover-slab. This and the upper part of the sides remained uncovered bythe mound of earth which was always heaped round the tomb. In latertimes the dolmen became more regularly rectangular in shape, and onlyits roof-block appeared above the mound. Contemporary with this laterform of dolmen were several other types of tomb. One was simply theearlier dolmen with one side open and in front of it a sort of porticoor elementary corridor formed by two upright slabs with no roofing (cf. The Irish type, Fig. 5, _b_). This quickly developed into the truecorridor-tomb, which had at first a small round chamber with one or twocover-slabs, a short corridor, and a round or rectangular mound. Latertypes have an oval chamber (Fig. 9) with from one to four cover-slabs ora rectangular chamber with a long corridor and a circular mound. Finally we reach a type where thin slabs are used in the construction, and the mound completely covers the cap-stones: here the corridor leadsout from one of the short ends of the rectangular chamber. 

The earliest of these types in point of view of development, the truedolmen, is common both in Denmark and in South Sweden; only one exampleexists in Norway. In Sweden it is never found far from the sea-coast. 

[Illustration: FIG. 9. Corridor-tomb, Ottagården, Sweden. (Montelius, _Orient und Europa_. )]

The corridor-tomb is also frequent in Denmark and Sweden, though it isunknown in Norway. In Sweden it is, like all megalithic monuments, confined to the south of the country. Of the early transition type withelementary corridor there are fine examples at Herrestrup in Denmark andTorebo in Sweden. A tomb at Sjöbol in Sweden where the corridor, consisting of only two uprights, is covered in with two roof-slabsinstead of being left open, shows very clearly the transition to thecorridor-tomb proper, in which the entrance passage consists of at leastfour uprights, two on each side. Of this there are numerous fineexamples. A tomb of this type at Broholm in Denmark has a roughlycircular chamber separated from the corridor by a kind ofthreshold-stone. Another at Tyfta in Sweden is remarkable for itscurious construction, the uprights being set rather apart from oneanother and the spaces between filled up with dry masonry of smallstones. Possibly there were not sufficient large blocks at hand toconstruct a tomb of the required size. 

The still later type consisting of a rectangular chamber with a longcorridor leading out of one of its long sides often attains to veryimposing dimensions. In Westgothland, a province of Sweden, there arefine examples with walls of limestone and often roofs of granite visibleabove the surface of the mound. The largest of these tombs is that ofKarleby near Falköping. In another at Axevalla Heath were found nineteenbodies seated round the wall of the chamber, each in a separate smallcist of stone slabs. The position of the bodies in the Scandinaviangraves is rather variable, both the outstretched and the contractedposture being used. It is usual to find many bodies in the same tomb, often as many as twenty or thirty: in that of Borreby on the island ofSeeland were found seventy skeletons, all of children of from two toeighteen years of age. 

In Denmark these rectangular tombs occasionally have one or more smallround niches. In 1837 a large tomb was excavated at Lundhöj on Jütland, which had a circular niche opposite to the entrance. The niche had athreshold-stone, and the two uprights of the main chamber which lay oneither side of this had been crudely engraved with designs, among whichwere a man, an animal, and a circle with a pair of diameters marked. Little was found in the chamber, and only some bones and a pot in theniche. 

In Denmark often occur mounds which contain two or more tombs, usuallyof the same form, each with its separate entrance passage. At theentrance of the chamber there is sometimes a well-worked framework intowhich fitted a door of stone or wood. 

The late type in which the corridor leads out of one of the narrow endsof the chamber is represented in both Sweden and Denmark. From this maybe derived the rather unusual types in which the corridor has becomeindistinguishable from the chamber or forms a sort of antechamber to it. An example of the former type at Knyttkärr in Sweden is wider at one endthan at the other, and has an outer coating of stone slabs. It resemblesvery closely the wedge-shaped tombs of Munster (cf. Fig. 7):

In Germany megalithic monuments are not infrequent, but they arepractically confined to the northern part of the country. They extend asfar east as Königsberg and as far west as the borders of Holland. Theyare very frequent in Holstein, Mecklenburg, and Hanover. There are evenexamples in Prussian Saxony, but in South Germany they cease entirely. Keller in one edition of his _Lake Dwellings_ figures two supposeddolmens north of Lake Pfäffikon in Switzerland, but we have no detailswith regard to them. 

The true dolmen is extremely rare in Germany, and only occurs in smallgroups in particular localities. The corridor-tomb with a distinctchamber is also very exceptional, especially east of the Elbe. The mostusual type of megalithic tomb is that known as the _Hünenbett_ or_Riesenbett_. The latter name means Giants' Bed, and it seems probablethat the former should be similarly translated, despite the suggestedconnection with the Huns, for a word _Hünen_ has been in use in NorthGermany for several centuries with the meaning of giants. A _Hünenbett_consists of a rectangular (rarely oval or round) hill of earth coveringa megalithic tomb. This is a simple elongated rectangle in shape, madeof upright blocks and roofed with two or more cover-slabs. The great_Hünenbett_ or Grewismühlen in Mecklenburg has a mound measuring 150feet by 36 with a height of 5 feet. On the edge of the mound arearranged forty-eight tall upright blocks of stone. 

The _Hünenbetter_ of the Altmark are among the best known and explored. Here the corridors are usually about 20 feet long, though in rare casesthey reach a length of 40 feet. Each is filled with clean sand up totwo-thirds of its height, and on this lie the bodies and their funeraldeposit. The bodies must have been laid flat, though not necessarily inan extended position, as there was not room above the sand for them tohave been seated upright. Various implements of flint have been found inthe tombs together with stone hammers and vases of pottery. There is nocertain instance of the finding of metal. 

A book printed by John Picardt at Amsterdam in 1660 contains quaintpictures of giants and dwarfs engaged in the building of a megalithicmonument which is clearly a _Hünenbett_. According to tradition thegiants, after employing the labour of the dwarfs, proceeded to devourthem. _Hünenbetter_ similar to those shown in Picardt's illustrationsare still to be seen in Holland, but only in the north, where over fiftyare known. They are of elongated rectangular form, built of uprightblocks, and roofed with from two to ten cover-slabs. They all widenslightly towards the west end. The most perfect example still remainingis that of Tinaarloo, and the largest is that of Borger, which containsforty-five blocks, of which ten are cap-stones. Several _Hünenbetter_have been excavated. In them are found pottery vases, flint celts, axesand hammers of grey granite, basalt, and jade. 

Belgium possesses several true dolmens, of which the best known is thatcalled La Pierre du Diable on the right bank of the Meuse. Near Lüttichare two simple corridor-tombs, each with a round hole in one of theend-slabs and a small portico outside it. 

 CHAPTER V

 FRANCE, SPAIN, AND PORTUGAL

France contains large numbers of megalithic monuments. Of dolmens andcorridor-tombs no less than 4458 have been recorded. In the east andsouth-east they are rare, but they abound over a wide strip running fromthe Breton coasts of the English Channel to the Mediterranean shores ofHérault and Card. In 1901 Mortillef counted 6192 menhirs, includingthose which formed parts of _alignements_ and cromlechs. Several ofthese attain to a great size. That to Locmariaquer (Morbihan), nowunfortunately fallen and broken, measured over 60 feet in height, beingthus not much shorter than the Egyptian obelisk which stands in thePlace de la Concorde in Paris. 

Passing now to combinations of menhirs in groups, we must first mentionthe remarkable _alignements_ of Brittany, of which the most famous arethose of Carnac. They run east and west over a distance of 3300 yards, but the line is broken at two points in such a way that the whole formsthree groups. The most westerly, that of Ménec, consists of eleven linesof menhirs and a cromlech, the total number of stones standing being1169, the tallest of which is 13 feet in height. The central group, thatof Kermario, consists of 982 stones arranged in ten straight lines, while the most easterly, that of Kerlescan, is formed by 579 menhirs, 39of which form a rectangular enclosure. 

There are other _alignements_ in Brittany, of which the most importantis that of Erdeven, comprising 1129 stones arranged in ten lines. Outside Brittany _alignements_ are unusual, but a fine example, nowruined, is said to have existed at Saint Pantaléon north of Autun. Inthe fields around it are found large quantities of polished stone axeswith knives, scrapers, and arrow-heads of flint. 

We have already noticed the cromlechs which form part of the_alignements_ of Brittany. There are other examples in France. AtEr-Lanic are two circles touching one another, the lower of which iscovered by the sea even at low tide. Excavations carried out within thecircles brought to light rough pottery and axes of polished stone. Twofine circles at Can de Ceyrac (Gard) have diameters of about 100 yards, and are formed of stones about 3 feet high. Each has a short entranceavenue which narrows as it approaches the circle, and in the centre ofeach rises a trilithon of rough stones. 

Of the definitely sepulchral monuments the dolmen is common in allparts of the French megalithic area. It will suffice to mention themagnificent example known as the Table des Marchands at Locmariaquer. Perhaps the most typical structure in France is the corridor-tomb inwhich the chamber is indistinguishable from the passage, and the wholeforms a long rectangular area. This is the _allée couverte_ in thenarrower sense. In the department of Oise occurs a special type of thisin which one of the end-slabs has a hole pierced in its centre and ispreceded by a small portico consisting of two uprights supporting aroof-slab (Fig 10). A remarkable example in Brittany known as LesPierres Plates turns at a sharp angle in the middle, and is thuselbow-shaped. 

[Illustration: FIG. 10. _Allée couverte_, called La Pierre aux Fées, Oise, France. (_Compte rendu du Congrès Préhistorique de France_. )]

In the north of France the _allée_ is often merely cut out in thesurface of the ground and has no roof at all. It is sometimes pavedwith slabs and divided into two partitions by an upright with a hole inits centre. Tombs of this kind often contain from forty to eightyskeletons, some of which are in the contracted position. The skulls arein some cases trepanned, i. E. Small round pieces of the bone have beencut out of them; such pieces are sometimes found separate in the graves. No objects of metal occur in these North French tombs. 

There are many fine examples in Brittany of the corridor-tomb withdistinct chamber. The best known lies on the island of Gavr'inis(Morbihan). It is covered by a tumulus nearly 200 feet in diameter. Thecircular chamber, 6 feet in height, is roofed by a huge block measuring13 feet by 10. The corridor which leads out to the edge of the mound is40 feet in length. Twenty-two of the upright blocks used in this tombare almost entirely covered with engraved designs. These are massedtogether with very little order, the main object having been apparentlyto cover the whole surface of the stone with ornament. The designsconsist of spirals, concentric circles and semicircles, chevrons, rowsof strokes, and triangles, and bear a considerable resemblance to thoseof Lough Crew and New Grange in Ireland. 

Another tomb in the same district, that of Mané-er-Hroeck, was intactwhen discovered in 1863. It contained within its chamber a hoard of 101axes of fibrolite and jadeite, 50 pebbles of a kind of turquoise knownas _callaïs_, pieces of pottery, flints, and a peculiarly fine celt ofjadeite together with a flat ring-shaped club-head of the same stone. The tomb was concealed by a huge oval mound more than 100 yards inlength. The famous Mont S. Michel is an artificial mound containing acentral megalithic chamber and several smaller cists, some of which heldcremated bodies. 

[Illustration: FIG. 11. Chambered mound at Fontenay-le-Marmion, Normandy. (After Montelius, _Orient und Europa_. )]

A very remarkable mound in Calvados (Fig. 11) was found to contain noless than twelve circular corbelled chambers, each with a separateentrance passage. The megalithic tombs of Brittany all belong to thelate neolithic period, and contain tools and arrow-heads of flint, smallornaments of gold, _callaïs_, and pottery which includes among its formsthe bell-shaped cup. 

In Central and South France the _allées couvertes_ are mostly of asemi-subterranean type, i. E. They are cut in the ground and merelyroofed with slabs of stone. The most famous is that of the Grotte desFées near Arles (Fig. 12), in which a passage (_a_) with a staircase atone end and two niches (_b b_) in its sides leads into a narrowrectangular chamber (_c_). The total length is nearly 80 feet. Anothertomb of the same type, La Grotte du Castellet, contained over a hundredskeletons, together with thirty-three flint arrow or spear-heads, one ofwhich was stuck fast in a human vertebra, a bell-shaped cup, axes ofpolished stone, beads and pendants of various materials, 114 pieces of_callaïs_, and a small plaque of gold. 

On the plateau of Ger near the town of Dax are large numbers of mounds, some of which contain cremated bodies in urns and others megalithictombs. Bertrand saw in this a cemetery of two different peoples livingside by side. But it has since been shown that the cremation moundsbelong to a much later period than those which contain megalithicgraves. In these last the skeletons were found seated around the wallsof the chamber accompanied by objects of flint and other stone, beads of_callaïs_, and small gold ornaments. 

[Illustration: FIG. 12. Plan and section of La Grotte des Fées, Arles, France (_Matériaux pour l'histoire de l'homme_, 1873). ]

[Illustration: FIG. 13. The so-called dolmen-deity, from the tombs of the Petit Morin. (After de Baye. )]

France has also its rock-hewn tombs, for in the valley of thePetit-Morin is a series of such graves. A trench leads down to theentrance, which is closed by a slab. The chamber itself is completelyunderground. In the shallower tombs were either two rows of bodies witha passage between or separate layers parted by slabs or strata of sand. In the deeper were seldom more than eight bodies, in the extended orcontracted position, with tools and weapons of flint, pots, and beadsof amber and of _callaïs_. On the walls were rough sculptures of humanfigures (Fig. 13), to which we shall have to return later. 

The Channel Islands possess megalithic monuments not unlike those ofBrittany. They are corridor-tombs covered with a mound and oftensurrounded by a circle of stones. Within the chamber, which is usuallyround, lies, under a layer of shells, a mass of mingled human and animalbones. The bodies had been buried in the sitting position, and with themlay objects of stone and bone, but none of metal. 

The Spanish Peninsula abounds in megalithic monuments. With theexception of a few menhirs, whose purpose is uncertain, all aresepulchral. Dolmens and corridor-tombs are numerous in many parts, especially in the north-east provinces, in Galicia, in Andalusia, and, above all, in Portugal. There is a fine dolmen in the Vall Gorguina inNorth-East Spain. The cover-slab, measuring 10 feet by 8, is supportedby seven rough uprights with considerable spaces between them. In thesame region is a ruined dolmen surrounded by a circle nearly 90 feet incircumference, consisting of seven large stones, some of which appear tobe partly worked. Circles are also found round dolmens in Andalusia. Portugal abounds in fine dolmens both of the round and rectangulartypes. At Fonte Coberta on the Douro stands a magnificent dolmen knownlocally as the Moors' House. In the name of the field, Fonte Coberta, there is doubtless an allusion to the belief that the dolmens concealsprings of water, a belief also held in parts of Ireland. 

At Eguilaz in the Basque provinces is a fine corridor-tomb, in which apassage 20 feet long, roofed with flat slabs, leads to a rectangularchamber 13 feet by 15 with an immense cover-slab nearly 20 feet inlength: the whole was covered with a mound of earth. The chambercontained human bones and "lanceheads of stone and bronze. " A famoustomb of a similar type exists at Marcella in Algarve. The chamber is afine circle of upright slabs. It is paved with stones, and part of itsarea is divided into two or perhaps three rectangular compartments. Acouple of orthostatic slabs form a sort of neck joining the circle tothe passage, which narrows as it leads away from the circle, and wasprobably divided into two sections by a doorway whose side-posts stillremain. 

In South-East Spain the brothers Siret have found corridor-tombs inwhich the chamber is cut in the rock surface and roofed with slabs; theentrance passage becomes a slope or a staircase. Here we have a parallelto the Giants' Graves of Sardinia, which are built usually of stoneblocks on the surface, but occasionally are cut in the solid rock. Other tombs in the same district show the common megalithic constructionconsisting of a base course of upright slabs surmounted by severalcourses of horizontal masonry (Fig. 14). The chamber is usually round, and may have two or more niches in its circumference. It is roofed bythe successive overlapping or corbelling of the upper courses. The vaultthus formed is further supported by a pillar of wood or stone set inthe centre of the chamber. On the walls of some of the chambers thereare traces of rough painting in red. The whole tomb is covered with acircular mound. In the best known example at Los Millares there areremains of a semicircular façade in front of the entrance, as in manyother megalithic monuments. 

[Illustration: FIG. 14. Corridor-tomb at Los Millares, Spain. (After Siret. )]

The finest, however, of all the Spanish monuments is the corridor-tombof Antequera in Andalusia. It consists of a short passage leading into along rectangular chamber roofed with four slabs. Within it on its axialline are three stone pillars placed directly under the threemeeting-points of the four slabs, but quite unnecessary for theirsupport. The whole tomb is covered with a low mound of earth. In thegreat upright slab which forms the inner end of the chamber is acircular hole rather above the centre. 

It is not the plan of this tomb, but the size, that compels theadmiration of the beholder. He stands, as it were, within a vast cavelighted only from its narrow end, the roof far above his head. The roughsurface of the blocks lends colour to the feeling that this is the workof Nature and not of man. Here, even if not in Stonehenge, he will pauseto marvel at the patient energy of the men of old who put together suchcolossal masses of stone. 

Among the corridor-tombs of Spain must be mentioned a wedge-shaped typewhich bears a close resemblance to those of Munster in Ireland (cf. Fig. 7). In Alemtejo, south of Cape de Sines, are several of these, usually about 6 feet in length, with a slight portico at one end. 

A further point of similarity with the Irish monuments is seen in thecorridor-tombs of Monte Abrahaõ in Portugal, where the chamber wallsseem to have been reinforced by an outer lining of slabs. Remains ofeighty human bodies were found in this tomb, together with objects ofstone and bone, including a small conical button similar to that ofCarrowmore in Ireland. 

The Spanish Peninsula also possesses rock-hewn tombs. At Palmella, nearLisbon, is a circular example about 12 feet in diameter preceded by abell-shaped passage which slopes slightly downwards. Another circularchamber in the same group has a much longer passage, which bulges outinto two small rounded antechambers. These tombs have been excavated andyielded some pottery vases, together with objects of copper and beads ofa peculiar precious stone called _callaïs_. All the finds made in themegalithic remains of Spain and Portugal point to the period oftransition from the age of stone to that of metal. 

The Balearic Islands contain remarkable megalithic monuments. Thoseknown as the _talayots_ are towers having a circular or rarely a squarebase and sloping slightly inwards as they rise. The largest is 50 feetin diameter. The stones, which are rather large and occasionallytrimmed, are laid flat, not on edge. A doorway just large enough to beentered with comfort leads through the thickness of the wall into around chamber roofed by corbelling, with the assistance sometimes of oneor more pillars. From analogy with the _nuraghi_ of Sardinia, which theyresemble rather closely, it seems probable that the _talayots_ arefortified dwellings, perhaps only used in time of danger (Fig. 15). 

[Illustration: Fig. 15. Section and plan of the Talayot of Sa Aquila, Majorca. (After Cartailhac. )]

[Illustration: Fig. 16. Nau d'Es Tudons, plan and section. (After Cartailhac. )]

The _naus_ or _navetas_ are so named from their resemblance to ships. The construction is similar to that of the _talayots_. The outer wallhas a considerable batter. The famous Nau d'Es Tudons is about 36 feetin length. The façade is slightly concave. A low door (_a_) gives accessthrough a narrow slab-roofed passage (_b_) to a long rectangular chamber(_c_), the method of whose roofing is uncertain. All the _naus_ arebuilt with their façades to the south or south-east, with the exceptionof that of Benigaus Nou, the inner end of which is cut in the rock, while the outer part is built up of blocks as usual. The abnormalorientation was here clearly determined by the desire to make use of theface of rock in the construction. The _naus_ seem to have been tombs, ashuman remains have been found in them. 

Rock-tombs also occur in the islands. The most remarkable are those ofS. Vincent in Majorca. One of these has a kind of open antechamber cutin the rock, and is exactly similar in plan to the Grotte des Fées inFrance (cf. Fig. 12). 

Prehistoric villages surrounded by great stone walls can still be tracedin the Balearic Isles. The houses were of two types, built either aboveground or below. The first are square or rectangular with roundedcorners, the base course occasionally consisting of orthostatic slabs. The subterranean dwellings are faced with stone and roofed with flatslabs supported by columns. In each village was one building of adifferent type. It stood above ground and was semicircular in plan. Inits centre stood a horizontal slab laid across the top of an upright, forming a T-shaped structure which helped to support the roof-slabs, butwhich may also have had some religious significance. The stones whichcomposed it were always carefully worked, and the lower was let into asocket on the under side of the upper. 

 CHAPTER VI

 ITALY AND ITS ISLANDS

Italy cannot be called a country of megalithic monuments. In the centreand north they do not occur, the supposed examples mentioned by Dennisin his _Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria_ having been provednon-existent by the Italian Ministry of Education. It is only in theextreme south-west that megalithic structures appear. They are dolmensof ordinary type, except that in some cases the walls are formed not ofupright slabs, but of stones roughly superposed one upon another. On thefarm of the Grassi, near Lecce, are what appear to be two small dolmensat a distance of only 4 feet apart; they are perhaps parts of a singlecorridor-tomb. In the neighbourhood of Tarentum there is a dolmen-tombapproached by a short passage, and at Bisceglie, near Ruvo, there is aneven finer example, the discovery of which is one of the most importantevents which have occurred in Italian prehistoric archæology during thelast few years. The tomb is a simple rectangular corridor 36 feet inlength, lying east and west. Only one cover-slab, that at the west end, remains, and the exact disposition of the rest of the tomb isuncertain. In one of the side uprights which supports this slab is acircular hole, which, however, seems to be the work of Nature, thoughits presence may have led to the choice of the stone. The tomb wascarefully excavated, and the remains of several skeletons were found, one of which lay in the contracted position on the right side. Three ofthe skulls were observed by an expert to be dolichocephalic, but theirfragile condition prevented the taking of actual measurements. Burntbones of animals, fragments of pottery, a terra-cotta bead, and a stonependant were also found, together with flint knives and a fragment ofobsidian. 

These discoveries show that the heel of Italy fell under the influencewhich caused the spread of the megalithic monuments, whatever thatinfluence may have been. The same influence may also have beenresponsible for the bronze age rock-hewn tombs of Matera in theBasilicata, each of which is surrounded by a circle of fairly largestones. 

Geographical considerations would lead one to suppose that the sameconditions existed in Sicily, and it is possible that this was the case. Yet it is an affirmation which must be made with great reserve. Megalithic monuments in the ordinary sense of the term are unknown inSicily. There are, however, four tombs in the south-east of the islandwhich show some affinity to megalithic work. Two of these were found byOrsi at Monteracello. They were rectangular chambers built of squaredslabs of limestone set on edge. At one end of the finer of the two was asmall opening or window cut in the upright slab. This same gravecontained a skeleton lying on the right side with the legs slightlycontracted. These two tombs can hardly be described as dolmens; theyseem to have had no cover-slabs, and the blocks, which were small, werelet into the earth, scarcely appearing above the surface. Taken bythemselves the Monteracello tombs would hardly prove the presence of themegalithic civilization in Sicily. However, in the valley called CavaLazzaro there is a rock-hewn tomb where the vertical face of the rock inwhich the tomb is cut has been shaped into a curved façade, a very usualfeature of megalithic architecture. This is ornamented on each side ofthe entrance of the tomb with four pilasters cut in relief in the solidrock, each pair being connected by a semicircular arch also in relief. On the pilasters is incised a pattern of circles and V-shaped signs. Asomewhat similar arrangement of pilasters is seen in two rock-tombs atCava Lavinaro in the same district. This work forcibly recalls the workof the megalithic builders in the hypogeum of Halsaflieni in Malta (seeChap. VII), and on the façades of the Giants' Tombs in Sardinia (seebelow). It affords, at any rate, a presumption that in all threeislands we have to deal with the same civilization if not the samepeople. 

Such a presumption is not weakened by the fact that in Sicily the usualform of tomb was the rock-hewn sepulchre, which, as will be seen later, is very often a concomitant of the megalithic monument, and in manycases is proved to be the work of the same people. In the earlyneolithic period in Sicily, called by Orsi the Sicanian Period, rock-hewn tombs seem not to have been used. It is only at the beginningof the metal age that they begin to appear. In this period, theso-called First Siculan, the tomb-chamber was almost always circular orelliptical, entered by a small door or window in the face of the rock. The dead were often seated round the wall of the chamber, evidentlyengaged in a funerary feast, as is clear from the great vase set intheir midst with small cups for ladling out the liquid. A single tomboften contained many bodies, especially in cases where the banquetarrangement was not observed; one chamber held more than a hundredskeletons, and it has been suggested that the bodies were only laid inthe tomb after the flesh had been removed from the bones, eitherartificially or as the result of a temporary burial elsewhere. Such acustom is not unknown in other parts of the megalithic area. With thesebodies were found large quantities of painted pottery, a few implementsof copper and many of flint. Among the ornaments which the deadcarried--for they seem to have been buried in complete costume--wereseveral axe-shaped pendants of polished stone, precisely similar tothose of Sardinia, Malta, and France. The most important cemeteries ofthis period are those of Castelluccio, Melilli, and Monteracello. Nearthis last site was also found a round hut based on a course oforthostatic slabs of typically megalithic appearance. 

In the full bronze age, called the Second Siculan Period, burial inrock-tombs still remained the rule. The tomb-form had developedconsiderably. The circular type was still usual, though beside it arectangular form was fast coming into favour. The main chamber often hadside-niches, and was usually preceded by a corridor which sometimespassed through an antechamber. Occasionally we find an elaborateopen-air court outside the façade of the tomb, built very much after themegalithic style. Large vertical surfaces of rock were carefully soughtafter for tombs, and the almost inaccessible cliffs of Pantalica andCassibile are literally honeycombed with them. Where such surfaces ofrock were unobtainable a vertical shaft was sunk in the level rock and achamber was opened off the bottom of it. The tradition of the banquet ofthe dead is still kept up, but the number of the skeletons in each tombsteadily decreases. The sitting posture is still frequent, thoughoccasionally the body lies flat on one side with the legs slightlycontracted. Flint is now rare, but objects of bronze are plentiful. Thelocal painted pottery has almost entirely given place to simpler yetbetter wares with occasional Mycenean importations. 

It is impossible to decide whether this Sicilian civilization ought tobe included under the term megalithic. If, as seems probable, the ideaof megalithic building was brought to Europe by the immigration of a newrace it is possible that a branch of this race entered Sicily. In thatcase I should prefer to think that they came not at the beginning of theFirst Siculan Period as we know it, but rather earlier. Certain vasesfound with neolithic burials in a cave at Villafrati and elsewhere inSicily resemble the pottery usually found in megalithic tombs; one ofthem is in fact a bell-shaped cup, a form typical of megalithic pottery. It is thus possible that an immigration of megalithic people into Sicilytook place during the stone age, definitely later than the period of theearliest neolithic remains on the island, but earlier than that of suchsites as the Castelluccio cemetery. This, however, is and will perhapsremain a mere conjecture, though it is quite possible that there are inthe interior of Sicily dolmens which have not yet come to the notice ofthe archæologist; in this connection it is worth while to remember thatup to five years ago the existence of dolmens in both Sardinia and Maltapassed unnoticed. 

If the inclusion of Sicily in the megalithic area is doubtful there isfortunately no question about the island of Sardinia. Here we have oneof the chief strongholds of the megalithic civilization, where thearchitecture displays its greatest variety and flexibility. The simplestmanifestation of megalithic building, the dolmen, was up till latelythought to be absent from Sardinia, but the researches of the last fewyears have brought to light several examples, of which the best knownare those of Birori, where the chamber is approximately circular inplan. 

The monuments, however, for which Sardinia is most famous are the_nuraghi. _ A _nuraghe_ is a tower-like structure of truncated conicalform, built of large stones laid in comparatively regular courses (Pl. II, Fig. 2). The stones are often artificially squared, and set with aclay mortar. The plan and arrangement of a simple _nuraghe_ are usuallyas follows (Fig. 17): The diameter of the building is generally under 30feet. A door of barely comfortable height even for an average man andsurmounted by a single lintel-block gives access to a narrow passage cutthrough the thickness of the wall. In this passage are, to the right, asmall niche (_c_) just large enough to hold a man, and, on the left, a winding staircase in the wall (_d_) leading to an upper storey. Thepassage itself leads into the chamber (_a_), which is circular, oftenwith two or three side-niches (_b b_), and roofed by corbelling, i. E. Bymaking each of the upper courses of stones in its wall project inwardsover the last. The upper chamber, which is rarely preserved, is similarin form to the lower. 

[Illustration: Plate II Fig. 1. MNAIDRA, DOORWAY OF ROOM H]

[Illustration: Plate II Fig. 2. THE NURAGHE OF MADRONE IN SARDINIA To face p. 82]

[Illustration: Fig. 17. Elevation, section and plan of a _nuraghe_. (Pinza, _Monumenti Antichi_. )]

Considerable speculation has been indulged in concerning the purpose ofthe _nuraghi_. For many years they were regarded as tombs, a view whichwas first combated by Nissardi at the International Congress in Rome in1903. Further exploration since that time has placed it beyond all doubtthat the _nuraghi_ were fortified dwellings. The form of the buildingitself is almost conclusive. The lowness of the door would at once putan enemy at a disadvantage in attempting to enter; it is significantthat in the _nuraghe_ of Su Cadalanu, where the doorway was over 6 feetin height, its breadth was so much reduced that it was necessary toenter sideways. Arrangements were made for the closing of the entrancefrom inside by a heavy slab of stone, often fitted into grooves. Theniche on the right of the passage clearly served to hold a man, whowould command the passage itself and the staircase to the upper floor;he would, moreover, be able to attack the undefended flank of an enemyentering with his shield on his left arm. To the same effort atimpregnability we may safely ascribe the fact that the staircase leadingto the upper room did not begin on the floor-level of the passage, butwas reached through a hole high up in the wall. Many of the _nuraghi_are surrounded by elaborate fortifications consisting of walls, towers, and bastions, sometimes built at the same time as the dwelling itself, sometimes added later. Those of Aiga, Losa, and s'Aspru are among themost famous of this type. All the _nuraghi_ stand in commandingsituations overlooking large tracts of country, and the more important aposition is from the strategical point of view the stronger will be the_nuraghe_ which defends it. All are situated close to streams andsprings of good water, and some, as for instance that of Abbameiga, areactually built over a natural spring. At Nossiu is a building which canonly be described as a fortress. It consists of a rhomboidal enclosurewith _nuraghe_-like towers at its corners and four narrow gateways inits walls. It is surrounded by the ruins of a village of stone huts. There cannot be the least doubt that in time of danger the inhabitantsdrove their cattle into the fortified enclosure, entered it themselves, and then closed the gates. 

Each _nuraghe_ formed the centre of a group of stone huts. Mackenzie hasdescribed such a village at Serucci, where the circular plan of thehuts was still visible. The walls in one case stood high enough toshow, from the corbelling of their upper courses, that the huts wereroofed in the same fashion as the _nuraghi_ themselves. Another village, that which surrounds the _nuraghe_ of Su Chiai, was protected by a wallof huge stones. 

It is thus clear that the _nuraghi_ were the fortified centres of thevarious villages of Sardinia. Probably each formed the residence of thelocal chieftain; that they were actually inhabited is clear from theremains of everyday life found in them, and from the polish whichcontinual use has set on the side-walls of some of the staircases. Ingeneral appearance and design the _nuraghi_ recall the modern _truddhi_, hundreds of which dot the surface of Apulia and help to beguile thetedium of the railway journey from Brindisi to Foggia. The _truddhi_, however, are built in steps or terraces and have no upper chamber. 

Who were the foes against whom such elaborate preparations for defencewere made? Two alternatives are possible. Either Sardinia was acontinual prey to some piratical Mediterranean people, or she wasdivided against herself through the rivalry of the local chieftains. 

The second explanation is perhaps the more probable. Mackenzie seems toadopt it, and fancies that in the growth of the largest _nuraghi_ we maytrace the rise to power of some of these local dynasts at the expense oftheir neighbours. He suggests that the existence of the fortifiedenclosure of Nossiu, where there is no sign of a true _nuraghe_, maymean that there were certain communities which succeeded in maintainingtheir independence in the face of these powerful rulers. But here, as hehimself is the first to admit, we are in the realm of pure conjecture. 

[Illustration: Fig. 18. Giant's Tomb at Muraguada, Sardinia. (Mackenzie, _Papers of the British School of Rome_, V. )]

It is now established that in the Giants' Tombs of Sardinia we are tosee the graves of the inhabitants of the _nuraghe_ villages. EveryGiant's Tomb lies close to such a village, and almost every village hasits Giants' Tombs, one or more in number according to its size. AGiant's Tomb consists of a long rectangular chamber of upright slabsroofed by corbelled masonry (Fig. 18). The slab which closes one end ofthe tomb is of great size, and consists of a lower rectangular half witha small hole at the base and an upper part shaped like a rounded gable. There is a raised border to the whole slab, and a similar band in reliefmarks out the two halves. This front slab forms the centre-piece in acurved façade of upright slabs. The chamber is covered with a coating ofashlar masonry, which is shaped into an apsidal form at the end oppositeto the façade. Occasionally more than 50 feet in length, the Giants'Tombs served as graves for whole families, or even for whole villages. Mackenzie has shown that the form is derived from the simple dolmen, andhas pointed out several of the intermediate stages. 

The inhabitants of Sardinia in the megalithic period also buried theirdead in rock-hewn sepulchres, of which there are numerous examples atAnghelu Ruju. The contents of these graves make it clear that they arethe work of the same people as the Giants' Graves. Were further proofneeded it could be afforded by a grave at Molafà, where a Giant's Gravewith its façade and gabled slab has been faithfully imitated in thesolid rock. There is a similar tomb at St. George. Two natural caves inCape Sant' Elia on the south of the island contain burials of this sameperiod. 

The neighbouring island of Corsica also contains important megalithicremains. They consist of thirteen dolmens, forty-one menhirs, two_alignements_, and a cromlech. They fall geographically into two groups, one in the extreme north and the other in the extreme south of theisland. 

The stones used are chiefly granite and gneiss. The dolmens, which areof carefully chosen flat blocks showing no trace of work, are allrectangular in plan, and usually consist of four side-walls and acover-slab. The finest of all, however, the dolmen of Fontanaccia, hasseven blocks supporting the cover, one at each short end, three in oneof the long sides, and two in the other. None of the dolmens are coveredby mounds. 

Of the _alignements_, that of Caouria seems to consist, in part atleast, of two parallel lines of menhirs, the rest of the plan beinguncertain. There are still thirty-two blocks, of which six have fallen. The other _alignement_, that of Rinaiou, consists of seven menhirs setin a straight line. The cromlech is circular and stands on Cape Corse. 

On the small island of Pianosa, near Elba, are several rock-hewn tombsof the æneolithic period which ought perhaps to be classed with themegalithic monuments of Sardinia and Corsica. 

 CHAPTER VII

 AFRICA, MALTA, AND THE SMALLER MEDITERRANEAN ISLANDS

North Africa is a great stronghold of the megalithic civilization, indeed it is thought by some that it is the area in which megalithicbuilding originated. Morocco, Tunis, Algeria, and Tripoli all abound indolmens and other monuments. Even in the Nile Valley they occur, forwhat looks like a dolmen surrounded by a circle was discovered by deMorgan in the desert near Edfu, and Wilson and Felkin describe a numberof simple dolmens which exist near Ladò in the Sudan. Tripoli remains asyet comparatively unexplored. The traveller Barth speaks of stonecircles near Mourzouk and near the town of Tripoli. The great trilithons(_senams_) with holes pierced in their uprights and 'altar tables' attheir base, which Barth, followed by Cooper in his _Hill of the Graces_, described as megalithic monuments, have been shown to be nothing morethan olive-presses, the 'altar tables' being the slabs over which theoil ran off as it descended. True dolmens do, however, occur in Tripoli, and Cooper figures a fine monument at Messa in the Cyrenaica, whichappears to consist of a single straight line of tall uprights with acontinuous entablature of blocks similar to that of the outer circle atStonehenge. 

Algeria has been far more completely explored, and possesses aremarkable number of megalithic monuments. Many of the finest aresituated near the town of Constantine. Thus at Bou Nouara there is ahill about a mile in length which is a regular necropolis ofdolmen-tombs. Each grave consists of a dolmen within a circle of stones. The blocks are all natural and completely unworked. The circle consistsof a wall of stone blocks so built as to neutralize the slope of thehill and to form a level platform for the dolmen. Thus on the lower sidethere are three courses of carefully laid stones rising to about fivefeet, while on the upper side there is only one course. The diameter ofthe circles varies from 22 to 33 feet. In the centre of the circle liesthe dolmen with its single long cover-slab. This usually rests on twoentire side-slabs, the ends being filled up either with entire slabs orwith masonry of small stones. In rare cases the side-slabs are replacedby masonry walls. The average size of the cover-slab is 6-1/2 by 5 feet. The dolmen itself is, of course, built directly on to the platform, andthe space between it and the circle is filled up with rough stones. Theorientation of the dolmens varied considerably, but the cover-slab wasnever placed in such a way that its length ran up the hill-slope, probably because in moving the slab into place this would have been anawkward position. 

Another equally fine site is that of Bou Merzoug, near Oulad Rahmoun, about an hour's railway journey from Constantine. The place is naturallyadapted for a settlement as there is a spring of water there. Thisspring was later utilized by the Romans to provide water for the city ofCirta. The dolmen-graves lie in great numbers on the hill at the foot ofwhich the spring rises, and extend down into the valley. Each dolmenlies in the centre of a stone circle. This last is in some cases formedby very large slabs set on edge, but more often by two or three coursesof rough oblong blocks. Many of the graves are badly damaged. One of thefinest had an outer circle about 27 feet in diameter, and an innercircle 14 feet in diameter. Between these two a third circle, much moreirregular and of small stones, could just be distinguished. But in mostcases it was impossible to make out clearly more than the one outercircle and the dolmen within it. The dolmen itself consisted of a largeslab resting on walls formed of several large blocks, the spaces betweenwhich were filled up with smaller stones. None of the stones used wereworked. The dolmens were not oriented according to any fixed system. M. Féraud states that the separate graves were united together by opencorridors formed by double or triple rows of large stones, but no tracesof such a system could be found by the later visitors to the site, Messrs. MacIver and Wilkin. 

Fortunately we have some record of what these graves contained, forthirteen were opened by Mr. Christy and M. Féraud. One contained a humanskeleton in good condition, buried in the contracted position with theknees to chin and arms crossed. With this were two whole vases, fragments of others, and pieces of cedar wood. At the feet of theskeleton were two human heads, and as the graves would not haveaccommodated more than one whole body M. Féraud suggests that thesebelong to decapitated victims. Another grave contained, in addition tohuman bones, those of a horse, together with three objects of copper, viz. A ring, an earring, and a buckle. In another were found the teethand bones of a horse and an iron bit. 

An entirely different type of monument is found near Msila, south-westof Algiers. Here is a long low hill called the Senâm, covered with largenumbers of stone circles. These consist of large slabs of naturallimestone set up on edge and not very closely fitted. The height of theslabs varies from 2 to 3 feet, and the diameters of the three stillperfect circles are 23-1/2, 26-3/4, and 34-1/3 feet respectively. At apoint roughly south-east there is a break in the circumference, filledby a rectangular niche (Fig. 19) consisting of three large slabs, andvarying in width from 2 ft. 6 in. To 6 feet. There is a possibility thatthe niches were originally roofed, but the evidence on this point is farfrom conclusive. The interior of the circle is filled with blocks ofstone, apparently heaped up without any definite plan. There seems to beno clue as to the meaning of these circles, as none have as yet beenexplored. MacIver and Wilkin are probably right in classing them asgraves. 

[Illustration: FIG 19. Stone circle at the Senâm, Algeria. (After MacIver and Wilkin). ]

The most famous, however, of the Algerian sites is unquestionably thatof Roknia. Here the tombs lie on the side of a steep hill. They consistof dolmens often surrounded by stone circles from 25 to 33 feet indiameter. The cover-slabs of the dolmens usually rest on singleuprights, and never on built walls. Several of the graves excavatedcontained more than one body, one yielding as many as seven. It isremarkable that three of the skulls showed wounds, the dead having beenapparently killed in battle. Several vases have been found and a fewpieces of bronze. 

We have seen that in some of the tombs of Bou Merzoug objects of ironwere found. This makes it clear that some at least of the Algerian tombsbelong to the iron age, i. E. That they are probably later than 1000B. C. , but beyond this we cannot go. The medal of Faustina sometimesquoted as evidence for a very late date proves nothing, as it is notstated to have been found in a tomb. There is no evidence to show howfar back the graves go. It may be that, as MacIver and Wilkin suggest, the parts of the cemeteries excavated chance to be the latest. At BouMerzoug the excavators worked chiefly among the graves on the plain andat the bottom of the hill. The more closely crowded graves which lie onthe hill itself may well be older than these. In fact, all that may besaid of the Algerian graves is that some are of the iron age, whileothers may be and probably are earlier. 

In Tunis the dolmen is not uncommon, and several groups or cemeterieshave been reported. Near Ellez occurs a type of corridor-tomb in whichthree dolmen-like chambers lie on either side of a central passage, anda seventh at the end opposite to the entrance. The whole is constructedof upright slabs of stone, and is surrounded by a circle formed in thesame way. 

Morocco, too, has its dolmens, especially in the district of Kabylia, while near Tangier there is a stone circle. 

Off the north coast of Africa, and thus on the highway which leads fromAfrica to Europe, lie the Italian islands of Lampedusa and Linosa. Thelatter is volcanic in origin, and its surface presents no opportunityfor the building of megalithic monuments. Lampedusa, on the other hand, consists of limestone, which lies about in great blocks on its surface. On the slopes of the south coast there are several remains of megalithicconstruction, but they are too damaged to show much of their originalform. However, on the north side of the island there are megalithic hutsin a very fair state of preservation. They are oval in form and have inmany cases a base course of orthostatic slabs. 

Some miles to the north of Linosa lies the much larger volcanic islandof Pantelleria, also a possession of Italy. Here megalithic remains bothof dwellings and of tombs have been found. On the plateau of the Mursiaare the remains of rectangular huts made of rough blocks of stone. Thesehuts seemed to have formed a village, which was surrounded by a wall forpurposes of defence. In the huts were found implements of obsidian andflat stones used for grinding. 

[Illustration: FIG. 20. Plan of the Sese Grande, Pantelleria. (Orsi, _Monumenti Antichi_, IX. )]

The tombs of the people who inhabited this village are, unlike thehouses, circular or elliptical in form. They are locally known as_sesi. _ The smaller are of truncated conical shape, the circular chamberbeing entered by a low door and having a corbelled roof. In one of the_sesi_ a skeleton was found buried in the contracted position. Thefinest of the tombs, known as the Sese Grande, elliptical in form (Fig. 20), has a major diameter of more than 60 feet, and rises in ridges, being domed at the top. It contains not one chamber, but twelve, each ofwhich has a separate entrance from the outside of the _sese. _ To judgeby the remains found in the _sesi_ they belong entirely to the neolithicperiod. 

The island of Malta as seen to-day is an almost treeless, though notunfertile, stretch of rock, with a harbour on the north coast which mustalways make the place a necessary possession to the first sea power ofEurope. Much of its soil is of comparatively modern creation, and fourthousand years ago the island may well have had a forbidding aspect. This is perhaps the reason why the first great inroads of neolithic maninto the Mediterranean left it quite untouched, although it lay directlyin the path of tribes immigrating into Europe from Africa. The earliestneolithic remains of Italy, Crete, and the Ægean seem to have noparallel in Malta, and the first inhabitants of whom we find traces inthe island were builders of megalithic monuments. Small as Malta is itcontains some of the grandest and most important structures of this kindever erected. The two greatest of these, the so-called "Phoeniciantemples" of Hagiar Kim and Mnaidra, were constructed on opposite sidesof one of the southern valleys, each within sight of the other and ofthe little rocky island of Filfla. 

[Illustration: FIG. 21. Plan of the megalithic sanctuary of Mnaidra, Malta. (After Albert Mayr's plan. )]

The temple of Mnaidra is the simpler of the two in plan (Fig. 21). Itconsists of two halves, the more northerly of which was almost certainlybuilt later than the other. Each half consists of two ellipticalchambers set one behind the other. The south half is the betterpreserved. It has a concave façade of large orthostatic slabs withhorizontal blocks set in front of them to keep them in position. In thecentre of this opens a short paved passage formed of fine upright slabsof stone, one of which is 13 feet in height. The first ellipticalchamber (_E_) into which this passage leads us has a length of 45 feet. Its walls (Pl. III) consist of roughly squared orthostatic slabs over 6feet in height, above which are several courses of horizontal blockswhich carry the walls in places up to a height of nearly 14 feet. Thiscombination of vertical and horizontal masonry is typical of all theMaltese temples. To the left of the entrance is a rectangular niche inthe wall containing one of the remarkable trilithons (_a_) which form sostriking a feature of Mnaidra and Hagiar Kim. It consists of ahorizontal slab of stone nearly 10 feet in length, supported at its endsby two vertical slabs about 5 feet high. To the right of the entrance isa window-like opening (_b_, behind the seated figure in Pl. III) in oneof the slabs of the wall, preceded by two steps and giving access toan irregular triangular space (_F_). In the north-west angle of thistriangle is fixed a trilithon table (_c_) of the usual type, 32 incheshigh; at a like height above the table is fixed another horizontal slabwhich serves as a roof to the corner. The south corner of the triangleis shut off by a vertical slab, in which is cut a window 29 inches by17. Through this is seen a shrine (?) consisting of a box (_d_) made offive well-cut slabs of stone, the front being open. The aperture bywhich _F_ is entered was evidently intended to be closed with a slab ofstone from the inside of _F_, for it was rebated on that side, and thereare holes to be used in securing the slab. When the entrance was thusblocked _F_ still communicated with _E_ by means of a small rectangularwindow 16 inches by 12 in one of the adjacent slabs (visible in Pl. III). 

[Illustration: PLATE III TEMPLE OF MNAIDRA, MALTA. APSE OF CHIEF ROOM To face p. 100]

Returning to the area _E_ we find in the south-west wall an elaboratedoorway (Pl. II, Fig. I, p. 82) leading to a rectangular room _H_. Thedoorway consists of two tall pillars with a great lintel laid across thetop. The space between the pillars is closed by a fixed vertical slab inwhich is a window-like aperture similar to that which gives access toRoom _F_. All the stones in this doorway are ornamented with pit-marks. The rectangular room _H_ has niches in its walls to the north, south, and west. Each niche is formed by a pair of uprights with a block laidacross the top. The west niche is occupied by a horizontal table orslab (_e_) supported at its centre by a stone pillar 39 inches inheight, of circular section narrowing in the centre (visible through thedoorway in Pl. II, Fig. I). The southern niche contains an ordinarytrilithon table (_f_): the northern niche is damaged, but apparentlyheld a table like that of the western. 

The area _I_ consists of only half an ellipse, the southern half beingreplaced by the area _H_, which we have already described. It has arectangular niche to the west containing a fine trilithon with acover-slab nearly 10 feet long. 

The whole of the southern half of the Mnaidra temple is surrounded by awall of huge rough blocks of stone, presenting a great contrast to thedressed slabs of which the inner walls are formed. They are placedalternately with their broad faces and their narrow edges outwards. Theroughness of this enclosure wall gives the structure a remarkably wildand craggy appearance from a distance. The northern half of Mnaidra isclearly a later addition. 

There is no doubt as to the way in which the areas were roofed. In theapse-like ends of the elliptical rooms the horizontal courses arecorbelled, i. E. Each course projects slightly forward over the last. Thus the space narrows as the walls rise, until the aperture is smallenough to be roofed by great slabs laid across. The corbelling of theapse is just perceptible in Pl. III. Whether the roofing of the Mnaidratemple was ever complete it is impossible to say: in any case the systemwe have described could only be applied to the apsidal portions of theareas, and their centres must either have been open to the sky or roofedquite simply with slabs. 

In the still more famous temple of Hagiar Kim we have a complicatedbuilding, in which the original plan has been much altered and enlarged. The main portion doubtless consisted originally of a curved façade and apair of elliptical areas, the inner of which has been fitted with asecond entrance to the north-west and completely remodelled at itssouth-west end. Four elliptical chambers, one of which is at a muchhigher level than the rest of the building, have been added. Here, too, as at Mnaidra, we find niches containing trilithon tables. In the firstelliptical area, in which the apsidal ends are divided from the centralspace by means of walls of vertical slabs, a remarkable group of objectswas found. In front of a well-cut vertical block stood what must be analtar, cut in one piece of stone. It is square in section except for thetop, which is circular. On the four vertical edges are pilasters inrelief, and in the front between these is cut in relief what looks likea plant growing out of a pot or box. To the left of the altar and thevertical slab behind were an upright stone with two hanging spirals cuton it in relief, and at its foot a horizontal slab. Both the altar andthe carved stone are covered with small pit-marks. 

In the outside wall of the building, quite unconnected with theinterior, is a niche partly restored on old foundations, in which standsa rough stone pillar 6-1/2 feet high. In front of this pillar is avertical slab nearly 3 feet high, narrowing towards the base, andcovered with pit-markings. This pillar can hardly be anything but abaetyl, or sacred stone. 

The temple called the Gigantia, on the island of Gozo, is no lessremarkable than the two which we have already described; in one placeits wall is preserved up to a height of over 20 feet. The plan issimilar to that of Mnaidra, though here the two halves seem to have beenbuilt at one and the same time. Several of the blocks show a design ofspirals in relief, while on others there are the usual pit-markings. Another bears a figure of a fish or serpent. At the foot of one of thetrilithons was found a baetyl 51 inches in height, now in the museum atValletta. 

That these three buildings were sanctuaries of some kind seems almostcertain from their form and arrangement. We do not, however, know whatwas the exact nature of the worship carried on in them, though there canbe no doubt that the stone tables supported by single pillars and thetrilithons found in the niches played an important part in the ritual. Sir Arthur Evans in his famous article _Mycenæan Tree and Pillar Cult_has suggested that in Malta we have a cult similar to that seen in theMycenæan world. This latter was an aneiconic worship developed out ofthe cult of the dead; in it the deity or hero was represented by abaetyl, i. E. A tree or pillar sometimes standing free, sometimes placedin a 'dolmen-like' cell or shrine, in which latter case the pillar oftenserved to support the roof of the shrine. In Malta Sir Arthur Evans seessigns of a baetyl-worship very similar to this. Thus at Hagiar Kim wehave a pillar still standing free in a niche, and another pillar, which, to judge from its shape, must have stood free, was found in theGigantia. On the other hand, at Mnaidra we have pillars which supportslabs in a cell or shrine, and at Cordin several small pillars werefound which must originally have served a similar purpose. 

There can hardly be any doubt that Sir Arthur Evans is right in seeingin the Maltese temples signs of a baetylic worship. But is he right inhis further assertion that the cult was a cult of the dead? Albert Mayrassumes that he is, and endeavours to show that the 'dolmen-like' cellsin the niches are not altars, but stereotyped representations of thedolmen-tombs of the heroes worshipped. He thinks that the slabs whichcover them are too large for altar-tables, and that the niches in whichthey stand are too narrow and inaccessible to have been the scene ofsacrificial rites. Neither of these arguments has much force, nor is iteasy to see how the cells are derived from dolmens. The fact is that theword 'dolmen-like, ' which has become current coin in archæologicalphraseology, is a question-begging epithet. The Maltese cells are notlike dolmens at all, they are either trilithons or tables resting on apillar. They are always open to the front, and instead of the roughunhewn block which should cover a dolmen they are roofed with awell-squared slab. If the pillar which supports the slab is, like thefree-standing pillars, a baetyl, the slab is probably a mere roof tocover and protect it; if not, the slab is almost certainly a table. 

At the same time, although we may not accept the hypothesis that thecell is derived from a dolmen, Sir Arthur Evans may still be right insupposing the worship to have originated in a cult of the dead. But hewas almost certainly wrong, as recent excavation has shown, in supposingthat the cells were the actual burial place of the deified heroes. 

A number of statuettes were found at Hagiar Kim, two of which are ofpottery and the rest of limestone. One figure represents a womanstanding, but in the rest she is seated on a rather low stool with herfeet tucked under her. There is no sign of clothing, except on onefigure which shows a long shirt and a plain bodice with very low neck. All these statuettes are characterized by what is known as steatopygy, that is, the over-development of the fat which lies on and behind thehips and thighs. 

Steatopygous figures have been found in many places, viz. France, Malta, Crete, the Cyclades, Greece, Thessaly, Servia, Transylvania, Poland, Egypt, and the Italian colony of Eritrea on the Red Sea. The Frenchexamples are from caves of the palæolithic period; the rest mainlybelong to the neolithic and bronze ages. Various reasons have been givenfor the abnormal appearance of these figures. In the first place it hasbeen suggested that they represent women of a steatopygous type, likethe modern Bushwomen, and that this race was in early days widelydiffused in the Mediterranean and in South Europe. Another hypothesis isthat they represent not a truly steatopygous type of women, but only anabnormally fat type. A third suggestion is that they portray thegenerative aspect of nature in the form of a pregnant goddess. 

Naturally there are considerable local differences in the shapes of thefigures from the various countries we have enumerated, and it may bethat no single hypothesis will explain them all. 

There are other megalithic buildings in Malta besides the three whichwe have discussed, but none of them call for more than passing mention. On the heights of Cordin or Corradino, overlooking the Grand Harbour ofValletta, there are no less than three groups, all of which have beenlately excavated. In all three we see signs of the typical arrangementof elliptical areas one behind another, and in the finest of the threethe curved façade and the paved court which lies before it are stillpreserved. 

It was for a long time believed that there were no dolmens in Malta. Professor Tagliaferro has been able to upset this belief by discoveringtwo, one near Musta and the other near Siggewi. It is hardly crediblethat these are the only two dolmens which ever existed in Malta. Morewill no doubt yet be found, especially in the wild north-west corner ofthe isle. 

The megalithic builders of Malta did not confine their achievements tostructures above ground, they could also work with equal facility below. In the village of Casal Paula, which lies about a mile from the head ofthe Grand Harbour of Valletta, is a wonderful complex of subterraneanchambers known as the Hypogeum of Halsaflieni, which may justly beconsidered as one of the wonders of the world. 

The chambers, which seem to follow no definite plan, are excavated inthe soft limestone and arranged in two storeys connected by a staircase, part of which still remains in place. The finest rooms are in the upperstorey. The largest is circular, and contains in its walls a series offalse doors and windows. It is in this room that the remarkable natureof the work in the hypogeum is most apparent. On entering it one sees atonce that the intention of the original excavator was to produce insolid rock underground a copy of a megalithic structure above ground. Thus the walls curve slightly inwards towards the top as do those of theapses of Mnaidra and Hagiar Kim, and the ceiling is cut to represent aroof of great blocks laid across from wall to wall with a space leftopen in the centre where the width would be too great for the length ofthe stones. The treatment of the doors and windows recalls at once thatof the temples above ground. The mason was not content, when he needed adoor, to cut a rectangular opening in the rock; he must represent inhigh relief the monolithic side-posts and lintel which were the greatfeatures of the megalithic 'temples' of Malta. Nor has he failed in hisintention, for, as one moves from room to room in the hypogeum, onecertainly has the feeling of being in a building constructed of separateblocks and not merely cut in the solid rock. No description can dojustice to the grace of the curves and the flow of the line in thecircular chamber and in the passage beyond it, and we have here thework of an architect who felt the æsthetic effect of every line hetraced. 

Behind the circular chamber and across the passage just referred to liesa small room which, rightly or wrongly, has been called the 'Holy ofHolies, ' the idea being that it formed a kind of inner sanctuary to thechamber. It contains a rough shelf cut in the wall, and in the centre ofthis a shallow circular pit. It has been suggested that this pit wasmade to hold the base of the cult-object, whether it was a baetyl or anidol. This, however, is a mere conjecture. In the passage just outsidethe door of this room are two small circular pits about 6 inches indiameter and the same distance apart. They connect with one anotherbelow, and are closed with tightly fitting limestone plugs. In one ofthem was found a cow's horn. Their purpose is unknown, but similar pairsof pits occur elsewhere at Halsaflieni. 

In two of the largest chambers in the hypogeum the roof and walls arestill decorated with designs in red paint. The patterns consist ofgraceful combinations of curved lines and spirals. Many other rooms, including the circular chamber, were originally painted with designs inred, which have now almost wholly disappeared. 

Many of the chambers are extremely small, too small for an adult even tostand upright in them, and their entrances are merely windows, perhapsa foot square and well above the ground. 

What then was the purpose of this wonderful complex of rooms? Beforeattempting to answer this question we must consider what has been foundin them. When the museum authorities first took over the hypogeumpractically all the chambers were filled to within a short distance oftheir roofs with a mass of reddish soil, which proved to contain theremains of thousands of human skeletons. In other words, Halsaflieni wasused as a burial place, though this may not have been its originalpurpose. The bones lay for the most part in disorder, and so thicklythat in a space of about 4 cubic yards lay the remains of no less than120 individuals. One skeleton, however, was found intact, lying on theright side in the crouched position, i. E. With arms and knees bent up. 

With the bones were found enormous quantities of pottery and otherobjects, buried with the dead as provision for the next world. Thepottery is rough in comparison with the fine painted wares of Crete, butit is extremely varied in its decoration. One particularly fine bowlshows a series of animals which have been identified by ProfessorTagliaferro as the long-horned buffalo, an animal which once existed onthe northern coasts of Africa. Ornaments of all kinds were common, andinclude beads, pendants, and conical buttons of stone and shell. Themost remarkable of all are a large number of model celts made ofjadeite and other hard stones. These are of the same shape as the stoneaxes used by neolithic man, but they are far too small ever to have beenused, and they must therefore have been models hung round the neck asamulets. Each is provided with a small hole for this purpose. Thepopularity of the axe-amulet makes it probable that the axe had somereligious significance. 

Finally Halsaflieni has yielded several steatopygous figurines. Some ofthese resemble those of Hagiar Kim, but two are of rather differenttype. Each of these represents a female lying on a rather low couch. Inthe better preserved of the two she lies on her right side, her head ona small uncomfortable-looking pillow. The upper part of her body isnaked, but from the waist downwards she is clad in a flounced skirtwhich reaches to the ankles. The other figurine is very similar, but thewoman here is face downwards on the couch. 

The bodies themselves were so damaged with damp that only ten skullscould be saved whole. These, however, afford very valuableanthropological evidence. They have been carefully measured by Dr. Zammit, and they prove to belong to a long-headed (dolichocephalic) typeusual among the neolithic races of the Mediterranean. 

We have still to discuss the purpose of this great complex ofunderground chambers and passages. It is quite clear that its eventualfate was to be used as a burial place for thousands of individuals, butit is far from certain that this was the purpose for which it was built. The existence of the central chamber, with its careful work andlaborious imitation of an open-air 'temple, ' is against thisinterpretation. It has therefore been suggested that the hypogeum wasmeant for a burial place, and that the central chamber was the chapel orsanctuary in which the funeral rites were performed, after which thebody was buried in one of the smaller rooms. This, however, does notexplain the presence of burials in the chapel itself, and it is far morelikely that it was only after Halsaflieni had ceased to be used for itsoriginal purpose that it was seized upon as a convenient place forburial. 

The question of the date of the Maltese megalithic buildings is adifficult one. It is true that no metal has been found in them, and thatwe can therefore speak of them as belonging to the neolithic age. Butthe neolithic age of Malta need not be parallel in date with that ofCrete for example. It is extremely probable that Malta lay outside themain currents of civilization, and that flint continued to be used therelong after copper had been adopted by her more fortunate neighbours. 

 CHAPTER VIII

 THE DOLMENS OF ASIA

In the south-east of Europe lie three groups of dolmens which are nodoubt in origin more closely connected with those of Asia than withthose of the rest of Europe. The first group lies in Bulgaria, where noless than sixty dolmens have been found north of Adrianople. The secondconsists of a few dolmens which still remain in the Crimea, and thethird lies in the Caucasus in two divisions, one to the south-east andthe other to the south-west of the town of Ekaterinodar. These last aremade of slabby rock, and thus have a finished appearance. A dolmen nearTzarskaya has a small semicircular hole at the bottom of one of itsend-slabs, while another in the valley of Pehada has sides consisting ofsingle blocks, placed so as to slant inwards considerably, and acircular hole in the centre of the slab which closes one of its ends. 

In Asia megalithic monuments are not infrequent. We first find them inSyria, they have been reported from Persia, and in Central and SouthIndia they exist in large numbers. Corridor-tombs occur in Japan, butthey are late in date, and there is no evidence to show whether theyare connected with those of India or not. 

Syria is comparatively rich in megalithic monuments, but it isremarkable that almost all of them lie to the east of the Jordan. Thuswhile there are hundreds of dolmens in the country of Pera and in Ammonand Moab, very few have been found in Galilee, and only one in Judæa, despite careful search. There is, however, a circle of stones west ofTiberias, and an enclosure of menhirs between Tyre and Sidon. Accordingto Perrot and Chipiez some of the Moabite monuments are very similar intype to the Giants' Tombs of Sardinia. Others are simple dolmens. In agood example at Ala Safat (Fig. 22) the floor of the tomb is formed by asingle flat slab of stone. The great cover-slab rests on two longblocks, one on either side, placed on edge. The narrow ends are closedup with smaller slabs, one of which, that which faces north, has a smallhole pierced in it. A similar closure slab with a hole is also found incertain rock-tombs quite close to this dolmen. Apparently none of thesedolmens have been systematically excavated, and nothing is known oftheir date. 

[Illustration: FIG. 22. Dolmen with holed stone at Ala Safat. (After deLuynes. )]

Menhirs, too, are not wanting in Syria. Perrot and Chipiez figure anexample from Gebel-Mousa in Moab which is quite unworked, except for ashallow furrow across the centre of the face. In many cases the menhiris surrounded by one or more rows of stones. Thus at Der Ghuzaleh amenhir about 3 feet in height is set in the centre of what when completemust have been a rectangle. In other cases the enclosure was ellipticalor circular in form. In an example at Minieh the menhir stands in thecentre of a double (in part triple) circle of stones, on which abuts anelliptical enclosure. In some cases the circle has no proper entrance, in others it has a door consisting of a large slab resting on twoothers. The largest of the circles attains a diameter of 600 feet, andhas a double line of stones. 

Within these circles and near them are found large numbers of monumentsconsisting each of a large flat slab resting on two others. On theupper surface of the top slab are often seen a number of basin-shapedholes, sometimes connected by furrows. Many of the slabs are slightlyslanting, and it has been suggested that the series of holes and furrowswas intended for the pouring a libation of some kind. In a monument ofthis type at Ammân the cover-slab slopes considerably; the upper part ofits surface is a network of small channels converging on a hole 11inches deep about the centre of the slab. Here, again, no excavationshave been carried out, and we do not even know what was the purpose ofthese structures. It is, however, probable that these trilithons werenot, like the dolmens, tombs, but served some religious purpose, possibly connected with the worship of the menhirs. 

In the Jaulân, where the rock consists of a slabby type of basalt, thereare many dolmens of fine appearance. They often lie east and west, andare often broader at the west end. Many are surrounded by a doublecircle of stones. In one of them two copper rings were found. At AinDakkar more than 160 dolmen-tombs are visible from a single spot. Theyare built on circular terraces of earth and stones about 3 feet high. The Arabs call them Graves of the Children of Israel. Most of them lieeast and west, and are broader at the west. In the eastern slab there isoften a hole about 2 feet in diameter. Near Tsîl are severalcorridor-tombs of simple type. Each consists of a long rectangularchamber with only one cover-slab, that being at the west end. In awell-known example of this type at Kosseir there is a hole in one of thetwo uprights which support the cover. 

These examples will serve to show the importance and variety of theSyrian monuments. They present analogies with those of many parts of themegalithic area, and we therefore await anxiously the publication ofMackenzie's promised article on his own explorations in this district. 

The central and southern parts of India afford numerous examples ofdolmens. They are to be found in almost all parts of Lower India fromthe Nerbudda River to Cape Comorin. In the Nilgiri hills there are stonecircles and dolmens, and numbers of dolmens are said to exist in theNeermul jungle in Central India. In the collectorate of Bellary dolmensand other monuments to the number of 2129 have been recorded. Othersoccur in the principality of Sorapoor and near Vellore in the Madraspresidency. These latter appear to be of two types, either with threesupports only or with four supports, one of which is pierced with acircular hole. Of the 2200 dolmens known in the Deccan, half are of thispierced type. They are known to the natives as "dwarfs' houses. " Oneonly had a pair of uprights outside the pierced stone, thus forming asort of portico to the dolmen. Near Chittore in North Arcot there issaid to be a square mile of ground covered with these monuments. In themwere found human remains in sarcophagi, and fragments of black pottery. Several of the Indian dolmens are said to have contained objects ofiron. Occasionally the dolmen is surrounded by a double circle of stonesor covered with a cairn. The Deccan, in addition to its numerousdolmens, possesses also megalithic monuments of another type. Theyconsist each of two rows, each of thirteen unworked stones set as closetogether as possible, in front of which is a row of three stones, eachabout 4 feet high, not let into the ground. The planted stones werewhitewashed, and each was marked with a large spot of red paint withblack in the centre. These stones seem to have been in use in moderntimes. Colonel Forbes Leslie thinks that a cock had been sacrificed onone of the three stones which lie in front of the double row, but thereseems to be no certain evidence for this. It is, however, very probablethat these _alignements_ had some religious signification, and the sameis no doubt true of certain small circles of small stones, also found inthe Deccan. 

The modern inhabitants of the Khasi Hills in India still make use ofmegalithic monuments. They set up a group of an odd number of menhirs, 3, 5, 7, 9, or 11, and in front of these two structures of dolmen form. These are raised in honour of some important member of the tribe who hasdied, and whose spirit is thought to have done some good to the tribe. If the benefits continue it is usual to increase the number of menhirs. 

The earliest burials in Japan are marked by simple mounds of earth. Itwas not until the beginning of the iron age that megalithic tombs cameinto use. The true dolmen is not found in Japan, and all the knowngraves are corridor-tombs covered with a mound. They are of four types. First, we have a simple corridor with no separate chamber; secondly, acorridor broadening out at one side near the end; thirdly, a truechamber with a corridor of access; and fourthly, a type in which thecorridor is preceded by an antechamber. All four types occur in roughunworked stone, roofed with huge slabs, but a few examples of the thirdtype are made of well-cut and dressed blocks. The mounds are usuallyconical, though some are of a complex form shortly to be described. Someof these contain stone sarcophagi. The bodies were never cremated, butthe bones are so damaged that it is impossible to say what the mostusual position was. Objects of bronze and iron together with pottery andornaments were found in the tombs. 

The more important tombs are of a more complicated type. They seem tohave contained the remains of emperors and their families. They consisteach of a circular mound, to which is added on one side another mound oftrapezoidal form. The megalithic tomb-chamber or the sarcophagus whichsometimes replaces it lies in the circular part of the mound. The totalaxial length of the basis of the whole mound is in a typical case--thatof Nara (Yamato)--674 feet, the diameter of the round end being 420feet. The mounds have in most cases terraced sides, and are surroundedby a moat. In early times it seems to have been the custom to slay orbury alive the servants of the emperor on his mound, but this was givenup about the beginning of the Christian era. 

These imperial double mounds seem to begin about two centuries beforethe Christian era, and to continue for five or six centuries after it. Many of them can be definitely assigned to their owners, and others areattributed by tradition. Thus a rather small mound at the foot of MountUnebi (Yamato) is considered to be the burial place of the EmperorJimmu, the founder of the Imperial dynasty, and annual ceremonies areperformed before it. 

The Japanese Emperors are still buried in terraced mounds, and in thegroup of huge stone blocks which have been placed on the mound of theEmperor Komei, who died in 1866, we may be tempted to see a survival ofthe ancient megalithic chamber. 

These early corridor-tombs are evidently not the work of the Ainu, theaborigines of Japan, but of the Japanese invaders who conquered them. These latter do not seem to have brought the idea of megalithic buildingwith them, as their earlier tombs are simple mounds. As no dolmen hasyet been found in Japan we cannot at present derive the corridor-tombthere from it. It is, however, worthy of mention that true dolmens occuras near as Corea, though none have been reported from China. 

 CHAPTER IX

 THE BUILDERS OF THE MEGALITHIC MONUMENTS, THEIR HABITS, CUSTOMS, RELIGION, ETC. 

With regard to the date of the megalithic monuments it only remains tosum up the evidence given in the previous chapters. It may be said thatin Europe they never belong to the beginning of the neolithic age, buteither to its end or to the period which followed it, i. E. To the age ofcopper and bronze. The majority date from the dawn of this latterperiod, though some of the chambered cairns of Ireland seem to belong tothe iron age. Outside Europe there are certainly megalithic tombs whichare late. In North Africa, for example, we know that the erection ofdolmens continued into the early iron age; many of the Indian tombs areclearly late, and the corridor-tombs of Japan can be safely attributedin part at least to the Christian era. 

With what purpose were the megalithic monuments erected? The most simpleexample, the menhir or upright stone, may have served many purposes. Indiscussing the temples of Malta we saw reason for believing that themegalithic peoples were in the habit of worshipping great stones assuch. Other stones, not actually worshipped, may mark the scene of somegreat event. Jacob commemorated a dream by setting up the stone whichhad served him as a pillow, and Samuel, victorious over the Philistines, set up twelve stones, and called the place "Stones of Deliverance. "Others again perhaps stood in a spot devoted to some particular nationalor religious ceremony. Thus the Angami of the present day in Assam setup stones in commemoration of their village feasts. It seems clear fromthe excavations that the menhirs do not mark the place of burials, though they may in some cases have been raised in honour of the dead. 

The question of the purpose of stone circles has already been dealt within connection with those of Great Britain. _Alignements_ are moredifficult to explain, for, from their form, they cannot have served astemples in the sense of meeting-places for worship. Yet they must surelyhave been connected with religion in some way or other. Possibly theywere not constructed once and for all, but the stones were addedgradually, each marking some event or the performance of some periodicceremony, or even the death of some great chief. The so-called"Canaanite High Place" recently found at Gezer consists of a line often menhirs running north and south, together with a large block inwhich was a socket for an idol or other object of worship. Severalbodies of children found near it have suggested that the monument was aplace of sacrifice. 

Other megalithic structures can be definitely classed as dwellings ortombs, as we have seen in our separate treatment of them. It is notimprobable that, if we are right in considering the dolmen as the mostprimitive form of megalithic monument, megalithic architecture wasfunerary in origin. Yet, as we find it in its great diffusion, itprovides homes for the living as well as for the dead. In their originalhome, perhaps in Africa, the megalithic race may have lived in huts ofwattle or skins, but after their migration the need of protection in ahostile country and the exigencies of a colder climate may have forcedthem to employ stone for their dwellings. In any case, in megalithicarchitecture as seen in Europe the tomb and the dwelling types areconsiderably intermixed, and may have reacted on one another. This, however, does not justify the assertion so often made that themegalithic tomb was a conscious imitation of the hut. It is true thatsome peoples make the home of their dead to resemble that of the living. Among certain tribes of Greenland it is usual to leave the dead manseated in his hut by way of burial. But such a conception does not existamong all peoples, and to say that the dolmen is an imitation in stoneof a hut is the purest conjecture. Still more improbable is Montelius'sidea that the corridor-tomb imitates a dwelling. It is true that theEskimos have a type of hut which is entered by a low passage often 30feet in length, but for one who believes as Montelius does that thecorridor-tomb is southern or eastern in origin such a derivation isimpossible, for this type of house is essentially northern, its aimbeing to exclude the icy winds. In the south it would be intolerablyclose, and its low passage besides serving no purpose would beinconvenient. 

There is really no reason to derive either the dolmen or thecorridor-tomb from dwellings at all. Granted the use of huge stones, both are purely natural forms, and the presence of the corridor in thelatter is dictated by necessity. The problem was how to cover a largetomb-chamber with a mound and to leave it still accessible for laterinterments, and the obvious solution was to add a covered passageleading out to the edge of the mound. 

A remarkable feature of the megalithic tombs is the occurrence in manyof them of a small round or rectangular hole in one of the walls, usually an end-wall, more rarely a partition-wall between two chambers. Occasionally the hole was formed by placing side by side two uprightblocks each with a semicircular notch in its edge. Tombs with a holedblock or blocks occur in England, instances being the barrows of Aveningand Rodmarton, King Orry's Grave in the Isle of Man, Lanyon Quoit inCornwall, and Plas Newydd in Wales, which has two holes. There are alsoexamples in Ireland, France, Belgium, Central Germany, and Scandinavia, where they are common. Passing further afield we find holes in theGiants' Graves of Sardinia, and in Syria, the Caucasus, and India, wherehalf the dolmens in the Deccan are of this type. The holes are usuallytoo small to allow of the passage of a human body. It has been suggestedthat they served as an outlet for the soul of the deceased, or in somecases as a means of passing in food to him. 

Attention has been frequently drawn to curious round pits so often foundon the stones of dolmens and usually known as cup-markings. They vary indiameter from about two to four inches, and are occasionally connectedby a series of narrow grooves in the stone. They vary considerably innumber, sometimes there are few, sometimes many. They occur nearlyalways on the upper surface of the cover-slab, very rarely on its undersurface or on the side-walls. 

Some have attempted to show that these pits are purely natural and notartificial. It has been suggested, for instance, that they are simplythe casts of a species of fossil sea-urchin which has weathered outfrom the surface of the stone. This explanation may be true in somecases, but it will not serve in all, for the 'cups' are sometimesarranged in such regular order that their artificial origin is palpable. These markings are found on dolmens and corridor-tombs in Palestine, North Africa, Corsica, France, Germany, Scandinavia, and Great Britain. In Wales there is a fine example of a dolmen with pits at Clynnog Fawr, while in Cornwall we may instance the monument called "The ThreeBrothers of Grugith" near Meneage. 

There is no clue to the purpose of these pits. Some have thought thatthey were made to hold the blood of sacrifice which was poured over theslab, and from some such idea may have arisen some of the legends ofhuman victims which still cling round the dolmens. Others have opposedto this the fact that the pits sometimes occur on vertical walls orunder the cover-slabs, and have preferred to see in them some totemisticsignification or some expression of star-worship. It is possible that wehave to deal with a complex and not a simple phenomenon, and that thepits were not all made to serve a single purpose. Those which cover someof the finest stones at Mnaidra and Hagiar Kim are certainly meant to beornamental, though there may be in them a reminiscence of some religioustradition. In any case, it is worth while to remember that cup-markingsalso occur on natural rocks and boulders in Switzerland, Scandinavia, Great Britain (where there is a good example near Ilkley in Yorkshire), near Como in Italy, and in Germany, Russia, and India. 

Of the builders of the megalithic monuments themselves we cannot expectto know very much, especially while their origin remains veiled inobscurity. Yet there are a few facts which stand out clearly. We evenknow something about their appearance, for the skulls found in themegalithic tombs have in many cases been subjected to carefulexamination and measurement. Into the detail of these measurements wecannot enter here; suffice it to say that the most important of them arethe maximum length of the skull from front to back and its maximumbreadth, both measures, of course, being taken in a straight line with apair of callipers, and not round the contour of the skull. If we nowdivide the maximum breadth by the maximum length and multiply the resultby 100 we get what is known as the cephalic index of the skull. Thus ifa skull has a length of 180 millimetres and a breadth of 135, itscephalic index is 135/180 X 100, i. E. 75. It is clear that in a roundishtype of head the breadth will be greater in proportion to the lengththan in a narrow elliptical type. Thus in a broad head the cephalicindex is high, while in a narrow head it is low. The former is calledbrachycephalic (short-headed), and the latter dolichocephalic(long-headed). 

This index is now accepted by most anthropologists as a useful criterionof race, though, of course, there are other characteristics which mustoften be taken into account, such as the height and breadth of the face, the cubic capacity of the skull and its general contour. At any rate, ifwe can show that the skulls of the megalithic tombs conform to a singletype in respect of their index we shall have a presumption, though not acertainty, that they belong to a single race. 

For Africa the evidence consists in a group of twenty skulls fromdolmen-tombs giving cephalic indices which range from 70. 5 to 84. 4. Theaverage index is 75. 27, and the majority of the indices lay within a fewunits of that number. Ten skulls from Halsaflieni in Malta have cephalicindices running from 66 to 75. 1, the average being 71. 84. Of a series of44 skulls from the rock-tombs of the Petit Morin in France, 12 had anindex of over 80, 22 were between 75 and 80, and 10 were below 75. Butin the dolmens of Lozère distinctly broad skulls were frequent. A seriesof British neolithic skulls, mostly from barrows, ran from 67 to 77. 

The builders of the megalithic monuments thus belonged in the main to afairly dolichocephalic race or races, for the large majority of theskulls measured are of a long-headed type. There are, however, invarious localities, especially in France, occasional anomalous types ofskull which are distinctly brachycephalic, and show that contaminationof some kind was taking or had taken place. 

Of the state of civilization to which the builders of the megalithicmonuments had attained, and of the social condition in which they lived, there is something to be gathered. It is clear in the first place fromthe evidence of the Maltese buildings that they were a pastoral peoplewho domesticated the ox, the sheep, the pig, and the goat, upon whoseflesh they partly lived. Shellfish also formed a part of their diet, andthe shells when emptied of their contents were occasionally pierced tobe used as pendants or to form necklaces or bracelets. 

Whether these people were agricultural is a question more difficult toanswer. It is true that flat stones have been found, on which some kindof cereal was ground up with the aid of round pebbles, but the grain forwhich these primitive mills were used may have been wild and notcultivated. No grain of any kind has been found in the Maltesesettlements. 

The megalithic race do not seem to have been great traders. This isremarkably exemplified in Malta, where there is not a trace ofconnection with the wonderful civilization which must have beenflourishing so near at hand in Crete and the Ægean at the time when themegalithic temples were built. The island seems to have been entirelyself-sufficing, except for the importation of obsidian, probably fromthe neighbouring island of Linosa. Of copper, which wide trade wouldhave introduced, there is no sign. 

Some writers, however, have argued the existence of extensivetrade-relations from the occurrence of a peculiar kind of turquoisecalled _callaïs_ in some of the megalithic monuments of France andPortugal. The rarity of this stone has inclined some archæologists toattribute it to a single source, while some have gone so far as toconsider it eastern in origin. For the last theory there is no evidencewhatsoever. No natural deposit of _callaïs_ is known, but it is highlyprobable that the sources of the megalithic examples lay in France orPortugal. 

It would of course be foolish to suppose that the megalithic peoplereceived none of the products of other countries, especially at a timewhen the discovery of copper was giving a great impetus to trade. Nodoubt they enjoyed the benefits of that kind of slow filtering tradewhich a primitive tribe, even if it had wished, could hardly haveavoided, but they were not a great trading nation as were the Cretans ofthe Middle and Late Minoan Periods, or the Egyptians of the XIIth andXVIIIth Dynasties. We know nothing of their political conditions, of thegroups into which they were divided, or the centres from which they weregoverned. That there were strong centres of government is, however, clear from the very existence of such huge monuments, many of which musthave required the combined and organized labour of large armies ofworkers, in the gathering of which the state was doubtless stronglybacked by religion. 

We have seen that the megalithic peoples frequently dwelt in huts ofgreat stones. Yet in the majority of cases their huts must have been, like those of most primitive races, of perishable material, such aswood, wattle, skins, turf, and clay. As for their form there wasprobably a continual conflict between the round and the rectangularplan, just as there was in the stone examples. Which form prevailed inany particular district was probably determined almost by accident. Thusin Sardinia the round type was mostly kept for the huts and _nuraghi_, while the rectangular was reserved for the dolmens and Giants' Graves. Even here the confusion between the two types is shown by the fact thatnear Birori there are two dolmens with a round plan. Again, inPantelleria the huts of the Mursia are rectangular, while the _sesi_, which are tombs, are roughly circular. It is therefore probable that theround and rectangular types of building were both in use among themegalithic people before they spread over Europe. 

Within their huts these people led a life of the simplest description. Their weapons and tools, though occasionally of copper, were for themost part of stone. Flint was the most usual material. In Scandinavia itwas often polished, but elsewhere it was merely flaked. The implementsmade from it were of simple types, knives, borers, scrapers, lanceheads, and more rarely arrowheads. Many of these were quite roughly made, nomore flaking being done than was absolutely necessary to produce theessential form, and the work being, when possible, confined to one faceof the flint. 

In the Mediterranean obsidian, a volcanic rock, occasionally took theplace of flint, especially in Sardinia and Pantelleria. Axes or celtswere often made of flint in Scandinavia and North Germany, but elsewhereother stones, such as jade, jadeite, and diorite were commonly used. 

We can only guess at the way in which the megalithic people wereclothed. No doubt the skins of the animals they domesticated and ofthose they hunted provided them with some form of covering, at any ratein countries where it was needed. Possibly they spun wool or flax into athread, for at Halsaflieni two objects were found which look likespindle-whorls, and others occur on sites which are almost certainly tobe attributed to the megalithic people. There is, however, nothing toshow that they wove the thread into stuffs. 

The love of personal decoration was highly developed among them, and allbranches of nature were called upon to minister to their desire forornament. Shells, pierced and strung separately or in masses, wereperhaps their favourite adornment, but close on these follow beads andpendants of almost every conceivable substance, bone, horn, stone, clay, nuts, beans, copper, and occasionally gold. 

One small object assumes a great importance on account of its widedistribution. This is the conical button with two converging holes inits base to pass the thread through. This little object, which may haveserved exactly the purpose of the modern button, occurs in several partsof the megalithic area. There are examples in Malta made of stone andshell. Elsewhere it is most usually of bone. It occurs in Sardinia, inFrance, in the rock-tombs of Gard, and in the corridor and rock-tombs ofLozère and Ardèche, in Portugal in the _allée couverte_ of MonteAbrahaõ, in Bohuslän (Sweden), and at Carrowmore in Ireland. Outside themegalithic area it has been found in two of the Swiss lake-dwellings andin Italy. 

The pottery of the megalithic people was of a simple type. It was allmade by hand, the potter's wheel being still unknown to the makers. Pottery with painted designs does not occur outside Sicily, except fora few poor and late examples in Malta. The best vases were of fairlypurified clay, moderately well fired, and having a polished surface, usually of a darkish colour. On this surface were often incisedornamental designs, varying both in type and in the skill with whichthey were engraved. As a rule the schemes were rectilinear, more rarelythey were carried out in curves. Sardinia furnishes some fine examplesof rectilinear work, while the best of the curved designs are found inMalta, where elaborate conventional and even naturalistic patterns aretraced out with wonderful freedom and steadiness of hand. 

The pottery of the megalithic area is not all alike; it would besurprising if it were. Even supposing that the invaders brought withthem a single definite style of pottery-making this would rapidly becomemodified by local conditions and by the already existing potteryindustry of the country, often, no doubt, superior to that of thenew-comers. Nevertheless, there are a few points of similarity betweenthe pottery of various parts of the megalithic area. The most remarkableexample is the bell-shaped cup, which occurs in Denmark, England, France, Spain, Sardinia, and possibly Malta (the specimen is too brokenfor certainty). Outside the area it is found in Bohemia, Hungary, andNorth Italy. Here, as in the case of the conical button, we cannot arguethat the form was actually introduced by the megalithic race, thoughthere is a certain possibility in favour of such a hypothesis. 

That the megalithic people possessed a religion of some kind will hardlybe doubted. Their careful observance of the rites due to the dead, andtheir construction of buildings which can hardly have been anything butplaces of worship, is a strong testimony to this. We have seen that inthe Maltese temples the worship of baetyls or pillars of stone seems tohave been carried on. Several stone objects which can scarcely have beenanything but baetyls were found in the megalithic structures of LosMillares in Spain, but none are known elsewhere in the megalithic area. 

There is some reason for thinking that among the megalithic race thereexisted a cult of the axe. In France, for instance, the sculpturedrock-tombs of the valley of the Petit Morin show, some a human figure, some an axe, and some a combination of the two. This same juxtapositionof the two also occurs on a slab which closed the top of a corbelledchamber at Collorgues in Gard. A simple _allée couverte_ at Göhlitzschin Saxony has on one of its blocks an axe and handle engraved andcoloured red. There are further examples in the _allée couverte_ ofGavr'inis and the dolmen called La Table des Marchands at Locmariaquer. 

These sculptured axes call to mind at once the numerous axe-shapedpendants of fine polished stone (jade, jadeite, etc. ) found in Malta, Sicily, Sardinia, and France, and apparently used as amulets. Theexcavation of Crete has brought to light a remarkable worship of thedouble axe, and it has been argued with great probability that one ofthe early boat signs figured on the pre-dynastic painted vases of Egyptis a double axe, and that this was a cult object. It seems very probablethat in the megalithic area, or at least in part of it, there was asomewhat similar worship, the object of cult, however, being not adouble but a single axe, usually represented as fitted with a handle. Itneed not be assumed that the axe itself was worshipped, though this isnot impossible; it is more likely that it was an attribute of some godor goddess. 

Among the rock-hewn tombs of the valley of the Petit Morin in thedepartment of Marne, France, were seven which contained engravings onone of the walls. Several of these represent human figures (Fig. 13). The eyes are not marked, but the hair and nose are clear. In some thebreasts are shown, in others they are omitted. On each figure isrepresented what appears to be a collar or necklace. Similar figuresoccur on the slabs of some of the _allées couvertes_ of Seine et Oise, and on certain blocks found in and near megalithic burials in the Southof France. Moreover, in the departments of Aveyron, Tarn, and Héraulthave been found what are known as menhir-statues, upright pillars ofstone roughly shaped into human semblance at the top; they are of twotypes, the one clearly female and the other with no breasts, but alwayswith a collar or baldric. 

It has been argued that these figures represent a deity or deities ofthe megalithic people. Déchelette, comparing what are apparently tattoomarks on a menhir-statue at Saint Sermin (Aveyron) with similar marks ona figure cut on a schist plaque at Idanha a Nova (Portugal) and on amarble idol from the island of Seriphos in the Ægean, seems inclined toargue that in France and Portugal we have the same deity as in theÆgean. This seems rather a hazardous conjecture, for we know that manyprimitive peoples practised tattooing, and, moreover, it is not certainthat the French figures represent deities at all. It is quite as likely, if not more so, that they represent the deceased, and take the place ofa grave-stone: this would account for the occurrence of both male andfemale types. This was almost certainly the purpose of six stones thatremain of a line that ran parallel to a now destroyed tomb at Tamuli(Sardinia). Three have breasts as if to distinguish the sex of three ofthose buried in the tomb. We must not therefore assume that any of theFrench figures represents a 'dolmen-deity. '

The method of burial observed in the megalithic tombs is almostuniversally inhumation. Cremation seems to occur only in France, butthere it is beyond all doubt. The known examples are found in thedepartments of Finistère, Marne, and Aisne, and in the neighbourhood ofParis. In Finistère out of 92 megalithic burials examined 61 werecremations, 26 were inhumations, and 5 were uncertain. It is extremelycurious that this small portion of France should be the only part of themegalithic area where cremation was practised. It is generally held thatcremation was brought into Europe by the broad-headed 'Alpine' people, who seem to have invaded the centre of the continent at some period inthe neolithic age. It is possible that in parts of France a mixture tookplace between the megalithic builders and the Alpine race. Intermarriagewould no doubt lead to confusion in many cases between the two rites. 

In all other cases the builders of the megalithic monuments buried theirdead unburned. Often the body was lying stretched out on its back, orwas set in a sitting position against the side of the tomb; but mostfrequently it was placed in what is known as the contracted position, laid on one side, generally the left, with the knees bent and drawn uptowards the chin, the arms bent at the elbow, and the hands placed closeto the face. Many explanations of this position have been suggested. Some see in it a natural posture of repose, some an attempt to crowd thebody into as small a space as possible. Some have suggested that thecorpse was tightly bound up with cords in order that the spirit mightnot escape and do harm to the living. Perhaps the most widely approvedtheory is that which considers this position to be embryonic, i. E. Theposition of the embryo previous to birth. None of these explanations isentirely convincing, but no better one has been put forward up to thepresent. 

This custom, it must be noted, was not limited to the megalithicpeoples. It was the invariable practice of the pre-dynastic Egyptiansand has been found further east in Persia. It occurs in the neolithicperiod in Crete and the Ægean, in Italy, Switzerland, Germany, and otherparts of Europe, and it is one of the facts which go to show that thebuilders of the megaliths were ethnologically connected, howeverremotely, with their predecessors in Europe. 

At Halsaflieni, in Malta, we have perhaps examples of the curious customof secondary interment; the body is buried temporarily in some suitableplace, and after the flesh has left the bones the latter are collectedand thrown together into a common ossuary. That the bones at Halsaflieniwere placed there when free from flesh is probable from the closenesswith which they were packed together (see p. 111). There are alsopossible examples in Sicily (see p. 79). The custom was not unknown inneolithic days, especially in Crete. It is still occasionally practisedon the island and on the Greek mainland, where, after the dead have laina few years in hallowed soil, their bones are dug up, roughly cleaned, and deposited in caves. 

 CHAPTER X

 WHO WERE THE BUILDERS, AND WHENCE DID THEY COME?

Modern discussion of the origin of the megalithic monuments may be saidto date from Bertrand's publication of the French examples in 1864. Inthis work Bertrand upheld the thesis that "the dolmens and _alléescouvertes_ are sepulchres; and their origin seems up to the present tobe northern. " In 1865 appeared Bonstetten's famous _Essai sur lesdolmens_, in which he maintained that the dolmens were constructed byone and the same people spreading over Europe from north to south. Atthis time the dolmens of North Africa were still unstudied. In 1867followed an important paper by Bertrand. In 1872 two events ofimportance to the subject occurred, the publication of Fergusson's _RudeStone Monuments in All Countries_, and the discussion raised at theBrussels Congress by General Faidherbe's paper on the dolmens ofAlgeria. Faidherbe maintained the thesis that dolmens, whether in Europeor Africa, were the work of a single people moving southward from theBaltic Sea. 

The question thus raised has been keenly debated since. At theStockholm Congress in 1874 de Mortillet advanced the theory thatmegalithic monuments in different districts were due to differentpeoples, and that what spread was the custom of building such structuresand not the builders themselves. This theory has been accepted by mostarchæologists, including Montelius, Salomon Reinach, Sophus Müller, Hoernes, and Déchelette. But while the rest believe the influences whichproduced the megalithic monuments to have spread from east to west, i. E. From Asia to Europe, Salomon Reinach holds the contrary view, which hehas supported in a remarkable paper called _Le Mirage Oriental_, published in 1893. 

The questions we have to discuss are, therefore, as follows: Are all themegalithic monuments due to a single race or to several? If to a singlerace, whence did that race come and in what direction did it move? If toseveral, did the idea of building megalithic structures arise among theseveral races independently, or did it spread from one to another?

We shall consider first the theory that the idea of megalithic buildingwas evolved among several races independently, i. E. That it was a phaseof culture through which they separately passed. 

On the whole, this idea has not found favour among archæologists. Theuse of stone for building might have arisen in many placesindependently. But megalithic architecture is something much more thanthis. It is the use of great stones in certain definite and particularways. We have already examined what may be called the style ofmegalithic architecture and found that the same features are noticeablein all countries where these buildings occur. In each case we see a typeof construction based on the use of large orthostatic slabs, sometimessurmounted by courses of horizontal masonry, with either a roof ofhorizontal slabs or a corbelled vault. Associated with this wefrequently find the hewing of underground chambers in the rock. Inalmost all countries where megalithic structures occur certain fixedtypes prevail; the dolmen is the most general of these, and it is clearthat many of the other forms are simply developments of this. Theoccurrence of structures with a hole in one of the walls and of blockswith 'cup-markings' is usual over the whole of the megalithic area. There are even more remarkable resemblances in detail between structuresin widely separated countries. Thus the Giants' Tombs of Sardinia allhave a concave façade which forms a kind of semicircular court in frontof the entrance to the tomb. This feature is seen also in the temples ofMalta, in the tomb of Los Millares in Spain, in the _naus_ of theBalearic Isles (where, however, the curve is slight), in the Giant'sGrave of Annaclochmullin and the chambered cairn of Newbliss in Ireland, in the tomb of Cashtal-yn-Ard in the Isle of Man, in the barrow of WestTump in Gloucestershire, and in the horned cairns of the north ofScotland. These parallels are due to something more than coincidence; infact, it is clear that megalithic building is a widespread andhomogeneous system, which, despite local differences, always preservescertain common features pointing to a single origin. It is thusdifficult to accept the suggestion that it is merely a phase throughwhich many races have passed. The phases which occur in many races alikeare always those which are natural and necessary in the development of apeople, such as the phase of using copper. But there is nothing eithernatural or necessary in the use of huge unwieldy blocks of stone wheremuch smaller ones would have sufficed. 

There are further objections to this theory in the distribution of themegalithic buildings both in space and time. In space they occupy a veryremarkable position along a vast sea-board which includes theMediterranean coast of Africa and the Atlantic coast of Europe. In otherwords, they lie entirely along a natural sea route. It is more thanaccident that the many places in which, according to this theory, themegalithic phase independently arose all lie in most natural seaconnection with each other, while not one is in the interior of Europe. 

In time the vast majority of the megalithic monuments of Europe seem tobegin near the end of the neolithic period and cover the copper age, the later forms continuing occasionally into that of bronze. Here againit is curious that megalithic building, if merely an independent phasein many countries, should arise in so many at about the same time, andwith no apparent reason. Had it been the use of _worked_ stones thatarose, and had this followed the appearance of copper tools, theadvocates of this theory would have had a stronger case, but there seemsto be no reason why huge unworked stones should _simultaneously_ beginto be employed for tombs in many different countries unless this usespread from a single source. 

For these reasons it is impossible to consider megalithic building as amere phase through which many nations passed, and it must therefore havebeen a system originating with one race, and spreading far and wide, owing either to trade influence or migration. But can we determinewhich?

Great movements of races by sea were not by any means unusual inprimitive days, in fact, the sea has always been less of an obstacle toearly man than the land with its deserts, mountains, and unfordablerivers. There is nothing inherently impossible or even improbable in thesuggestion that a great immigration brought the megalithic monumentsfrom Sweden to India or vice versa. History is full of instances of suchmigrations. According to the most widely accepted modern theory thewhole or at least the greater part of the neolithic population of Europemoved in from some part of Africa at the opening of the neolithic age. In medieval history we have the example of the Arabs, who in theirmovement covered a considerable portion of the very megalithic areawhich we are discussing. 

On the other hand, many find it preferable to suppose that over thissame distance there extended a vast trade route or a series of traderoutes, along which travelled the influences which account for thepresence of precisely similar dolmens in Denmark, Spain, and theCaucasus. Yet although much has been written about neolithic traderoutes little has been proved, and the fact that early man occasionallycrossed large tracts of land and sea in the great movements of migrationdoes not show that he also did so by way of trade, nor does it prove theexistence of such steady and extensive commercial relations as such atheory of the megalithic monuments would seem to require. Immigration isoften forced on a race. Change of climate or the diverting of the courseof a great river may make their country unfit for habitation, or theymay be expelled by a stronger race. In either case they must migrate, and we know from history that they often covered long distances in theirattempt to follow the line of least resistance. Thus there is nothing apriori improbable in the idea that the megalithic monuments were builtby a single invading race. 

There are other considerations which support such a theory. It will bereadily admitted that the commonest and most widely distributed form ofthe megalithic monument is the dolmen. Both this and its obviousderivatives, the Giant's Grave, the _allée couverte_, and others, areknown to have been tombs, while other types of structure, such as theMaltese temple, the menhir, and the cromlech, almost certainly had areligious purpose. It is difficult to believe that these types ofbuilding, so closely connected with religion and burial, were introducedinto all these regions simply by the influence of trade relations. Religious customs and the burial rites connected with them are perhapsthe most precious possession of a primitive people, and they are thosein which they most oppose and resent change of any kind, even when itonly involves detail and not principle. Thus it is almost incrediblethat the people, for instance, of Spain, because they were told bytraders that the people of North Africa buried in dolmens, gave up, evenin isolated instances, their habit of interment in trench graves infavour of burial in dolmens. It is still more impossible to believe thatthis unnatural event happened in one country after another. It is truethat the use of metal was spread by means of commerce, but here therewas something to be gained by adopting the new discovery, and there wasno sacrifice of religious custom or principle. An exchange of productsbetween one country and another is not unnatural, but a traffic inburial customs is unthinkable. 

Perhaps, however, it was not the form of the dolmen which was brought bycommerce, but simply the art of architecture in general, and this wasadapted to burial purposes. To this there are serious objections. In thefirst place it does not explain why exactly the same types of building(e. G. The dolmen), showing so many similarities of peculiar detail, occur in countries so far apart; and in the second place, if what wascarried by trade was the art of building alone, why should the learnersgo out of their way to use huge stones when smaller ones would havesuited their purpose equally well? That the megalithic builders knew howto employ smaller stones we know from their work; that they preferred touse large ones for certain purposes was not due to ignorance or chance, it was because the large stone as such had some particular meaning andassociation for them. We cannot definitely say that large stones werethemselves actually worshipped, but there can be no possible doubt thatfor some reason or other they were regarded as peculiarly fit to be usedin sanctified places such as the tombs of the dead. It is impossiblethat the men who possessed the skill to lay the horizontal upper coursesof the Hagiar Kim temple should have taken the trouble to haul to thespot and use vast blocks over 20 feet in length where far smaller oneswould have been more convenient, unless they had some deep-seatedprejudice in favour of great stones. 

Such are the main difficulties involved by the influence theory. On theother hand, objections have been urged against the idea that themonuments were all built by one and the same race. Thus Dr. Montelius inhis excellent _Orient und Europa_ says, "In Europe at this time dweltAryans, but the Syrians and Sudanese cannot be Aryans, " the inferencebeing, of course, that the European dolmens were built by a differentrace from that which built those of Syria and the Sudan. Unfortunately, however, the major premise is not completely true, for though it is truethat Aryans did live in Europe at this time, there were also people inEurope who were not Aryans, and it is precisely among them thatmegalithic buildings occur. 

The French archæologist Déchelette also condemns the idea of a singlerace. "Anthropological observations, " he says, "have long since ruinedthis adventurous hypothesis. " He does not tell us what theseobservations are, but we presume that he refers to the occurrence ofvarying skull types among the people buried in the megalithic tombs. Nothing is more natural than that some variation should occur. We aredealing with a race which made enormous journeys, and thus becamecontaminated by the various other races with which it came in contact. It may even have been a mixed race to start with. Thus even if we foundskulls of very different types in the dolmens this would not in theleast disprove the idea that dolmen building was introduced into variouscountries by one and the same race. It would be simply a case of thecommon anthropological fact that a race immigrating into an alreadyinhabited country becomes to some extent modified by intermarriage withthe earlier inhabitants. The measurements given in the last chapterwould seem to show that despite local variation there is an underlyinghomogeneity in the skulls of the megalithic people. 

It thus seems that the most probable theory of the origin of themegalithic monuments is that this style of building was brought to thevarious countries in which we find it by a single race in an immensemigration or series of migrations. It is significant that this theoryhas been accepted by Dr. Duncan Mackenzie, who is perhaps the firstauthority on the megalithic structures of the Mediterranean basin. 

One question still remains to be discussed. From what direction didmegalithic architecture come, and what was its original home? This isclearly a point which is not altogether dependent on the means by whichthis architecture was diffused. Montelius speaks in favour of an Asiaticorigin. He considers that caves, and tombs accessible from above, i. E. Simple pits dug in the earth, were native in Europe, while tombs reachedfrom the side, such as dolmens and corridor-tombs, were introduced intoEurope from the east. Salomon Reinach, arguing mainly from the earlyappearance of the objects found in the tombs of Scandinavia and therarity of the simpler types of monument, such as the dolmen, in Germanyand South Europe, suggests that megalithic monuments first appeared inNorth Europe and spread southwards. Mackenzie is more inclined tobelieve in an African origin. If he is right it may be that someclimatic change, possibly the decrease of rainfall in what is now theSahara desert, caused a migration from Africa to Europe very similar tothat which many believe to have given to Europe its early neolithicpopulation. The megalithic people may even have been a branch of thesame vast race as the neolithic: this would explain the fact that bothinhumed their dead in the contracted position. 

It is probable that the problem will never be solved. The only way toattempt a solution would be to show that in some part of the megalithicarea the structures were definitely earlier than in any other, and thatas we move away from that part in any direction they become later andlater. Such a means of solution is not hopeful, for the earliest formof structure, the dolmen, occurs in all parts of the area, and if weattempt to date by objects we are met by the difficulty that a dolmen inone place which contained copper might be earlier than one in anotherplace which contained none, copper having been known in the former placeearlier than in the latter. 

It still remains to consider the question of the origin of the rock-hewnsepulchre and its relation to the megalithic monument. The rock-tomboccurs in Egypt, Phoenicia, Rhodes, Cyprus, Crete, South Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, Malta, Pianosa, the Iberian Peninsula, the Balearic Isles, andFrance. In all these places there are examples which are certainlyearly, i. E. Belong to the neolithic or early metal age, with theexception of Malta and perhaps Rhodes and Phoenicia. Two types arecommon, the chamber cut in the vertical face of rock and thus enteredfrom the side, sometimes by a horizontal passage, and the chamber cutunderground and entered from a vertical or sloping shaft placed notdirectly over the chamber, but immediately to one side of it. It isunlikely that these two types have a separate origin, for they areclearly determined by geological reasons. A piece of country wherevertical cliffs or faces of rock abounded was suited to the first type, while the other alone was possible when the ground consisted of a flathorizontal surface of rock. We frequently find the two side by side andcontaining identically the same type of remains. In South-East Sicily wehave the horizontal entrance in the tombs of the rocky gorge ofPantalica, while the vertical shaft is the rule in the tombs of thePlemmirio, only a few miles distant. 

Two curious facts are noticeable with regard to the distribution of therock-hewn tombs. In the first place they are all in the vicinity of theMediterranean, and in the second some occur in the megalithic area, while others do not. The examples of Egypt, Cyprus, and Crete show thatthis type of tomb flourished in the Eastern Mediterranean. Was it fromhere that the type was introduced into the megalithic area, or did themegalithic people bring with them a tradition of building rock-tombstotally distinct from that which is represented by the tombs of Egypt, Cyprus, and Crete?

The question is difficult to answer. One thing alone is clear, that incertain places, such as Malta and Sardinia, the megalithic people werenot averse to reproducing in the solid rock the forms which they moreusually erected with large stones above ground. The finest instance ofthis is the Halsaflieni hypogeum in Malta, where the solid rock is hewnout with infinite care to imitate the form and even the details ofsurface building. 

Similarly we have seen that both in Sardinia and in France the sameforms of tomb were rendered in great stones or in solid rock almostindifferently. 

There can therefore be no doubt that the hewing out of rock waspractised by the megalithic people, and that they were no mean exponentsof the art. We have no proof that they brought this art along with themfrom their original centre of dispersion, though if they did it iscurious that they did not carry it into other countries where theypenetrated besides those of the Mediterranean. It may be that earlyrock-tombs will yet be found in North Africa, but it seems improbablethat, had they existed in the British Isles, in North Germany, or inScandinavia, not a single example should have been found. 

On the other hand, if the megalithic people did not bring the idea ofthe rock-tomb with them we must suppose either that it evolved amongthem after their migration, or that they adopted it from the EasternMediterranean. The last supposition is particularly unlikely, as itwould involve the modification of a burial custom by foreign influence. 

We have, in fact, no evidence on which to judge the question. Perhaps itis least unreasonable to suppose that the idea of the rock-tomb wasbrought into the megalithic area by the same people who introduced themegalithic monuments, and did not result from contact with the EasternMediterranean. Similarly we ought perhaps to disclaim any directconnection between the corridor-tombs of the megalithic area and thegreat _tholoi_ of Crete and the Greek mainland. At first sight there isa considerable similarity between them. The Treasury of Atreus at Mycenæwith its corbelled circular chamber and long rectangular corridor seemsvery little removed, except in size and finish, from the tombs of Gavr'Inis and Lough Crew. Yet there are vital points of difference. The twolast are tombs built partly with upright slabs on the surface of theground, entered by horizontal corridors, and covered with mounds. TheTreasury of Atreus is simply an elaborated rock-tomb cut undergroundwith a sloping shaft; as the ground consisted only of loose soil acoating of stone was a necessity, and hence the resemblance to amegalithic monument. 

 BIBLIOGRAPHY

 OF THE MEGALITHIC MONUMENTS

 GENERAL

Fergusson, _Rude Stone Monuments in all Countries_ (London 1872). Bonstetten, _Essai sur les dolmens_ (Geneva 1865). Mortillet, _Compte rendu du congrès d'archéologie préhistorique_, Stockholm, 1874, pp. 267 ff. Reinach, _Le mirage oriental_, in _L'Anthropologie_, 1893, pp. 557 ff. Montelius, _Orient und Europa_. Borlase, _The Dolmens of Ireland_, Vols. II and III. Reinach, _Terminologie des monuments mégalithiques in Revue archéologique_, 3^{e} sér. , XXII, 1893. Westropp, _Prehistoric Phases_ (London 1872). 

 ENGLAND AND WALES

Fergusson, _op. Cit. __Recent Excavations at Stonehenge, Archæologia_, LVIII, pp. 37 ff. Flinders Petrie, _Stonehenge: Plans, Descriptions, and Theories_ (London 1880). Windle, _Remains of the Prehistoric Age in England. _James, Sir Henry, _Plans and Photos of Stonehenge and of Turnsuchan in the Island of Lewis_ (Southampton 1867). Evans, Sir A. , _Archæological Review_, II, 1889, pp. 313 ff. Lockyer, Sir N. , _Nature_, November 21st, 1901. Hinks, _XIXth Century_, June, 1903, pp. 1002 ff. Lockyer, Sir N. , _Nature_, LXXI, 1904-5, pp. 297 ff. , 345 ff. , 367 ff. , 391 ff. , 535 ff. Lewis, A. A. , _Stone Circles in Britain, Archæological Journal_, XLIX, pp. 136 ff. Thurnam, _Ancient British Barrows, Archæologia_, XLII, pp. 161 ff. , XLIII, pp. 285 ff. Lewis, A. A. , _Prehistoric Remains in Cornwall, Journal of the Anthrop. Inst. , _ XXV, 1895, and XXXV, 1905. Kermode and Herdman, _Illustrated Notes on Manks Antiquities_ (Liverpool 1904). 

 SCOTLAND

Wilson, _The Archæological and Prehistoric Annals of Scotland. _Forbes Leslie, _Early Races of Scotland. _Spence, Magnus, _Standing Stones and Maeshowe of Stenness. _

 IRELAND

Borlase, _Dolmens of Ireland. _Lewis, A. A. , _Some Stone Circles in Ireland_, in _Journal Anthrop. Inst. , _ XXXIX, pp. 517 ff. 

 SWEDEN

Montelius, _Orient und Europa. _Montelius, _Kulturgeschichte Schwedens. _Montelius, _Dolmens en France et en Suède_ (Le Mans 1907). Montelius, Graf från stenåldern, upptäckt vid Öringe i Ekeby socken, 1907. Nilsson, _Das Steinalter, oder die Ureinwohner des Scandinavischen Nordens_ (Hamburg 1865). 

 DENMARK

Montelius, _Orient und Europa. _Sophus Müller, _L'Europe préhistorique. _Sophus Müller, _Nordische Alterthumskunde. _

 HOLLAND

_Archæological Journal_, 1870, pp. 53 ff. _Journal Anthrop. Inst. _, VI, 1876, p. 158. _Compte rendu du congrès d'arch. Préhist. _, Stockholm, 1874. 

 BELGIUM

Engelhardt, _Om stendysser og deres geografiske udbredelse_, in _Aarböger f. Nord. Oldkynd. _, 1870, pp. 177 ff. 

 GERMANY

Krause und Schoetensack in _Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_, 1893 (Altmark only). Morlot, _L'archéologie du Meclenbourg_ (Zurich 1868). Von Estorff, _Heidnische Altertümer der Gegend von Aelzen_ (Hanover 1846). 

 SWITZERLAND

Keller, _Pfahlbauten_, 3 Bericht (Zurich, 1860), p. 101; Pl. XI, Figs. 8 and 9. 

 FRANCE

Cartailhac, _La France préhistorique. _Bertrand in _Revue archéologique_, 1864 (List of monuments). Bertrand, _Archéologie celtique et gauloise_, 2nd edit. , 1889. Déchelette, _Manuel d'archéologie préhistorique celtique et gallo-romaine_, Vol. I. Lewis, _Alignements at Autun_ in _Journal Anthrop. Inst. _, XXXVIII, 1908, pp. 380 ff. Lewis, _On some dolmens of peculiar form, op. Cit. _, XL, 1910, pp. 336 ff. De Baye, _L'archéologie préhistorique_ (Petit-Morin tombs). Reinach, S. , _La Sculpture en Europe_ (Angers 1896. Figures of the 'dolmen deity'). 

 SPAIN

Cartailhac, _Âges préhistorique de l'Espagne_. Cartailhac, _Monuments primitifs des îles baléares_. Bezzenberger in _Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_, XXXIX, 1907, pp. 567 ff. 

 ITALY

_Bullettino di Paletnologia Italiana_, XXV, pp. 178 ff. Nicolucci, _Brevi note sui monumenti megalitici di Terra d'Otranto_, 1893. _Bull. Paletn. Ital. _, XXXVII, pp. 6 ff. Mosso and Samarelli, _Il dolmen di Bisceglie_, in _Bull. Paletn. Ital. _, XXXVI, pp. 26 ff. And 86 ff. 

 SICILY

Orsi in _Bull. Paletn. Ital. _, XXIV, pp. 202-3 (Monteracello). Orsi in _Ausonia_, 1907, pp. 1 ff. (Cava Lazzaro). Orsi in _Notizie degli Scavi_, 1905, p. 432, Fig. 18 (Cava Lavinaro). 

 SARDINIA

La Marmora, _Voyage en Sardaigne_. Pinza in _Monumenti Antichi_, Vol. VIII. Nissardi in _Atti del Congresso Internazionale_, Roma, 1903, sezione preistorica. Nissardi and Taramelli in _Mon. Ant. _, Vol. XVII. Taramelli in _Memnon_, Band II, Mai, 1908, pp. 1-35. Préchac in _Mélanges d'archéologie et d'histoire_, XXVIII. Mackenzie in _Ausonia_, III, 1908, pp. 18 ff. Mackenzie in _Memnon_, Vol. II, fasc. 3. Mackenzie in _Papers of the British School of Rome_, V, pp. 89 ff. Taramelli, _Notizie degli Scavi_, 1904, pp. 301 ff. (Anghelu Ruju). Colini in _Bullettino di Paletnologia Italiana_, XXIV, pp. 252 ff. 

 CORSICA

_Nouvelles archives des missions scientifiques_, Vol. III, 1892, pp. 49 ff. 

 PIANOSA_Bullettino di Paletn. Ital. _, XXIV, pp. 281 ff. 

 MALTA

Mayr, A. , _Die vorgeschichtlichen Denkmäler von Malta_. Mayr, A. , _Die Insel Malta_. Zammit, _First Report on the Halsaflieni Hypogeum_. Tagliaferro, _The Prehistoric Pottery found in the Hypogeum at Halsaflieni_, in _Annals of Archæology and Anthropology_, Vol. III, pp. 1 ff. Zammit and Peet, _Report on the small objects found at Halsaflieni_ (Valletta, in the Press). Magri, _Ruins of a Megalithic Temple at Xeuchia, Gozo_. Ashby, T. , and others, _Report on Excavations at Corradino, Mnaidra, and Hagiar Kim_, appearing in Vol. VI of _Papers of the British School of Rome_. Peet, _Contributions to the Study of the Prehistoric Period in Malta, Papers of the British School of Rome_, V, pp. 141 ff. Tagliaferro, _Prehistoric Burials in a Cave at Burmeghez_, in Man, 1911, pp. 147 ff. 

 NORTH AFRICA

Faidherbe in _Compte rendu du congrès d'archéologie préhistorique_, Bruxelles, 1872, pp. 406 ff. Flower in _Transactions of the International Congressof Prehistoric Archæology_, Norwich, 1868, pp. 194 ff. MacIver and Wilkin, _Libyan Notes_. 

 MOROCCO

_Matériaux pour l'histoire de l'homme_, V, p. 342; VIII, p. 57; XX, p. 112. 

 TUNIS

Cartailhac in _L'Anthropologie_, 1903, pp. 620 ff. Carton in _L'Anthropologie_, 1891, pp. 1 ff. _Matériaux pour l'histoire de l'homme_, XXI, Pl. VI; XXII, pp. 373 and 416. 

 EGYPT AND THE SUDAN

Wilson and Felkin, _Uganda and the Egyptian Sudan_, Vol. II, p. 123. De Morgan, _Recherches sur l'origine de l'Egypte_, p. 239, Fig. 398. 

 PANTELLERIA

Orsi in _Monumenti Antichi_, IX, pp. 449 ff. 

 LAMPEDUSA

Ashby in _Annals of Archæology and Anthropology_, Vol. IV. 

 BULGARIA

_Mittheilungen der anthropologischen Gesellschaft in Wien_, 1888, pp. 285 ff. _L'Anthropologie_, 1890, p. 110. 

 CRIMEA

Borlase, _Dolmens of Ireland_, III, p. 722. 

 CAUCASUS AND CRIMEA

Chantre, _Recherches anthropologiques dans le Caucase_, Vol. I, pp. 50 ff. Chantre in _Verhandlungen der Berliner Anthropologischen Gesellschaft_, 1882, p. 344. _Matériaux pour l'histoire de l'homme_, 1885, pp. 545 ff. Borlase, _Dolmens of Ireland_, III, p. 722. 

 SYRIA AND PALESTINE

_Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Reports_ for 1882; _Annual_, 1911, pp. 1 ff. Conder, _Heth and Moab_, pp. 190, 293. Perrot and Chipiez, IV, pp. 341, 378-9. 

 PERSIA

de Morgan in _Revue mensuelle de l'Ecole d'anthropologie de Paris_, 1902, p. 187. De Morgan, _La délégation en Perse_, 1902. De Morgan, _L'histoire d'Elam_, Paris, 1902. 

 INDIA

_Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy_, XXIV, 1865. Westropp, _Prehistoric Phases_. 

 COREA

_Journal Anthrop. Inst. _, XXIV, p. 330. 

 JAPAN

Gowland in _Archæologia_, LV, pp. 439 ff. Gowland in _Journal Anthrop. Inst. _, 1907, pp. 10 ff. 

 INDEX

Abbameiga, 85Aberdeen, circles near, 38Adrianople, 114Africa, 90-6Aiga, 85Ain Dakkar, 117Ainu, the, 122Ala Safat, 116Alemtejo, 71Algeria, 91-5_Alignements_, 3, 59-60, 89, 119-20, 124, 154-7_Allées couvertes_, 3, 61, 64Altar Stone at Stonehenge, 18Altmark, 57Ammân, 117Ammon, 115Anghelu Ruju, 88Anglesey, 27, 29Annaclochmullin, 145Antequera, 70Arbor Low, 25Arcturus, 50, 51Arles, 64Arles, Council of, 12Arran, circles on, 35-6Arthur, King, 11, 25Arthur's Quoit, 29Asia, 114-22Atreus, Treasury of, 157Aurelius Ambrosius, 15Avebury, 23-4, 27-8Avening, 33, 127Axe, cult of, 137-8Axe-shaped pendants, 80, 112Axevalla Heath, 54

Baetyls, 104, 105-6, 137Balearic Isles, 71-5Barnstone, the, 36-7Barrows, long, 30-3Barth, 90Belgium, 58Bellary, 118Bell-shaped cup, 64, 81, 136Beltane festival, 37Benigaus Nou, 74Bertrand, 64, 143Birori, 82, 133Bisceglie, 76Bonstetten, 143Borreby, 54-5Boscawen-un, 26Bou Merzoug, 92Bou Nouara, 91Boyle Somerville, Captain, 50Brittany, 59-60Brogar, Ring of, 36-7Broholm, 54Bulgaria, 114Button, conical, 42, 71, 111, 135

Cæsar, 27Cairns, horned, 38-9Caithness, cairns of, 38-9_Callaïs_, 63, 64, 66, 67, 71, 132Callernish Circle, 34Calvados, 64Camster, 39Can de Ceyrac, 60Caouria, 89Capella, 50, 51Carnac, 13, 59-60Carrick-a-Dhirra, 43Carrickard, 45Carrickglass, 41Carrigalla, 49Carrowmore, 41-2Cashtal-yn-Ard, 145Cassibile, 80Castelluccio, 80, 81Castor, 50Caucasus, 114Cava Lavinaro, 78Cava Lazzaro, 78Cave burial, 81, 88Chagford, 29Champ Dolent, menhir of, 13Channel Isles, 67Charlemagne, 12Charlton's Abbott, 33China, 122Chittore, 119Chun Quoit, 29Circles, stone, 15-28, 34-8, 48-51, 60, 96, 115Cirta, 92Clava, 37Clynnog Fawr, 128Collorgues, 137Constantine, 91Contracted burials, 33, 54, 62, 77, 80, 81, 93, 97, 111, 140-1, 153Coolback, 43Corbelled roofs, 6, 32, 45, 48, 69, 73, 84, 86, 87, 102-3Cordin, 105, 108Corea, 122Cornwall, dolmens in, 29 monuments of, 26Corridor-tombs, 3, 43-8, 52-5, 56-8, 62-4, 67-71, 76-7, 96, 118, 120-2Corse, Cape, 89Corsica, 88-9Coursed masonry, use of, 5, 73, 82Cove, the, 25Cremation, 35, 42, 66, 140Crete, 113, 132, 142, 155, 157Crickstone, the, 30Crimea, 114Cromlechs, 3Cumberland, monuments of, 25Cup-markings, 117, 127-8Cyprus, 155Cyrenaica, 91

Dance Maen Circle, 26Date of megaliths, 123Dax, 64Deccan, 118-9Déchelette, 139, 151de Morgan, 90Denmark, 53-5Dennis, 76Der Ghuzaleh, 116Dolmens, 2, 29, 40-1, 52-3, 56, 58, 61, 67-8, 82, 89, 90, 91-6, 108, 114-9Drawings on stones, 46, 48, 55, 62, 110Drewsteignton, 29Druids, 11, 27-8

Edfu, 90Eguilaz, 68Egypt, 155Ellez, 96England, monuments of, 15-33Erdeven, 60Er-Lanic, 60Eskimos, 126Es Tudons, _nau_ of, 73-4Evans, Sir Arthur, 20, 105

Façades, curved, 78, 145-6Faidherbe, General, 143Faustina, medal of, 95Féraud, M. , 92-3Fergusson, 28, 143Fibrolite, 63Finistère, dolmens of, 13Fontanaccia, 89Fonte Coberta, 68Forbes Leslie, Colonel, 119France, 59-67Friar's Heel, 18, 21

Galilee, 115Gargantua, 11Gaulstown, 41Gavr'inis, 62, 137Gebel Mousa, 116Geoffrey of Monmouth, 26Ger, 64Germany, 56-7Get, 39Gezer, 124Giant's Bed, 56Giant's Tombs, 87-8Gigantia, 104

Giraldus Cambrensis, 15Göhlitzsch, 137Gozo, Is. , 104Greenland, 125Grewismühlen, 56Grotte des Fées, 64, 74Grotte du Castellet, 64

Hagiar Kim, 6, 103-4Hakpen Hill, 24, 27Halsaflieni, 108-13, 130Hauptville's Quoit, 25Hengist, 15Herrestrup, 53Highwood, 45Hinks, Mr. , 22Hirdmane Stone, 13Holed tombs, 77, 114, 116, 117, 126-7Holland, 57-8Horned cairns, 146_Hünenbetter_, 45, 56-8Hurlers, the, 26

Idanha a Nova, 139India, 118-20Inigo Jones, 27Inverness, circles in, 37-8Ireland, monuments of, 40-51Iron, 39, 46, 93, 119Italy, 76-7

Jadeite, 63James I, 27Japan, 120-2Jaulân, 117Jimmu, 121Judæa, 115

Karleby, 54Karnak (Egypt), 22Keamcorravooly, 44Keller, 56Kennet Avenue, 24Kerlescan, 60Kermario, 60Keswick Circle, 25Khasi Hills, 119Kingarth, circle at, 36Kirkabrost, circle at, 36Kit's Coty House, 29Knyttkärr, 55Komei, 121Kosseir, 118

Labbamologa, 43Ladò, 90Lampedusa, Isle of, 96Lanyon Quoit, 29, 127La Perotte, 7Leaba Callighe, 43Lecce, 76Lewis, Isle of, 34Linosa, Isle of, 96, 132Lockyer, Sir Norman, 21-2, 51Long Meg and her daughters, 25Losa, 85Los Millares, 70, 137, 145Lough Crew, 45, 48, 62Lough Gur, 48-51Lozère, 130Lundhöj, 55Lüttich, 58

MacIver, D. R. , 93-4Mackenzie, Duncan, 85, 152, 153Maeshowe, 36-7Malta, 98-113Man, Isle of, 30Mané-er-Hroeck, 62-3Marcella, 68Matera, 77Maughold, 30Mayborough Circle, 25Mayr, Albert, 105Meayll Hill, 30Melilli, 80Men-an-tol, 30Ménec, 59Menhirs, 2, 29, 59, 115-6, 123-4 cult of, 12, 123-4Merivale, circle at, 26Merlin, 15Merry Maidens, the, 26Messa, 90Minieh, 116Mnaidra, 100-3Moab, 115-7Molafà, 88Monte Abrahaõ, 71Montelius, O. , 126, 151, 153Monteracello, 78Morocco, 96Mortillet, de, 59, 144Mourzouk, 90Msila, 93Munster, tombs of, 44Mursia, 97Musta, 108Mycenean vases, 81

Naas, 15Nantes, Council of, 12Nara, 121_Naus_, 73-4, 145_Navetas_, see _Naus_Neermul jungle, 118Newbliss, 145New Grange, 46, 62Nile valley, 90Nilgiri Hills, 118Nine Maidens, the, 26Nissardi, 84Norway, 53Nossiu, 85, 87_Nuraghi_, 82-7

Obsidian, 77, 134Odin's Stone, 11, 36Orkney Isles, cairns of, 38-9Orry's Grave, 30, 127Orsi, Paolo, 78, 79Orthostatic slabs, use of, 4, 69, 74, 80, 96, 100

Palmella, 71Pantalica, 80, 155Pantelleria, Isle of, 96-8Papa-Westra, 39Pehada, 114Penrith Circle, 11Pentre Ifan, 29Pera, 115Périgord, 13Persia, 114Petit Morin, 66-7, 130Pfäffikon, Lake, 56Phoenicia, 154Pianosa, 89Picardt, John, 57Pierre du Diable, La, 58Pierres Plates, Les, 61Piper, the, 26Plas Newydd, 29, 127Plemmirio, 155Pliny, 27Portico-dolmens, 40-1, 52, 119Portugal, 67Pottery, 135-6

Reinach, Salomon, 144Religion, megalithic, 105-6, 137-9Rhodes, 154Rinaiou, 89Rock-tombs, 3, 66-7, 71, 74, 79-81, 88Rockbarton, 48Rodmarton, 33, 127Roknia, 94Rollright Circle, 25, 29, 50

Saint George, 88Saint-Germain-sur-Vienne, 12Saint Michel, Mont, 63Saint Pantaléon, 60Saint Sermin, 139Saint Vincent, 74Sant' Elia, Cape, 88Sardinia, 82-8S'Aspru, 85Scandinavia, 52-5Scotland, monuments of, 34-9Sculptures, 67, 138Secondary burial, 79, 141-2Senâm, the, 93-4Seriphos, 139Serucci, 85_Sesi_, the, 97-8Shap, circle at, 23Sicily, 77-82Sidbury Hill, 21Sidon, 115Siggewi, 108Silbury Hill, 24, 28Siret, Messieurs, 68Sjöbol, 53Skulls, 77, 112, 129-31Sorapoor, 118Spain, 67-71Spence, Magnus, 37Stanton Drew, 25, 49Star-worship, 23, 50-1, 128Steatopygous figures, 107, 112Stenness, Ring of, 36Stonehenge, 15-23Stoney-Littleton, 32Stripple Stones, the, 26Stromness, circle at, 36Stukeley, Dr. , 27Su Cadalanu, 84Sudan, 90Suetonius, 27Sun-worship, 21-3, 28-9, 37, 51Sweden, 52-5Switzerland, 56Syria, 115-8

Table des Marchands, La, 16, 137Tagliaferro, Professor, 108, 111Tahutihotep, tomb of, 8_Talayots_, 71-3Tamuli, 139Tangier, 96Tarentum, 76Tattooing, 139"Three Brothers of Grugith, " the, 128Tiberias, 115Tinaarloo, 57Toledo, Council of, 12Torebo, 53Tours, Council of, 12Trade relations, 131-3Tregeseal, circles near, 26Trepanned skulls, 62Trilithons, 2, 17, 90, 100-1, 103-4, 117Tripoli, 90-1_Truddhi_, 86Tsîl, 117-8Tunis, 95-6Tyfta, 54Tyre, 115Tzarskaya, 114

Unebi, Mt. , 121

Vail Gorguina, 67Vellore, 118Villafrati, 81Villages, megalithic, 74, 85-6, 97

Wales, monuments of, 29Watchstone, the, 36-7Wayland the Smith's Cave, 11, 14, 30, 32Wedge-shaped tomb, 44-5, 55, 70-1, 117Westgothland, 54West Tump, 146

Yarhouse, 39

Zammit, Dr. T. , 112

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