bones of Carnivora were the most numerous; whence it may be supposed that these animals entered largely into the funeral rites, of which analogous instances may be seen in sepulchres of a more recent period.[1]
One circumstance struck me as remarkable: that although we collected a great many lower jaws, almost entire, of Camivora, and, in the interior of the cave, some of herbivorous animals, not a single upper jaw in the entire state, nor any considerable portion of the cranium of any of these animals were met with. Must we conclude that the crania in general had been broken to pieces for the extraction of the brain? The North American Indians, according to Hearne, as quoted by M. Morlot, prepared the skins of animals with a lye composed of the brain and marrow. "The Samoiedes," says Pallas, "split up the bones of the Reindeer, in order to devour the marrow quite fresh and raw. Their favourite food consists of the brain taken raw and steaming from the skull; and they also devour in the raw state, the young horns of the Reindeer, when they are beginning to sprout."
In the soil within the cave at B, were discovered, as has been said, everal human bones which had been left buried in it, after the removal which had been effected, several years before, of the skeletons interred in the burial ground of Aurignac. It was in the same situation that were found the most higmy finished flint implements and the finest specimen of worked Reindeer's horn, as well as an almost entire horn of that animal The only bones of Herbivora that we obtained in a good state of preservation, were also procured in the same deposit. The carnivorous bones constituted the majority, and amongst these, those of the Fox were the most numerous, after which came those of the Great Cave Bear (Ursus spelæus). Of this species, one specimen must have been introduced entire, since we found in very close continuity, the various bones of its skeleton. Amongst the individuals of this great species of Bear whose remains had been conveyed into the cave by the hand of man, one must have been a female in an advanced stage of gestation, for in the loose earth outside the cave we met with several remains of a foetus nearly at ihe period of birth. Whilst the bones of the Herbivora found outside the cave were all broken and comminuted, burnt and gnawed, both those found in the ashes, as well as those lying in the layer of earth above the ash-layer, the bones found in the interior had, on the contrary, been well preserved, and, in particular, showed no mark of their having been attacked by the teeth of Carnivora. Whence it may be concluded that these parts of animals had been introduced into the sepulchre for a special purpose; and, at the same time, that the entrance had been constantly closed against the Hyænas.
- ↑ The Laplanders of the present day are not so dainty as we may suppose the aborigines of Aquitaine to have been, for, according to J. Acerbi, (Voyage au Cap Nord) they eat indifferenty the Bear, Wolf, Fox, Otter, and Seal.
