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Show ~~4 IIUMAN REMAINS IN CAVES. [Ch. XIII, . h' · * ,.hr esta te Of the bones, says Dr. substance m t e mtenor · h' 1 antiquity. m d . d' ations of very Ig 1 Buckland, arror s m lC k 1 t have been also found in . f 1 an s e e ons The remams 0 1 um . W lls in the Mendips, dis. f W key Hole near e ' the cave o 0 . ' d d clay and some of them d l h ·edd1sh mu an ' perse t 1roug 1 . into a firm osseous b ·eccia. '' The spot 1 united by stalagmite . . h f the hiahest floods of the h' h th lie is withm reac o o . . on w IC ey d . hich they are buried IS ev1. a dJ. acen t river ' and the mu m w . 'l t ,, dently fluviati e .1 d 'tl lludinO" to some caverns recently We shall cone u e WI 1 a o b d · d in the sout1 1 of F ran ee ' in which human . ones an examme d 'bed as intermingled m the same f ts of pottery are escn ragmen . f extinct mammalia. We may d · ith the remams o eposlts w f Bize in the department of Aude, fi t ntion the cavern o ' b f rs me d S . . met with a small num er o 1 M Marcel e enes . w 1ere . . d 'tl those of extinct animals and With 1 bones mixe WI 1 d mman . a calcareous stony mass, boun 1 d hells They occur m an -s . f t 1 amite On examining the same th l' by a cement 0 s a al:l . b a toge e M Tourna1 £o un d not only in these calcareous e as, caver1ns , · . black mu d hl'cll overlies a red osseous mu ' w but a so m a oaether with broken angular fragments several h urn an teeth' t o d 1 rine and terrestrial shells of a rude kind of pottery' an a so rna . , 1 but the h The teeth preserve thelr ename ' of our own epoc ~ altered as to adhere strongly to the tongue. fangs are so muc . t d with the bones and Of the terrestrial shells thus assocm e 1 Bulirous . mmon are Cyclostoma e egans, pottery, the most co . d H 't'da AmonO' the ma-l 1. rahs an · 01 1 • 0 decollatus, Fe IX nemo M '1 edulis and Natica d P t · acobreus, yti us ' rine are foun ec en J bl k' d Bones of quadru· ll f th m eata e m s. mille-punctata, a o e b 1 nginO' to three new .r d . the same mass e o o ) peds were. lOUD m . t b r ( Ursus arctol.deus ' l d k'nd an extmc ea + species of t 1e eer l ' 1 native of Germany+. besides the wild bull (Bos u.rus ), fo;;e~: ~bristol has found in In the same part of France, . t lb. p. 165. * Buckland, Reliquim, P· 164• . . 64 Introduction • t M. Marcel de Serres, Geognosl. e ues Terrains Terbalres, P· . Ch. XIII.] IIUMAN REMAINS IN CAVES, caverns in a te1·tiary limestone at Pondres and Souvignargues, situated two leagues north of Lunel-viel, (department of Herault,) human bones and pottery confusedly mixed with the remains of the rhinoceros, bear, hyrena, and many other terrestrial mammifers. They were imbedded in an alluvial mud, of the solidity of calcareous tufa, and containing some flint pebbles and fragments of the limestone of the country. Beneath this mixed accumulation, which sometimes attained a thickness of thirteen feet, is the original floor of the cavern, about a foot thick, covered with bones and the dung of animals (album g1Yecum), in a sandy and tufaceous cement, The human bones in these caverns of Pondres and Souvignargues were found, upon a careful analysis, to have parted with their animal matter to as great a degree as those of the hyrena which accompany them, and are equally brittle, and adhere as strongly to the tongue. In order to compare the degree of alteration of these bones with those known to be of high antiquity, M. Marcel de Serres, and M. Dallard, Chemist of Montpellier, procured some from a Gaulish sarcophagus in the plain of Lunel, sup~ posed to have been buried for fourteen or fifteen centuries at least. In these the cellular tissue was empty, but they were more solid than fresh bones. They did not adhere to the tongue in the same manner as those of the caverns of Bize and Pondres, yet they had lost at least three·fourths of their original animal matter. The superior solidity of the Gaulish bones to those in a fresh skeleton is a fact in perfect accordance with the observa~ tions made by Mr. Mantell on bones taken from a Saxon tumulus, near Lewes. Let us now consider what conclusions are deducible from the important facts above enumerated. Must we infer that man and these extinct quadrupeds were contemporaneous inhabitants of the south of France at some former epoch? We should unquestionably have arrived at this conclusion if the bones had been found in an undistmbed st,ratified deposit of VoL, II. Q |