Page:Annualreportofbo1906smitfo.djvu/495

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QUATERNARY HUMAN REMAINS IN CENTRAL EUROPE.
391

The finds made at Andernach are preserved in the Provincial Museum at Bonn.

Erroneous, Doubtful, or Indefinite Observations.

(a) BAVARIA.

HUMAN REMAINS OF THE "RÄUBERHOEHLE," NEAR RATSIBONE.

This cave is situated in the valley of the Nab, at about 8 kilometers west of Ratisbon. It was explored in 1871 by O. Fraas, Ch. de Zittel, and F. de Guembel, who encountered in it a neolithic deposit with recent fauna, but on a lower level came across a quaternary stratum with remains of Hyæna spelea, Ursus spelæus, Rangifer tarandus, etc. There were signs that the earth had been disturbed, for bones of quaternary mammals were found in the recent deposit, and vice versa. The writer has not been able to find the rare quaternary implements of bone or reindeer horn mentioned by Zittel, and all that he could see of the flint objects were atypical flakes with relatively fresh color and fracture. Under these conditions he can not admit the existence of a paleolithic station in the cave in question. Whatever the facts may be, however, it is wholly impossible, in view of the disturbed condition of the deposits, to assign any definite age to fragments of a human skull exhumed with the other objects in this locality.

CAVE OF GAILENREUTH—CAVE OF OFNET.

The data concerning the specimens found in these caves are in neither case satisfactory, and it is necessary to place both finds among those of uncertain age.

(b) WURTEMBERG.

Ancient reports mention a human skull exhumed in 1833 in the "Schillerhoehle," near Wittlingen, and a second one discovered in 1831 in the "Erpfinger," or "Karls-Hoehle." There are no paleontological or stratigraphical data concerning these caves. Another cave, known as "Heppenloch," near Gutenberg, yielded remains of a human skeleton belonging, according to all indications, to the neolithic age; while a skeleton discovered in the "Bocksteinhoehle," not far from Bissingen, and believed by some to be of quaternary origin, has been shown to be that of a suicide, buried in the cave in 1730. A human femur has been discovered in a cave named "Hohlefels," near Schelklingen, in the valley of the Ach, and the same cave yielded bones of quaternary mammals, but it is not certain that the human specimen came from undisturbed quaternary deposit, and hence its age must remain uncertain.