Page:Palæolithic Man and Terramara Settlements in Europe.djvu/189

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FOSSIL MAN (FRANCE)
133

were in their anatomical position. A corner of a large block of stone lay over the spine, which in falling had crushed the bones. A number of shells from the Mediterranean were disseminated over the body, which appeared to have adorned the man's dress. The cranium (cephalic index 73.19), though also damaged (Fig. 36), has furnished to the late M. Hamy measurements which clearly correspond with those of the Chancelade skeleton, a later discovery of the same kind. Judging from the length of

Figure(s): 36-37

FIG. 36. Skull of Laugerie Basse.

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FIG.37. Skull of Chancelade. (Col. Massénat.) (After Testut.)

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the femur, the height of the crushed man would be about 5 feet 4½ inches. (Crania Ethnica, p. 53.)

The explanation of the unfortunate fate of the man to whom the skeleton belonged, is that he was killed during sleep by a sudden fall from the roof, and that consequently he was contemporary with the culture débris over which he reposed.

At various points in the talus fragments of human bones teeth, lower jaws, portions of skulls, and broken long bones were found. M. Ed. Lartet found a fragment of a lower jaw at the Les Eyzies, where previously portions of human skulls had been found. These are described by M. Hamy in Reliquiæ Aquitanicæ, p. 255, et seq.

Chancelade Skeleton.

About 7 kilometres from Périgeaux, on the road to Brantome, Commune of Chancelade (Dordogne), there exist at the foot of the escarpment of Raymonden some deposits of the Magdalénien epoch which had yielded a few worked flints and bones. In October 1888 MM. Feaux and Hardy found a