both the Latin and German editions of Gesner the Fallow Deer is unmistakably portrayed.
According to the marginal notes on Daniel Spekle's excellent map of Alsace there were still Fallow Deer in Wasgau as late as 1576.[1] In the neighbourhood of Rome, in a postpliocene travertine on the heights of Monte delle Gioie, numerous fragments of antlers of the Fallow Deer have been found with remains of Hyæna spelæa, Cervus tarandus, Rhinoceros megarhinus,[2] &c.
Finally, it may be observed that representations of the Fallow Deer are found carved on Assyrian monuments, and with such characteristic accuracy that it is impossible to confuse them with those of any other species. We would recommend the reader to examine the beautiful plates, Nos. 35 and 53, in Layard's 'Monuments of Nineveh.'[3] Representations of this species are also to be seen in the pictures on the walls of Egyptian tombs, as for example at Beni-Hassan. The hieroglyphical name is "hanen."[4]
We will now consider the present geographical distribution of Cervus dama.
This species is still found in a wild state in Asia Minor. Canon Tristram speaks of its occurrence near Mount Tabor, in Palestine, and in the woods between this mountain and the gorge of the Litany River, and he once met with it himself "about ten miles west of the Sea of Galilee."[5] The late Prof. Ed. Lartet had previously found teeth of this species of deer in the bone-heaps of Lebanon.[6] According to Hartmann, "The Fallow Deer inhabits the fertile valleys of the deserts of Africa and the borders of the cultivated parts of Tunis, Tripoli, Barqah, as far as Wâdî-Nâhûn."[7] Gervais, in his 'Zoologie et Paléontologie Française' (2nd edit., p. 145), records its presence in the neighbourhood of La Calle, in Algiers, but Loche, in his 'Hist. Nat. des Mammiferes de l'Algérie' (Paris, Bertrand, 1867), says it is now seldom met with in that province. In the island of Sardinia, in Cetti's time, there were large numbers of Fallow Deer on every part of the island, and especially
- ↑ Gerard, 'Faune historique de l'Alsace,' Colmar, 1871, p. 328.
- ↑ Trutat et Cartailhac, Matériaux pour l'Histoire de l'Homme,' 1869, p. 299.
- ↑ See images p.35 and p. 53 in Internet Archive (Wikisource-ed.)
- ↑ Robt. Hartmann, in Brugsch 'Zeitschrift für Ægyptische Sprache und Alterthumskunde,' Jahrgang ii., 1864, p. 21.
- ↑ 'Report on the Mammals of Palestine,' Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond., 1866, p. 66.
- ↑ 'Bulletin de la Société Géologique de France," xxii., p. 542.
- ↑ 'The Geographical Distribution of existing wild Mammalia of North-East Africa,' in the 'Berliner Zeitschrift für Erdkunde,' 1868, p. 252.
