Cave Dwellers

Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)

prehistoric men dwelling in caves, and cave -dwelling animals of corresponding periods; also cavedwelling men of more recent historic times. Long before the dawn of authentic history, primitive races of men dwelt in large numbers in natural caverns , which were often shaped , enlarged, fortified, or furnished by the occupants. The ages in which the prehistoric cave dwellers lived are usually called the Paleolithic, or ancient stone age, and the Neolithic, or later stone age. Some of the caves have been found and explored in England, France , Belgium, Spain, America, and Australia; notably a famous cave known as Kent's Hole in Devonshire, Eng.; caves at Brixham and Perigord, and the Madeleine cave on the Vézère river, France. In the Neolithic human skeletons are age numerous found, but very few in the earlier age. It is believed that some of these human remains possibly antedate the glacial drift period of Europe. Implements of flint and stone are mingled with the remains. Rude carvings on stone and ivory, and on the antlers of animals have been found. Among the animals known to have dwelt in the caves with men, or to have been carried there for food, or to furnish their skins for clothing, are the cave bear, and cave lion, the mammoth, musk ox, horse, dog, bison, rhinoceros, and hyena. Needles of ivory are found, leading to the inference that they knew how to sew skins together for garments. No traces of agriculture, and no implements used in agriculture have been discovered. Lance heads, arrow heads, hammers, saws made of flint, and harpoons, have been found. In the cave of Cro-Magnon in the S. of France skeletons were found that are accepted by paleontologists as those of genuine cave men. Taking them as the type it is inferred that the Paleolithic cave dwellers were a tall , powerfully built race, with long , narrow skulls, sk broad faces, and powerful jaws. Investigations in the Belgian caves seem to indicate that the cave men of that region were of much smaller stature , but with symmetrical, well-shaped bodies. The caves belonging to the Neolithic age yield remains classified into three ages: Neolithic ( proper), bronze, and They are widely distributed iron. throughout Europe, and contain celts , with flints, flakes, rude pottery , bones of the pig, dog, horse, sheep, and goat, those of many wild animals still indigenous in Europe , and of some that are extinct, and many human skeletons. The latter show that the people populated the caves in great numbers . They were a race of short-statured people having common resemblances in various regions of Europe. They were in some regions cannibals, and slightly in advance of the Paleolithic races in the variety of their implements and occupations . Their gradual progress down to the dawn of history is shown by the substitution of bronze, and then of iron, in place of the stone of earlier ages for implements and weapons. In America, caves with human remains have been investigated in Brazil, Ohio , Kentucky, Minnesota, Arizona , Colorado , Nevada, Utah, and California. There are remains that have been deposited within the period of authentic history. The conclusions drawn from cave remains, as to the antiquity of man, are subject to the doubts that beset all calculations as to the rate of deposit of geological strata and to the rapidity of changes in climates and zoological characteristics.