Page:Horse shoes and horse shoeing.djvu/201

Rh Roman and barbarian domination. Nevertheless, it is not only the permanence of the shape of the horse-shoes which has given rise to this opinion, but also the persistence that the people and the artisans of the country have shown in the reproduction of the forms of ordinary articles, instruments, or arms; and to such a degree is this the case, that the hatchets of stone, for example, and those of bronze and iron, are found, after long intervals, to be so similar in form and dimensions that the difference of material could not be taken into account. This evidently proves the influence of habit in the use of utensils of a certain form. The hatchet of bronze remains as small as that of stone; and it is the same with the weapon made of iron—apparently for the same reason, that the untempered instrument of iron was scarcely better than the one made of bronze. Drawings of Roman antiquities and those of the middle ages represent iron arrow-heads, keys, knives, and designs of vases, which are exactly the same. The same fact is noticed in certain details in architecture; for instance, the church of Moutiers-Grand-Val, built in the 7th century, we find the same details that may yet be discerned in the theatre of Mandeura. 'The shoes we look upon as the oldest, show, to commence with, that the Celts were already acquainted with siderurgy; the examination we have made of the ancient forges in the Jura furnishes us with important indications in this respect, (More than 160 siderurgical establishments of various epochs have been already discovered, and some of them have furnished antique objects which serve to determine the age of the iron. The furnaces