Page:Natural History Review (1862).djvu/58

Rh daggers, axes, spear heads, knives, arrow heads, pins, and ornaments. The number of these weapons which have been discovered is already very great.

From the settlement at Estavayer, in Lake Neufchatel, the following collection of bronze implements has been obtained:—

Again at Morges (Lake of Geneva) forty-two bronze hatchets and thirteen pins have been found. From the Steinberg M. Schwab has obtained five hundred bronze hair-pins, besides other instruments of the same metal. These are of the same type as those found in other parts of Europe, and the swords are characterised, as usual, by the small space allowed for the hand. They were, however, made in Switzerland, as is shown by the discovery at Morges of a mould for celts, and at Estavayer of a bar of tin.

The pottery of this period was more varied and more skilfully made than that of the Stone age, and the potter's wheel was already in use. Rings of earthenware are common, and appear to have been used as supports for the round bottomed vases. As neither copper nor tin occur in Switzerland, the possession of bronze implies the existence of commerce. It is difficult to say from whence the copper was obtained, but Saxony and Cornwall are the only parts of Europe which produce tin. It is, however, possible that Asia may have supplied both the one and the other. The presence of amber shows that there must have been a certain amount of communication with Northern Europe.

The Pileworks of Switzerland appear to have become gradually less numerous. During the Stone age they were spread over the whole country. Confined duriog the Bronze era to the Lakes of Western Switzerland, during that of Iron, we find them only on the Lakes of Bienne and Neufchatel. In these settlements not only has a new substance made its appearance, but the forms of the implements are different. We have indeed copies of the bronze axes made in iron, just as we found before that the early bronze celts were copies of the still earlier stone axe, but these are exceptional cases.