Page:Palæolithic Man and Terramara Settlements in Europe.djvu/136

82 Dr Nüesch thinks that the rock-shelter was then no longer inhabited by man, but only visited by him for the purpose of burying, or perhaps cremating the dead an idea suggested by the large quantity of ashes it contained. The reindeer was now scarce in the district, and its place was taken by the red-deer. It was a true forest fauna, of which the following animals were represented in Schweizersbild:—Brown bear, badger, marten, wolf, fox, wild cat, mole, hare, beaver, squirrel, hamster, water-rat, urus, Bos longifrons, goat, sheep, stag, roe, reindeer, wild boar, horse, and ptarmigan. Among these, the newcomers were badger, wild cat, hare, urus, Bos longifrons, goat, and sheep; while of those animals which were represented in Palæolithic times, the following are wanting:— Manul cat, Arctic fox, ermine, weasel, glutton, spider, musk-shrew, field vole, red suslik, pica, Alpine hare, bison, ibex, maral deer, wild ass, and all the birds with the exception of ptarmigan. In short, the Steppe fauna had in its turn given way to a forest fauna, and, synchronous with these changes, Palæolithic man and the reindeer gradually vanished from the district. Dr Nüesch, with the assistance of his collaborateurs in this great work, has clearly demonstrated that Tundra, Steppe, Forest, and Domestic fauna have succeeded each other in chronological sequence in North Switzerland.

I do not regard the chronological deductions founded on the investigations at the Schweizersbild as data on which absolute reliance can be placed, as from the very nature of the subject precision is unattainable. This Dr Nüesch fully admits, and, indeed, he himself has advanced several considerations which might considerably reduce his highest estimate (29,000) years of the time since man began to frequent the neighbourhood as, for example, that conclusive evidence of the presence of man in the lower Rodent bed was not found till near its middle. But, after all allowances for possible errors are made, he thinks the date of man's first appearance in the district cannot be less than 20,000 years ago. One thing, however, is certain, as the explorer pertinently remarks, that hundreds of thousands of years cannot have elapsed since the Reindeer period and its civilisation flourished at the Schweizersbild.