Page:Palæolithic Man and Terramara Settlements in Europe.djvu/330

244 Des dégres, des points intermédiaires, peuvent encore faire défaut, mais on sent, on reconnaît, qu'il y a suite continue. II n'en est plus de même entre le paléolithique et le néolithique, entre le Magdalénien et le Robenhausien. II y a là une large et profonde lacune, un grand hiatus ; il y a une transformation complète.

"Avec le Magdalénien disparaissent les animaux quaternaires, le Grand Ours, le Mammoth, le Mégacère; avec le Magdalénien émigrent les espèces des régions froides qui peuplaient nos plaines ; le Renne, le Gluton, le Boeuf musque, rémontent vers le pole; le Chamois, le Bouquetin, la Marmotte, gagnent le sommet neigeux de nos montagnes.

"Avec le Robenhausien (néolithique) ont apparu non seulement les instruments en pierre polie, mais encore la poterie, les monuments, dolmens et menhirs, les animaux domestiques et 1'agriculture. C'est done un changement complet." (Comptes rendus (1872), p. 440.)

The doctrine here advocated by De Mortillet was then held by a majority of the ablest palæontologists of the day, at the head of whom stood Edward Lartet. Dr Broca, however, and a few others, maintained that the flint tools of the later Palæolithic stations and those of Neolithic times were not so dissimilar as to justify the idea that there was any break in the continuity of this industry in Europe ; and further, that there was valid evidence to show that the extremely dolichocephalic race of the sepulchral caverns of the Lozere (Baumes Chaudes, l'Homme Mort, etc.), so well explored by Dr Prunieres, were the descendants of the Cave-men.

At the meeting of the same Congress held at Stockholm (1874), M. Cazalis de Foudouce reviewed the hiatus problem, in all its aspects, in a masterly paper entitled "Sur la Lacune qui aurait existé entre l'âge de la pierre taillée et celui de la pierre polie," in which he combated De Mortillet's theory on every point. His general conclusions were that the transition from the one civilisation to the other was slow, but without interruption since the commencement of the Palæolithic period down to the present day ; that towards the close of that long period two or more different races had combined and ultimately developed the primary elements of Neolithic civilisation ; that the ameliorated climate attracted from time to time new immigrants who imported improved elements into the arts and industries ; and finally, that the incoming tribes gradually absorbed the indigenous people of the old Stone Age, thus accounting for the persistence of the marked ethnic peculiarities