Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 1.djvu/114

104 On a farm occupied by M. Dahls, near Elbe in Jutland, are four tumuli, known as Great Kongehoi, Little Kongehoi, Guldhoi, and Treenhoi. This last was examined in 1861. Near its centre were found three wooden coffins, two of full size, and one evidently intended for a child. The contents of the larger were partially preserved, and very interesting: caps, a comb, two woollen shawls, traces of leather, some black hair, and the brain, remained, when all of the bones had changed into a kind of blue powder. Implements of bronze accompanied these remains, and there seems no doubt that they dated from a prehistoric antiquity.

Many of the dwellings in use during the Bronze Age were no doubt subterranean or semi subterranean. On almost all large tracts of uncultivated land, ancient villages of this character may still be traced. A pit was dug, and the earth which was thrown out formed a circular wall, the whole being then probably covered over with boughs. The "Penpits," near Gillingham, in Wiltshire, are of this character, and indicate a populous settlement. In Anglesea, similar hut circles exist. On Dartmoor and elsewhere, where large blocks of stone abounded, the natives saved themselves the trouble of excavating, and simply built up circular walls of stone. In other cases, probably when concealment was an object, the dwellings were entirely subterranean. Such ancient dwellings are in Scotland known as "weems," from "Uamha," a cave. In one of these at Monzie, in Perthshire, a bronze sword was discovered. Such underground chambers, however, appear to have been used in Scotland as dwellings, or at least as places of concealment, down to the time of the Romans; for a weem described by Lord Rosehill was constructed partly of stones showing the diagonal and diamond markings peculiar to Roman workmanship. Sir John Lubbock believes that Stonehenge also belongs to the Bronze Age.

From the independent statements of Homer and in the book of Kings (where the word is mistranslated brass) we find that bronze was abundant in the East no less than three thousand years ago. Bronze is composed of about nine parts of copper to one of tin: and copper is found in so many countries that we cannot as yet tell whence the