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ters and cist graves. Most of these dry land burials, which were not, in most cases at least, Lake Dwelling cemeteries, contain human remains of Mediterranean type, although a few brachycephals have been found in them.⁶⁹

The most extensive single series is that from the cist cemetery of Cham- blandes, with ten male and eight female skeletons.⁷⁰ (See Appendix I, col. 14.) These remains are those of small, light-boned Mediterraneans, dolicho- to mesocephalic, mesorrhine, and shallow jawed, with very little metrical sex differentiation. Basically, these Chamblandes people resem­ble the smaller groups of predynastic Egyptians very closely, but are even closer to Muge. There seems to be a perceptible negroid element in the Chamblandes groups, which accentuates the African relationship. In vault size and height, they do not resemble the Danubians.

The Chamblandes culture was mid-Neolithic, and probably represents the northward intrusion of a semi-nomadic tribe or band from northern Italy, where cist burials of the same type have been found.⁷¹ Since the Chamblandes physical type is an excellent example of the small Mediter­ranean race, that type must, therefore, have been prevalent in the Early and Middle Neolithic of northern Italy. Its presence furthermore illus­trates the complexity of ethnic movements in Neolithic Europe.

The racial prpblems exposed by the study of Neolithic man in Switzer­land apply equally to France, which presents an even more complex archaeological situation. Along the whole Atlantic coast, and most of all in Brittany, dolmens and other kinds of megalithic monuments were built in abundance. The north of France, especially the Paris Basin, formed the westernmost reflection of the Danubian invasions from the east, through the mixed cultures of southern Germany, but in the Paris Basin this culture was mingled with megalithic elements, since many of the burials are in hewn underground vaults and in dolmens.

The southeast of France contained a surviving cave culture, while the whole eastern section of the country, in the valley of the Rh6ne and the borders of Switzerland, was occupied by farmers with the same blend of Mesolithic and Neolithic cultural elements which in Switzerland ap­pear in the western Lake Dwellings. Both Dechelette and Menghin derive the agricultural element in the French Neolithic south of the Paris Basin from North Africa.⁷²

Although, if one may judge by the number of finds made, France was a densely populated country during the Neolithic, the distribution of

66. Schlaginhaufen, o., op. Cit.

67. Schenk, a., reap, vol. 14, 1904, pp. 335-375.

68. Childe, The Danube in Prehistory, pp. 163, 174.

69. Dechelette, J., Manuel d’archaeologie prehistorique.

Menghin, O., Weltgeschichte der Steinzeit.

THE RACES OF EUROPE

people was very uneven. It is very likely that large areas, notably in the Massif Central, the mountain core of south-central France, where a thin soil and granite base are inimical to agriculture, were still inhabited throughout the Neolithic time span by scattered bands of Mesolithic hunters and grubbers. The bulk of the population lived in the great river valleys.

As an indication of the head form of the French Neolithic people, we may turn to a compilation of 608 crania, out of which 43 per cent are dolichocephalic, 38 per cent meso-, and 19 per cent brachycephalic.⁷⁸ Although this distribution is not bimodal, there are at least two types present, a long and a round one.

The long-headed type or types belong clearly to the Mediterranean category. Although most series include brachycephalic crania, a few are purely long headed. Some of them, such as the series from L⁵Homme Mort and Loz&re ⁷⁴ (see Appendix I, col. 15), are low dolichocephals, with means of 72; these approach but do not quite approximate the British Long Bar­row standards of size. The skulls from the corridor tomb of Vaudancourt, Oise, are of full Long Barrow size, and the stature of the skeletons is tall. Thus there was, apparently, here and there, a tall, large, and very long­headed element in the French Neolithic, related to that which predom­inated in the British Isles. It was rarely, however, pure.

The mesocephalic crania are, as a rule, larger in vault size than most of the Mediterranean groups which we have studied, such as the Danu­bians, the Ghamblandes series, and the Mesolithic skulls from Muge. One suspects that the mesocephaly so common among Neolithic French crania may, in part, be due to a mixture between a Megalithic, rather than a small Mediterranean, dolichocephalic type with brachycephals. This is supported by the evidence of stature, for means of French Neolithic series run to 164 and 165 cm., taller than the majority of Mediterraneans proper.

In certain definite ways, the long-headed crania of the French Neolithic, as a whole, show a western affiliation: the vaults are wider than they are high, and the noses are leptorrhine or low mesorrhine. In these respects they differ from the Danubians, as well as in size; and in the vault form, they differ from the Corded group. These peculiarities further strengthen the similarity between the longer and larger examples, and the British Long Barrow type. We may conclude from this that most of the Mediter­ranean racial element in France came from North Africa and the Mediter­ranean, and little from central and eastern Europe.

⁷⁸ Salmon, P., REAP, vol. 5, 1895, pp. 155-181. Series re-divided to agree with con­ventional partitionment of cranial index.

⁷⁴ Unpublished measurements by Mrs. Ruth Sawtelle Wallis.

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The geographical distribution of Neolithic crania by head form can be partially determined from Salmon’s study.⁷⁶ In all, forty-one departments are represented, covering less than half of France. Of these forty-one, only fifteen departments, one-sixth of France, have ten or more crania each. As far as we can tell from this fragmentary distribution, there were two centers of high brachycephaly, one in the Auvergne region, crossing the Rh6ne to Savoie, and fading out in the Massif Central; the second in the north of France, from Paris over to the Meuse. The Atlantic coastal region below Brittany, and the west central part of France, were dolicho­cephalic strongholds during the Neolithic.

The range of indices in the French Neolithic extends from 63 to 97, which is practically the normal range for the world. Whole groups of over thirty skulls (as at Beaumes Chaudes), found in single caves, are entirely long headed, showing that some purely dolichocephalic local pop­ulations existed in Neolithic France, as they do in parts of the country today ⁷⁶ (see Appendix I, col. 16); while smaller interments contain wholly brachycephalic clusters. Hyperbrachycephaly had already developed as an evolutionary phenomenon, for twenty-five out of Salmon’s six hundred and eight crania have indices between 85 and 97. Others over 90 were found in the Swiss collection. This extreme head form was not, appar­ently, as common then as it is today.

Salmon’s list luckily contains data as to mode of interment as well as to cranial index and locality. Most of the crania come from either mega­lithic tombs or caves. Rock shelters and caves contain the same head form ratio as the total for France; and this is also true of the totality of mega­lithic tombs. Brachycephalic crania are found in all kinds of interments; there is nothing of an archaeological nature to distinguish them socially or ethnically from the others. They were, therefore, an integral part of the Neolithic population in all sections where they have been found. They cannot have belonged to a separate, unified group of immigrants, but formed rather a residual element in the total population, with a strong genetic impulse for the perpetuation and increase of its peculiar head form, regardless of other racial factors.

The further examination of this problem of western European brachy­cephaly can best be pursued by a study of Belgium, which formed an extension of the archaeological province of northern France during the Neolithic. Most of the sites of this period come from the Ardennes hills, from the present Walloon-speaking part of Belgium, for the swamps and fens of the Flemish country offered little inducement to Neolithic farmers.

⁷⁶ Salmon, op. cit.

76. Bonin, G. von, considers the Beaumes Chaudes series a Palaeolithic survival into Neolithic times. HB, vol. 7, 1935, pp. 216-217.

THE RACES OF EUROPE

It is perhaps for this reason that Neolithic Belgians were even more brachycephalic than their relatives in France—out of seventy skulls of both sexes,⁷⁷ one-half have cranial indices above 80. The largest series, that of Hastiere,⁷⁸ has a mean of 79.8; and a high variability.⁷⁹

Among the readily available published crania one may seriate eighteen male specimens ⁸⁰ for which adequate measurements have been given. The eighteen adult male skulls divide themselves naturally into two sub­groups, of eight and ten, respectively. The first ranges in cranial index from 74 to 77; the second from 80 to 83. This natural division is so marked that it would be futile to seriate the eighteen as a whole, for the mean would fall at a point unrepresented by a single specimen. Seven female crania which accompany this series likewise have none in the middle brackets.

The dolichocephalic group of eight male skulls belongs to a normal, Mediterranean type, mesocephalic, and relatively low vaulted. The brachycephals (see Appendix I, col. 17), the important group for our pres­ent purpose, may serve, through comparison, to help elucidate the prob­lem of western European Neolithic brachycephaly.

In Switzerland we had only a few individual crania for study; in France the brachycephalic crania are mingled in individual series with dolicho­cephalic ones. In the small Belgian group of ten males, however, we have a purely brachycephalic series for comparative purposes.⁸¹

In searching for the prototype of these Neolithic Alpine skulls, one turns naturally to the few Upper Palaeolithic and Mesolithic crania of brachy­cephalic type for comparison.⁸² In vault diameters, the Neolithic skulls correspond nearly to the Ofnet ones of the same sexes, but the female examples are smaller than those from the Upper Palaeolithic. All speci­mens, of all three periods, are low vaulted.

The Neolithic Alpine faces, insofar as we can judge, run somewhat smaller and narrower than do most of the earlier ones; the orbits are much the same, but the noses seem smaller in size. On the whole, the Neolithic brachycephalic crania are less rugged and much smoother than the earlier examples, more globular, and more infantile. The faces look, in many cases, little different from those of the Mediterraneans which accompany them. The stature of these brachycephals varies, but is greater than that of the accompanying long-heads, reaching 165 or 166 cm. for

77. Including those on Salmon’s list and others.

78. Salmon, 1895, 33 crania.

⁷⁸ Range = 72-88, <j = 3.65.

80. Anvers, 3; Sandron, 10; Pr6alle, 4; Grotte du Docteur, Huccorgen, 1.

81. These crania come from the same series as the dolicho- dhes, Sandron and Pr£alle, plus the Huccorgne cranium. There is no such thing as an exclusively brachycephalic Neolithic group of any size from any one place.

82. SolutrS #2, #5, Le Placard (1881). Solutr6 #1 and #3, and Le Placard F and B, are high mesocephals. Among Mesolithic crania, Ofnet 1800, 1801, 1802, 1806, 1815.

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males in the few ascertainable instances. This correlation would favor the Upper Palaeolithic comparison.

It is impossible, in an orderly and logical manner, to explain the pres­ence of these ancestral Alpines during the Neolithic in Europe west of the Alps, north of the Pyrenees, and south of the Rhine. But certain hypothe­ses ⁸³ merit discussion, and by elimination of lesser probabilities we may narrow the field. The most important of these hypotheses are:

1. The Alpine brachycephals came into the area in question during the Neolithic period, as part of an agricultural invasion, from the east. This theory, which has been accepted as fact by the majority of anthropologists for some thirty or more years, may be practically ruled out. All the evidence in existence serves to contradict it.

2. The Alpine brachycephals came into the area in question during the Meso­lithic, as part of a preagricultural invasion, from North Africa by way of the Iberian Peninsula. This theory is based upon the discovery of allegedly brachycephalic crania at Muge in Portugal. Vallois has recently shown that the Muge crania are in reality of Mediterranean type, and that most, if not all, of the alleged brachycephaly was due to the post-mortem de­formation of a few skulls. Hence, in its usual form, this theory may also be considered unlikely, although less improbable than the first.

3. The Alpine brachycephals are Afalou type round-heads, carried up to western Europe with the Mesolithic movements from North Africa, or from Asia by some unknown Mesolithic movement. We have already suggested that the Ofnet skulls might have had some such origin. But the Alpine crania are smaller, and more globular. The faces are much smaller, though similar in propor­tions. These differences may possibly be explained by mixture with small­headed and short-statured Mediterraneans.

4. The Alpine brachycephals represent a continuation of the Aurignacian brachy­cephalic tendency found at Solutre. The Azilian culture was a blend of Capsian and Magdalenian elements. It is possible that a brachycephalic element from Palaeolithic France passed into this Mesolithic cultural expression, and was carried over into the Neolithic, which retained many Mesolithic cultural forms.

5. The Alpine brachycephals are the result of a genetic tendency toward a globu­lar skull form acting on a dolichocephalic group. Without reasonable doubt, there has been a tendency toward an increase in brachycephaly in the Alpine racial zone in modern times. We are as yet unaware of its true cause and of its mechanism. But we cannot, for various reasons, suppose that the Neolithic Alpines were merely brachycephalized Mediterraneans. They were often taller, and had larger vaults, lower orbits, shorter faces,

80. The hypothesis that they were the ancestors of the Lapps serves in no direct way to explain their origin, and will be dealt with later.