GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS ON THE PHENOMENON OF BONE CAVERNS
M. Tournal, of Narbonne
(Translated and with Preface by A. B. Elsasser)1
The late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries in Europe witnessed
the publication of a number o4 articles in scientific journals which were
concerned with associations of human bones or stone tools with bones of ani-
mals thought to be extinct.  Not the least important of these articles appears
reprinted here. The article by M. Tournal was first published in 1833 in
France, in Annales de Chimie et de Physique, Vol. 52, pp. 161-181, under the
title "ConsideratiTons generales sur le Phe'nomene des cavernes a ossemens."
So far as can be determined, the article has never since been translated and
reprinted either in the United States or England.
While the spirit of objective inquiry into man's prehistoric past was
certainly not lacking even as early as 1800, neither geology nor archaeology
had yet been systematized, and interpretations, for example, of sedimentary
deposits throughout Europe were still influenced by the story of the Noachian
flood. MN Tournal was one of the early figures in the movement which sought
to dispel the myth and folklore which surrounded the subject of early man.
Prior to 1833 he had published two other articles dealing with the simultane-
ous occurrence in limestone caves of human bones and artifacts with bones of
extinct animals. Glyn Daniel, in his A Hundred Years of Archaeology (1950),
names Tournal, along with Schmerling o? Belgium, MacEnery of England, and
Jouannet and de Christol of France, for example, as contemporary pioneers in
the early investigation of this association.
A tribute to Schmerling of Belgium by Charles Lyell (Antiquity of Man,
1863), quoted by Daniel in his 1950 work, may appropriately be applied here
to Tournal and the others mentioned as well:
To be let down, as Schmerling was, day after day, by a rope tied to
a tree so as to slide to the foot of the first opening of the Engis cave,
where the best-preserved human skulls were found; and, after thus gaining
access to the first subterranean gallery, to creep on all fours through a
contracted passage leading to larger chambers, there to superintend by
torchlight, week after week and year after year, the workmen who were
breaking through the stalagmite crust as hard as marble, in order to re-
move piece by piece the underlying bone breccia nearly as hard; to stand
for hours with one's feet in the mud and with water dripping from the
roof on one's head, in order to mark the position and guard against the
loss of each single bone of a skeleton, and at length after finding lei-
sure, strength and courage for all these operations, to look forward, as
the fruits of one's labour, to the publication of unwelcome intelligence,
opposed to the prepossessions of the scientific as well as of the unsci-
entific public--when these circumstances are taken into account, we need
scarcely wonder, not only that a passing traveller failed to stop and
6
scrutinise the evidence, but that a quarter of a century should have
elapsed before even the neighbouring professors of the University of
Liege came forth to vindicate the truthfulness of their indefatigable
and clearsighted countryman.
Albert B. Elsasser
University of California
January 29, 1959
+    4    +    +    +    +    +
Many observations have been published concerning caverns with evidences
of osseous faunal remains in them. This phenomenon, at first thought so
simple, now appears to be very complicated, if one considers the observations
and discussions that have taken place in the matter. The circle of inter-
ested persons in which the questions were originally discussed has become so
vast that it seems useful here generally to review the principal questions
involved today in this field.
I have thought that I was, in a manner of speaking, authorized to take
charge of this work, because the attention of naturalists has again been
fixed on these matters since I have published [1828] on the fossil human
bone of the Bize Cavern, near Narbonne, and since the publication of Messrs.
de Serres and Jules de Christol on several other caverns in the south of
France.                                      I
I should like first of all to pay signal recognition to the works of
Messrs. Buckland, Bertrand Jeslin and Constant Prevost, who were the first
to have thrown light on the curious phenomenon of caverns which contain
faunal skeletal remains. The work of Mr. Buckland (Reliquiae Diluvianae),
to which one cannot take any exception save perhaps with the title, will
always be an admirable model of description and an immense collection of
carefully observed facts. It is annoying that we do not have a French edi-
tion.
The caverns or grottoes whi ch one encounters so commonly in mountain-
ous limestone formations have always caught the attention of the curious by
the odd disposition of passages and rooms which are seen in them, by the
impressiveness of the vaults and pillars and by the rocky deposits, called
stalactites and stalagmites, which decorate the caverns' interiors in such
a bizarre and capricious fashion. Several more or less ingenious theories
have successively been set forth to explain the origin of these caves. Thus
it has been suggested that they have been the result of the issue of springs
charged with carbonic acid, by the dissolving action of water upon mineral
materials which are often found in irregular agglomeations, like gypsum,
marl, and so on, within calcareous soil. It seems to me that one might bet-
ter attribute the origin of these caves to numerous disturbances which the
soil has undergone, disturbances which must have, in displacing originally
horitontal calcareous strata, produced these irregular hollows which under-
groundwater has then eroded and enlarged. This theory seems justified by
the observation of upthrusting of earth strata in the area in which the
caves occur, and also of the interior walls of these caves, where angular
7
projections are rarely seen: on the contrary, the surfaces are smooth, with
rounded contours. However, I do not pretend to be certain that all the
caves have been formed in this manner. I wlsh only to indicate what must
have been the most probable general cause.
If the phenomena of the caves were limited to the simple observations
that I have just made, and to the theorles that have been conceived to ex-
plain them, they would not be worthy of attracting the attention of natural-
ists. But the whole matter is much more vast, interesting, and complicated
than might first be imagined. Indeed, in examining closely several of the
caverns, it is discovered that a vault sometimes contains bones, pebbles,
and silt, all adhering together as a result of 'the calculous infiltration;
that the soil is covered with an ordinarily reddish, silty deposit which also
contains bone and pebbles; that the silt or mud, sometimes hardened, fills
vertical fissures and more or less extended galleries.  In breaking the often
quite thick stalagmitic crust which one walks upon, almost always silt is
found below it, and with it, bones and other material transported by streams.
It is for caverns which present this phenomenon that the name ttbone cavern"
has been specially reservedo
This observation once recognized, a multitude of questions will present
themselves; one asks first of all why certain caverns contain no bones what-
ever?  To what species of animal do the remains buried in the silt belong?
Were they (the animals) the same throughout, or did they vary from one loca-
tion to another? One asks oneself finally how and since when they had been
introduced into the caverns?
When these general questions were resolved, new ones presented them-
selves; these arose as a result of the solutions themselves of the preceding
questions. We are going to try to set forth briefly some of the opinions
which have been educed on these questions, and their most probable solutions.
We shall say here a word about the most recent discussions which have pro-
duced several partisan and even opposing camps.
All the caverns, as we have indictted above, do not include bones; some
contain only mud or silt ano pebbles. In others, absolutely nothing is found
except c4lculous infiltrations or prodigious quantities of guano from recent
bats and birds of prey. It is again difficult to tell what the causes of the
difference are, or at least to establish, as we have tried to do, a general
rule in this regard. Actually, bone caverns are observed at all altitudes,
in calcareous formations of very different ages, and at levels which are well
above those of valleys of the present time. A point that one might be allowed
to hazard is that generally the caves which animals could get into only with
difficulty, which for example are located in the centers of high mountain
regions, or too distant from water courses, or which must, because of their
geographic position, have been out of the range of the animals, do not con-
tain bones. It seems likewise that their presence depends on the age of the
caves or upon the time of formation of the openings leading into them.   One
might easily conceive that the caverns which have remained entirely closed
since the time of their formation, and which have been open only occasionally
since, this caused by the slow and successive disintegration of mountains,
could only have been filled up in quite recent times.
8
What we have just said naturally leads us to the examination of whether
or not the different species of animals buried in the silt and gravel of the
caves vary from one locality to another, and to the question of the cause of
any such variation. Upon the latter point all the observers are in accord.
To be sure, in the deposits of certain caves are encountered almost nothing
but bones of a bear species of great size (Ursus speleus); very often the
bones are still in articulation,* (Mr. Pitorre has observed about 15 verte-
brae in articulation.) and in perfect preservation."    (Several species of
bear have been found in the caves; the most common is one with a convex fore-
head. Mr. de Serres has observed in the caverns of Minerva (Herault) a new
species which must have equalled the size of a large horse. Those of Bize,
near Narbonne, include remains of a small species which is distinguished
only with difficulty from the brown bear of the Pyrenees.) In other caverns
a considerable accumulation of partially gnawed bones may be observed. The
bones belong to different species of animals, among which is noted a large
number of hyenas and some perfectly preserved coprolites of these animals.
Sometimes vertical crevices*** (Under the name of "bony breccialt are dis-
tinguished rock crevices filled with hardened alluvium, including bones and
pebbles. The phenomena of bony breccia, being quite similar to those of the
bone caverns, are accordingly found occurring together In the same locality.
I believe I can dispense with further talk on the subject; this little note
seems to me more than adequate.) contain nothing but the bones of small
rodents, birds and small carnivores; but besides the differences which we
have just pointed out, one very great one is yet noted in the distribution
of the species, and this difference is in agreement with the geographical
position of the caves anrd their situation, which could be in large forests,
or better, on the edge of large plains.
It is easy, after what I have just said, to explain how the bones have
been introduced into the caves, and one can easily see that the explanation
must vary infinitely according to the locality under observation. In fact,
in those (localities) where nothing but bear bones are encountered, it is
evident that these animals must have lived peaceably in these deep retreats,
and during a long period of time. Mro Buckland has,noted in England very
narrow corridors, worn and polished by the friction brought about by the
continual passage of these animals.  After the death of the animals, when
their cartilaginous tissue was entirely decomposed, the ground waters must
have.dispersed their bones and carried them even into narrow crannies.
The manner in which the broken and gnawed bones of different species
are accmulated is equally easy to conceive. One has,-so to speak, surprised
nature in the act, when one has observed in our time the charnel houses of
hyenas and other carnivorous animals which carry their prey into grottoes in
order to eat them, and which at length accumulate immense quantities of
gnawed bones, belonging to all sorts of animals, Now, in the case which con-
cerns us, the identity is perfect, since with the hyenas are found the bones
which they have gnawed, and even their coprolites.2 At the same time it has
been observed that in the caverns the bones accumulate in the most remote
passages.A",    (It is well-known that carnivorous animals have the habit of
devouring their prey in dim, remote, spots.  The house cat, although for a
very long time living in domesticity, has not at all yet lost this habit.)
What has just been said for the hyena bone caverns applies equally to caverns
9
which contain less ferocious or smaller-sized carnivores. In the cavern of
Bize, near Narbonne, one crevice contains rat and rabbit bones exclusively;
it is quite evident in this case that it must have served as the particular
habitat of these small animals.
These examples, to which I could add several others, will suffice to
prove that the bones of animals have not been introduced everywhere in the
same manner, that the explanation must then vary necessarily according to the
locality which one is observing, and that several circumstances could even
have concurred to complicate this phenomenon.
It now remains for me to treat a very grave question, one which has
given place to several explanations and has excited very animated discussions.
I wish to speak of the introduction into the caverns of silty deposits and
rolled pebbles in the midst of which the bones were buried.
Mr. Buckland and several other geologists had first of all thought that
the cause which brought about transport of these materials into the caverns
had been sudden, short-lived, and universal-.they attribute it to one of the
last upheavals of the earth, to a cataclysm, a general inundation, to a
deluge, in short, making thus allusion to the Deluge of Moses,* which they
were trying to support, besides, by other proofs; they had named the soil
which they supposed deposited during that tempestuous epoch, and of which the
silt of the bone caves made up part, flood soil. (*I would have liked to
avoid speaking of the Deluge of Genesis because it has always seemed to me
that one should avoid calling in the authority of religious traditions in
scientific discussion. However, since some have wished to pass over the wall
of separation, and to place the question on this ground, we must be permitted
to pursue in all freedom the thread of our observations and inductions.  I
shall point out then that the naturalists who have needed the tradition of
Moses to support their observations have all committed grave heresies in
wanting to remain orthodox. I shall indicate but one: They say that one
does not find human bones in the flood deposits. Yet the flood having oc-
curred, according to Genesis,. in order to destroy almost the whole human
species, one shduld of necessity find, in the deposits that are said to have
been laid down during that epoch, the remains of individuals who were its
victims.)  Proceeding with.this notion, they divided the organic whole which
is found buried in the late deposits which were laid down on the surface of
the earth into "pre-" and "post-"f flood deposits.**  (The strongest proof
that was brought to bear in favor of the existence of "tflood soil,'" which is
designated also under the name "diluvium," was its composition and its wide
distribution.)
Some naturalists still think that the diluvian cataclysm was occasioned
by an alteration brought about in the axis and poles of the earth, by the
collision of a star, or even by the sudden shift in a chain of mountains.
They do not fail to cite in support of this opinion the vague traditions of
great inundation, which have been handed down by groups of different people,
e.g., the submersion of Samothrace, or the floods of Deucalion and Ogyges.
But it will suffice, to upset all these fictions about the shift of the
axis of the globe, to put in opposition to them the opinion of Arago,
10
Fourrier, and La Place. Besides, a thorough examination of the terrain des-
ignated under the name "diluvriumIt proves in the most evident manner that,
far from being the result of a single violent, general and short-lived
inundation, there have been on the contrary deposits laid down during an
extremely long period of time, and that they are the result of a multitude
of local phenomena, generally slow but sometimes also sudden and transitory.
Actually, to speak only of the silty deposit of the caves, it has been ob-
served in certain local'ities that the s ilt alternated with very thick strata
of stalagmitic deposit, and that consequently a long time must have elapsed
in the formation of the entire deposit. One observes in other localities
that this same silt shows several quite distinct layers, and that sometimes
it is divided into laminae representing a number of small successive deposits.
I have said above, and I believe it necessary to recall again, that it
was not accurate to say that the characteristics of the flood terrain might
be everywhere the same. The cQlor, which is in general reddish, depends on
the composition of the different calcareous formations, all of which, under
the prolonged influence of atmospheric agents, made up a silt colored red
by the superoxidation of iron.  It is this silt that must have been trans-
ported by the waters of rivers, streams, and springs into the caves or crev-
ices where we still observe it today. What I have just said for the silt
can partly be applied to the pebbles which it contains.  Generally their
composition is local, that is to say that they have been transported from
adjacent mountains.
Almost always this silt and these pebbles must have been brought into
the caverns from top to bottom, through the vertical crevices and not through
the present openings to cuts in the horizontal plane,, which did not exist at
the time of the filling of the caverns.* (I think, however, contrary to the
generally credited opinion, that the streams which now flow in a generally
horizontal plane, i.e., in "tvalleys,," far from having filled up the caverns,
very often served only to clear them out.)  The surface relief must have
undergone considerable changes in several places, such that the rivers which
today flow in the valleys at that tim? might have had their courses on or
near the summits of the mountains.. These changes of relief must be attribu-
ted to the breaking down of soil, produced by internal agents, breaking down
which was followed no doubt by a lowering of sea-level.
After having proved thus that the bone caverns varied from one place to
another., and that they had been filled during a very long period and under
the influence of very varied circumstances, it remains for me to speak of
new questions which offer a large interest.
The most important is to know if the silty deposit of the bone caverns
includes pottery and human bones, and, in the affirmative, if these objects
are of the same date. In a word, the question is whether man has been con-
temporaneous with extinct animal species that are found buried in the caves,
animals which have been considered by all the naturalists as fossils, and if
consequently there are human fossil bones.
In the terrain considered as "diluvian't and in the silt of the caverns
there had been observed for a long time remains. of man's industry and some
11
fragments of human bones, but these objects had not caught anyone's attention
because it was supposed that the jumble was later, and accidental. The im-
portant men of science wanted it thus and their opinion had the value of a
thing already judged. Nevertheless the discovery of the caves of Aude,
Herault and Gard offered for observation a mass of human bone debris and re-
mains of antique pottery, buried in the same deposit with bones of hyenas,
lions, tigers, and deer, and a multitude of other animals belonging to extinct
species.  Attention was then fixed anew on these materials, and Messrs. de
Serres, Jules de Christol, and myself, after a close and conscientious examina-
tion, thought that all of the objects were of the same date, from which we drew
the conclusion that man had been contemporaneous with animal species disap-
peared today from the surface of the earth and considered as fossils by all
the naturalists.
Our observation was based principally on the equal amount of alteration
of the bones, and upon their manner of occurrence in the cave.  To these
proofs have been added others, such as the variety of species which could
not have been produced except through domestication; also, the discovery of
bones of extinct species, carrying the imprint of cutting implements presum-
ably man-made and so on.
The problem being thus resolved, the secondary question of the existence
of man In the fossil state was deduced, as it were, automatically, and became
almost a question of terminology., since it was evident that the contemporaries
of fossil animals would have to receive the same designation,*  (In a work
published two years ago, and which has received wide publicity, I applied my-
self to demonstrating that the generally accepted definition of the word
"fossil" (organic body buried in the successive strata of the earth) did not
suffice when one wished to apply it to organic bodies buried in the last
strata which were laid down on the surface of the earth, because it was impos-
sible to say where the successive strata were terminated. I must point out
again that the physical and chemical characters are hardly helpful in indi-
cating that an organic body is fossil, since the name is given to everything
which calls to mind the existence of an organized body. It is thus that one
considers- as fossils the molds, imprints, and the petrifactions of every
nature, in a word, the debris of all that has lived, or even everything that
recalls a positive existence. Mr. Deshayes has developed this idea well in
his work on the description of characteristics of land molluscs.) Also we
did not hesitate, with MNr  Jules de Christol, and despite the objections
which our observation must raise, we did not hesitate, I say, to proclaim,
and we support the idea even today, that man exists in the fossil state.,
Geologists do not confuse, I hope, our observation with the mystification of
the shapeless block of sandstone found at Fontainebleau, and other absurdities.
After what I said in the note above it stands well-established that the
situation of an organic body is the sole characteristic to refer to in order
to determine if a body i,s in reality fossil. But as the evidently successive
strata are confused and vary but slightly from those which are still being
deposited in our times, and as it is impossible to say where some begin and
others end, it is equally impossible to say where the organic fossil bodies
can be identified as such.
12
Several geologists, well aware of this difficulty, have admitted the
existence of "sub-fossils" or "tdemi-fossilsit; but the difficulty always
remains the same, notwithstanding their efforts.  Mr. de Serres has likewise
attempted to avroid this difficulty by calling the organic bodies buried
since the last retreat of the oceans "humatiles" (from humatus, buried body),
reserving that of fossils for all those burled during the preceding period.
But outside of the inconvenience of a new word given to these quasi-fossils,
to these fossils which are not fossils, this new designation offers the dis-
advantage of depending upon an event which is not yet well fixed in geologi-
cal chronology, and which, by its very etymology, can be applied to all the
buried, organic bodies in the successive strata of the earth.* (Moreover,
if we adopt only the sense which Mr. de Serres attaches to the word huma-
tiles, man would always exist in the fossil state, as it seems proved that
since: his existence the level of the oceans has risen from 100 to 150 feet
above Its present level, and that many caverns have been filled since that
epoth. This is what would explain the presence of certain marine shells in
the deposits of some caverns, and of some bony breccia. [See on this sub-
ject the excellent observations of Mr. Albert de Marmora.])   It is desirable
then to leave things so that general terms may be adopted, to agree that no
limitations be imposed, not tQ try to establish a division where it is yet
impossible to make one, and to agree frankly that since man is contemporane-
otus with animal species regarded by all the naturalists as fossils, the
existence of fossil man cannot be called in question.
The only division that should be adopted, and which has been, I believe,
already proposed, is the following:
Ancient Geolo    1 Period
This includes (1) the immense stretch of time which preceded the
appearance of man on the surface of the globe, during which an infinity of
generations have succeeded each other, and (2) the modern geological period
or "Age of Man." This period perhaps divided into:
Prehistoric Period                      Historic Period
'This started with the appearance       This hardly dates beyond seven
of9man on the surface of the globe,    thousand years ago, i.e., to the epoch
and extends to the beginning of the    of the construction of Thebes, during
most ancient traditions.  It is prob-  the nineteenth Egyptian Dynasty
able that during this period sea       (Josephus cites the kings of this
level rose to 150 feet above its       dynasty month by month and day by day.)
prsent level. Mr. Reboul is to pub-
lish-on this subject a very important       This period could be extended
work., which will remove doubts and    farther back, following new historic
will settle many irresolutions.        observation$.
This division offers, as one can see, the advantage of being based only
on positive observations and of setting aside the solution of the question
relative to the limitation of fossils, a question which as I have already
sdid, does not seem to be able to be solved in the present state of science.
13
Before finishing the discussion relative to fossil human bones, I should
state that Mr. Desnoyers thinks that these bones are quite recent, and that
they belonged to the first inhabitants of Gaul who established their abode in
the caves. This opinion, which seems probable for the cave of Fort near
Miallet, in which Mr. Tessler has observed figurines, fragments of jars,
bracelets and other antique objects, cannot by any means be applied to the
localities which we have described with the Messrs. Marcel de Serres and Jules
de Christol, and above all to the cavern visited and described with such care
by the la-tter.*  (It does not much matter, after what we have just said, that
the Aquitanians had retired into the caverns, and that Caesar had ordered
that they be shut up there.  Even the judgment of Florius in these affairs
does not matter. To want thus to generalize all these examples, and to say
that wheresoever one observes a melange of bones of human beings and extinct
animal species, this mixture has taken place at a later time, is to present a
conclusion of non-acceptance and to declare the problem a priori insoluble.
But yet again, and notwithstanding what I have just said I recognize that
the observations of the Messrs. Desnoyers and Tessier are true and offer
something of importance; only they do not seem to me amenable to general ap-
plication.)
I now come to another order of considerations which, although not rest-
ing on such positive data as the preceding, nevertheless offer a great inter-
est. I have already said that probably since the appearance of man on the
surface of the earth, sea level had risen about 150 feet above the present
level. The breccias of Cagliari, Nice, Gibraltar and Tripoli would be proof
of this, since they include marine shells. It would be the same with a
deposit of shell, including pottery, observed by Mr. de la Marmora at Cape
Saint Hospice, near Nice.  This same phenomenon is presented also in the
bony breccia of Dalmatia and of Syria, which include likewise human bones,
and, according to Count Rasoumovski, in the ossiferous gravels of Bades,
near Vienna.
Mr. Boue has called to our attention that these occurrences had been
noted in too many places to be able to fit the more or less ingenious explan-
ations by which one has human bones introduced in these deposits since
historic times..
Conceding then that these different observations are accurate; that the
sea-level has diminished by fits and starts; that this diminution has been
occasioned by shocks imparted to the soil and the sudden reelevation of great
mountain chains, and that the last retreat of the seas took place whilst man
already existed on the surface of the globe, we shall have a new proof that
all the bone caverns are not of the same epoch, that a great number were under
water during the Tertiary Period, and that certain of these whose level is
very little elevated, may well have been submerged during the prehistoric
period. According to tChis viewpoint, the caverns would have been filled only
in proportion to their immersion.
If it were permitted to set forth an opinion about the remains of our
species, of which I have spoken above, and which are found buried in the
caverns and bony breccias in several locations in Europe, I would have ranged
myself on the side of the naturalists who think that our regions could have
been successively inhabited by different races of men.*   (The form of the
14
heads found at Vienna approaches that of the African or Negro race. Those
found in the fluviatile mud on the banks of the Rhine and the Danube show
great resemblance to the heads of the Caribs or those of the ancient inhabi-
tants of Peru and Chile. I would be able thus to multiply examles, but
these that I have cited will, I think, suffice.)
It is true that, in attributing to our species such remote antiquity,
one has the right to be surprised at not finding even in man's urwritten
history the tradition of violent upheavals which the earth has undergone
and following which mountains were suddenly uplifted, rivers have changed
their courses, barriers which held back immense quantities of water have
been broken down, and the shore lines of the sea were extended. If history
remains silent on all of these events, or if we have only extremely vague
or fragmentary reminders of them, this is because traditions diminish as
sources of information in proportion as they are removed from their points
of origin. It is not, then, in examining the old chronicles or even in
studying the mysterious writings of the most ancient peoples that we shall
be able to hope to discover the early history of the human species. Geology
alone can reconstruct the time sequence; but this science is still brand
new--it offers an immense field of observation and promises the furnishing
of a supplement to our short records. It is necessary here more than else-
where to apply philosophic doubt, to adopt nothing lightly, nor to reject
anything except after severe and impartial examination.
I shall at-this point terminate these observations, already quite
lengthy, although I have tried to shorten them as much as possible. I
think it necessary to review in a few sentences the principal points of
this work, which is nothing, so to speak, but a summar-y of the present state
of our knowledge upon one of the newest and most curious questions of geol-
owr.
1. The bones buried in caverns have been introduced there in several
different ways.
2.  The buried species vary from one locality to another, and this
difference depends either on the time of filling or on the geo-
graphic situation of the cavern.
3. Man has been contemporaneous with extinct animal species which are
encountered buried in the alluvial deposits of caverns, animals
which are regarded by all the naturalists as fossils; man exists,
then, in the fossil state.
4. The silt and the pebbles which are found in the bone caverns have
not been introduced into these cavities by a sudden and shortlived
cause, but on the contrary have been introduced almost always
slowly and in several different ways.
5. The close examination of pebbles included in the silty deposit
proves that they obviously have been carried from neighboring local-
ities, and consequently that the agency which transported them was
entirely local.
6. The period during which the bone caverns have been filled has been
a long one.
7. In certain caverns, the silty deposit, the bones, and the pebbles
have been introduced simultaneously; in others, on the contrary, the
silt has been introduced later, and has thus moved in, as it were,
on the bones.
Table of Animal Species Found in the Caverns
of the South of France
Elephant
Rhinoceros
Wild Boar
Horse
Oxen, two species
Deer, five species
Antelope, of a very
large size
Chamois
Goat
Sheep
Bear, at least two
species
Lion
Leopard
Lynx
Fossil Hyena
Striped Hyena
(Christol)
Brown Hyena
(Christol)
Dog, two species
Wolf
Fox
Polecat (Christol)
Marten (Christol)
Hare
Rabbit
Lagomis
Field Mouse
Several species
of bird
Terrestrial tortoise
Lizard
Snake, of the size of
the Coluber
nutrix
Badger
Tiger
The sole difference which exists between the caverns of England and
Germany, compared with those of the south of France, is that in England is
found the hippopotamus, and at Sandwik in Westphalia, the glutton [Gulo gulo].
M. C. Provost likewise has just observed bones of the hippopotamus in
the caverns of Syracuse.
ENDNOTES
(1) Mr. Elsasser is Archaeologist, University of California Archaeological
Surrvey.  The translatorSt and editor'- notes will be indicated by number
and found. at the end of the paper. The author't notes are indicated by
asterisks (*) and are retained in the body of the paper (Ed.).
(2) For an exhaustive rev iew of this claim, see Dart, 1956 (Eds.).
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