Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1890-01-31


The recent discovery of tombs of the lake
jewellers has awakened a renewed interest
IN the people Of prehistoric Switzerland
Tourists will hardly be content any more
TO pass through Switzerland without visit
ing one or more Of the museums where the
collections made from the excavated lake
dwellings are exhibited
Perhaps the most extensive exhibition of
these relics is the one at the Helm House 90
ia Zurich. There one sees what are IN fact
the greatest antiquities Of the whole world
There are hundreds and thousands Of spec
linens Of stone, wood cloth weapons and
ornaments Of "a people whose towns were
old Thousand wears before gray old exca
waited POmpeii was ever thought Of
To Professor Ferdinand Keller before all
others the world is indebted for knowledge
OF what it probably was before the time of
history All the later years of his life were
devoted To- the investigation of the lake
dwellers' villages, and no man was so con.
peteut as he to reiuvenate those dead old
skulls and relics, lifting thousand years
from the forgotten past into the middle of
the nineteenth century.
Keller has translated the hierogyphics of
the dead ages lie has explained how the
antiquarians have divided all the prehistoric
past into the ages of stone, of bronze and
Of iron. how the lake dwellings of Switzer-
land were first discovered at Meien. on the
lake of Zurich, IN 1929 and more fully re
vealed III 1888 "a aud how the world at
large shut It's eyes. almost. to the great
contribution made to history He has told.
too, how the patient. hard working inves
tigators of whom he is chief, have uncov-
cred and dug out enough of these buried
towns 10 prove that our best families" do
not need to break of their ancestral line
with William the ConquerOr or with any
other William Those of US who think we
might bee proud of our far. off progenitors
may yet be gratilied to see some shreW
ankee following our line clear back to
OrgetoriN, the Youngest offspring of our
Celtic grandfathers of the lake dwelers.
II our American tourist will take a little
more time. Jump ON the cars and ride out
To Rohenhausen, on the lake Of Plafiikun.
he will there witness with his own ewes the
turf beds and the lake giving up tine secrets
Of the age OF stone ROnenhausen is a town
Of the stone age period 1t was perhaps
twelve hundred feet square, standing on a
platform built ON hundred thousand piles
driven into the bottom Of the shallpN lake.
about three hundred yards from the shore
Like all other swiss lake towns it was con
nected with the land 10y long bridge. also
built on piles OF course the visitor now
will see httic chopped of piles sticking IN
the peat, aud among them the debris Of the
villages that have gone to ruin Roben-
hansen had been partly burned down aud
built up again on the same site, but at M.
tervals of ages. probably. apart so that
the peat bed shows on being opened three
sets of piles, one above the other The only
Q o
lake dwellings Is 10y estimating the centuries
required for peat beds 10 form Rrckoued
"a this manner the age of the first town
built at the bottom of Robenhausru must bee
prOdigious
la these lake villages once lived "a people
as much civilized, possibly, as are the Mex
leans of today They titled the soil they
dwelt IN houses. they wove fine linen they
had articles of luxury and traded more or
less with other countries OF them there
are no written annals History stops stock
still with Switzerland only sixty year, far
Their back than the birth OF Christ The
nearest reference there Is III history to these
Swiss lake jewellers l. where Caesar tells
how quarter of Il million armed Helvetans
under Dlvico burned down their homes and
marched into Gaul Caesar himself. after
great battling, defeated them aud drove
them back into their own country There
Is now much reason h believe that these
Helvetaus were the last of the lake dwell
ers. 1t Is known that most of the lake
villages we're DESTROYED by fire. and 1t is
altogether probable that when Caesar com.
PEELED the people to return they established
new homes on the shore instead Of rebuild
ing their lake dwellings which they had
left IN search of a SUMMER CLINE and "a more
grateful soil than were found amid the
Alps Hdper'> H00d-Hs toi. Febitu,.u