Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1893-01-17
ANCIENT MURDERS
SCIENCE FERRETS OUT CRIMES CON-
MITTEO CENTURIES AGO.


Testify to Mans Brutality.
Murder will out" so it is said This
statement is not wholly true, inasmuch rs
slayers of men do in I. large proportion Of
instances escape unpublished and unde-
tected. But how strange it seems that the
science OF the present day, acting the de-
tective's part, should unearth positive evil
dence of murders committed on individuals
who died perhaps not less that 100000
years ago.
The caves of southern France, which
once were occupied as dwellings by prime
val man, yield proofs of scores Of murders
| in most remote antiquity. Those guilty
of these crimes were doubtless indifferent
to detection, inasmuch as in the early
stages of human development there was
no law save physical strength. In that
epoch men gave way to their brutal pas
sions unrestrained. Women must have
suffered then more than at any subsequent
period, owing to their muscular inferiority
That this is true is proved by evidence
which has survived hundreds of centuries,
for in the very caves referred to are dis
covered the remains Of many murdered
| women, testifyipg to the fact.
| found woman's skull with a cut in the
forehead three inches long, evidently made
by flint hatchet. The weapon penetrated
| the frontal bone and caused death, but the
victim did not die Immediately from the
wound. She fingered for some weeks. at
all events as is shown by the fact that par
tial healing took place. In a cave at
| sSordes, among many human bones bearing
scars, was dug up the skull OF a woman
with a gaping hole in it. She must have
| been instantly killed. \ similar skull of
| a woman was found IN cave at ChaIles,
| in Savoy, with q fracture that was unques-
| tionably made by a flint instrument OF
nineteen skulls obtained from a primeval
| sepulcher at Naureal, two show traces Of
wounds inflicted by human hands. One,
that of a woman, has three fractures I'm
| questionably they were not all inflicted at
| the same time, inasmuch rs two of them
| exhibit signs of healing. The unfortunate
| recovered from these, only TO succumb 10
| a third blow.
| Enthusiastically these women were muir
| dered. But II their sex it might be sup
posed that'they persisted in fight, as did SO
| many of the men who lived in those times.
| The struggle for existence among human
| beings then must have been fierce and
animals provided with artificial weapons
and cunning of q superior order. Doubt
! less their contentious We're most frequently
| for the possession of the females of their
| kind, who were the prize of battle and the
| property of the strongest. One primeval
| sepulcher was found to contain the skele-
| tons OF thirty men, all of them strongly
| made, piled closely. Together with the
| bones We're seventy-three flint arrowheads
| and spearheads, which presumably were
| sticking in The bodies when they were in
| tered. These must have been warriors
who persisted in some battle. Another
| cave ut Gourvan has yielded a number of
| crania and jaws, which were broken by
blunt weapons. Hundreds of other skele-
/ tons of the cave jewellers of ANTIQUITY have
| been unearthed in a similar condition, the
| bones in many cases being transfXed by
weapons of flint. In one instance skull
| contained three arrowheads, a fourth ar
| row being lodged between the vertebrae.
! In fact these caves are filled with evil
dence OF homicidal struggles among the
| distant ancestors Of the human beings of
| today. From the same sources proofs are
| supplied that can2ibalism prevailed in
| that distant epoch. Scattered about the
| ancient hearths where meals were cooked
| uncountcd thousands of years ago, are ever
so many bones Of men, women and chill
dren, bearing not only traces of fire, but
| the marks of instruments employed TO split
them lengthwise for the purpose of getting
| at the marrow. Particularly in winter
primeval man was obliged to RELY mainly
| on flesh for food. Never having conceived
| the notion Of demonstrating the horse, he
utilized that animal to a large extent as
an article of diet. Reindeer, which were
then very plentiful in southern Europe,
were likewise a favorte prey The re-
mains of 5000 reindeer have been discov-
| cred in single cave. At Solutrc, on "a
hillside, the bones Of not fewer than 10000
| horses form accommodations which are
| known to this day as the horse walls. "
| Many of these equine bones show traces OF
| burning.
Even at that time man considered him
| self monarch of creation, not Eesitatinc to
encounter contemporary wild beasts far
! more formidable than any which exist now.
| Great cats twice the size OF modern Bengal
tigers and proporticnately ferocious were
numerous. MamGoths, rhinoceroses and
| hirpopotaini roamed abroad More terri
bic perhaps than any Of these was the great
| cave bear, double the SIZE Cf the grizzly.
| With these bears. rs well as with TIE
| mighty tigers and fierce hyeDaS, the people
of that carly period were compelled to dis
pute possession of the caves That they
did so successfully there is no doubt, as is
proved by the thousands of gnawed bones
of bears and giant cats discovered in the
caves. Mingled with the same sort of
kitchen refuse are numerous shells of mol
lusks and bones Of carp, trout, chub tench
and other fishes of species which now pop
ulate the rivers and lakes OF the same re-
glon. Fishhooks were made from bears
teeth, boars' tusks and Washington
Star.
| Natural Icehouse.
In Washington coulee is ravine that
a river has worn for itself and then aban-
doned for another course. The coulees of
the Columbia river are immense ravines