The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1893-06-29
CANNIBAIS OF ANCIENT TIMES.
Vast Quantities OF Interesting Relics Found
In Caves of Southern Eurone.

Vast Quantities OF Int resting Relics Found
In Caves of Southern Europe.
The scientists holding the belief that
man Is very ancient animal on earth
have referred for evidence to numerous
caves in southern Europe and elsewhere,
which We're doubtless inhabited Icy
many generations of human beings for
the sake of shelter and security. These
caverns contain great numbers of hu-
man bones and primitive tools. which.
1t is alleged, have been found numerous
instances mixed with fragments of
skeletons of the huge cave bear, the
saber-toothed tiger. the woody rhinoc-
eros, the giant beaver and even the
elephas antiquus, which sTas the
ancestor of the mammoth and
the elephants OF to-day. The floor
ing of ashes from ancient house
hold fires in these cavcrns is
sometimes as much as twenty feet thick
representing the accommodations Of hun
dreds if not thousands of years. Scat
tered about the ancient hearths are
ever so many bones of men, women and
children, which bear not only traces of
fire but marks of implements employed
to split them lengthwise for. the pur-
pose of getting at the marrow. Thus
it would seem that these savages of an
tiquity were eannibals.
In these caves testimony is found of
many murders committed thousands of
years ago. Skulls of women cleft by
sharp weapons prove that they often
were victims of savage violence. One
such Uranium of a female bears the
marks of three penetrating wounds.
The fact that two of them exhibit
signs of having healed shows that she
recovered, only to succumb to a third
assault. The ancient occupants
of the caverns appear 10 have
depended for food chiefly on the meat
of reindeer, which in their time were
as plentiful in the south of Europe as
sheep are now. Reindeer horn was
their earliest raw material employed
for manufacturing purposes They
fiShed with hooks made of splinters of
bone pointed at both ends Twenty
pounds of the bones of vater-rats. half
roasted, where dug up in a single cave
at Chaleux, from which IL is inferred
that these animals co attributed 70 the
food supply in times of scarcity. 1t
has been alleged that the dwellcrs in
the caverns used the lower jawbonc of
the cave bear as a weapon, the great
canine teeth serving as a point with
which deadly blows could be struck.
Some of the caves were regular fac
tories for making tools and weapons.
From the one at Chaleux twenty-thou-
sand flint hatchets, daggers aod knives
have been obtained by digging. 4
workshop of this kind in Perigord was
devoted TO the making Of spearheads.
while another confined itself 10 fabri-
ca ting tools of reindeer horn. Curious
whistles were turned out from the first
Joint Of the RENDERS foot Many Of
the implements and weapons diseov-
cred were rudely decorated with repre- |
sensations Of fishes. of reindeer and |
even mann moths There were hunting
scenes carved in bone and horn. in
which men were shown IN pursuit OF
game or in conflict with beasts One |
carving IS a landscape, with reindeer |
browsing in admirable perspective. |
The British museum owns supposed |
paleolithie pOniard Of reindeer horn, |
with the handle carved in the form Of |
reindeer, which would not Dc M /
worthy of modern art--Boston Tran. |
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